Queen Camilla's Six-Word Stunner: Future Queen’s First Meeting With Prince William Had Royal Mistress Needing Some Reinforcements
A future Queen Camilla once quipped a six-word stunner of a phrase after first meeting a 16-year-old Prince William in 1998.
One weekend in June 1998, Prince William, 16, told his father, Prince Charles, heir to the throne, that he would be returning to York House, which apparently caught the future monarch "on the hop." Camilla, staying with Charles at the stately home, initially planned to leave but was convinced to stay. The future queen was about to meet a future king.
At that time, both Prince William and his brother, Prince Harry, were gradually introduced to Camilla by their father. The introduction that evening was part of Charles' efforts to integrate Camilla into the family and normalize her presence in their lives, especially considering the public and familial complexities surrounding her relationship with Charles.
Prince William was around 16 years old at the time of this first meeting with the woman who would become the queen his mother, Diana, Princess of Wales, was once destined to be. The process of meeting and accepting Camilla into the family was reportedly gradual and sensitive, given the circumstances surrounding their father's previous marriage to Diana.
The princess had not even been dead for a full year by the time Camilla met the future king, which was all part of a long-term plan by the Prince of Wales and his team to rehabilitate the mistress' image.
When the unlikely duo finally met, the future stepson got acquainted with his stepmom-to-be "for about an hour," royal author Penny Junor revealed in her new book, Queen Consort: The Life of Queen Camilla.
After the pair got to know one another privately, Her future Majesty jokingly quipped: "I need a gin and tonic."
In her research for the book, Junor spoke with PR guru Mark Bolland who told the scribe of both William and Harry: "It was difficult for them; it was a natural thing. You want your mum, you don't want her, and she had her own family. To be fair to Camilla, she never tried to be mummy, but she was the 'other woman' and she was there taking daddy's time."
In his 2023 memoir, Spare, Harry claimed that both he and William were "unhappy" about their father marrying "the other woman" in the spring of 2005.
Former royal butler Grant Harrold dished: "It was also complete nonsense that William and Harry were unhappy. I promise you that wasn't the case. I was there."
After nearly eight years following Diana's tragic death, the Prince of Wales, petitioned his mother, Queen Elizabeth II, to allow him to marry his mistress and his ex-wife's longtime rival. The duo were granted the right to wed in a registrar's office on April 9, 2005, with a "blessing service" afterward at St George's Chapel on the grounds of Windsor Castle.
Harry, who was only a few months removed from his worldwide scandal of wearing a Nazi uniform to a costume party, beamed with happiness and smiles alongside his brother, during the service.
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Daily Express reported on Junor's book.
