Rayneval, Alphonse, Count of

RAYNEVAL, Alphonse, Count of. - Diplomat,
b. in Paris on 1 Aug. 1813, d. there on 10 Feb. 1858.

(from the Panthéon des illustrations françaises
du XIXe siècle published under the direction
of Victor Frond, Cierpi, Paris 1.0.)
RAVIGNAN, GUSTAVE-XAVIER DELACROIX de - Portrait. Lithograph from a drawing from life.

Sent to represent the French Second Republic at the Court of Naples, in 1848 he worked to encourage the clandestine emigration of numerous liberals compromised in the political events of that year.

Having then moved to Gaeta, to follow there the meetings of Pius IX and the Grand Duke of Tuscany with the King of Naples and his ministers, in 1849 he was accredited to the person of the Pontiff, an exile in the Bourbon fortress. R. succeeded in making himself so agreeable to Pope Mastai that the latter requested from the government of Paris his appointment as ambassador of France to the Holy See as soon as he was able to return to Rome. R. held the post until 1857, when he was abruptly transferred to St. Petersburg because of the unexpected publication in the Daily News, of 18 March of that year, of a secret report that he had sent to his government on 14 May 1856 and which had come to the knowledge of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Turin. In that report the extensive and valuable administrative and structural reforms of the State carried out by Pius IX after his return from Gaeta were set forth and praised. Cavour, who had obtained the publication of R.'s writing in the British periodical, in order to place the French government in evident difficulty and to strike a dangerous adversary, therefore had it polemically commented upon by Minghetti in the pamphlet Observations sur la note de M. de R. par un subjet du Pope.

Recalled to Paris to provide explanations to the Ministry, R. died there suddenly before reaching his new destination.

Renzo U. Montini