Alfons Mumm von Schwarzenstein

Philipp Alfons Freiherr Mumm von Schwarzenstein (19 March 1859 – 10 July 1924) (also known as Alfons von Mumm) was a diplomat of the German Empire. He succeeded the murdered Baron Clemens von Ketteler as ambassador in Beijing in 1900.

Mumm studied law at Göttingen University and entered the diplomatic service afterwards. He served in London (1885), Washington D.C. (1888), Bucharest (1892–93), Rome (1893–94), Luxembourg (1898) and again in Washington (1899). During his years in China, he dealt with the Boxer Rebellion and signed The Boxer Protocol on September 7, 1901, on behalf of Germany, maintained an extraordinarily good relation with Empress Dowager Cixi, but also he took many pictures of China in the 1900s as an amateur photographer. From 1909-11, he was ambassador of the German Reich in Japan. He retired in 1911, but was reactivated 1914 in Berlin.

In March through November 1918, he represented the German Reich in Kiev.[1][2]

In 1911 he bought and restored a medieval castle in the small village of Portofino, Italy, where he eventually retired in 1920 with his wife Jeannie von Mumm.[3] Jeannie is now considered "the saviour" of Portofino because she persuaded Lieutenant Ernst Reimers not to ignite the charges the Germans planned to detonate during their retreat from the village.[4]

Works

• Ein Tagebuch in Bildern (1902), private print scanned by Tōyō Bunko exlibris George Ernest Morrison
• Kriegslyrik (1914–18) in several volumes printed privately
• Mein ligurisches Heim (in Portofino). Mit Freunden für Freunde zusammengestellt und nach eigenen Aufnahmen illustrirt. (private print). Berlin 1915.

Further reading

• Franz Lerner (1997), "Mumm (Familie), S. 581: Alfons Mumm von Schwarzenstein", Neue Deutsche Biographie (NDB) (in German), 18, Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, pp. 580–582; (full text online)
• Régine Thirez: Barbarian Lens: Western Photographers of the Qianlong Emperor's. 1998. ISBN 90-5700-519-0

References

1. All-Ukrainian Union of Zemstvos at the Encyclopedia of Ukraine
2. Kulynych, I.M., Kryvets, N.V. Mumm von Schwartzenstein (МУММ ФОН ШВАРЦЕНШТАЙН). Encyclopedia of History of Ukraine. "Naukova Dumka". Kiev, 2010
3. https://www.scotsman.com/lifestyle-2-15039/the-glaswegian-who-saved-an-italian-village-from-the-nazis-1-4263693
4. Peter Hahn (ed.), Alfons & Jeannie von Mumm: Cosmopolitans and Honorary Citizens of Portofino, catalogue of exhibition, Portofino, 2013