Princess Mikasa, the oldest member of Japan’s imperial family and the emperor’s great-aunt, died in a Tokyo hospital on Friday at the age of 101, the Imperial Household Agency said.
She had been hospitalized since March after suffering a stroke and pneumonia and was recovering after treatment in intensive care.
Born Yuriko Takagi into an aristocratic family on June 4, 1923, the princess was 18 when she married the younger brother of wartime Emperor Hirohito.
The couple had five children – two girls and three boys. She gave birth to her first daughter in 1944, during World War II.
According to Japan’s Asahi Shimbun daily, the royal couple’s home burned down in an airstrike and they were forced to live in a shelter with their child.
Hirohito – who served as Japan’s commander-in-chief during its brutal march across Asia in the 1930s and 40s – in an August 1945 speech after the United States dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki I surrendered.
Princess Mikasa’s husband Prince Mikasa, who died in 2016 at the age of 100, was in favor of the decision to end the war.
But young officers who disagreed regularly came to the shelter to try to change their minds.
The Asahi Shimbun stated that Princess Mikasa recalled that the atmosphere was “very frightening with heated debate and tension”, as if shots were about to be fired.
After losing her home, her following decades were far from luxuries for the princess, as the family struggled financially, so she took on household responsibilities.
“When I was raising my children, Japanese society was still in a difficult period,” she said in a statement released by the Imperial Household Agency on her 100th birthday.
The princess added, “I remember with deep gratitude how many people, including my husband, always supported me.”
Princess Misaka’s three sons predeceased her, one of whom died at the age of 47 while playing squash at the Canadian Embassy.
Male-only succession rules mean Japan’s imperial women cannot ascend the throne and must give up their imperial status if they marry outside the family.
Princess Misaka has three granddaughters who remain princesses, including Akiko, whose 2015 book was a hit in Japan, describing her studies at Oxford and an incident in which she was detained at an airport because of her diplomatic passport. But doubt had arisen.
After the death of the 101-year-old woman, since the beginning of November, there were reports that her condition had started deteriorating.
Prince Hisahito, the 18-year-old nephew of current Emperor Naruhito, is the only young heir to the throne. Naruhito’s daughter, Princess Aiko, is barred from the throne under the Imperial Household Law in force since 1947.
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