HRH Princess Märtha of Sweden, Crown Princess of Norway (March 28, 1901 in Stockholm – April 5, 1954 in Oslo), was the first crown princess of Norway in modern times who was not also Crown Princess of Sweden or Denmark. She was also Princess of Norway from her birth in 1901 to the dissolution of the personal union between Sweden and Norway in 1905.

     Märtha was the daughter of HRH Prince Carl of Sweden and HRH Princess Ingeborg of Denmark, Princess of Sweden. After a secret and then public engagement, she married her cousin HRH Crown Prince Olav of Norway (later King Olav V) on March 21, 1929, and so became HRH The Crown Princess of Norway. Theirs was the first royal wedding in Norway in 340 years.

 When German troops invaded Norway in 1940, she and her three children fled to her native Sweden where she was not well received. Some felt she had put Sweden's neutrality at jeopardy and some even suggested she should take her three year old son Harald back to Norway so he could be proclaimed King by the Germans. This was never an option for Märtha and after an invitation by President Roosevelt she left for the United States. In the US she and the children at first lived in the White House at the insistence of the Roosevelts, who felt a friendship with the family..

     When she arrived back in Norway after the war she received a hero's welcome and was referred to as a "mother of the nation".

     She and her husband had three children: HM Harald, Ragnhild and Astrid. After several illnesses and poor health, she died in 1954 from the effects of cancer, three years before her husband became king. (Bio taken from Wikipedia).

     The statue is free and open to the public, but is located on private property, so take photos from the street.  The house is the Royal Residence . . . and the street is difficult because you cannot park on Massachusetts Avenue in this section.  You'll have to park down 34th street, which is usually for the other residents and you'll have to walk.  If you will be walking to other embassies, the distance from one to another is further than the ones near Dupont circle etc.  You should bring water and good walking shoes as well as a nice camera as the architecture is beautiful on some of the buildings and you never know WHO you might meet!  Parking in this section would be free, but is not really for tourists, so keep a low profile.