Author Reveals Camilla's Cheeky Quip When Asked to 'Help Out' a Mourning Queen Elizabeth
When Camilla offered to help after Prince Philip's death, royal author Gyles Brandreth claims Queen Elizabeth's steely personality blew her away.
The late Queen Elizabeth was known for her steely sense of duty, continuing to carry out engagements until she died in 2022. While many expected her to step back after Prince Philip died in 2021, royal author Gyles Brandreth said that the late monarch took a very different approach to mourning than her predecessors. According to him, when Queen Camilla offered to help, she quipped that she wasn't really needed, as the formidable Queen chose to focus on her responsibilities rather than wallowing over her husband's loss.
In his book, Elizabeth: An Intimate Portrait, Brandreth revealed that the Queen kept herself occupied after her husband's death by attending the October 2021 openings of the Scottish Parliament and the Welsh Senedd, with King Charles and Camilla by her side. He wrote that the then-Duchess of Cornwall had told him their presence was not really needed during those trips. She reportedly quipped, "'We weren't required, we were there to help out if necessary...The Queen did it all. She wanted to. She's unstoppable.'" Indeed, the royal author stressed that the Queen put so much energy into her duties during her mourning period that it sometimes went too far.
That being said, Brandreth penned that the Queen had one simple motto in dealing with her loss: "Life goes on. It has to." He continued, "In that period of six months, the late Queen did so much, so purposefully and with such a determination to not give way to any form of self-pity (which, she said, 'My husband would certainly have not approved of'), that she probably did too much." She also believed that no magic formula existed to transform 'sorrow into happiness,' but drowning herself in duties worked out well for her.
The late Duke of Edinburgh is said to have passed away peacefully at age 99 on April 9, 2021, without his wife by his side. In his new book, Queen Elizabeth II: A Personal History, serialized by The Daily Mail, royal author Hugo Vickers penned, "Due to Covid rules, the number of mourners at Philip's funeral was restricted to 30. Nothing would have delighted the Duke more than having such a pared-down farewell." Therefore, his funeral service at St. George's Chapel, 8 days later, saw the Queen sit alone, with her face sunk in despair. Upon her own death at 96, she was laid to rest beside him in the King George VI Memorial Chapel.
