Witte continued in Russian politics as a member of the State Council but he was never again appointed to an administrative role in the government.
He was ostracized by the Russian establishment.
In January 1907 a bomb was found planted in his home.
The investigator Pavel Alexandrovich Alexandrov proved that the Okhrana, the tsarist secret police, had been involved.
During the winter season, Witte lived in Biarritz and started writing his Memoirs, but he returned to St Petersburg in 1908.

During the July Crisis in 1914, Grigori Rasputin and Witte desperately urged the Tsar to avoid the conflict and warned that Europe faced calamity if Russia became involved.
The advice went unheeded; the French ambassador Maurice Paléologue complained to the Minister of Foreign Affairs Sazonov.
Witte died shortly afterwards at his home in St. Petersburg; his death was attributed to meningitis or a brain tumor.
His third-class funeral was held at the Alexander Nevsky Lavra.
Witte had no children, but he had adopted his wife's by her first marriage.
According to Edvard Radzinsky, Witte asked for the title of count to be given to his grandson L.K. Naryshkin (b. 1905, see image above).
Nothing is known about his life after this period.

Witte's reputation was burnished in the West after his secret memoirs were published in translation in 1921.
They had been completed in 1912 and kept in a bank in Bayonne, France.
He had left orders that they could not be published during the lifetimes of him and his contemporaries.
The original manuscript of his memoirs are now held in Columbia University Library's Bakhmeteff Archive of Russian and East European History and Culture.
Witte continued in Russian politics as a member of the State Council but he was never again appointed to an administrative role in the government. He was ostracized by the Russian establishment. In January 1907 a bomb was found planted in his home. The investigator Pavel Alexandrovich Alexandrov proved that the Okhrana, the tsarist secret police, had been involved. During the winter season, Witte lived in Biarritz and started writing his Memoirs, but he returned to St Petersburg in 1908.
During the July Crisis in 1914, Grigori Rasputin and Witte desperately urged the Tsar to avoid the conflict and warned that Europe faced calamity if Russia became involved. The advice went unheeded; the French ambassador Maurice Paléologue complained to the Minister of Foreign Affairs Sazonov. Witte died shortly afterwards at his home in St. Petersburg; his death was attributed to meningitis or a brain tumor. His third-class funeral was held at the Alexander Nevsky Lavra. Witte had no children, but he had adopted his wife's by her first marriage. According to Edvard Radzinsky, Witte asked for the title of count to be given to his grandson L.K. Naryshkin (b. 1905, see image above). Nothing is known about his life after this period.
Witte's reputation was burnished in the West after his secret memoirs were published in translation in 1921. They had been completed in 1912 and kept in a bank in Bayonne, France. He had left orders that they could not be published during the lifetimes of him and his contemporaries. The original manuscript of his memoirs are now held in Columbia University Library's Bakhmeteff Archive of Russian and East European History and Culture.
Sergei Witte