King Charles and Queen Camilla's 'unconventional' love story from first meet to low-key wedding
Charles and Camilla had to postpone their wedding dayKing Charles and Queen Camilla have been married for 20 years, but how and where did they meet all those years ago? The married couple knew each other for decades before finally tying the knot, and their love story, unconventional as it has been, saw many complications.
Although King Charles and Camilla are celebrating their 20th wedding anniversary, their relationship actually stretches back decades beyond that, to the 1970s. This was before Princess Diana, Camilla’s husband Andrew Parker Bowles and the scandals in between.
We take a look back at their relationship, why it failed the first time around and how the royals ended up where they are now.
How did Camilla and Charles meet?
It’s believed King Charles first laid eyes on the future Queen Camilla at a polo match in 1970, in London’s Windsor Great Park, without knowing what was in store in the years that would follow after they did meet.
At the time, Camilla was with Andrew Parker Bowles, on and off, a captain with The Blues and Royals regiment of the British Army. Being the daughter of a military officer, their paths crossed.
Sources say she even cracked a joke about one of her relatives having an affair with one of Charles’: “My great-grandmother was the mistress of your great-great-grandfather. I feel we have something in common”.
Whereas Charles at the time was a young Prince of Wales, only having being formally invested in the title the year before. The young prince had graduated from Cambridge University and finished his RAF training.
They would go on to date for two years, but decided to part ways when Charles left to join the Navy for eight months – most heirs to the British throne complete an act of service – and Camilla ended up rekindling her romance with Andrew. When he returned, she was engaged. Camilla and Andrew tied the knot in 1973, and would go on to have two children, Tom and Laura.
But there were no hard feelings, Charles and Camilla remain friends, and the prince even became Tom’s godfather.
Charles meets Lady Diana Spencer
At 31 years old, several years later, the prince begins dating 18-year-old Lady Diana Spencer after briefly seeing her older sister Sarah.
At the time, Lady Sarah Spencer took credit for being match-maker, saying: “I introduced them – I’m Cupid”.
The couple were together for a year before he proposed, and their wedding took place in the summer of 1981. They went on to have two sons together, Prince William and later Harry.
But the cracks begin to show a few years later, with reports King Charles’ affair with Queen Camilla starting in 1986 – 16 years after their first meet. Diana and Charles later separated in 1992.
The following year, the future king admits he was unfaithful to his wife in an interview, and Camilla divorces Andrew in 1995. It’s the same year that Princess Diana told Panorama in her infamous interview that Camilla was the “third person” in their marriage.
Following the fallout of the affair being made public, Charles allowed a documentary filmmaker to follow him for 18 months.
But it was during this film that he admitted what happened. When Jonathan Dimbleby asks the prince if he was “faithful and honourable” to Diana, he replies: “Yes, yes…Until it became irretrievably broken down, us both having tried.”
Why was Charles forbidden to marry Camilla?
Royal author Sally Bedell Smith writes Camilla’s dating history made it impossible for the pair to be officially together.
In Prince Charles: The Passions and Paradoxes of an Improbably Life, she says Patricia Mountbatten, a relative of the monarch, explained why.
There were reported concerns on whether Camilla would be an appropriate bride for the heir to the throne, due to old-fashioned beliefs the bride should have no past dating history.
Bedell Smith wrote: “The conventions of the time called for the heir to the British throne to marry a woman who at least appeared to be virginal.”
Although Charles went off overseas for Navy training and Camilla moved on, he was still heartbroken. The prince reportedly wrote to his friend and mentor, Lord Mountbatten, at the time: “I suppose this feeling of emptiness will pass eventually”.
However, their love story wasn’t finished being written.
How long did Charles wait to marry Camilla?
Charles and Camilla publicly announce their relationship in 1999, almost 20 years after meeting at that polo match, and two more decades before they are crowned king and queen.
While throwing a birthday party for her sister at the Ritz Hotel, the pair leave the party together in front of reporters and photographers. It was the first appearance of the couple in public.
Later, they enjoy a holiday in Greece with his teenage sons, Prince William and Harry.
It’s believed the late Queen did not approve of their relationship to begin with, denying attending Charles’ 50th birthday party in 1998 because she would be there. However, it settled down, and she did accept an invitation to a royal event at Highgrove in 2000 despite Camilla being in attendance. It’s said that this was a sign she did approve of their relationship.
Did the Queen go to Charles and Camilla’s wedding?
As 2003 rolls around, they are living together in Clarence House, and two years later they announce they are engaged – 35 years after they first met.
On April 8, 2005, King Charles and Queen Camilla get married in a civil ceremony with Prince William as best man. They wanted a low-key affair and didn’t have a sit-down dinner, or a formal wedding breakfast either.
The Queen did not attend the wedding itself, and her husband Prince Philip also chose to not show up on the big day. Although, did host a reception later on, as well as a private blessing at St George’s Chapel.
Camilla is gifted the title as the Duchess of Cornwall.
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How old were Camilla and Charles when they married?
In 2005, King Charles was 56 years old when he married Camilla, and the now Queen Consort was age 57. Their relationship had been public for six years at the time.
In 1970, the year they would meet, Camilla was 23 years old and Charles, the British heir, was 22.
Now, His Majesty is 76 years old, and his wife Camilla is 77.
The couple had to postpone their wedding
The duo announced their wedding in February 2005, planning for it to take place on April 8 the same year.
However, just days before, the palace revealed Charles and Camilla were forced to change their wedding date. This was so the then Prince of Wales could attend the funeral of Pope John Paul II as a representative of the Queen.
The wedding was pushed back by a day, to April 9, also allowing some of the guests who were invited to the funeral to also attend the wedding.
Read more: King Charles and Queen Camilla agreeing to have ‘two homes’ is the ‘key’ to strong marriage
Not everyone was happy with their marriage
Their union wasn’t smooth sailing for all members of the royal family, with Prince Harry writing about his feelings over their marriage in his memoir Spare.
He revealed he had begged his father not to marry Camilla, which he ignored.
Harry wrote:”Willy and I promised Pa that we’d welcome Camilla into the family. The only thing we asked in return was that he not marry her. You don’t need to remarry, we pleaded.
“A wedding would cause controversy. It would incite the press. It would make the whole country, the whole world, talk about Mummy, compare Mummy and Camilla, and nobody wanted that. Least of all Camilla. We support you, we said. We endorse Camilla, we said. Just please don’t marry her. Just be together, Pa.”
The Duke of Sussex also expanded on his feelings in an interview with Anderson Cooper, where he said: “We didn’t think [getting married] was necessary.
“We thought that it was going to cause more harm than good and that if he was now with his person, that — surely that’s enough?”
“Why go that far when you don’t necessarily need to? We wanted him to be happy. And we saw how happy he was with her. So, at the time, it was, ‘Ok’.”
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