Irmingard was born at her father's residence, Schloss
Berchtesgaden. She spent her childhood between Berchtesgaden and the family's other residences, the Leuchtenberg Palais in
Munich, Schloss Leutstetten, and
Schloss Hohenschwangau. In 1936 she was sent to England for education at the Convent of the Sacred Heart in
Roehampton (later
Woldingham School), where several of her Luxembourg cousins were also enrolled. In early 1940 Irmingard and her siblings were allowed to travel to Italy to join their father, who had left Germany to avoid conflict with the Nazi authorities. She spent much of the remainder of the war in Rome,
Florence, and
Padua. In September 1944 Irmingard was arrested by the Nazis, who had been unable to locate her father. She fell ill with typhus and was taken to a prison hospital in
Innsbruck. After recovering, she was imprisoned at
Sachsenhausen, where other members of her family who had been arrested were reunited with her. They were later transferred to the concentration camps at
Flossenbürg and
Dachau, and were liberated by the U.S. Third Army on 30 April 1945. After the war Irmingard and her sisters sought refuge in
Luxembourg, where their maternal aunt,
Grand Duchess Charlotte, reigned. Following a brief return to Germany, she spent a year in the United States, where her uncle
Prince Adolf of Schwarzenberg owned a ranch in
Montana. ==Marriage and children==