My Husband and I

by Ingrid Seward

  A week later, the Queen went to hospital, ostensibly to have a wisdom tooth removed, but conveniently at the same time as her long-serving police officer Commander Michael Trestrail, of whom she had been very fond, had to resign after it was revealed he was conducting an affair with a male prostitute.

  As if all of that wasn’t enough, on 20 July the IRA detonated 25lb of high explosive from a blue Austin car parked in the South Carriage Drive of Hyde Park just as the Household Cavalry Blues and Royals rode past. The blast killed three soldiers and injured a further twenty-three, but the horses took the worst of it and seven were killed or so badly injured they had to be destroyed. One of the horses, Sefton, had an eight-hour operation; survived his thirty-four injuries to become a national icon and symbol of the appalling tragedy. That night the watchman outside the Queen’s door said he heard Her Majesty saying repeatedly: ‘The horses, the poor horses . . .’ Two hours after the first attack, there was a second blast underneath the bandstand where the regiment of the Royal Green Jackets were playing to a crowd of over a hundred onlookers. The final death toll was eleven and over fifty were injured.

  Where royalty is concerned, the show must go on and on 4 August, with her smile fixed firmly in place, the Queen attended the christening of the heir presumptive in the Music Room of Buckingham Palace. Diana was not at her most supportive and resented the attention being focused on the Queen Mother, who was celebrating her eighty-second birthday. She said she felt ‘excluded totally’, and little William Arthur Philip Louis, sensing his mother’s distress, cried throughout.

  That significant family moment, with four generations of the royal family gathered together, highlighted the big changes that were occurring within the Queen’s own family and their difficulties in adapting to the times. They were still expected to be royal and behave like royalty, and at the same time people wanted them to be ordinary enough to have a drink in a pub. They were no longer cocooned by a deferential press, but exposed and, indeed, overexposed. In an interview with the Observer newspaper, Prince Philip tried to explain what it was like living above ‘the shop’ at Buckingham Palace. ‘We didn’t choose this house, we didn’t build this house, we simply occupy it like a tortoise occupies a shell,’ he said firmly. ‘We go to state occasions all dressed up but we wouldn’t dress up like that if the occasion were not a state occasion – the state occasions are part of the living theatre of the monarchy. People expect us to be all things to all men and to all kinds at all times.’

  After all the dramas of 1982, the next significant event in the royal couple’s family life took place on 15 September 1984 at 4.20pm. The Queen was on her Balmoral break with the Duke of Edinburgh and members of her family when the Princess of Wales gave birth to her second child, another boy. His name was announced from the steps of the Lindo Wing of St Mary’s Hospital in Paddington as Prince Henry Charles Albert David and he would be known as Harry. Diana had a difficult pregnancy, was tired and overwrought, and felt thoroughly miserable as she acknowledged she was not made for the production line. The Queen had been aware for a while that her daughter-in-law was finding it difficult to adapt to the pressures of her royal role, but assumed she would eventually find her feet. And, to outward appearances at least, that is what Diana seemed to be doing. She carried on performing her royal duties until July, to the admiration of people she met.

  Four days before Christmas, Harry was christened in St George’s Chapel, Windsor. Lord Snowdon, who took the official photographs, despite being divorced from Princess Margaret, had an almost impossible task. William was trying to get all the attention and kept tugging at the ancient Honiton lace christening robe his brother was wearing and protesting loudly when he was not allowed to hold the baby. Snowdon’s assistant recalled his behaviour, feeling it to be spoilt: ‘Every time he did something naughty they roared with laughter. No one admonished him and he was a thorough pest.’

  The christening was shown in the Christmas broadcast that year, with rare footage of William chasing his cousin, Zara Phillips, round the legs of the Archbishop of Canterbury. In another sequence, Diana was seen trying to explain to William how many generations of royalty had worn the robe he had tried to tear to pieces. ‘Great-Granny was christened in it,’ she said. Charles quickly interjected: ‘And I was christened in it.’ He was trying to cover up for his wife’s mistake, for the great-granny in question was the Queen Mother who, like Diana, was an earl’s daughter and therefore had most definitely not worn the regal robe.

  Weddings and christenings are the things that bind families together and in March 1986 Prince Andrew had become engaged to Sarah Ferguson, the lively daughter of Prince Charles’s polo manager, Ronald Ferguson. ‘I am delighted he’s getting married,’ Prince Philip said, when he and the Queen returned from their tour of Australia and New Zealand, ‘but not because I think it will keep him out if trouble because, in fact he’s never been in trouble, but because I think Sarah will be a great asset.’

  Sarah was indeed a great asset to begin with. On the wedding day, the Queen chose a particularly stunning outfit designed by her Hartnell-trained couturier, Ian Thomas. It had prompted a rare compliment from Prince Philip, who came into her dressing room during one of the fittings. According to Thomas, she had blushed with pleasure – it was a great example of the ongoing strength of their love for each other, as they approached forty years of marriage.

  She may not have felt quite so happy with Prince William’s behaviour as a sailor-suited page at the wedding in Westminster Abbey. He jiggled and fiddled throughout the ceremony and the Queen kept glancing disapprovingly in his direction. She had been taught to sit still when she was far younger than the four-year-old Prince William – and to keep a straight back. As far as she could see, he had not been taught any royal discipline at all.

  It was, however, an exceptionally joyful day. The Queen liked her new daughter-in-law and was delighted with the match. The feeling was mutual and Sarah often spoke of their ‘special bond’. They both loved horses, dogs, country life and of course Prince Andrew – and to this day the Queen keeps in touch with her.

  The joy and cheerfulness generated by the Duke and Duchess of York’s wedding was gradually diminished as the eighties drew to end. First of all, Prince Edward dropped out of the Royal Marines in January 1987, much to the horror of his siblings, who thought they had persuaded him to stay and complete his training.

  Prince Philip was extremely understanding; indeed, it was he, not the Queen, who was the more sympathetic to Edward’s decision. The royal family had a long association with this most martial of services: Edward’s grandfather George VI was Captain General of the Royal Marines, his father succeeded him and his great uncle Earl Mountbatten was Colonel Commandant up to the time he was murdered. Royal private secretaries and equerries were frequently drawn from those with a Marine background. Both Charles and Andrew had undergone commando training before they joined the Royal Navy and earned the right to wear the coveted green beret.

  Edward had wanted to go one better than his brothers and make the Marines his full-time career – perhaps to prove that, in effect, he was better than them. Whatever the reason, Edward had his mind set on the Marines from the age of ten, so it was a huge surprise when he decided to quit. The Queen’s initial shock quickly turned to icy-cold regal displeasure, while the Queen Mother couldn’t understand it as she felt Edward’s decision smacked of dereliction of duty. Given his well-earned reputation for irascibility, it was perhaps inevitable that many would surmise that Philip had been outraged by Edward’s decision and that harsh words had been exchanged between the two; even that Edward had been reduced to tears by his father’s anger. It was a potent image and it grew in the telling and retelling.

  The truth was quite the opposite. Philip was in fact the most supportive of all the royal family. More worldly than his wife, he could analyse the problem in a rational, objective way, while the Queen saw it only in terms of family duty and royal reputation, which by her logic w
ere one and the same. Adam Wise, Prince Edward’s private secretary at the time, recalled: ‘The first person he went to when he’d really had enough of the Marines was Prince Philip and he was extremely understanding about the whole thing. He was very reasonable and gave very sensible advice.’ He added: ‘Prince Philip did not get on his high horse at all and did not get cross about the fact that his son was rejecting the Royal Marines of which he was Captain General.’

  The counsel Philip gave was straightforward and practical. As he informed the Marines’ Commandant General Sir Michael Wilkins in a private and confidential letter, which later appeared on the front page of the Sun, the family had made every effort to make Edward change his mind, ‘but we all made clear that the final decision was his and his alone’.

  Philip, infuriated by trivialities, was showing himself to be clearheaded at a time of major crisis. In a significant public gesture, father and son were photographed walking together side by side to church at Sandringham the following Sunday. He understood his son’s decision, which he considered a brave one, and supported him fully. Edward had explained to him he felt he was never going to be able to fit in as neatly as he had hoped: ‘I was always going to have a policeman there. I could never go out with the rest of the lads into the town as everyone knew who I was. I didn’t see the way really it was going to work.’

  James Edwards, his former headmaster, received a letter from the prince two days after his resignation. ‘It was a long letter thanking me for my concern and explaining why he had done what he had done. He said Prince Philip had been extremely supportive and because of that, he felt he could make the right decision. I think he had had a rough time and had been bullied and teased about gayness until he couldn’t take it any more. Physically he did not have a problem as he was very tough despite his angelic looks.’ Edwards explained that the prince’s detective Andrew Merrylees was away on a recce of New Zealand at the time and perhaps if he had been around Edward might have stuck it out at least until the end of his course.

  Prince Philip and the Queen may not always agree, and clearly did not in this case, but as James Edwards said: ‘They are a tight unit. Cross one and you’ve crossed them both.’

  For all their superficial differences, Philip had a better relationship with Prince Edward than with Charles or Andrew, based on respect on Edward’s part and equally genuine affection on Philip’s. He is not a demonstrative man, but in private he will affectionately put his arm around his son’s shoulder – he calls him Ed – and give him a kiss. Before his marriage in 1999, Edward always kept one book on his bedside table at Buckingham Palace. It was his journal of the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award, its handwritten pages bearing testimony to the years he spent achieving his three awards. The book is a diary of his youth, written in many different hands by those who taught him and those he came to respect. It is a symbolic reminder of the empathy between the prince and his father, whose name the scheme bears.

  Indeed, his father and the award have been two of the most notable influences in his life. It was Philip, for instance, not the Queen, who came to see Edward receive his degree on graduation day from Cambridge. ‘Prince Philip can freeze or melt an atmosphere depending on his mood,’ says friend and former director of the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award, Sir Michael Hobbs. ‘If he is irritable or unhappy about something he will make no attempt to hide it.’

  ‘Prince Philip’s attitude to life was formed by a very tough upbringing,’ observed Hobbs. ‘He meets discomfort head on and isn’t worried by it. He is much less overtly compassionate as a result. He keeps it well hidden.’

  Like the duke on a good day, Edward can move smoothly through a room, sipping a drink, smiling at the appropriate moment, making a humorous remark, before seamlessly moving on. It is an acquired skill, one that did not come easily, and is something the Queen has always found difficult.

  That Edward should study his father is perfectly natural. That Philip should take such an interest in this son is perhaps more unexpected. Philip’s relationship with his youngest child is conducted on a level of easily familiarity that he has never managed with his eldest. The distance between Philip and Charles remains quite extraordinary. For extended periods, their only contact was via memo, while his relationship with Edward is conducted on a much more informal, friendly level.

  He is also very fond of the Countess of Wessex, who married Edward after a seven-year courtship in 1999. During that period, the Queen took the unusual step of inviting Sophie Rhys-Jones to live at Buckingham Palace so she could familiarise herself with the protocol and rituals of the royal family. Some churchmen criticised the Queen for allowing an unmarried couple to live together, but she felt it was of vital importance after the failure of her children’s other marriages that Sophie knew exactly what she was letting herself in for. It showed how they had gained in understanding of the pressures faced by outsiders joining the royal family, and that the best preparation for what would follow was to give them direct experience of it.

  In the popular imagination, the royal family are in daily consultation. In fact, they live surprisingly separate lives. They seldom get together during the week, even if they happen to be under the same roof at Buckingham Palace. The Queen often has her dinner alone in her private apartment, which she serves herself from a hotplate. Philip, meanwhile, until recently, if he returned late from an engagement, could be dining on the floor below with his private secretary. At the same time, Edward, before his marriage to Sophie, could have been having a snack by himself in his rooms. It would never have occurred to any of them to pick up the internal telephone to organise an impromptu family supper.

  If Edward’s resignation from the Marines had brought some criticism, the way he followed it up brought much more. That summer he produced the charity TV show It’s a Royal Knockout, in which members of his family dressed in period costume as captains of four teams in a celebrity tournament at Alton Towers theme park. It was undignified, loud and, to make things worse, Edward was in a truculent mood and lost his temper and flounced out of the ensuing press conference after they made it clear what they thought of it all. It was such a disaster it is still talked of today as one of the greatest PR gaffes the royal family have made.

  For the Queen and Prince Philip, who were celebrating their fortieth wedding anniversary, and the Queen Mother, who was about to celebrate her eighty-seventh birthday, it was a sorry episode. The Queen Mother was incensed and told Andrew, Edward and Anne (who each captained a team, along with the Duchess of York) that she had spent years building the reputation of the monarchy with the King only to have them try to destroy it in one evening. Her underlying fear was that everything her daughter had strived to build since the beginning of her reign by hard work and duty could so easily be erased by the behaviour of her own grandchildren and the vigilant press attention they attracted.

  As the Queen’s confidant the Right Reverend Michael Mann, former Dean of Windsor, explained: ‘For the best reasons in the world, younger members of the royal family wanted to make the monarchy more approachable. I think the supreme example of that was when they all participated in It’s a Knockout. It was making it a soap opera.’

  In 1988, the Queen and Prince Philip were overjoyed when Sarah and Andrew had their first child – and their fifth grandchild. She was named Princess Beatrice after Queen Victoria’s youngest daughter. The Queen was at Balmoral as usual, but four days after the birth Sarah made the effort to travel to Scotland so the Queen and Philip could see the baby before Andrew returned to his ship in the Philippines. Having grandchildren of her own made the Queen more aware of the kind of world they would one day inherit.

  Philip and Andrew have never been close and Philip often couldn’t resist taking a verbal swipe at his middle son whenever the opportunity arose. But in those early days he got along well with Sarah, though that was soon to change when their marriage fell into difficulties, something that came about relatively quickly after they had a second daughter, Princess Eu
genie, who was born on 23 March 1990. By March 1992, they announced their separation and suddenly the Duke of Edinburgh’s attitude changed. Unsentimental and dispassionate, he only ever spoke badly about one of his children’s partners and that was Sarah.

  In the end, he just couldn’t be in the same room as her, and if she came in one door he would leave by another. When the couple finally divorced in 1996, he refused to allow her in any of the royal residences if he was there, and that has applied to this day. He simply felt she had let down the Queen and the institution of the monarchy by her indulgent behaviour and was no longer to be tolerated. However, Andrew has not only chosen not to remarry, but remains on close terms with his ex-wife, despite the disapproval of the Queen and Philip.

  Philip felt differently about Anne. She was a similar sort of personality to him, and she had separated from Captain Mark Phillips in 1989 before they finally divorced in April 1992. By the end of the year, she had remarried Timothy Laurence, who had been the Queen’s equerry between 1986 and 1989. When a cache of her love letters from him was offered for sale to one of the Murdoch newspapers, Philip just shrugged and said let them get on with it. In the end the newspaper didn’t publish them. He was hopeful she would find happiness with her second husband, but to this day continues to worry about her.

  It was not in the Queen’s nature to become a participant in other people’s troubles, especially those of her own children. She found it hard enough dealing with her own and, like her mother, preferred to overlook a problem rather than confront it, in the belief that if she ignored it long enough it would go away. But even more significant than the problems in the marriages of Princess Anne and Prince Andrew were the growing problems in the marriage of Prince Charles and Princess Diana, as this had a direct bearing on the future of the monarchy.