When Prince Charles married Diana, it was a fairy tale wedding. Alas, their loveless marriage ended in separation after 11 years. Prince Andrew, the Queen’s second son, married Sarah. Their marriage, too, ended in separation after just 6 years. The royal husbands failed to live up to expectations.
It was all too much for the royal wives of Windsor. They were a new breed of royalty, young and attractive, independent, and unwilling to bow to a system they considered stuffy and old-fashioned. They projected a new image of royalty and captured the attention of the world. Alas, behind this image, the truth was different.
Stories of their real lives leaked out. Diana as a lonely, unhappy princess suffering from bulimia and married to an uncaring man with a mistress. With Andrew away at sea, the lonely Sarah sought male company elsewhere. Her extrammarital relationships were exposed when she was caught in the south of France with her lover.
Diana, Princess of Wales, and Sarah, Duchess of York, brought a sense of scandal and fun to the traditional circles of British monarchy. Alas, they were forced to stand aside when their royal secrets were revealed. Were they really to blame for their marriage breakdowns? Or were they simple victims of a system that had not kept up to date with the times? On a visit to India in 1992, the sherade of Diana’s marriage to Charles was almost over. At 31, Diana faced a future
denied of married love, of which she dreamed since her unhappy childhood. Officially, her relationship with Charles was still a happy one, but gradually it shifted to one of mutual indifference. Diana increasingly acquired a sense of destiny. The flame for Charles flickered and died. In a clumsy attempt to prove publicly his affection for her, the prince tried to kiss his wife.
She rebuffed his advances. The dam, it seemed, was about to burst. Sarah, Duchess of York, now accepts that she was simply not cut out to join the royal family. She admitted in a newspaper interview that she had messed up her life. We all make serious mistakes and we learn from them. She claimed for Sarah, it’s been a difficult time, but she always put on a happy face and fulfilled her royal duties with dignity.
When she married Andrew, she took on the role of a duchess enthusiastically and looked forward to supporting her husband. She had high expectations of her marriage with Andrew, perhaps a little too high. I think she really hoped that that that it would be something that it perhaps wasn’t. Diana’s shy image was in sharp contrast to Sarah’s extrovert manner.
A professional woman, an expert skier, Sarah had a career in publishing. She was confident of her own identity and seemed far more prepared than Diana for the pitfalls of a royal marriage under the intense scrutiny of the media. But here was Gerald Sarah was a complete breath of fresh air, you know, who loved sort of larking about and having the odd glass of champagne.
It was very much frowned upon. But I mean, it was just fun. It was just giggly. It was relaxation. It was an ally. They could they could they could have a good old gossip about how ghastly the situation was. When Sarah first appeared on the royal scene, skiing holidays meant happier times for Diana. But her influence was not always appreciated by Charles who was irritated by their girish behavior in front of the press.
The whole thing actually was a bit embarrassing. They kept um came over as a bit sort of immature really. It wasn’t it wasn’t a good thing to do. Sarah Ferguson brought a breath of fresh air to the stuffy royal circles. They made an attractive couple. He was a dashing naval officer. she his exuberant partner.
Together, Sarah and Andrew projected a united front. We’re a good team anyway. Yes. I think that’s a saving grace is the fact that that in the last nine months, we’ve discovered that we work very well together and we’re good friends, good team. Very happy. The queen was relieved when Andrew married Sarah.
She was happy to see her son betrothed after his many adventures with less suitable companions. She felt that Andrew had met his match in Sarah, bodding well for a strong relationship. At the wedding ceremony, she vowed to love and honor, but not to obey him. [cheering] The couple’s own mood of vitality and genuine happiness seemed to rub off, creating an unusually festive royal occasion.
The Queen never looked happier or more relaxed. Sadly, it was the last time the royal family would present such a genuinely united front. Sarah was not a purebred English rose in the mold of her friend and royal confident, Princess Princess Diana. In the early days, family gatherings at Polo brought the two girls closer together.
For once, Diana could stay in the background and let her sister-in-law do the honors. Sarah was roped in for the prize giving. Come rain or shine, a royal consort must perform her duties. On this occasion, it’s all in the family. Brother-in-law Charles is in the winning team, and the young Prince William is there to give his support. Another close friend of the royal family was Sarah’s father, Major Ronald Ferguson, who was Prince Charles’s polo manager for almost 20 years.
Diana and Sarah first met at a polo match and together brought valuable new blood into a royal house of essentially German stock. Now, British royalty will certainly be able to claim a more British ancestry. But how would these two lively young women fit into the traditions of monarchy and the atmosphere of royal palaces? If you go into Bucking Palace, I mean, if I’ve ever been there, it’s very hushed and everybody’s sort of tiptoeing around and it’s like being in a hospital, you know, and I’m sure suddenly these two women
would come along and they’d probably have a good giggle at something and everybody would turn around almost like they’re in a library and go, “Shh.” And I’m sure that they found that very restricting that they really couldn’t just be themselves there. As Duchess of York, Sarah embraced her royal duties with enthusiasm.
Within a year of their wedding, they visited Canada. Sarah’s passion for life in general bravado was greatly admired, and the young couple’s relaxed manner won the hearts of the Canadian people. Down. Down. Obviously still very much in love. Sarah and Andrew were a huge hit. They were very, very physically attracted. And all the time we were with
them on that tour, we used to feel that we needed a bucket of cold water to throw over them. They were so tactile, obviously in love. And that’s very infectious. They communicated this wonderful feeling of happiness to everybody around them. And it made it a joy to work with them. And that’s why it was such a tragedy when they split up because we had seen how happy they were.
We hadn’t seen this obvious affection with Charles and Diana only for a very very short time. But with Andrew and Sarah, it was clear that they were meant for each other and so happy together. and they worked so well together as a team and um it it just brought joy to the Canadians and to everybody who saw them.
For Diana, looking good is important. Fashion is a way to express herself in public. She relishes the opportunity to dress up and perform for her audience. She doesn’t smoke, rarely drinks alcohol, exercises regularly, and swims in a cold pool every morning. On official occasions, she pushes food around the plate, rarely eats meat, and sticks to small portions of fish and salads, going to great lengths to maintain her appearance.
But Diana had this extraordinary relationship with the camera. It’s the same kind of thing that Maui Monroe had. Or perhaps Jackie Kennedy. Now, there’s a very good example because there are a lot of parallels here between Jackie Kennedy as the president’s wife and Princess Diana as wife of the heir to the throne of England.
It was after she learned how to present herself that she became both the greatest asset of the royal family in terms of her visual style and her fashion and her the wonderful way she looked and also a problem in that she did in a way show up what looked rather fusty side of the royal family. A good performer, Diana never forgets which way the cameras are pointing.
Don’t you think we see in Diana the essence of her character, something that goes very deep, which is a really desperate desire to please? She wants to make other people feel at ease. She wants all the things that a broken home, a difficult childhood didn’t give her. She wants to feel that other people are at ease in her presence.
Diana reflects how she feels in the clothes that she wears. When she’s feeling good about herself, when she’s in the public arena, she’ll wear short, snappy suits, very short skirts these days. And when she’s feeling bad, she covers herself up. You see her whole body more hunched. She wears big sweaters, long skirts.
And there are those occasions when she’s really feeling blue. When she tends to wear blue, something long and droopy like that outfit just after the revelations about the breakdown of her marriage. Diana creates a mystique so powerful that her public is still unwilling to hear any criticism of her. Fashion writers acclaim her sense of style.
The way she can wear those dinner suits. She wore this one with what’s called a Trump lawyer. It’s a kind of fake waste coat at the front, fake vest. And it was so trim and neat and very smart. And yet at the same time, it’s sort of funny. It’s a take on men’s wear. It’s also a joke on those stuffed shirts that British men, not least her husband, have to wear on official occasions.
It’s a tremendous fun outfit, her looking at her best. On a visit to Hong Kong, Diana wore a strapless Katherine Walker cream gown with a short matching jacket with a high-standing collar topped off by the dazzling Queen Mary tiara. Diana doesn’t like wearing tiaras, and she particularly doesn’t like the one that the queen gave her, which is very pretty, but is heavy.
And she wears much more the Spencer tiara with the rather interlacing of the diamonds which is very pretty. But of course she also on official occasions like at the Malaysian state banquet when she wore that green dress by Victor Adelstein very slim dress that went with the Queen Mary emeralds. She wears the queen’s personal gift which is the royal family order.
you. It’s got a little picture of the queen surrounded by diamonds and that’s a very special mark of affection. And it’s one of those things that shows to other members of the royal family. Look, the queen gave me this. I’m one of them. Separated from Charles alone at the D-Day ceremonies, her legs were regally displayed.
Have you noticed with Diana how her skirt, her hemline, and her shoe heels have gone up now that she feels more independent and better about herself? Those Jimmy Shu shoes she wore, a young British designer who makes lively shoes. Quite expensive. They cost £250, you know, nearly $500 a pair.
But they give Diana the right kind of look. Slightly sexy, isn’t it? And something that makes her look like an independent young woman. On a trip to Australia, the press was quick to take advantage of all the bronzed bodies on display. Often in her desire to please, Diana is accused of becoming a chameleon. Psychologists claim that her self-esteem is so low that she feels she exists only when she takes on the coloring of her surroundings. She mixes easily.
She is a princess in Kensington, a Sloan Ranger in Nightsbridge, and a very ordinary girl when in conversation with Australian lifeguards. She’s never at a loss to expose her sexuality when the occasion arises. And she knew the effect she had on men. She was very, very aware of it and she used it to great advantage.
They were all putty in her hands. And I remember looking at it once and thinking, what is she saying with that look? And I decided that what she was saying was, you know, I’m gorgeous. I think I’m gorgeous, but remember I’m taken. During her unhappy marriage to Charles, Diana suffered from the slimming disease bulimia nervosa.
But since those dark days, she has regained her confidence and her food preferences are common knowledge. She is known to prefer pasta with creamy sauces like carbonara. She likes potatoes and bacon sandwiches with white bread and cheese. Despite this, she keeps her figure trim. Now, for a silhouette, a narrow silhouette, you need to be slim.
And so, of course, she had to work at slimming down. So there’s been the swimming at Buckingham Palace in that pool. She’s done that very religiously, swam a tremendous amount, the gym. She now has a personal trainer coming to her the whole time. Diana also goes in for a lot of beauty therapy, aroma therapy, massage.
She spends a very great deal of money, if you like to look at it in financial terms, on the infrastructure. That’s what I’d call it. We’re not talking about the makeup here, although she’s been wearing increasingly quite a lot of makeup, but we’re not talking about cosmetics. We’re talking about the foundations here. Ballet is still her great passion.
She grew too tall to pursue her own ambition to dance, but now channels her enthusiasm into supporting the professionals. Privately, she continued to use dance as part of an exercise routine for many years. And although swimming now maintains her high level of fitness, watching rehearsals is still a favorite occupation.
On formal visits, Diana must not be caught off guard. Her skirt must not blow up, and the correct length of dress is all important. She charmed her host on an official visit to Japan by wearing a new evening dress created by the Japanese designer Yuki with a headband of diamonds and sapphires. In Hungary, she wore an outfit by Katherine Walker and a hat by Philip Somerville.
She dazzled the people of Indonesia. In Washington, a slinky evening gown by Hachi stunned onlookers. In Paris, she wore a new gown by Victor Edelstein. The bodice and the small bolero jacket encrusted with shimmering beads. Hats too were a favorite with Diana. Most of them come from Philip Somerville, who produces the most flattering hats in London.
Now officially out of the royal family, Diana feels embittered that they did not appreciate what she had done to improve their image. I think she’d be quite justified in feeling bitter because uh there was a gap in the royal ranks before she came along for a young glamorous woman, somebody who wasn’t as aloof and dowdy as the rest of them.
Somebody once said, a newspaper columnist once said that the royal members of the royal family, especially the women, have the strange ability to make expensive designer clothes worth thousands, look like they came from British home stores, you know, the retail chain. And um Diana was the exception to that. She was like an Afghan hound amongst the all the corgis.
Elegant, tall, she had everything. She had everything that the public expected of a woman in that position and that the rest of them didn’t have that. They were a dumpy frumpy lot. And then along came this gorgeous girl who gave them the polish, the glamour that they lacked. And now that she’s retired, once again, there’s this gap in the royal ranks.
And it’s not going to be filled in the same way until William gets himself a wife or a fiance. Royal status for Sarah meant royal duties. She performed these in her own personal relaxed manner. Her independence and modern ideas were at odds with the formality and protocol of the British monarchy.
Living in a gilded cage was not her idea of being royal. Her dress sense came in for a lot of public attention. As a naval officer, Andrew was away at sea for almost 9 months of the year. Their time together was very precious and stolen kisses showed their youthful love. They reveled in each other’s company.
But moments like this were rare. For most of the time, they were forced to live apart. And Sarah found the stress of being alone hard to bear. With a natural zest for life, she needed the buzz of excitement. When Andrew wasn’t around, she found life within the royal confines rather dull. To relieve the tedium, she took her pilot’s license.
Flying was a way of life for Andrew, and she wanted to find out more about her husband’s work. Not to be outdone, she also decided to fly helicopters. I now know exactly what he’s talking about when he goes out on the sort. So that’s what I wanted to achieve. So when he comes back in the evening, he tells me what he’s been doing.
I now know what he’s been doing. With Andrew away so much, Sarah was often on duty alone. How you doing? Not getting too hot. Are you Simon? Yes. Oh, that’s a nice name, isn’t it? Called upon to present trophies at polo matches, Sarah was often ins snared in the company of attractive men. Before she became part of the royal family, she had had a 4-year love affair with the millionaire Formula 1 racing entrepreneur Patty McNal.
Sarah enjoyed the attention of the company of men, and in Andrew’s absence, she turned to her father for support, putting him in the spotlight. Ronald Ferguson was Prince Charles’s polo manager. A ceremonial stick marked the end of his many years as deputy chairman of the Guard’s Polo Club. After the press revealed details of his visits to a massage parlor in London’s West End, the club committee had voted him out, and the message was clear.
It was an emotional farewell under a cloud of scandal. Sarah was on hand to support him in a brave show of solidarity. For both of them, it was a case of putting on a stiff upper lip. With an absentee husband, the media quickly focused on Sarah’s performance as a single mom. Sarah was performing her public duties in a style the cameras had come to expect. Unfairly, she was lampuned.
Determined to be herself, she chose to support good causes, but in her own way. Her lack of regard for the cool, stuffy performance left her wide open to criticism from royal officials. not going to sing a song and um I haven’t prepared a speech but I I just I’m so pleased to be here today.
I mean it’s just wonderful and it’s not very much snow and I think you’ve done a fantastic job. There was fierce criticism that her speeches and general behavior were too unconventional and familiar. The press often made disparaging comments on her dress sense, but she was determined to survive the icy disapproval of Buckingham Palace, and her confidence to handle the situation and dismiss the establishment was demonstrated by her liberated and relaxed fashion of bare legs, short skirts, and smiles all round, and a new
shorter hairstyle, assertive body language of a new woman. It’s certainly true in the 20s that when people said shocking, shocking, those women cutting off their hair, they knew something about women, that women were asserting their independence. When did Diana first start going public with the troubles in her marriage? When she chopped off her hair, when did Sarah Ferguson start saying, “I want to be independent.
I I’m fed up with these courtiers and this palace protocol.” She chopped off that wonderful red hair that is Fergie’s crowning glory. Sadly, Sarah’s own guarded manner was to be her downfall. In a fashionable block of flats in London’s Chelsea, her passionate nature and her zest for life were suddenly exposed to the world when holiday photographs featuring Princess Beatatrice and Texan oil millionaire Steve Wyatt were discovered by a window cleaner.
Allegations of Sarah’s infidelity confirmed gossip that her marriage to Andrew was on the rocks. In the eyes of the establishment, the lonely royal mother had failed to progress from commoner to royalty. Under the pressure of a crumbling marriage and in the full glare of publicity, Andrew and Sarah tried to continue with their daily lives.
Andrew carried out his duties as a naval officer while Sarah took their three-year-old daughter Beatatric to and from school. After weeks of speculation, the announcement of the York separation was finally made. Details emerged after the Queen’s solicitor and a team of lawyers had discussed exactly how it would be arranged, including the custody of the children.
questions were asked why the marriage had hit the rocks. I think the main reason is because they were apart so much. I mean I think that must be a very major factor. I mean the fact that uh they obviously had close friendships both of them with people outside the marriage I think contributed to it but I think initially I think it was the fact that he was a sailor he was abroad a great deal and I felt very sorry for Fergie and that you know when she used to go to a she went to Australia didn’t she and there was great outcry about the number of holidays she
had and so on and yet all the poor girl was doing was going to see her husband you know and I think I think that that was one of the major problems there were too many absences is forces within Buckingham Palace closed ranks. Stories were leaked that Sarah’s extravagant and irresponsible lifestyle had caused the marriage breakup.
Reports that the queen was unhappy were confirmed when the press claimed that the knives were out for Fergie. Without Andrew, Sarah had no royal protection. when he was away, she was very vulnerable to the um shall we say the Machavevelian courtiers who didn’t like the way she behaved and um decided that they had to rein her in very sharply.
Now, being a redhead with a bit of a temper, she didn’t take kindly to the methods they used. I think if they had been more subtle, if they’d been more understanding, more diplomatic, the situation could have been avoided. But they were determined that she would do things their way. And she was a very independent, free-spirited girl who was not going to take kindly to the sexism and the patronizing attitudes at the palace.
And therefore, the the end result was disaster. Now Sarah was suffering the consequences of a job she couldn’t fulfill. Buckingham Palace closed its doors on her. The truth lay in her loneliness and the pressures of being royal. When she tried to explain to the Duke when he came home, the problems that she had, he just wanted to relax.
He didn’t want to hear about problems. He wanted just to have a good time for the brief period he was home. And he used to say, “Well, look, darling, you know, I don’t have those problems. I can’t understand it. You know, they don’t like they’re not like that with me. Aren’t you sure you this is right?” You know, he wasn’t sympathetic.
[snorts] And in the end, she decided that life was better on the outside. Andrew responded with a round of public engagements. Outwardly untouched by the scandal, plans were already underway for Sarah to move out of their family house with the young princesses and into rented accommodation down the road. When asked, he declined to answer questions about his marriage breakup.
It had all begun so well. Royal marriages off to a good start with spontaneous signs of affection and happiness. Heirs to the throne and a promised future built on mutual support and public partnership. All the queen’s grandchildren are products of broken marriages. Yet set against the power and ceremony of British royalty, the dreams faded.
Diana, still officially living with Charles, but in an unhappy marriage, took note at the palace’s treatment of her sister-in-law. I think Diana was shocked by what happened to Sarah and determined that it would not happen to her. Um, when she heard, you know, that famous phrase, the knives are out for Fergie, I think she realized that when you walk out, that’s liable to happen to anyone who flouts the conventions and and uh tries to stand up to the Windsores.
and she was determined not to repeat Sarah’s mistakes. Diana’s strength and character pulled her through the next few months. The strains of her own marriage breakdown and the truth of her relationship with Charles was about to explode on the British public. The book Diana Her True Story went on sale. The romantic image of a loving royal couple was shattered.
Charles was exposed as an uncaring husband and adulterer. These revelations were the beginning of Charles’s downfall and threatened the very institution of the British monarchy. The royal wives of Windsor were to blame. Some people may say that they were dragging the royal family down. Others thought that they provided a much needed lightness and um um more reality into a very stuffy old institution.
I mean the if the worst thing you can be accused of is proddding somebody with an umbrella, I don’t think that’s such a bad thing to do. They were girls having fun. The things they did, they didn’t expect most of the time to be made public. And you know, let’s face it, they weren’t robbing banks or shooting people.
And I think a lot was made out of very, very little. On the surface, it was business as usual. The aranged husbands put on a royal face to attend a family wedding. When a crisis occurs in a royal marriage, the palace machine puts its full weight behind the blood royal. Now with the gloves off, Charles had been advised to dump Diana immediately and seek a divorce.
Just for one day at least, marriage difficulties within the royal family were put to one side as they turned out in force to enjoy a royal wedding which might prove successful. Sarah had been the one missing guest, but at another marriage ceremony, her eldest daughter, Princess Beatatrice, was bridesmaid. The queen’s granddaughter, a new generation of royalty, enjoyed the limelight.
usually taken by her mother. Diana, meanwhile, continued with her public engagements alone, except for the company of her sons who enjoyed the experience of meeting film stars at opening nights. This was the image of new royalty at work, single moms teaching their children the ropes. Public interest in the broken royal marriages remained high.
Photographed alone taking the children to school, the press attention turned back to Sarah. After revelations of her association with the Texan oil millionaire Steve Wyatt, public interest now centered around another Texan, Johnny Bryan. His cover as Sarah’s financial adviser was blown wide open after photographs appeared of the almost naked couple coorting on holiday together in the south of France.
It was a royal exposure without president and the press had a field day. Sarah’s alleged lover, Johnny Brian, failed to get an injunction to stop publication of the very revealing photographs and the media onslaught continued. Eventually, Johnny Brian and Sarah were successful in winning a court battle in France against intrusion of their privacy by a French freelance photographer.
At the time the photographs appeared in the press, Sarah was on holiday with her children with the queen at Bal Marl. Well, I know the duchess was so upset that they had to twice call the doctor, the local doctor at Bal Marl, to come and attend to her. She was absolutely distraught, quite understandably. And uh it was a bombshell for the queen, for the entire royal family.
It was one more devastating blow in a very, very bad year. Sarah insisted that Johnny Brian was merely her financial adviser. As a house guest of the Queen at Balmor Moral, the embattled duchess found the situation difficult to explain. Worst of all, of course, to to Sarah because she was right there in the enemy camp when this news broke.
and um how could she possibly explain it away? The the the evidence was all too overwhelming. So um I think that that probably was the worst time of her life. Diana’s unhappy marriage meant she was spending more time away from the royals. Sarah needed the understanding of an outsider, so turned to her sister-in-law for support.
Diana was sympathetic and she she was um you know visiting her and trying to support her, but I think the duchess was beyond any kind of uh support or sympathy. She was just totally devastated by it. Continuing to protest his innocence, Johnny Brian became the center of massive public interests and debate. No further comment to make in addition to the comments and statements I made last night.
Have you seen this? Newspapers claimed that the photographs were published to strip away the hypocrisy surrounding the couple’s relationship. The French freelance photographer who took them made half a million pounds from worldwide sales. Once he knew that Fergie was there, I don’t personally know whether he knew who she was there with or how he found out she was there.
But as you can imagine, there’s a chain of command, chain of bookings of flights of villas. There’s the police protection service. There are endless ways that information could get out. I think the royal family’s always needed a black sheep. For many years, it was Princess Margaret, then it was Princess Anne. Recently, it’s been Fergie.
And of course, the mirror’s publication of those photographs, while she happened to be at the Queen’s guest at Balmoral and was was banished that very day, was the low point of Fergie’s relationship with the British public really, and with royal life. And since then, she’s been an ex-royal.
Uh, the mirror of course made an awful lot of money and put on an enormous amount of circulation by printing those photographs. So although it was a continuing saga of circulation war among the tabloids, it was also an irresistible story whichever one had got hold of it. Immediately the royal publicity machine went on the defensive.
Prince Andrew claimed that the photographs were set up. Stories were hatched that Sarah was suffering from a nervous breakdown. Even the queen doubted that Sarah would ever be able to shoulder official duties again. When the story broke, Sarah, Andrew, and the children were the holiday guests of the queen at Balmoral Castle.
The newspaper headlines exploded like a bombshell at the royal breakfast table. The Duchess of York left Balmoral in disgrace. Sarah had to face the reality that the royal family no longer considered her a member. With her children, she boarded a flight for London and virtual exile. The official line was that Sarah had always intended to leave Balmoral at this time.
Normal royal life resumed in Scotland as though nothing untoward had happened. The royal family, including Prince Andrew, attended morning service at the local church. It was just like any other Sunday with the crowds coming out to watch. When Sarah arrived at Heathro, there was little thought of future plans except perhaps to visit her mother in Argentina.
Her main concern was to head for the sanctuary of home as quickly as possible. After her traumatic departure from the royal family and the return to her besieged home, Ramena Lodge, Sarah needed help in the hope that somewhere there was somebody she could really trust, she turned to therapy. I would say now to anybody that um you know if they’ve been through problems that it’s good to just to talk to somebody who you know you can trust.
I in my particular position, you don’t know who you’re going to trust at all. You’re suspicious of everybody because you you trust I trust trusted and do trust still too much and then you get betrayed and let down and then all that all that starts. I think that the most important thing if anyone goes through this sort of thing is for the sake of the children and for the sake of your own self is that you you’ve got a great friendship.
You’re always going to have a great friendship. There doesn’t need to be animosity. And um Andrew and I really have a good deep friendship and that’s good. After Sarah’s dramatic departure from Scotland, the royal family continued with their summer holiday. For the moment at least, peace and tranquility returned to the Scottish Highlands.
The palace announced that no significant developments were expected in the next few days. Yet the family holiday was about to be disrupted once more. The privacy of the Scottish estate was again invaded by the press. Transcripts appeared in newspapers of a bugged telephone conversation allegedly between the Princess of Wales, endearingly referred to as Squidi, and her friend James Gilby.
The recording revealed a princess in turmoil, deeply troubled, lonely, and vulnerable, pathetically grateful for the attention of her male confidant. During their intimate exchange, she discusses her unhappy marriage, her remoteness from her in-laws, and her torturous lifestyle. It’s just so difficult, so complicated. It makes my life real, real torture.
I’ve decided. Lonely and without friends in the royal family, Diana turned to the Queen Mother for support. It’s affection. It’s affection. It’s definitely affection. It’s sort of um Oh, it’s affection. Yeah, definitely. Is it? It’s not hostile. Anyway, there is no fascinated by me but doesn’t quite know how to unravel it.
Despite Diana’s recorded protestation that she had done so much for the royal family, officials dismissed the tapes as inconclusive. So that was it. I was very backl. I just felt really sad and empty. I thought, “Bloody hell, what I done for this family.” The Sun newspaper reported that the Secret Service MI5 was behind the recordings.
Newspaper reports claim that the government’s official electronic eavesdropping station was responsible. In the interest of national security, MI5 monitors royal telephone conversations to gain knowledge about their movements and acquaintances. A more sinister view is that Charles needed evidence of his wife’s infidelity. It was in Charles’s interest, and perhaps the palace’s interest, no one else’s, that Diana’s phones be bugged.
And bugged they were. She knew that herself and had complained to uh the Queen’s private secretary, Sir Robert Fellows, that uh her apartments were bugged and they needed debugging and indeed they were cleaned up. What wasn’t cleaned up was what was happening on the line from her apartments to the outside world.
And most experts concur that it was between, let us say, her phone and the general switchboard that um that a a bug was placed. What’s disturbing is not that Diana was bugged necessarily because that was the excuse could have been the national interest, but that the eventual recording was cleaned up. Cleaned up with a very sophisticated device called a a digital adapter filter.
The sort of thing that would be needed would cost about £35,000 and would normally only be available to the security services or to the military. So that was used. It was cleaned up and after it was cleaned up it was spliced together. There are there are joins in the um audible joins of milliseconds in in the uh conversation and then it was rebroadcast rebroadcast using a mobile telephone to disguise their sources.
This way the perpetrators ensured that the taped conversation was picked up accidentally by amateur radio hams by contacting the press. This telephone evidence confirmed that Diana was unhappy in her marriage to Charles and needed the support and love of a male companion. Exposed by the tapes and now handed by the press, there is no doubt that James Gilby helped Diana through her crisis.
Lonely, depressed, and spied upon, Diana spent many years waiting to be heard by a man with a sympathetic and understanding ear. She was a very lonely, vulnerable woman who needed a shoulder to cry on and he provided it. I think she needed some sort of buffer between her and the the enemies that that that’s what she thought of.
I think the people that surrounded her at that time. She needed somebody who was not one of them to turn to to advise her and to as a sort of sounding board. And he was the perfect answer. somebody she could trust, she could confide in, and unfortunately their relationship became public. Diana’s critics claimed that the tapes confirmed her tendency towards paranoia.
If she does have a tendency, I think it’s quite justified. I think anybody in that position should feel they’re surrounded by assassins night and day because once the tapes emerged and she found out about them long before the public did she was worried that she quite rightly that she was being bugged that she was being spied upon and she was so any paranoia she felt I think she was entirely right.
It troubles Diana deeply that her own sons will be the products of a broken home. Diana had seen her own parents split up when she was a child and knew what grief it could cause on young children. She’s directed much of her public work to promoting family values. Her main concern has been the importance of physical contact.
Tactile by nature, she’s voiced her belief in its benefits, particularly for children. Hugging has no harmful side effects. If we all play our part in making our children feel valued, the result will be tremendous. There are potential huggers in every household. Always the focus of hugs and kisses herself.
Diana represents a new, more acceptable type of royalty. No other member of the British royal family can make such immediate contact with the public. Their admiration is genuine and their acts of affection spontaneous. This huge popularity will be her main weapon in her fight for a fair settlement with Charles. As an indication to the way forward as an independent princess with international status, Diana visited Zimbabwe.
[cheering] Using her high profile to focus media attention onto the hidden problems of one of Africa’s small countries, she uses her public position for the benefit of the world’s sick and needy from an international charity platform. Do you want to go? Do you want an independent Sarah found a role for herself drawing attention to the plight of children the world had forgotten.
No. No. You want your mommy back? You got lovely eyes. You have. You got lovely eyes. Yeah, they say they send a lot of letters to Germany and they get German sponsors and the films from Poland and um and um how old is Kasha now? She she will be six years in December. She will be six in December.
Nice. She’s exactly the same age as Beatric. Then all at the time leading the charity Children in Crisis, Sarah is putting her past behind her and with her own brand of enthusiasm. Although with less exposure, she is helping to raise money to support her charitable activities. She’s still doing a lot of work with these charities and she’s still trying to get a profile for them.
And even though it’s a lot harder for her now, but she’s still working for them. And I think with Diana, I’m sure too, although it’s not obvious at the moment, I’m sure she’s still doing the same. And I think, you know, the charities sorely miss having that public image. With the serious side of charity work comes the glamour of fundraising first night.
This is where Diana’s talents as a performer come into their own. She plays the part of a fairy tale princess with apparent ease. Her glamorous image has fueled the media’s obsession with her. On an official visit to Egypt, her morning swim was intruded upon by a group of sensation hungry photographers spying from a high-rise balcony.
Both she and her detective were aware they were being watched, but she chose to ignore them, resigned yet again to being forced back onto center stage by her relentless audience. Diana is a victim of her own success with the media branded as the villain of the piece. The reason she gave for reducing her public engagements and her prominent royal position.
When I started my public life 12 years ago, I understood the media might be interested in what I did, but I was not aware of how overwhelming that attention would become. nor the extent to which it would affect both my public duties and my personal life in a manner that’s been hard to bear. I don’t think that any any marriage that is as unhappy as the Wales is was can survive the kind of of press intrusion that it had. Absolutely not.
I think it would just would have been extraordinary if it have survived. Um because once once the press have a little inkling that something’s wrong, they go for it. They really go for it. And of course, it’s it’s probably the greatest story that Frea had in the last 50 years. Often accused of smothering her children, William and Harry are incredibly fond of their mother.
Her sons were her main solace during the years of her marriage breakdown. Now she has to bear the loneliness of her new situation as an officially separated wife. Diana has replaced the Queen as the nation’s primary mother figure by announcing the importance her sons will have on her future life. My first priority will continue to be our children, William and Harry, who deserve as much love and care and attention as I am able to give, as well as an appreciation of the tradition into which they were born.
She’s very anxious to avoid any publicity which is which is perhaps understandable but the way she’s going about it is perhaps not the wisest way. So she’s the first victim. Uh the charities naturally are the second victim. The royal family is also suffering because she was a great asset and wherever she went she uh appealed greatly to the public and she was the um the very modern young face of the royal family which was uh very very useful a great asset to them all round.
A year after her official separation from Charles, Diana joins the royal family for the Christmas Day service at Sandringham Church and again took center stage. Shortly afterwards, however, she left abruptly to spend the rest of Christmas alone. Until now, the magnetism of royalty has helped to make royal engagements a powerful medium for promoting its causes.
It remains to be seen whether Diana’s future detachment from the royal family will affect its pulling power. Diana leaves an unfillable gap in the royal lineup. Sadly, there’s no longer a real role for her in the royal family. Whatever small role she still has, she’ll be seen as just the mother of the next king but one, Prince William.
Um, she may not even have the title Princess of Wales anymore. It’s very doubtful. They may invent some new title for her. like Duchess of Kensington for instance to um give her a title that’s that that tells the public that she is no longer the wife of the heir to the throne and no longer Princess of Wales and no longer the third lady in the land.
Since her marriage to Charles, Diana has received little guidance from within the palace. She has had to find her own way. In an attempt to escape from an unhappy marriage, she exposed a side of royalty which has done immeasurable damage to the institution of the monarchy. Diana stands accused of being disloyal to her husband and to the queen.
They certainly backfired on her and on the family. And I don’t think she appreciated just what the public reaction to those revelations would be or that it would quickly become apparent that she was behind all the leaks. The experiment of bringing commoners into the House of Windsor has failed and royalty can no longer set an example of happy family life.
The two young wives have gone and all that is left is the shell of respectability and tradition. Neither had set out to challenge timehonored customs, but their effect on the whole image of the British monarchy has been dramatic. Together, they’ve opened up a new line of questioning on an institution that must move with the times if it is to survive into the 21st century.
As mothers to the Queen’s grandchildren, they still have an important role to play in the lives of the next royal generation.
