A count dedicated to the Revolution

Descended on his mother's side from the Gonzaga princes, he was born in Venice on 16 May 1796. A robust and attractive figure, he led a pleasant and somewhat libertine life in the Serenissima until Napoleon replaced the banner of St Mark's with that of the French Revolution.

He became a fervent activist in the Risorgimento uprisings and was banned with the confiscation of all his possessions by the Austrian police who were looking for him to arrest him. To save himself, he fled Venice and went to Milan where he fought valiantly during the fateful Five Days.

Hunted down by Radetski's police, after an adventurous journey, hiding in a barrel, he reached the Capuchin convent of Voltri where the Guardian, Father De Canis, from Sanremo, welcomed him, protected him and, to save his life, offered him to move to Sanremo to the family of his brother Maurizio De Canis. The latter, having received a sum of money from the Count, built a house next to the Cenobio di San Michele on the heights of Sanremo, in a secluded place.

In November 1855, the people of Sanremo saw this mysterious gentleman disembark, tall, thin, decently dressed, with a military bearing, who, without exchanging words with anyone, headed towards the old town to reach the Hermitage of San Michele, from where he would never come down again. Nothing is known of what he did from then until his death other than charitable and philanthropic works towards his neighbours.

But his secluded and mysterious attitude fuelled many rumours among the people of Sanremo... It came to be thought that the gentleman in question, instead of the Count, was none other than King Carlo Alberto, who instead of having died on 28th July 1849 in Oporto, was said to have remained in Italy, incognito, to follow the events that were taking place and to have chosen his own refuge in Sanremo and that, still incognito and during the night, he was periodically reached by an unknown visitor who was none other than his son Vittorio Emanuele II.

In reality, Count Toffetti, who was very active in the revolutionary movements of 1848, was at the side of the Magnanimous King and also became his great friend during the defeat at Custoza.
Count Toffetti's adventurous and somewhat legendary life came to an end in the hermitage of San Michele, leaving some mysteries unresolved: the presence of a daughter, whom he never wanted to meet, from one of his great youthful loves and the inheritance of his property...

Count Michele Vincenzo Toffetti died in Sanremo on 22nd October 1866 and was buried in the Foce cemetery.

(source Marco Mauro on bibliography by Giuseppe Ferrari)