Ambassador to Italy
General Draper’s account of his years as Ambassador to Italy covers about sixty pages in his autobiography. Below are a couple of lines about his appointment in 1897, followed by several paragraphs from the first few months of 1898.
He (President William McKinley) said that after thinking over the Cuban matter, he had decided to make other arrangements but that he had decided to send in my name for ambassador to Italy within a few days.
April 1st my name was sent to the Senate, April 4th I was unanimously confirmed, and my commission was dated April 5, 1897. William F. Draper, Recollections of a Varied Career, p. 273
The first court ball took place January 31st (1898). It was of course, a most brilliant function, but one of its features I dreaded exceedingly, namely la quadrille d’honneur, – danced by the Queen, members of the royal families, distinguished members of the noblesse, and members of the diplomatic corps. There were, as I remember, ten couples who danced in a reserved space, while two thousand guests, more or less, – the men largely in uniform and wearing orders, and the ladies magnificent in evening dress and jewels, – looked on and admired or criticized. I had not danced for a quarter of a century and was afraid I should make some mistake in the figure; but I was on the side, with la Marquise di Rudini as a partner, and went through, not only without a break, but without the feeling of mauvaise honte (shame or bashfulness according to Webster online) that I had anticipated. Mrs. Draper danced opposite Queen Margherita and conducted herself as though she had occupied such a position every night of her life.
The next day, however, she was ill, on account of our long-continued dissipation; and the 2nd of February we received a telegram announcing her mother, Mrs. Preston’s death, which put an end to the season’s festivities, as far as we were concerned. Mrs. Preston had been ill for several months and the end was not unexpected, but the pain of parting was none the less. Mrs. Draper did not recover easily from the shock, and the doctor insisted on a brief change of air and scene. I could not leave at once, but we did get away for ten days about the 1st of March, making a brief visit to Nice.
While at Nice, I was asked to meet Mr. Pierpont Morgan, the great financier, and we had a conversation of some hours, regarding the prospect of a war with Spain, (the news of the destruction of the Maine had reached us), and subjects collateral thereto. I was also entertained by General Carette, former commandant of the Papal Guard, and now prominent in the Legitimist party in France. He married an American lady, a friend of Mrs. Draper’s, – Miss Antoinette Polk, of Tennessee.
On our return from Nice we had telegraphic news of another bereavement, – Mrs. John Mason Brown, Mrs. Draper’s oldest sister, having died suddenly. Her health had been poor for some years, but we had no idea that the end was near. She was a talented woman and a leader of society in Louisville. Her husband, John Mason Brown, was colonel in the Union army, and a distinguished lawyer who had been prominently mentioned for the United States Supreme Court.
The mourning for Mrs. Preston and Mrs. Brown of course removed Mrs. Draper from general society, but I was compelled to entertain prominent American visitors, – among them Mr. Morgan, before mentioned, Mr. Cornelius Vanderbilt, Mr. Marshall Field, and Mr. William Waldorf Astor, who had formerly been minister to Italy.
From the middle of March to the commencement of hostilities with Spain, April 18th, and in fact, for a month or two thereafter, I was really busy. Questions of neutrality and the position of the Italian Government had to be discussed, and cipher dispatches came and were sent by me daily, – sometimes several times a day. Owing to the difference in time, these dispatches reached me often at night. They needed to be read, and sometimes replied to, immediately, and as considerable time was required to translate those received and put those sent into cipher, my nights were pretty thoroughly broken up. It was very interesting though, and I did not regret the experience.
The subjects of these dispatches and the detail of negotiation are outside of what I am at liberty to record; but it is safe to say that the attitude of the Italian government left us nothing to complain of, – their ground being that of the strictest neutrality. William F. Draper, Recollections of a Varied Career, pp. 300 – 303.
As was the case with last time’s story by Adin Ballou, there’s really no good stopping point without going to the end of the book. If you’d like to read more, you can see the book online at Google Books.