Giuseppe Montanelli

Russian revolutionary democrats 1813–1862 ○ Natural causes

Democratic law professor who became Tuscany's prime minister in 1848 and one of the triumvirs of the Tuscan Republic in 1849

Born in 1813 at Fucecchio in the Grand Duchy of Tuscany, he became professor of law at Pisa in 1840 and in 1847 founded the newspaper L'Italia, whose programme was "Reform and Nationality". A federalist and Neo-Guelph at first, he moved towards republican and vaguely utopian socialist views. In 1848 he served with the Tuscan student volunteers at Curtatone, where he was wounded and taken prisoner by the Austrians. Once freed, he was sent by Grand Duke Leopold II to quell the disturbances at Livorno, and in October was asked to form a ministry. In January 1849 he induced the grand duke to call a national constituent assembly, and when Leopold fled Florence he was elected one of the triumvirs of Tuscany with Guerrazzi and Mazzoni, advocating union with Rome. Condemned in absentia after the restoration, he stayed in France; after unification he entered parliament, and he died in 1862.