Aug. 19, 2026
Princess Diana’s Private Struggles With the Press, Balmoral Life and Her Duty to Queen Elizabeth
Former members of Princess Diana’s inner circle reveal how closely she followed newspaper coverage about herself and how she managed to perform royal duties even after reading painful headlines. Plus, former royal chefs and bodyguards share stories about Diana at Balmoral, her late-night visits to palace kitchens, Prince William’s love of burgers and pizza, and Diana’s strong sense of duty to Queen Elizabeth II. We also look at the million-dollar sale of a trilogy of Diana portraits and the complicated relationship between Diana and the late Queen.
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Palace Intrigue is a daily British royal family podcast covering King Charles, Meghan Markle, Prince Harry, Kate Middleton and the House of Windsor. New episodes every day. Follow on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen. Part of the Caloroga Shark Media network.
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Ah Calorogu Shark Media. He hello and welcome to Palace Intrigue.
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I am your host, Mark Francis, Princess Diana's former bodyguard,
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Ken Wharf, tells Marie Clear the Princess had a morning
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ritual that probably wasn't particularly good for her peace of mind.
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She read what the newspapers were saying about her every day.
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Warf recalled that the morning papers would be spread across
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a deep freezer in the kitchens and Kensington Palace, ready
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for Diana to go through. Inevitably, if she wasn't on
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the front page, she'd be on pages three, four or five.
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She lived with it and understood it was part and
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parcel of her job. What impressed him was what happened next.
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To read those headlines first thing in the morning, then
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get into a car or a helicopter, fly somewhere like Manchester, Nottingham,
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or anywhere else in the world and immediately perform that
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takes a remarkable level of professionalism. Wolfe said. There were
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more when he wondered how much the coverage was affecting
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Diana and whether she could put it aside long enough
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to handle the engagements ahead. But once the car door opened,
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Diana could switch into public mode. The royal family is
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a bit like a traveling theater, Wharfe said, you move
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from one place to the next in them. Moment that
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door opens, you're on stage. You're only as good as
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your performance. The more professional your performance, the more popular
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you become. And in that respect, Diana was exceptional. She
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also sometimes challenged coverage she believed was wrong. Royal biographer
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Ingrid Seward had recalled writing something Diana disliked, only to
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receive a summons of sorts from the princess. According to Seward,
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Diana told her secretary, get Ingrid round here. We need
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a girly chat. I talked to Diana shortly before she died.
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She did tell me that she still got nervous going
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out and meeting people if there's been something unkind written
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about her in the newspapers that day. Former royal butler
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Paul Burrell has even said he occasionally tried to protect
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Diane by removing particularly upsetting newspapers before she could read them.
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I took a strong line when something was personal and
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upsetting and thought it was best for her not to
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see it, Birel said, But Diana usually noticed she would
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ask for them, but I wouldn't let her see them.
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Former Royal Chef Darren McGrady says Diana was less enthusiastic
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about some of the traditional activities of bow Moral, but
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Graddy says she wasn't comfortable riding horses after suffering a
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fall as a child. For her, the closest she would
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get was pulling and walking William with his little Shetland
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pony smoking around the estate. That was as close as
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she got to the horses. Diana did, however, express affection
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for bow Moral itself. In a letter written during the
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early days of her marriage to Charles, She wrote, I
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adore being outside all day and hate London and about
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adjusting two life. Surrounded by her new royal relatives, the
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young Diana joked, it's a case of playing with grown ups.
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Former Royal Chef Mervyn Wikerly said Diana had a bit
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of a habit of star slipping into the kitchen late
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at night for something simple to eat. In the chat
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with the staff, Diana's bodyguard wharf recalled, I remember the
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Princess would very often come in and sit in the
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kitchen with Wykely, adding that Diana would sometimes perch astride,
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the chest freezer or whatever. Why. Likely said Diana spent
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a lot of time in the kitchen, and that he
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deliberately kept a few things on hand for her. I
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always had in the kitchen. There was a small fridge,
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and he used to leave things in the fridge that
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she liked cold lamb cutlets and things like that, so
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she could just snack whenever she wanted to. As William
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got older, he apparently developed a taste for burgers and pizza,
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and Diana was happy to take the boys out for
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the sort of fast food most children would recognize immediately.
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Wolf said, as William got older, of course he was
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very keen to go to burger bars and pizza places,
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and they didn't really sit that comfortably with his father.
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On one occasion, William apparently returned from a burger outing
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and excitedly told Charles, Oh, Papa, we just had these
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amazing burghers. According to Dwarf, Charles was not impressed. He
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recalled Charles saying, I don't know why you eat that
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food when I have this marvelous army of chefs at
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Kensington Palace More Palace in just a moment. A trilogy
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of paintings depicting Princess Diana has now sold for a
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combined total of more than one million dollars. The works
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are by the anonymous London artist known as mister Phantom.
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A third and final painting in the series, called The Guardian,
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has just been sold to a private collector for roughly
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four hundred five thousand dollars. The project began with The
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People's Queen, which reportedly took eighteen months to complete. The
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paintings showed Diana alongside Prince William and attracted some attention
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because Prince Harry was noticeably absent. The second portrait, called
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Grand Master, depicted Diana sitting on a throne. That one
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sold for two hundred and seventy five thousand pounds. Mister
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Fantom is an unusual figure in the British artwall because
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his identity remains secret and much of his previous work
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has been more contemporary conceptual. The Diana paintings were his
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first major move into traditional oil portraiture, using Diana as
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the subject. While explos bring ideas about celebrity royalty in
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the way famous people are remembered. Ken Wharfe says Diana
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remained committed to her royal responsibilities, even during some of
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the most difficult years of her marriage. At that particular time,
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despite the unhappiness, her commitment was to her Majesty the Queen.
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According to Wharf, there were days when Diana simply didn't
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feel capable of facing another royal engagement. She would tell
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him I don't think I can do today. Ken Wolfe
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says he would remind her that canceling was possible, but
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Diana's response was consistently, well, I can't let my mother
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in law down, So there was a real sense of
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duty on her part. The royal biographer wrote that the
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Queen never directly addressed the question of Charles's marriage, but
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by nod and nuance, she made it clear she approved
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of Diana. Once Dina joined the royal family, however, the
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relationship between the two women remained relatively formal. Biographer Andrew
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Morton described Diana as initially intimidated by her mother in law.
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In the early days, Diana was quite simply terrified of
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her mother in law. She kept the formality, dropping a
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deep curtsey each time they met, but otherwise kept her distance.
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That dynamic changed as Diana's marriage deteriorated, According to Seward,
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Diana began arriving at Buckingham Palace without appointments because she
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wanted to speak with the Queen about what was happening.
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At first, the Queen took a tolerant view of these
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unscheduled visits. Diana was usually in a lot better mood
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when she left than when she arrived, but the emotional
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burden of those conversations reportedly became difficult for Elizabeth as well.
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Seward recounts on occasion when a footman told the Queen
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the Princess cried three times in a half hour while
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she was waiting to see you. The Queen reportedly replied,
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I had her for an hour, and she cried NonStop.
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Morton has argued that Diana nevertheless regarded Elizabeth as someone
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who might be able to help save the marriage. He said,
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the Queen was very supportive of Diana always felt that
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the Queen was a kind of marital referee and that
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the Queen should really intervene over her husband's relationship with
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missus Camilla Parker Balls, But the Queen's policy was to
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hope for the best, and that may have been one
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of the fundamental problems between them. Diana wanted intervention. Elizabeth,
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by temperament and generation, was much less comfortable inserting herself
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directly into the emotional crisis between her son and daughter
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in law. Sue described the Queen as wanting to help,
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but being unsure what she could actually do. The Queen
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was desperate to help Diana, but she just didn't know how.
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Charles and Diana formally separated in nineteen ninety two and
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divorced in nineteen ninety six. Diana died in Paris the
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following year. And there you have it. If you'd like
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to email us, our address is the Palace Intrigue at
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Mark Francis my thanks to John McDermott. This is Palace
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