Career
From 1908 to 1911, Mirbach served as the embassy clerk in Saint St. Petersburg, and then as political councillor for the German military command in Bucharest. In 1915 he became the German ambassador in Greece, before being expelled from Athens in December 1916 when the Entente-leaning government of Eleftherios Venizelos took power. He participated in the Russian-German negotiations in Brest-Litovsk from December 1917 to March 1918.
He was appointed German ambassador to Russia in April 1918.
Blumkin entered Mirbach"s residence in Moscow using forged papers and shot his victim at point blank range. Mirbach was succeeded as German ambassador to Russia by Karl Helfferich.
Coincidentally, a later relative, Andreas von Mirbach, would be murdered by the Red Army Faction at the West German Embassy siege in Stockholm in 1975.