Even before the First World War, France could not tolerate a possible U-boat base so close to Toulon, and preferred a descent from Albert's son Prince Louis, who had had a career in the French army for many years.
Louis therefore adopted his natural daughter, Charlotte, to ensure a pro-French succession, and Monaco signed a concessive treaty with France in July 1918.
[4] He then exhibited in 1930-32 at the Leicester and Redfern galleries in London, Galerie Bonaparte in Paris and at Blomquist in Oslo, but could not make a living from painting with the start of the Great Depression, and took up freelance photography.
In April 1934 he was living in Venice, renting a flat from Alma Mahler,[6] and by chance photographed the first unpublicized meeting of Mussolini and Hitler, which was followed by a public rally in the Piazza San Marco.
[7] Albrecht turned this scoop into a permanent position as a journalist based in Tokyo from September 1934, covering the Chinese-Japanese war and also the Nomonhan incident for several German newspapers.
[9] By chance the German military attaché and then ambassador in Tokyo, Eugen Ott, had served under his father in 1914–18, and their regular drinking friend was Richard Sorge, the famous Red Army spy.
[10][11] In early 1939 he returned to Europe and was posted to Rome as the Foreign Office liaison between the German and Italian Press, and made friends with Count Ciano.
Ciano's diary of 10 March 1942 mentions German pessimism about the war in Russia, and that Prince "Alberto von Urago" had visited Rome, making "bitter-sweet" comments about Japan, and hinting at the need for an Axis peace with Britain.
Anxious to leave Germany, which was now facing defeat, in early 1944 he succeeded in being appointed press attaché at the German Embassy in Bern, with the rank of Unterkonsul.
In 1946–1948 von Urach was charged by a German court for creating and broadcasting propaganda in the National-Socialist style, and for membership of the Nazi party (see Denazification).