Early Life
After the death of her mother, Mary Ann Vaughn was placed under the guardianship of Professor John Wilson, with nanny Fumi Kaneko (later Fumi Yamaguchi) in custodial care. Due to the privations of the postwar period, John Wilson sailed to Sweden with his wife and children in 1952. Mary Ann was to accompany them, but due to an outbreak of whooping cough, she was to sail on the next ship. However, Yamaguchi absconded with Mary Ann, and Yamaguchi destroyed the child's records, raising her under claim of an abandoned American orphan in the slums of Yokohama.
John Wilson continued to search for Mary Ann, and with the intervention of the AJCAJAO (American Joint Committee for Assisting Japanese-American Orphans), the Red Cross of Sweden and the International Red Cross, found and identified her in Yokohama in 1955. The AJCAJAO identified her residency with Masakatsu Yamaguchi and wife in Yokohama. The Consul of the Royal Swedish Legation attempted to negotiate a custody settlement with the Yamaguchi family, but was unsuccessful. The Crown then brought suit on behalf of Wilson for custody.
According to Fumi Kaneko (reading from her interview in Asahi Shinbun and Shukan Shincho), the baby was entrusted to her by Vivian at her death bed. There was no mention of a search for the baby; instead Fumi Kaneko said she was the one who approached Swedish Embassy to recognize Mary Ann before she entered into grade school.
Read more about this topic: Sweden V. Yamaguchi
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