My Grandfather Prince Chun

   

 I was born in Peking in the mansion of Prince Chun on February 7, 1906. My grandfather Yi Huan, the seventh son of Emperor Tao Kuang (reigned 1821-50), was the first Prince Chun. Although my father was only his fifth son the inherited the title as the eldest, third and fourth sons died in childhood and the second son was taken into the palace to become the emperor Kuang Hsu (reigned 1875-1908), I was the eldest son of the second Prince Chun. I was nearly three when on November 13 1908 the empress dowager Tzu Hsi suddenly decided to make me the heir to the throne as she and ht emperor Kuang Hsu lay seriously ill.  I became the adopted son of Emperor Tung Chih (reigned 1862-740 and the ritual heir of his cousin Kuang Hsu. Within two days of my entering the palace both Kuang Hsu and the Empress Dowager were dead, On December 2, I ascended the imperial throne as the tenth ruler of the Cing Dynasty and last emperor of China. Before three years were out the 1911 Revolution against the Ching Dynasty broke out and I abdicated.

   My earliest memories are of the time of my abdication, but to make things clearer it would be best to start with my grandfather and my family. 

  In that blackest of eras, the late Ching Dynasty, the family of Prince Chun were for half a century the faithful servants of the empress dowager Tzu Hsi, and my grandfather in paricular devoted his life to her service. 

     My grandfather was born in 1842 and died in 1890, Looking through the records of the imperial family one can see that he received few honours during the eleven-year reign of his brother, Emperor Hsien Feng 9reigned 1851-61), but that in the six months or so after Hsien Feng's death, when Tzu Hsi had just been made Empress Dowager, he was suddenly loaded with titles and positions.