THE TRUE STORY OF HOW PRINCE CHARLES FOCUSED ON DIANA SPENCER
In the fourth season of 'The Crown', we will see how they met in Diana's family home. She is dressed as a forest nymph while rehearsing 'A Midsummer Night's Dream', but was that really how it happened?
We're longing for more descriptions of some real historical moments, which is why we are preparing to see the fourth season of The Crown series which begins in the late 1970s where the previous season ended. Thus, one of the main stories will be the presentation of Lady Diana Spencer and her relationship with Prince Charles, from the first days to the tragic end.
With that in mind, we share the true story of how Prince Charles and Lady Diana met when he was 29 and she was just 16, and how a chance meeting three years later sparked a union that would go down in history.
A teenage encounter with the prince
It was in 1977 when Lady Diana Spencer, then 16 years old, first met 29-year-old Prince Charles. Carlos attended as the guest of Diana's older sister, Lady Sarah McCorquodale, a hunting party in Althorp, home of the Spencer family. Carlos at that time was dating Sarah and, in that period, Sarah supposedly shared her affair with two journalists in front of whom she admitted to having an eating disorder, “several boyfriends” and assuring that she would not marry Carlos “even if he was a recycler or the king of England ”. According to sources, the relationship ended shortly after Carlos saw the article and said, "You just did something incredibly stupid."
While her sister didn't get carried away by Prince Charles, it was a different story for Diana. In The Diana Chronicles, Tina Brown wrote that Diana told her friends that one day she would marry the prince, as he would be "the only man on the planet who would not be allowed to divorce me." She later confessed to biographer Andrew Morton, author of Diana: Her True Story, that her first thoughts about Carlos were not very effusive. She remembered thinking, "God, what a sad man."
During the interview he gave after their engagement in 1981, the prince said: “I remember thinking how happy, funny and attractive she was at 16; very funny, lively and full of life ”.
A meeting in Sussex
It was not until three years after that first meeting that Carlos and Diana saw each other again. In July 1980, the two were invited to a weekend barbecue at their friend Philip's house in Sussex.
“Some friends asked me to stay with them in Sussex and they said, 'The Prince of Wales is going to be there' and I thought I hadn't seen him in years, Diana told her public speaking teacher on a tape used at the documentary Diana: In Her Own Words by Channel 4.
She added: “He had just broken up with his girlfriend and his friend Mountbatten had been murdered. I thought it would be good to see it. I was unimpressed. I sat there and this man came in and I thought, "Well, now I am quite impressed." I was different ”.
According to Diana herself, she also enchanted Carlos. She revealed on the tapes, “She was absorbed in me,” adding, “We were talking about Mountbatten and her girlfriend and I said,“ You must be so lonely. It's horrible to see you walking down the hall with Mountbatten's coffin, horrible, you need someone by your side. Then she lunged at me and started kissing me; I thought, "Ugh, this is not what normal people do"; and he was on top of me for the rest of the night, following me like a puppy. "
Diana also revealed how difficult those early days were, how difficult dating a prince was: “It was not consistent with her courtship. She called me every day for a week, and then she didn't talk to me for three weeks. Very weird, I thought, “Good. Well, he knows where I am if he wants me. "The excitement when he used to call was immense and intense; the other three girls on my floor were going crazy."
Diana spent a weekend at Balmoral as a guest of Prince Charles, and a tabloid headline on September 8, 1980 published: "He's in Love Again." Thus the news of the incipient romance spread to the rest of the world.
The couple reportedly communicated primarily through phone calls during those early days, and sources say they only saw each other 13 times before Carlos proposed to her.
A real commitment
Diana and Carlos are said to have dated for about six months before the prince knelt down. On February 24, 1981, Buckingham Palace announced the news with a statement: “With the pleasure that the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh announce the engagement of their beloved son, the Prince of Wales, to Lady Diana Spencer, daughter of the Earl Spencer and the Honorable Mrs. Shand Kydd ”.
Carlos had asked the question just three weeks ago and in the BBC Radio engagement interview he said: "She had been planning to go with her mother to Australia for quite some time, so I thought, 'Well, I'll ask her so I have a chance to think about it when be out and decide if you can support the whole idea, or not, as the case may be ”. However, Diana said yes "immediately".
When Diana was asked how she would cope with her role she replied, "Well, naturally, it is quite overwhelming, but I hope it is not too difficult, and with Prince Charles by my side I cannot go wrong."
According to an article written at the time by The Guardian, Diana's sister, Lady Sarah, revealed to reporters: “I introduced them. I am Cupid ”.
The future Princess of Wales later spoke about the "gruesome" engagement interview, telling her biographer: "This ridiculous (newscast) said, 'Are you in love?' I thought, "What a complicated question," and said, "Yes, of course we are." Carlos turned around and said, "Whatever love means." That completely baffled me and I thought, "What a strange answer." That episode traumatized me. "
Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer were married in St. Paul's Cathedral on July 29, 1981, just over five months after the official announcement of their engagement. The wedding, which was seen by 750 million people around the world, was called by Debrett's "the last great state event of the 20th century."
Of course, they had children: Prince William, heir to the throne, and Prince Harry, but their relationship began to break down in the late 1980s, and by 1992 the couple had already separated, although the official divorce took place in nineteen ninety six.
