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Empress Sunjeong in 1909. aged 15
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Empress Sunjeong was born Lady Yun of Haepyeong in Seoul on August 20th 1894. Her father was Marquis Yun Taek-yeong, the Lord of Haepung.
Yun Bo-seon, 2nd president of the Republic of Korea, was her ninth cousin three times removed.
She married Crown Prince Cheok after his first wife (known posthumously as Empress Sunmyeong) died.
On 20 July 1907, at the age of 13, she became Empress of Korea when her husband ascended the throne as the Emperor Sunjong following the forced abdication of his father, Emperor Gwangmu.
It is said that it was she who put up a last bit of resistance when the Japanese moved to finally annex Korea in 1910. She is supposed to have hidden the great seal of state needed to legitimize the Annexation Treaty the Japanese forced on Korea. This enabled her husband, the Emperor, to say he didn't know where the seal was and therefore could not affix it to the documents the Japanese presented to him. However, her uncle, the Grand Chamberlain of the Royal Court eventually got his hands on the seal and passed it to the Japanese who affixed it to their documents and thereafter claimed their annexation of Korea was perfectly legal under international law. The Empress would have been 16 at that time.
The Empress was demoted by the Japanese government in the Japan-Korea Annexation Treaty and thereafter known as Her Majesty Queen Yi of Korea (but only among the Japanese since that title was ignored in Korea).
Empress Sunjeong became a widow 24 April 1926, when Emperor died without issue at the Changdeok Palace in Seoul. The Emperor had been rendered infertile (and was also said to be mentally disabled) by poisoning attributed to the Japanese.
