Prince Philip Dead at 99
It is with deep sorrow that Her Majesty The Queen has announced the death of her beloved husband, His Royal Highness The Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh.
His Royal Highness passed away peacefully this morning at Windsor Castle. pic.twitter.com/XOIDQqlFPn
— The Royal Family (@RoyalFamily) April 9, 2021
Britain’s Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, led the tributes to Prince Philip on Friday as the country — and the world — reacted to the death of Queen Elizabeth II’s husband at the age of 99.
Speaking outside his home in London’s Downing Street, Johnson said that Philip had “helped to steer the Royal Family and the monarchy so that it remains an institution indisputably vital to the balance and happiness of our national life.”
He said that Philip “was an environmentalist, and a champion of the natural world long before it was fashionable,” adding that he had “inspired the lives of countless young people” with his Duke of Edinburgh awards scheme.
“We remember the duke for all of this and above all for his steadfast support for Her Majesty the Queen,” he said. “Not just as her consort, by her side every day of her reign, but as her husband, her ‘strength and stay,’ of more than 70 years.”
“And it is to Her Majesty, and her family, that our nation’s thoughts must turn today, because they have lost not just a much-loved and highly respected public figure, but a devoted husband and a proud and loving father, grandfather and, in recent years, great-grandfather.”
Sir Keir Starmer, leader of the U.K.’s opposition Labour Party paid his respects to the royal, saying in a statement that the U.K. had “lost an extraordinary public servant.”
“Prince Philip dedicated his life to our country – from a distinguished career in the Royal Navy during the Second World War to his decades of service as the Duke of Edinburgh,” he said.
“However, he will be remembered most of all for his extraordinary commitment and devotion to the Queen.”
He was a character. It’s sad but I’m mostly heartsick for HRM. I have known a number of long standing couples in my life and at these ages one seldom much outlived the other and I am not ready for the Queen to pass on. It’ll be the ending of an era.Report
Odd to think that I’ll be 70 in less than three years, and Elizabeth has been Queen my entire life. My wife and I had our 40th anniversary last year. 50 seems doable. 60 requires both of us to beat the odds on family longevity.Report
My dad died in his late fifties though I am optimistic that I can beat that deal because I haven’t spent my early life as exposed to interesting chemicals as he was.
My beloved Grandmother was a devote royalist and I absorbed her attitude stock and barrel. When, God(ess?) forbid, the Queen passes away it’ll feel like an echo of losing my Grandmother.
Also Charles just can’t measure up to his mum, poor dude.Report
What do you mean when you said that your grandmother was a royalist? Just that she was very fond of the royal family, or that she supported a return to a more monarchical form of government?Report
I was born and raised in Canada (half American) and my Grandmother was a Royalist. Canada has an unelected Monarch its the head of state and my Grandmother thought the system was the bees knees. Queen Elizabeth II was like an absent extra member of the family.Report
We forget (I know I certainly do) that Prince Philippos had some significant Royal ‘chops’ belonging to both the Royal houses of Greece and Denmark.
My family were staunch Greek Royalists and I have a battered picture of my Great Grandfather (artist) with a young Prince Constantine I (c. 1890s) in the palace they are decorating. King Constantine was Philip’s Uncle. My Great Grandfather broke tradition and named my Grandfather, Constantine after his patron.
Interestingly, my Grand Mother’s family fled Smyrna in 1922 as a result of King Constantine’s failed attack on Kemal’s Ankara.
Not sure if the families spoke of these matters one they were in America.Report
Yes, really Philip was extremely well qualified for the job so long as you didn’t subscribe to a very British form of Anglo snobbery about continental nobility. In fairness, the English nobles would retort, the continentals did kind of fish up their demesnes.
That is a fascinating family anecdote, to have been a fly on the wall if the subject was brought up would have been fascinating!Report
Well, when you think about it after WWI what’s a poor Prince to do? The eligible pool had shrunk so much he had to settle for the English.Report
Hahah True! It’s not like he was going to move out east to kick it with the Tzars!Report
He had to settle for the very English aristocrat duties such as charities, and avocations such as painting.
Yes. He was the Prince, formerly known as an artist.Report
I know this is late to the party but – good lord, that quip was just excellentReport
There’s “settle”, and then there’s the English monarchy was on the winning side in every important conflict since 1066, and still exists.Report
You need to change that to every important foreign conflict, they weren’t on the winning side of the English Civil War.Report
True, Charles did not come out ahead.Report
Shakespeare’s spirit raising speeches notwithstanding, the English Kings not only lost the Hundred Year War, but lost about half of the lands they controlled before declaring war on FranceReport
I’m confused on this point. Why did Greece have a royal family that was not ethnically Greek?Report
I assume for similar reasons that the British royal family was/is arguably ethnically German.Report
A bit different. After the Stuarts died out, the Hanovers were their closest Protestant relatives (George I was James I’s great-grandson.). In Greece, there was no native royalty, so after becoming independent they invited foreign princes (first a Bavarian and then a Dane) to be their king.Report
And in choosing George elector of Hanover they skipped close to 50 Catholic more senior dynasts. The true King of the UK is the (would be) King of Bavaria, Franz of Wittelsbach, Francis Ii of England and Scotland
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacobite_successionReport
If you have to tell everyone you’re King, then you’re not King.Report
I’m envisioning the year 2420 version of Wikipedia having an entry for the true President of the United States, the scion of Mar A Lago, the CEO of Trump Inc., Ivanka IX.Report
In 1862 the Greek National Assembly wanted to elect a new king. The United Kingdom, the Second French Empire, and the Russian Empire suggested and supported the choice of Prince William of Denmark. He was elected and took the name King George I of the Hellenes.Report
There wasn’t any ethnic Greek candidate that people could agree on. After Otto of Bavaria turned out to be a failure, they got a Danish Prince after some negotiation. The Danish Prince married a Russian Princess, for the Eastern Orthodox angle, and the Greek royal family was born.Report
It is a reminder that that generation isn’t merely passing, its all but passed. The queen may reign for a few years yet, but a decade seems unlikely. All of the countries that still hold to the Monarchy need to be prepared for the change in rulers, including I suspect, the severely reduced enthusiasm for the monarchy that King Charles will bring.Report
It is entirely possible, though obviously poor Charles is going to be destined for a far shorter reign than his mother enjoyed. William seems like a strong hand to take the reins after a short Charles era.Report
DMX passed, too. Heaven is missing some angels.Report
My mother lived in a modest town/city with a weekly newspaper from her early 40s until she died at age 92 last year. She did develop the habit of opening the local weekly to the obituaries first, to see who else she had outlived. I have moved often enough over the years, and then my wife and I moved, that single easy sources are no longer available. Particularly because of my wife’s memory issues, I have started a notebook for my children titled “Things to Know If Dad Dies.” Paper, because leaving a note that says, “Log onto Dad’s Linux box, fire up a terminal window, and run the command ‘scraps’ to get to his antique self-coded free-form database” is problematic. Among those pages I’m working on a list of e-mail addresses and/or web sites where comments can be left (including one for Ordinary Times) with instructions to notify those people.Report
My mom has a 3 ring binder of instructions for disposal of her quilt fabric stash. My dad’s computer password list is in neat handwriting on an old IBM punch card.Report