Charles appeared “giddily elated like a lottery winner” when he spoke to Princess Diana’s brother shortly after her death in 1997, according to a new memoir by Diana’s younger brother, Charles Spencer. In an extract from his forthcoming book Swan Song: Diana, My Sister, Spencer recalls receiving a call from the then Prince Charles after Diana died in a car crash in Paris.While other people calling Spencer were “stunned” and struggling to express their condolences, Spencer writes that Charles sounded “giddily elated — like a lottery winner”.Charles also told him that he had informed his sons, Prince William and Prince Harry, of their mother’s death that morning at Balmoral. Spencer says the conversation sounded “strangely matter-of-fact” given the circumstances.Looking back, Spencer writes that he suspected Charles’s immediate reaction may have been focused on what Diana’s death meant for his relationship with Camilla Parker Bowles.“I suspect the prince’s first reaction must have been to think more of how this event might free him to marry the woman he loved,” Spencer writes, according to the published extract.The claim comes nearly three decades after Diana’s death and forms part of Spencer’s highly personal account of his sister’s life and her troubled marriage to Charles.
What happened between Charles and Diana?
Charles and Diana married in 1981 but separated in 1992 after years of marital difficulties. Their divorce was finalised in 1996, just a year before Diana’s death.Diana had publicly discussed Charles’s relationship with Camilla Parker Bowles, famously saying in a 1995 BBC interview that there were “three of us in this marriage”.Charles later married Camilla in 2005.Diana died on August 31, 1997, after the car carrying her and Dodi Fayed crashed in a Paris tunnel while being pursued by paparazzi. She was 36.
Palace responds to Diana’s brother
The claims have triggered an unusual response from Buckingham Palace.The Palace said Wednesday that it does not normally comment on books but noted that grief can affect how people remember events decades later.“His Majesty is mindful that the pain of fraternal grief can cloud reason, affect judgment and colour memory in ways others do not recognise, even many years after such a loss,” a Palace spokesperson said.The statement came after earlier extracts from Spencer’s memoir claimed that Charles told him, during an argument surrounding Diana’s funeral, “Rest assured, we’ll forget her soon enough.”Spencer has said he wrote the memoir to correct what he considers untruths about his sister.The book, Swan Song: Diana, My Sister, is due to be published next week, with the latest extracts likely to renew scrutiny of the relationship between Diana, Charles and the wider royal family.
