Ulrich Von Hassell - World War I

World War I

In the First World War, Hassell was wounded in the chest in the First Battle of the Marne on 8 September 1914. Later in the war, he worked as Alfred von Tirpitz's advisor and private secretary. He also later wrote his father-in-law's biography.

After the war ended in 1918, Hassell joined the German National People's Party (Deutschnationale Volkspartei or DNVP). In the years that followed, he returned to the Foreign Office and worked until the early 1930s in Rome, Barcelona, Copenhagen, and Belgrade. In 1932, Hassell was made Germany's ambassador to the Kingdom of Italy.

In 1933, Hassell joined the Nazi Party. He was very much against the Anti-Comintern Pact concluded by Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, and the Empire of Japan in 1937, and favoured instead Western-Christian unity in Europe (he was, in fact, a member of the Order of Saint John, a German Protestant noblemen's association, to which he had been admitted as a Knight of Honor in 1925 and in which he had been promoted to Knight of Justice in 1933). In 1938, as a result of the Blomberg-Fritsch Affair, Hassell was recalled from his posting as ambassador in Rome by Adolf Hitler, without, however, being cast out of the diplomatic service. Then, soon after the German attack on Poland on 1 September 1939, Hassell led a delegation to allay north European governments' fears of a forthcoming German strike on their countries.