Queen Camilla’s first ‘heartbreaking’ meeting with late Queen after ‘wicked’ woman claims: tough time turning…
Queen Camilla has seen her popularity increase over recent years, however, it took her a tough while to get to where she is now and it all started with her late mother-in-law, the late Queen Elizabeth. The Queen, who will be celebrating 20 years of marriage to King Charles on Wednesday, shouldered much of the blame for King Charles and the late Diana, Princess of Wales’s marriage breakdown.
Charles and Camilla made their relationship official in 1999 – two years after the death of Diana – but they have been in one another’s lives since the 1970s. And it was one year after their relationship was official that Camilla was formally introduced to her future mother-in-law in what’s been described as a “tense” meeting at King Constantine of Greece’s 60th birthday party at Highgrove, the King’s Gloucestershire country home.
Royal author Katie Nicholl told the Mirror: “It was incredibly difficult. Camilla went through a lot. Meghan [Markle] complained about the press turning against her and of having a difficult time, but I don’t think anyone has had it as hard as Camilla.
The Queen went to great lengths to shift the public’s perception of her but her quiet devotion to duty and to her husband seems to have paid off.
Following King Charles’s cancer diagnosis last year, a YouGov poll published last November showed that 49% of the British public held a positive view of her. Her positive score has been previously lower.
In 2017, the Queen spoke about the public’s perception towards her after news of their relationship broke, saying that she wouldn’t “wish the public scrutiny that she has faced on her worst enemy.
She told the Mail on Sunday’s You Magazine: “I couldn’t really go anywhere… it was horrid. It was a deeply unpleasant time and I wouldn’t want to put my worst enemy through it.”
Among the claims made against the Queen was that Elizabeth had once described her as “the wicked woman”.
Royal historian Robert Lacey was quoted as saying in Ms Nicholl’s book The New Royals: “In 1998, when Charles was trying to persuade his mother to be more accommodating of Camilla, the Queen described her as ‘that wicked woman.
Those damning words were reported in distress by Prince Charles himself.” Prince Harry also wrote about whether Camilla would become a “wicked stepmother” after she married his father, however, he did note the positive impact that she had had on his father.
He wrote: “We thought he should be happy. Yes, Camilla had played a pivotal role in the unraveling of our parents’ marriage, and yes, that meant she’d played a role in our mother’s disappearance, but we understood that she’d been trapped like everyone else in the riptide of events. We didn’t blame her, and in fact we’d gladly forgive her if she could make Pa happy.”
Ms Nicholl added: “She needed to carve the role of Duchess of Cornwall for herself and she did so quite diligently, very quietly, in her own dignified and unassuming way. I think the Queen appreciated that – she saw how much Camilla did and how hard she worked.
And I think the Queen also realised what she brought to Charles. Camilla actually made Charles a happier person and she recognised that, having had the most loyal of consorts in Prince Philip. She knew that, to be a successful King, Charles also needed support – and he had it in spade-loads with Camilla.
The King and Queen married at a poignant civil ceremony at Windsor Guildhall, on April 9 2005.
Camilla’s royal seal of approval came in February 2022, when the late monarch declared that it was her “sincere wish” for Camilla to use the title, Queen Consort.
Their Coronation came 18 years later, on May 6 2023, and Charles’s devotion and love to his wife was made clear even further when, on the invitations sent out for the grand event, Buckingham Palace invited recipients to the “Coronation of Their Majesties King Charles III & Queen Camilla”.
