badminton estate

royal biography reveals details of charles and camilla in our exclusive serialisation of a brilliant new biography of prince charles, we told on saturday how diana’s emotional instability left him needing 14 years of therapy. here, in the second extract, sally bedell smith examines the prince’s encounters with a glamorous chilean researcher — and a camilla lookalike who ran his highgrove gift shop. during her 20s, camilla shand was considered quite a catch. along with an upper-class pedigree, she had fine features, a low husky voice, merry deep-blue eyes and a fetching figure with a large bust. ‘you could see what a man could see — an intensely warm, maternal, laughing creature, with enormous sex appeal,’ said lady annabel goldsmith, a family friend. certainly, camilla appealed to andrew parker bowles, then an officer in the household cavalry.

but so did other women: during his on-and-off relationship with her, parker bowles also enjoyed romances with princess anne and lady caroline percy, the daughter of the duke of northumberland. camilla despaired. and launched into a couple of dalliances of her own — first with rupert hambro, the handsome scion of a prominent banking family. then, when she was 25, she caught the eye of the 23-year-old prince of wales. unlike diana spencer, she’d had a blissful childhood in a rambling seven-bedroom house, where rows of gumboots stood at attention by the door. nicknamed milla, she was an extrovert tomboy, who was mad about ponies and horses. when she was just nine, her father bruce had introduced her to foxhunting. she took instantly to the thrill of the chase, vaulting the fences with courage and vigour.

like most upper-class girls of her era, she had only a sketchy education. having left school with just one o-level, she’d gone on to a swiss finishing school to learn how to roast a chicken and lay a table correctly. although she had no intention of pursuing a career, she needed to stay occupied, so she then found a job as a receptionist at the prestigious decorator colefax and fowler in mayfair. but her grandmother sonia cubitt was concerned that camilla might not be able to get to work on time. so she rented her granddaughter a room on the top floor of the luxurious claridge’s hotel, just down the street from colefax. once installed there, camilla started inviting her friends over for expensive claridge’s breakfasts — jane wyndham (later churchill), another colefax girl; nina campbell, then training as an interior designer; and john bowes lyon, a cousin of the queen and of andrew parker bowles. for all her wealth, sonia was annoyed when she began receiving the exorbitant bills, so she soon put a stop to the morning feasts. if camilla seemed feckless and footloose, at least she knew what she wanted out of life. and that was marriage and children with andrew parker bowles — all of which seemed further from her grasp as the years went by. that was the uneasy situation in the summer of 1972 when ‘prince charles sort of parachuted in the middle’, according to her friend of 50 years, patrick beresford. the prince landed at a convenient time. in july, parker bowles was off to northern ireland and cyprus for six months of army service, leaving camilla to her own devices. what appealed to charles more than anything was that ‘she talked to him’ and ‘always listened,’ said a man who was close to her during those years.

in camilla, the prince found not only a sympathetic ear but also warmth, vivacity and a goofy sense of humour. when she walked into a room, said patrick beresford, ‘your spirits rose, because you know you were going to have a laugh’. for a young prince with downbeat tendencies, that sort of personality was catnip. she would go to see him playing polo, and in the evenings they’d slip out to the exclusive annabel’s nightclub in mayfair. the relationship met with the approval of charles’s uncle lord mountbatten, who felt that the earthy camilla would be a good learning experience for the prince. so the earl lent them his hampshire country house, broadlands, for trysts away from the public eye. both knew their time together was limited. he felt he had to marry a virgin, and — according to camilla’s friend charles benson — she ‘still had the shadow of andrew parker bowles looming large over her’. the affair reached a natural hiatus when charles, then still in the navy, left for the caribbean in january 1973. as for camilla, she returned to the arms of parker bowles. but he still showed no signs of proposing — much to the exasperation of both their families. two months later, both his father, derek parker bowles, and hers decided to put an end to his dithering. according to john bowes lyon, andrew’s cousin, the two fathers forced the dashing young officer’s hand by publishing an engagement notice in the times on march 15. ‘camilla was very much in love with him,’ said bowes lyon.

‘her parents were very keen that andrew should marry her.’. the game was up: parker bowles duly proposed to his girlfriend of nearly seven years. charles heard the news while docked at english harbour in antigua, and felt blindsided. he now had ‘no one’ to return to. ‘i suppose the feeling of emptiness will pass eventually,’ he wrote to a friend. andrew parker bowles and camilla shand were married in a catholic ceremony at the guards’ chapel in london on july 4, 1973. it was a major social event, with the queen mother and princess anne seated in the front pew. afterwards, the couple moved to bolehyde manor near chippenham in wiltshire, where camilla settled into domestic routines while parker bowles was either deployed with his regiment or doing army work in london. but charles had no intention of losing sight of his fun and relaxing ex-girlfriend. they spoke while she was pregnant with her first child, and saw each other on the polo field whenever he and her husband were playing. in february 1975, charles became godfather to her son, tom — and two days later he called the duke of beaufort to ask if he could try foxhunting on the duke’s badminton estate, where camilla was a regular. from then on, she and the prince regularly rode to hounds together. not only that, but she became his best friend and confidante — and he ended up buying his highgrove estate in gloucestershire partly because it was near her home.