LONDON — Prince Philip, Queen Elizabeth II’s husband and the longest-serving consort of any British monarch, has died (*99*) age 99.
An announcement posted on the royal household’s web site Friday morning mentioned: “It is with deep sorrow that Her Majesty The Queen proclaims the dying of her beloved husband, His Royal Highness The Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh.
“His Royal Highness handed away peacefully this morning (*99*) Windsor Castle. Further bulletins will made in the end. The Royal Family be a part of with individuals around the globe in mourning his loss.”
Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, who died on Friday, visits a university in Richmond, London, in 2015.Matt Dunham / WPA Pool through Getty Images
Philip spent 65 years supporting the queen, retiring from his public function in 2017 and staying largely out of the view since. In his lively years, he helped set a brand new course for the monarchy underneath a younger queen, championing Britain itself, in addition to environmental causes, science and know-how.
Philip’s relationship with the younger Princess Elizabeth started as a narrative of younger love.
“We behave as if we had belonged to one another for years,” Elizabeth wrote in a letter to her mother and father shortly after they married.
Over the years, the queen acknowledged Philip’s deep affect on her, calling him her “power and keep” in a speech on their fiftieth marriage ceremony anniversary in 1997.
Then Princess Elizabeth after which Philip Mountbatten throughout their engagement in July 1947.PA through AP
“I, and his entire household, and this and lots of different international locations, owe him a debt higher than he would ever declare or we will ever know,” she mentioned (*99*) the time.
The intensely non-public prince will seemingly be remembered for his early efforts to assist modernize the royal household’s picture throughout a time of nice change for Britain and the world, particularly (*99*) the outset of Elizabeth’s reign in 1952. He additionally developed a fame for the occasional brusque remark and crass, if not racist jokes.
“The queen inherited from her father a mannequin of monarchy that was very fingers off, old style and barely invisible,” mentioned Sarah Gristwood, a historian and the writer of “Elizabeth: The Queen and the Crown.”
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“It wasn’t outfitted to take care of a brand new media age, and Prince Philip performed an enormous function in transferring it ahead then.”
Philip helped deliver the royals to life on tv moderately than by means of radio experiences. He was the primary member of the royal household to do a televised interview and he introduced a present on a royal tour of the Commonwealth. He can be mentioned to have had a hand in televising the queen’s coronation in 1953 and in organizing a groundbreaking 1969 tv documentary concerning the household.
Prince Philip (*99*) work on one of his hobbies, portray, in a scene from the tv documentary ‘Royal Family’ on June 19, 1969.Keystone / Hulton Archive/Getty Images
“He helped create the mannequin of the British royal household that has enabled it to proceed ahead into the twenty first century,” Gristwood mentioned. “We might have misplaced sight of that now, however I hope we’ll bear in mind him for it.”
Despite being born right into a royal household, Philip’s early childhood was not usually royal.
Born on June 10, 1921, on the Greek island of Corfu, he was the one son of Prince Andrew of Greece and Denmark, and Princess Alice of Battenberg. Greece’s king, Philip’s uncle, was compelled to abdicate when Philip was a child, and the household fled to Paris, with Philip famously carried to security in a crib produced from an orange field.
At age 7, he moved to England, the place he lived (*99*) Kensington Palace, now dwelling to Prince William. Philip lived there together with his paternal grandmother, Victoria Mountbatten, and later attended Gordonstoun, a boarding college in Scotland.
At 18, Philip joined the Royal Navy and graduated from the Britannia Royal Naval College as a prime cadet. He noticed lively obligation from the Indian Ocean to the Mediterranean, and in 1945 (*99*) the top of World War II, he was in Tokyo Bay when the Japanese surrendered.
Prince Philip as a naval officer inspecting troopers of the naval college in Corsham, England in 1946.ullstein bild through Getty Images
Philip’s army profession was really central to his character, not like maybe different royals, based on Ashley Jackson, a professor of imperial and army historical past (*99*) King’s College London.
“It’s simple to look (*99*) the army profession of a royal male and see it as a ceremony of passage, however with Philip one must look past that,” he mentioned. “He joined when he wasn’t anyplace close to marrying the longer term queen. This was a profession path for a Greek prince,” he added. “This wasn’t a quick dalliance within the army. It’s essential to notice that he’s clearly an distinctive officer.”
Then referred to as Philip Mountbatten, he first met his cousin Elizabeth in 1934 (*99*) a household marriage ceremony. The two are each great-great-grandchildren of Queen Victoria.
The couple exchanged letters whereas Philip was abroad in the course of the conflict, solely often seeing one another. They would exit driving in Philip’s “tiny MG” sports activities automotive, in addition to dancing (*99*) London nightclubs.
