It’s the biggest game of royal musical chairs for 70 years. And the Duke and Duchess of Sussex have lost the first round.
King Charles III has grasped the nettle just before his coronation. He is kicking Harry and Meghan out of Frogmore Cottage, Windsor, and, it’s alleged, is putting Prince Andrew there instead, evicting him from the much bigger Royal Lodge.
The King is taking an admirable but tough line – tougher than most expected of him.
I’ve been to Frogmore, and it’s less a cottage, more a sprawling series of charming rooms with access to one of the greatest gardens in the world. The 35 acres are a picturesque combination of follies and a serpentine lake with its own island. Also at Frogmore, Prince Andrew can visit the vast, Romanesque mausoleum of his great-great-great grandparents, Queen Albert and Victoria. Next door is the Royal Burial Ground, with the graves of that other unhappy royal exile, the Duke of Windsor and another American divorcée royal wife, the Duchess of Windsor.
All pretty grand – not that Prince Andrew is likely to look at the move as anything other than a huge demotion.
The eviction of the Sussexes and the house-move for Prince Andrew are all part of King Charles’s vision for a slimmed-down monarchy, which he has been planning for years, long before the sad death of the Queen last year.
The idea is to keep the focus on the direct line of succession – the King and Queen, the Prince and Princess of Wales and their three children – along with Princess Anne and her husband, Sir Tim Laurence, and the Wessexes.
“That explains the suggestion that Prince Andrew will leave Royal Lodge,” one long-retired courtier said to me. “It makes sense for the Waleses to move there, eventually. It’s much bigger than Adelaide Cottage at Windsor, where they are now. There isn’t even enough room for a nanny there.”
Prince Andrew is highly unlikely to achieve his dream of a return to royal duties. The Queen backed the departure of her own son, said to be her favourite, from official duties – it is unfeasible that King Charles, in slimming-down and economising mood, will restore him to favour.
It’s one of the anomalies of royal life that Charles, now he is top dog, has less ready money at his disposal than when he was Prince of Wales. Yes, he has now inherited one of the greatest collection of palaces and works of art on the planet – but he can’t sell any of them.
Yes, the income he gets from the Duchy of Lancaster – around £23 million – is a little bigger than that from the Duchy of Cornwall – around £21m, which now goes to the Prince of Wales. But his outgoings as King, and responsibilities, are that much greater than when he was Prince of Wales. He also gets £86.3m this year from the Sovereign Grant, but that goes on the palaces and on expenses. Thus the economy drive – and the rationalisation of the royal property portfolio.
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Meanwhile, the Queen’s first cousins – the Kents, the Gloucesters and Princess Alexandra – are largely retired from royal duties, after a lifetime of support to the monarch.
That presents King Charles with a real problem. There just aren’t enough royals to carry out the official duties demanded of the monarchy, hard as the current working royals work. Charities still much prefer a royal figurehead to, say, the local mayor. The serving members of the Royal Family have stepped in to take over the duties of Prince Andrew and the Sussexes but they are at capacity.
There is a rumour that Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie might step in to fill the gap but they both have young families now to look after. And that expansion of the Firm would take a big step from King Charles – to enlarge the Royal Family, when he is in a distinctly slimming mood.
Harry Mount is author of Et Tu, Brute? The Best Latin Lines Ever (Bloomsbury)
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