ARNIM, HARRY KARL KURT EDUARD, CONTE DI

ARNIM, HARRY KARL KURT EDUARD, Count of. – Prussian diplomat, b. at Moitzelfitz (Pomerania) on 3 Oct. 1824, d. at Nice on 19 May 1881. From 1853 to 1855 he served as secretary of legation in Rome, then until 1858 at the Prussian ministry of foreign affairs. Promoted in 1859 to first counsellor at the Prussian embassy in Vienna, after two years in the Austrian capital he was appointed to represent the Berlin court in Lisbon, whence he moved in 1864 to Munich. In October of the same year he was accredited as Prussian representative in Rome, and during the Italo-Prussian alliance of 1866 he succeeded with great skill in avoiding political complications that might have been raised by the Holy See. In 1868 Arnim was reconfirmed as minister in Rome representing the North German Confederation. In 1870, during the proceedings of the XX Ecumenical Council, he carried on feverish activity, though uncertain whether to advise his government to recall him from Rome after the proclamation of papal infallibility. In any case Arnim remained, behaving ambiguously during the Italian occupation of Rome. While in Roman circles rumours spread that Prussia, at Arnim’s suggestion, would intervene in Florence on behalf of the Holy See, on the morning of 19 Sept. Arnim had in fact gone to General Cadorna, even attempting to persuade the Pope to yield without resistance. Appointed ambassador to Paris in January 1872, he soon came into serious disagreement with Bismarck, which led in 1874 to his retirement. The personal rivalry between the two men grew ever sharper, until Bismarck, taking as pretext the disappearance of some diplomatic documents from the Paris embassy archives, had Arnim brought to trial. Exiled first to Switzerland and Italy, Arnim died at Nice.