Prince Harry and his wife Meghan’s effective resignation from front-line duties is the biggest crisis to hit the royal family in the new year.
Love over the country
The 1936 abdication of Edward VIII, 326 days into his reign, remains the biggest scandal in modern royal history and caused a worldwide sensation.
Britain’s willful king stirred a constitutional crisis when he stepped down in order to get married to the woman he loved, Wallis Simpson.
Britain’s brief king provoked a constitutional crisis when he stepped down in order to marry the twice-divorced US socialite Wallis Simpson
The union was deemed impossible while Edward was monarch and head of the Church of England, which at the time refused to remarry divorcees while their former spouse was still alive as it opposed divorce.
Edward was the first monarch in the 1,000-year history of the British Crown to give up the throne, forsaking the monarchy, of his own free will.
His brother King George VI replaced him as King, and Edward — who had married Simpson in 1937 — was subsequently ostracized by the rest of the Windsor family until the late 1960s. He remained in exile for the remainder of his life, and lived in a Chateau in France with Wallis Simpson, till his death at the age of 77, in 1972.
Read more: Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s run from royalty
Margaret’s Heartbreak
Queen Elizabeth II’s fun-loving younger sister, Princess Margaret, also sparked a firestorm with her choice for marriage.
In 1952, the then-22-year-old began a romance with her late father’s divorced equerry, former Royal Air Force officer Peter Townsend.
The couple’s wish to marry prompted a battle between the government and the public — which was seen to be sympathetic to the union — with the queen caught in the middle
The couple’s wish to marry prompted a battle between the government and the public — which was seen to be sympathetic to the union — with the queen caught in the middle.
Margaret was eventually persuaded to abandon the relationship, under the threat of losing her royal position, and instead married photographer Antony Armstrong-Jones in 1960.
Read more: Prince Harry and Meghan name ‘dream’ son Archie
They divorced in 1978.
A horrible year
The queen memorably described 1992 as an “annus horribilis” after three of her children’s marriages crumbled.
Heir to the throne Prince Charles’ split from Princess Diana after 11 years of marriage caused a media sensation.
The couple’s wish to marry prompted a battle between the government and the public — which was seen to be sympathetic to the union — with the queen caught in the middle
The princess then rocked the monarchy by leaking shocking details of palace life to author Andrew Morton for his 1992 book “Diana: Her True Story – In Her Own Words”.
Around the same time the queen’s second son Prince Andrew separated from wife Sarah Ferguson, whom he had married six years earlier.
Read more: Prince Harry and Meghan Markle expecting their first baby
Meanwhile Princess Anne, the reigning monarch’s only daughter, finalised her divorce from first husband Mark Phillips following their separation in 1989.
Diana’s death
The popular princess died in a high-speed car crash in a Paris tunnel in August 1997.
For the next week leading up to her spectacular funeral, Britain was plunged into an unprecedented outpouring of grief which shook the monarchy.
Meanwhile Princess Anne, the reigning monarch’s only daughter, finalised her divorce from first husband Mark Phillips following their separation in 1989
Anger had soon mounted at the silence of senior royals holed up in Balmoral, in Scotland, where the queen, Diana’s ex-husband Charles, and their two children, William, 15, and Harry, 12, were holidaying over the summer.
Newspapers, furious that the Union Jack flag was not flying at half-mast over Buckingham Palace, called on the queen to address her subjects.
Read more: Harry and Meghan to head Down Under later this year: palace
Within days she had paid homage to her former daughter-in-law in a televised speech for only the second time in her reign. She also publicly bowed before Diana’s coffin.
Prince Andrew scandal
Andrew has been dogged by allegations he had sex with one of the then-teenage victims of deceased US sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
The prince, often referred to as the queen’s “favourite son”, attempted to clear his name in a BBC interview in November but it backfired spectacularly.
https://twitter.com/will_farquhar/status/1215487229881016321
He looked stiff and unapologetic in a performance that one public relations consultant said was akin to “watching a man in quicksand”.
The prince promptly promised to “step back from public duties” a few days later but remains under pressure to cooperate with United States authorities still investigating the Epstein case.
AFP with additional input by GVS News Desk.