PONZA DI SAN MARTINO, GUSTAVO. - Statesman, b. at Cuneo on 6 Jan. 1810, d. at Dronero on 6 Sept. 1876.

Having entered the administrative career at a young age, before he was forty he was already a senior official of the Ministry of the Interior, and in 1849 he discharged with great tact and energy the duties of intendant (prefect) of Genoa in a time of turmoil. A deputy and later a senator, he was Minister of the Interior, Sardinian commissioner at Massa in 1859 and two years later lieutenant-general at Naples.

The most important event in P.'s life was the mission entrusted to him by Victor Emmanuel II in Sept. 1870 to Pius IX to persuade the Pontiff not to oppose the royal occupation of Rome. Bearer of the letter addressed to the Pope, he, as is well known, did not succeed in his aim of turning the Pontiff aside from the at least formal defense of his legitimate rights, and a few days later came the episode of the breach of Porta Pia, that is, the use of force, which only apparently seemed to resolve the Roman question.

In the last five years of his life, P. withdrew from active politics, devoting himself to philanthropic institutions, whose presidency he energetically held in his native Piedmont. Sebastiano Tecchio commemorated him eloquently at the session of 27 Dec. 1876 of the Senate.

Bibliography2 works

BIBL.: obituary in Unità Cattolica, 10 Sept. 1876; A. Colombo, Lettere ined. di Vittorio Emm. II., in Rass. st. del Risorgimento, 2 (1934), pp. 281-92.

Renzo U. Montini

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Ponza di San Martino, Gustavo

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