Prince Philip, the irascible and tough-minded husband of Queen Elizabeth II who spent greater than seven a long time supporting his spouse in a task that each outlined and constricted his life, has died, Buckingham Palace stated Friday. He was 99.His life spanned practically a century of European historical past, beginning together with his delivery as a member of the Greek royal household and ending as Britain’s longest serving consort throughout a turbulent reign through which the thousand-year-old monarchy was compelled to reinvent itself for the 21st century.He was recognized for his sometimes deeply offensive remarks — and for gamely fulfilling greater than 20,000 royal engagements to spice up British pursuits at house and overseas. He headed tons of of charities, based packages that helped British schoolchildren take part in difficult out of doors adventures, and performed a distinguished half in elevating his 4 youngsters, together with his eldest son, Prince Charles, the inheritor to the throne.Philip spent a month within the hospital earlier this yr earlier than being launched on March 16.”It’s with deep sorrow that Her Majesty The Queen has introduced the dying of her beloved husband, His Royal Highness The Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh,” the palace stated. “His Royal Highness handed away peacefully this morning at Windsor Citadel.”Philip noticed his sole position as offering help for his spouse, who started her reign as Britain retreated from empire and steered the monarchy by a long time of declining social deference and U.Okay. energy into a contemporary world the place individuals demand intimacy from their icons.Within the 1970s, Michael Parker, an outdated navy pal and former non-public secretary of the prince, stated of him: “He informed me the primary day he provided me my job, that his job — first, second and final — was by no means to let her down.”Talking outdoors 10 Downing St., Prime Minister Boris Johnson famous the help Philip supplied to the queen, saying he “helped to steer the royal household and the monarchy in order that it stays an establishment indisputably important to the steadiness and happiness of our nationwide life.”The queen, a really non-public particular person not given to extravagant shows of affection, as soon as referred to as him “her rock” in public.In non-public, Philip referred to as his spouse Lilibet; however he referred to her in dialog with others as “The Queen.”Video above: British PM pays tribute to ‘steadfast’ Prince PhilipCondolences poured in Friday from statesmen and royals across the globe. German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier remembered Philip’s “poise, allure and wit” in addition to his contribution to the “liberation of Europe from Nazi terror.” Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi additionally famous his navy profession and that he was on the “forefront of many group service initiatives.””His vigorous character by no means ceased to go away an unforgettable impression,” the Dutch royal home tweeted. British politics was placed on pause, with figures from all events expressing condolences. The principle events suspended campaigning for subsequent month’s native and Scottish elections.Over the a long time, Philip’s picture modified from that of good-looking, dashing athlete to conceited and insensitive curmudgeon. In his later years, the picture lastly settled into that of droll and philosophical observer of the occasions, an aged, craggy-faced man who maintained his navy bearing regardless of illnesses.The favored Netflix sequence “The Crown” gave Philip a central position, with a barely racy, swashbuckling picture. He by no means commented on it in public, however the portrayal struck a chord with many Britons, together with youthful viewers who had solely recognized him as an aged man.Philip’s place was a difficult one — there isn’t a official position for the husband of a sovereign queen — and his life was marked by extraordinary contradictions between his private and non-private duties. He all the time walked three paces behind his spouse in public, in a present of deference to the monarch, however he performed a major position at house. Nonetheless, his son Charles, as inheritor to the throne, had a bigger revenue, in addition to entry to the high-level authorities papers Philip was not permitted to see.Philip usually took a wry strategy to his uncommon place on the royal desk.”Constitutionally, I don’t exist,” stated Philip, who in 2009 grew to become the longest-serving consort in British historical past, surpassing Queen Charlotte, who married King George III within the18th century.He often struggled to seek out his place — a friction that will later be echoed in his grandson Prince Harry’s resolution to surrender royal duties.”There was no precedent,” he stated in a uncommon interview with the BBC to mark his 90th birthday. “If I requested someone, ‘What do you count on me to do?’ all of them regarded clean.”Key occasions within the lifetime of Prince PhilipBut having given up a promising naval profession to change into consort when Elizabeth grew to become queen at age 25, Philip was not content material to remain on the sidelines and luxuriate in a lifetime of ease and wealth. He promoted British trade and science, espoused environmental preservation lengthy earlier than it grew to become modern, and traveled extensively and often in help of his many charities.In these frequent public appearances, Philip developed a fame for being impatient and demanding and was typically blunt to the purpose of rudeness.Many Britons appreciated what they noticed as his propensity to talk his thoughts, whereas others criticized conduct they labeled racist, sexist or out of contact.In 1995, for instance, he requested a Scottish driving teacher, “How do you retain the natives off the booze lengthy sufficient to move the take a look at?” Seven years later in Australia, when visiting Aboriginal individuals with the queen, he requested: “Do you continue to throw spears at one another?” On one go to to a navy barracks, he requested a sea cadet teacher if she labored in a strip membership.Many imagine his propensity to talk his thoughts meant he supplied wanted, unvarnished recommendation to the queen.”The best way that he survived within the British monarchy system was to be his personal man, and that was a supply of help to the queen,” stated royal historian Robert Lacey. “All her life she was surrounded by males who stated, ‘sure ma’am,’ and he was one man who all the time informed her the way it actually was, or not less than how he noticed it.”Lacey stated on the time of the royal household’s troublesome relations with Princess Diana after her marriage to Charles broke down, Philip spoke for the household with authority, displaying that he didn’t robotically defer to the queen.Philip’s relationship with Diana grew to become difficult as her separation from Charles and their eventual divorce performed out in a sequence of public battles that broken the monarchy’s standing.It was extensively assumed that he was essential of Diana’s use of broadcast interviews, together with one through which she accused Charles of infidelity. However letters between Philip and Diana launched after her dying confirmed that the older man was at occasions supportive of his daughter-in-law.After Diana’s dying in a automotive crash in Paris in 1997, Philip needed to endure allegations by former Harrods proprietor Mohamed Al Fayed that he had plotted the princess’s dying. Al Fayed’s son, Dodi, additionally died within the crash.Throughout a prolonged inquest into their deaths, a senior decide appearing as coroner instructed the jury that there was no proof to help the allegations towards Philip, who didn’t publicly reply to Al Fayed’s prices.Philip’s last years had been clouded by controversy and fissures within the royal household.His third little one, Prince Andrew, was embroiled in scandal over his friendship with Jeffrey Epstein, an American financier who died in a New York jail in 2019 whereas awaiting trial on intercourse trafficking prices.U.S. authorities accused Andrew of rebuffing their request to interview him as a witness, and Andrew confronted accusations from a lady who stated that she had a number of sexual encounters with the prince at Epstein’s behest. He denied the declare however withdrew from public royal duties amid the scandal.Firstly of 2020, Philip’s grandson Harry and his spouse, the American former actress Meghan Markle, introduced they had been quitting royal duties and shifting to North America to flee intense media scrutiny that they discovered insufferable.Final month, they gave an explosive interview to Oprah Winfrey, saying that Meghan had suffered neglect and racist attitudes whereas a working member of the household. The palace referred to as the problems raised by the couple “regarding” and stated they’d be “addressed by the household privately.”Born June 10, 1921, on the eating room desk at his mother and father’ house on the Greek island of Corfu, Philip was the fifth little one and solely son of Prince Andrew, youthful brother of the king of Greece. His grandfather had come from Denmark through the 1860s to be adopted by Greece because the nation’s monarch.Philip’s mom was Princess Alice of Battenberg, a descendent of German princes. Like his future spouse, Elizabeth, Philip was additionally a great-great-grandchild of Queen Victoria.When Philip was 18 months outdated, his mother and father fled to France. His father, a military commander, had been tried after a devastating navy defeat by the Turks. After British intervention, the Greek junta agreed to not sentence Andrew to dying if he left the nation.The household was not precisely poor however, Philip stated: “We weren’t properly off” — and so they obtained by with assist from family members. He later introduced solely his navy pay to a wedding with one of many world’s richest ladies.Philip’s mother and father drifted aside when he was a toddler, and Andrew died in Monte Carlo in 1944. Alice based a spiritual order that didn’t succeed and spent her outdated age at Buckingham Palace. A reclusive determine, usually wearing a nun’s behavior, she was little seen by the British public. She died in 1969 and was posthumously honored by Britain and Israel for sheltering a Jewish household in Nazi-occupied Athens through the warfare.Philip went to highschool in Britain and entered Britannia Royal Naval Faculty Dartmouth as a cadet in 1939. He obtained his first posting in 1940 however was not allowed close to the principle warfare zone as a result of he was a international prince of a impartial nation. When the Italian invasion of Greece ended that neutrality, he joined the warfare, serving on battleships within the Indian Ocean, the Mediterranean and the Pacific.On go away in Britain, he visited his royal cousins, and, by the top of warfare, it was clear he was courting Princess Elizabeth, eldest little one and inheritor of King George VI. Their engagement was introduced July 10, 1947, and so they had been married on Nov. 20.After an preliminary flurry of disapproval that Elizabeth was marrying a foreigner, Philip’s athletic expertise, beauty and straight speak lent a definite glamour to the royal household.Elizabeth beamed in his presence, and so they had a son and daughter whereas she was nonetheless freed from the obligations of serving as monarch.However King George VI died of most cancers in 1952 at age 56.Philip had to surrender his naval profession, and his subservient standing was formally sealed on the coronation, when he knelt earlier than his spouse and pledged to change into “her liege man of life and limb, and of earthly worship.”The change in Philip’s life was dramatic.”Inside the home, and no matter we did, it was collectively,” Philip informed biographer Basil Boothroyd of the years earlier than Elizabeth grew to become queen. “Folks used to come back to me and ask me what to do. In 1952, the entire thing modified, very, very significantly.”Mentioned Boothroyd: “He had a selection between simply tagging alongside, the second handshake within the receiving line, or discovering different retailers for his bursting energies.”So Philip took over administration of the royal estates and expanded his travels to all corners of the world, constructing a task for himself.From 1956, he was Patron and Chairman of Trustees for the most important youth exercise program in Britain, the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award, a program of sensible, cultural and adventurous actions for younger those that exists in over 100 international locations. Hundreds of thousands of British youngsters have had some contact with the award and its well-known tenting expeditions.He painted, collected trendy artwork, was keen on industrial design and deliberate a backyard at Windsor Citadel. However, he as soon as stated, “the humanities world thinks of me as an uncultured, polo-playing clot.”In time, the well-known blond hair thinned and the lengthy, fine-boned face acquired a couple of strains. He gave up polo however remained trim and vigorous.To a pal’s suggestion that he ease up a bit, the prince is claimed to have replied, “Effectively, what would I do? Sit round and knit?”However when he turned 90 in 2011, Philip informed the BBC he was “winding down” his workload and he reckoned he had “carried out my bit.”The subsequent few years noticed occasional hospital stays as Philip’s well being flagged.He introduced in Might 2017 that he deliberate to step again from royal duties, and he stopped scheduling new commitments — after roughly 22,000 royal engagements since his spouse’s coronation. In 2019, he gave up his driver’s license after a critical automotive crash.Philip is survived by the queen and their 4 youngsters — Prince Charles, Princess Anne, Prince Andrew and Prince Edward — in addition to eight grandchildren and 10 great-grandchildren.The grandchildren are Charles’ sons, Prince William and Prince Harry; Anne’s youngsters, Peter and Zara Phillips; Andrew’s daughters, Princess Beatrice and Princess Eugenie; and Edward’s youngsters, Woman Louise and Viscount Severn.The good-grandchildren are William and Kate’s youngsters, Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis; Harry and Meghan’s son, Archie; Savannah and Isla, the daughters of Peter Phillips and his spouse, Autumn; Mia, Lena and Lucas, the youngsters of Zara Phillips and her husband, Mike Tindall; and Eugenie’s son, August, together with her husband, Jack Brooksbank.___This story has been corrected to point out that the queen and Philip have 10 great-grandchildren, not 9. It has additionally been corrected to point out that the queen and he are great-great-grandchildren of Queen Victoria, not great-grandchildren.___Katz and Related Press author Robert Barr contributed to this report earlier than their deaths.
Prince Philip, the irascible and tough-minded husband of Queen Elizabeth II who spent greater than seven a long time supporting his spouse in a task that each outlined and constricted his life, has died, Buckingham Palace stated Friday. He was 99.
His life spanned practically a century of European historical past, beginning together with his delivery as a member of the Greek royal household and ending as Britain’s longest serving consort throughout a turbulent reign through which the thousand-year-old monarchy was compelled to reinvent itself for the 21st century.
He was recognized for his sometimes deeply offensive remarks — and for gamely fulfilling greater than 20,000 royal engagements to spice up British pursuits at house and overseas. He headed tons of of charities, based packages that helped British schoolchildren take part in difficult out of doors adventures, and performed a distinguished half in elevating his 4 youngsters, together with his eldest son, Prince Charles, the inheritor to the throne.
Philip spent a month within the hospital earlier this yr earlier than being launched on March 16.
“It’s with deep sorrow that Her Majesty The Queen has introduced the dying of her beloved husband, His Royal Highness The Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh,” the palace stated. “His Royal Highness handed away peacefully this morning at Windsor Citadel.”
Philip noticed his sole position as offering help for his spouse, who started her reign as Britain retreated from empire and steered the monarchy by a long time of declining social deference and U.Okay. energy into a contemporary world the place individuals demand intimacy from their icons.
Within the 1970s, Michael Parker, an outdated navy pal and former non-public secretary of the prince, stated of him: “He informed me the primary day he provided me my job, that his job — first, second and final — was by no means to let her down.”
Talking outdoors 10 Downing St., Prime Minister Boris Johnson famous the help Philip supplied to the queen, saying he “helped to steer the royal household and the monarchy in order that it stays an establishment indisputably important to the steadiness and happiness of our nationwide life.”
The queen, a really non-public particular person not given to extravagant shows of affection, as soon as referred to as him “her rock” in public.
In non-public, Philip referred to as his spouse Lilibet; however he referred to her in dialog with others as “The Queen.”
Video above: British PM pays tribute to ‘steadfast’ Prince Philip
Condolences poured in Friday from statesmen and royals across the globe. German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier remembered Philip’s “poise, allure and wit” in addition to his contribution to the “liberation of Europe from Nazi terror.” Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi additionally famous his navy profession and that he was on the “forefront of many group service initiatives.”
“His vigorous character by no means ceased to go away an unforgettable impression,” the Dutch royal home tweeted. British politics was placed on pause, with figures from all events expressing condolences. The principle events suspended campaigning for subsequent month’s native and Scottish elections.
Over the a long time, Philip’s picture modified from that of good-looking, dashing athlete to conceited and insensitive curmudgeon. In his later years, the picture lastly settled into that of droll and philosophical observer of the occasions, an aged, craggy-faced man who maintained his navy bearing regardless of illnesses.
The favored Netflix sequence “The Crown” gave Philip a central position, with a barely racy, swashbuckling picture. He by no means commented on it in public, however the portrayal struck a chord with many Britons, together with youthful viewers who had solely recognized him as an aged man.
Philip’s place was a difficult one — there isn’t a official position for the husband of a sovereign queen — and his life was marked by extraordinary contradictions between his private and non-private duties. He all the time walked three paces behind his spouse in public, in a present of deference to the monarch, however he performed a major position at house. Nonetheless, his son Charles, as inheritor to the throne, had a bigger revenue, in addition to entry to the high-level authorities papers Philip was not permitted to see.
Philip usually took a wry strategy to his uncommon place on the royal desk.
“Constitutionally, I don’t exist,” stated Philip, who in 2009 grew to become the longest-serving consort in British historical past, surpassing Queen Charlotte, who married King George III within the18th century.
He often struggled to seek out his place — a friction that will later be echoed in his grandson Prince Harry’s resolution to surrender royal duties.”There was no precedent,” he stated in a uncommon interview with the BBC to mark his 90th birthday. “If I requested someone, ‘What do you count on me to do?’ all of them regarded clean.”
Key occasions within the lifetime of Prince Philip
However having given up a promising naval profession to change into consort when Elizabeth grew to become queen at age 25, Philip was not content material to remain on the sidelines and luxuriate in a lifetime of ease and wealth. He promoted British trade and science, espoused environmental preservation lengthy earlier than it grew to become modern, and traveled extensively and often in help of his many charities.
In these frequent public appearances, Philip developed a fame for being impatient and demanding and was typically blunt to the purpose of rudeness.
Many Britons appreciated what they noticed as his propensity to talk his thoughts, whereas others criticized conduct they labeled racist, sexist or out of contact.
In 1995, for instance, he requested a Scottish driving teacher, “How do you retain the natives off the booze lengthy sufficient to move the take a look at?” Seven years later in Australia, when visiting Aboriginal individuals with the queen, he requested: “Do you continue to throw spears at one another?” On one go to to a navy barracks, he requested a sea cadet teacher if she labored in a strip membership.
Many imagine his propensity to talk his thoughts meant he supplied wanted, unvarnished recommendation to the queen.
“The best way that he survived within the British monarchy system was to be his personal man, and that was a supply of help to the queen,” stated royal historian Robert Lacey. “All her life she was surrounded by males who stated, ‘sure ma’am,’ and he was one man who all the time informed her the way it actually was, or not less than how he noticed it.”
Lacey stated on the time of the royal household’s troublesome relations with Princess Diana after her marriage to Charles broke down, Philip spoke for the household with authority, displaying that he didn’t robotically defer to the queen.
Philip’s relationship with Diana grew to become difficult as her separation from Charles and their eventual divorce performed out in a sequence of public battles that broken the monarchy’s standing.
It was extensively assumed that he was essential of Diana’s use of broadcast interviews, together with one through which she accused Charles of infidelity. However letters between Philip and Diana launched after her dying confirmed that the older man was at occasions supportive of his daughter-in-law.
After Diana’s dying in a automotive crash in Paris in 1997, Philip needed to endure allegations by former Harrods proprietor Mohamed Al Fayed that he had plotted the princess’s dying. Al Fayed’s son, Dodi, additionally died within the crash.
Throughout a prolonged inquest into their deaths, a senior decide appearing as coroner instructed the jury that there was no proof to help the allegations towards Philip, who didn’t publicly reply to Al Fayed’s prices.
Philip’s last years had been clouded by controversy and fissures within the royal household.
His third little one, Prince Andrew, was embroiled in scandal over his friendship with Jeffrey Epstein, an American financier who died in a New York jail in 2019 whereas awaiting trial on intercourse trafficking prices.
U.S. authorities accused Andrew of rebuffing their request to interview him as a witness, and Andrew confronted accusations from a lady who stated that she had a number of sexual encounters with the prince at Epstein’s behest. He denied the declare however withdrew from public royal duties amid the scandal.
Firstly of 2020, Philip’s grandson Harry and his spouse, the American former actress Meghan Markle, introduced they had been quitting royal duties and shifting to North America to flee intense media scrutiny that they discovered insufferable.
Final month, they gave an explosive interview to Oprah Winfrey, saying that Meghan had suffered neglect and racist attitudes whereas a working member of the household. The palace referred to as the problems raised by the couple “regarding” and stated they’d be “addressed by the household privately.”
Born June 10, 1921, on the eating room desk at his mother and father’ house on the Greek island of Corfu, Philip was the fifth little one and solely son of Prince Andrew, youthful brother of the king of Greece. His grandfather had come from Denmark through the 1860s to be adopted by Greece because the nation’s monarch.
Philip’s mom was Princess Alice of Battenberg, a descendent of German princes. Like his future spouse, Elizabeth, Philip was additionally a great-great-grandchild of Queen Victoria.
When Philip was 18 months outdated, his mother and father fled to France. His father, a military commander, had been tried after a devastating navy defeat by the Turks. After British intervention, the Greek junta agreed to not sentence Andrew to dying if he left the nation.
The household was not precisely poor however, Philip stated: “We weren’t properly off” — and so they obtained by with assist from family members. He later introduced solely his navy pay to a wedding with one of many world’s richest ladies.
Philip’s mother and father drifted aside when he was a toddler, and Andrew died in Monte Carlo in 1944. Alice based a spiritual order that didn’t succeed and spent her outdated age at Buckingham Palace. A reclusive determine, usually wearing a nun’s behavior, she was little seen by the British public. She died in 1969 and was posthumously honored by Britain and Israel for sheltering a Jewish household in Nazi-occupied Athens through the warfare.
Philip went to highschool in Britain and entered Britannia Royal Naval Faculty Dartmouth as a cadet in 1939. He obtained his first posting in 1940 however was not allowed close to the principle warfare zone as a result of he was a international prince of a impartial nation. When the Italian invasion of Greece ended that neutrality, he joined the warfare, serving on battleships within the Indian Ocean, the Mediterranean and the Pacific.
On go away in Britain, he visited his royal cousins, and, by the top of warfare, it was clear he was courting Princess Elizabeth, eldest little one and inheritor of King George VI. Their engagement was introduced July 10, 1947, and so they had been married on Nov. 20.
After an preliminary flurry of disapproval that Elizabeth was marrying a foreigner, Philip’s athletic expertise, beauty and straight speak lent a definite glamour to the royal household.
Elizabeth beamed in his presence, and so they had a son and daughter whereas she was nonetheless freed from the obligations of serving as monarch.
However King George VI died of most cancers in 1952 at age 56.
Philip had to surrender his naval profession, and his subservient standing was formally sealed on the coronation, when he knelt earlier than his spouse and pledged to change into “her liege man of life and limb, and of earthly worship.”
The change in Philip’s life was dramatic.
“Inside the home, and no matter we did, it was collectively,” Philip informed biographer Basil Boothroyd of the years earlier than Elizabeth grew to become queen. “Folks used to come back to me and ask me what to do. In 1952, the entire thing modified, very, very significantly.”
Mentioned Boothroyd: “He had a selection between simply tagging alongside, the second handshake within the receiving line, or discovering different retailers for his bursting energies.”
So Philip took over administration of the royal estates and expanded his travels to all corners of the world, constructing a task for himself.
From 1956, he was Patron and Chairman of Trustees for the most important youth exercise program in Britain, the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award, a program of sensible, cultural and adventurous actions for younger those that exists in over 100 international locations. Hundreds of thousands of British youngsters have had some contact with the award and its well-known tenting expeditions.
He painted, collected trendy artwork, was keen on industrial design and deliberate a backyard at Windsor Citadel. However, he as soon as stated, “the humanities world thinks of me as an uncultured, polo-playing clot.”
In time, the well-known blond hair thinned and the lengthy, fine-boned face acquired a couple of strains. He gave up polo however remained trim and vigorous.
To a pal’s suggestion that he ease up a bit, the prince is claimed to have replied, “Effectively, what would I do? Sit round and knit?”
However when he turned 90 in 2011, Philip informed the BBC he was “winding down” his workload and he reckoned he had “carried out my bit.”
The subsequent few years noticed occasional hospital stays as Philip’s well being flagged.
He introduced in Might 2017 that he deliberate to step again from royal duties, and he stopped scheduling new commitments — after roughly 22,000 royal engagements since his spouse’s coronation. In 2019, he gave up his driver’s license after a critical automotive crash.
Philip is survived by the queen and their 4 youngsters — Prince Charles, Princess Anne, Prince Andrew and Prince Edward — in addition to eight grandchildren and 10 great-grandchildren.
The grandchildren are Charles’ sons, Prince William and Prince Harry; Anne’s youngsters, Peter and Zara Phillips; Andrew’s daughters, Princess Beatrice and Princess Eugenie; and Edward’s youngsters, Woman Louise and Viscount Severn.
The good-grandchildren are William and Kate’s youngsters, Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis; Harry and Meghan’s son, Archie; Savannah and Isla, the daughters of Peter Phillips and his spouse, Autumn; Mia, Lena and Lucas, the youngsters of Zara Phillips and her husband, Mike Tindall; and Eugenie’s son, August, together with her husband, Jack Brooksbank.
___
This story has been corrected to point out that the queen and Philip have 10 great-grandchildren, not 9. It has additionally been corrected to point out that the queen and he are great-great-grandchildren of Queen Victoria, not great-grandchildren.
___
Katz and Related Press author Robert Barr contributed to this report earlier than their deaths.