Bold and dutiful Prince Philip: Remembering the Queen’s strongest support
Prince Philip: A Lifetime of Devotion and Duty
For over seven decades, Prince Philip stood as the Queen’s unwavering support and great love through triumphs and trials. William Langley reflects on the devoted duke’s remarkable journey of service.
Their Enduring Bond
Their lives intertwined for more than 80 years, marked by love, war, and an unyielding sense of duty. Even the most extraordinary marriage of our times had to reach an end, and when it did, Prince Philip and the Queen were still side by side.
The 94-year-old sovereign personally oversaw her husband’s last days, ensuring his comfort and rejecting suggestions that he might be taken back into hospital. She was at his bedside when he passed away peacefully in his private apartment at Windsor Castle, as he had wished.
A Great Romance
The story of Philip and Elizabeth was a sweeping saga of history and success, but also a great romance. It began when they were teenagers, before World War II, and continued through decades of adventure, exhilaration, and sometimes crisis, until the duke’s death on April 9, at the age of 99.
The Queen’s tribute on their golden wedding anniversary in 1997 was poignant: “He is someone who doesn’t take easily to compliments, but he has, quite simply, been my strength and stay all these years. I and his whole family, and this and many other countries, owe him a greater debt than he would ever claim or we shall ever know.”
Final Days Together
Although Philip’s health had been in gradual decline, he and the Queen were able to spend more time together in recent months. After his retirement from public duties in 2017, the duke lived mostly in a cottage on the Sandringham estate, while the Queen carried on in London. The pandemic saw them both return to Windsor, and royal sources say the couple delighted in being back together.
Famously averse to illness, Philip was unsentimental about the prospect of death. Some years ago, his friend and biographer, Gyles Brandreth, asked him if he would like to reach 100. “Good God, no,” spluttered the duke. “I can’t imagine anything worse.”
A Remarkable Life
Philip’s death marked the end of a truly remarkable life. He was the ultimate consort, the reassuring presence always two steps behind the Queen. Yet, at the end of their long, devoted life together, he remained much as he was at the start—a faintly mysterious and misunderstood figure, who almost no one could claim to know well.
Philip arrived in Britain as a displaced aristocrat in an era following the collapse of many of Europe’s great royal houses. His parents, Prince Andrew of Greece and Denmark and Princess Alice of Battenberg, had seen the monarchies of Germany, Austria, and Russia toppled. In 1922, they were driven into exile by political turmoil. A year earlier, Philip—their only son—was born on the kitchen table of their seaside villa on the island of Corfu.
For more information on Prince Philip’s life and legacy, you can visit this authoritative source.
