princess diana biography

Biography of Diana, Princess of Wales

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Princess Diana (born Diana Frances Spencer; July 1, 1961–August 31, 1997) was the consort of Charles, Prince of Wales. She was the mother of Prince William, currently in line for the throne after his father, Diane's former husband, and of Prince Harry. Diana was also known for her charity work and her fashion image.

Fast Facts: Diana, Princess of Wales

• Known For: Diana became a member of the British royal family when she married Charles, Prince of Wales, in 1981.
• Also Known As: Diana Frances Spencer, Lady Di, Princess Diana
• Born: July 1, 1961 in Sandringham, England
• Parents: John Spencer and Frances Spencer
• Died: August 31, 1997 in Paris, France
• Spouse: Charles, Prince of Wales (m. 1981–1996)
• Children: Prince William (William Arthur Philip Louis), Prince Harry (Henry Charles Albert David)

Diana Frances Spencer was born on July 1, 1961, in Sandringham, England. Although she was a member of the British aristocracy, she was technically a commoner, not a royal. Diana's father was John Spencer, Viscount Althorp, a personal aide to King George VI and to Queen Elizabeth II . Her mother was the Honourable Frances Shand-Kydd.

Diana's parents divorced in 1969. Her mother ran away with a wealthy heir, and her father gained custody of the children. He later married Raine Legge, whose mother was Barbara Cartland, a romance novelist.

Diana grew up practically next door to Queen Elizabeth II and her family, at Park House, a mansion next to the Sandringham estate of the royal family. Prince Charles was 12 years older, but Prince Andrew was closer to her age and was a childhood playmate.

After Diana's parents divorced, her father gained custody of her and her siblings. Diana was educated at home until she was 9 and was then sent to Riddlesworth Hall and West Heath School. Diana did not get along well with her stepmother, nor did she do well in school. Instead, she found an interest in ballet and, according to some reports, Prince Charles, whose picture she had on the wall of her room at school. When Diana was 16, she met Prince Charles again. He had dated her older sister Sarah. She made some impression on him, but she was still too young for him to date. After she dropped out of West Heath School at 16, she attended a finishing school in Switzerland, Chateau d'Oex. She left after a few months.

After Diana left school, she moved to London and worked as a housekeeper, nanny, and kindergarten teacher's aide. She lived in a house purchased by her father and had three roommates. In 1980, Diana and Charles met again when she went to visit her sister, whose husband worked for the queen . They began to date, and six months later Charles proposed. The two were married on July 29, 1981, in a much-watched wedding that's been called the "wedding of the century." Diana was the first British citizen to marry the heir to the British throne in almost 300 years.

Diana immediately began making public appearances despite her reservations about being in the public eye. One of her first official visits was to the funeral of Princess Grace of Monaco. Diana soon became pregnant, giving birth to Prince William (William Arthur Philip Louis) on June 21, 1982, and then to Prince Harry (Henry Charles Albert David) on September 15, 1984.

Early in their marriage, Diana and Charles were publicly affectionate. By 1986, however, their time apart and coolness when together were obvious. The 1992 publication of Andrew Morton's biography of Diana revealed the story of Charles' long affair with Camilla Parker Bowles and alleged that Diana had made several suicide attempts. In February 1996, Diana announced that she had agreed to a divorce.

The divorce was finalized on August 28, 1996. Settlement terms reportedly included about $23 million for Diana plus $600,000 per year. She and Charles would both be active in their sons' lives. Diana continued to live at Kensington Palace and was permitted to retain the title Princess of Wales. At her divorce, she also gave up most of the charities she'd been working with, limiting herself to only a few causes: homelessness, AIDS, leprosy, and cancer.

In 1996, Diana became involved in a campaign to ban landmines. She visited several nations in her involvement with the anti-landmine campaign, an activity more political than the norm for the British royal family.

In early 1997, Diana was linked romantically with the 42-year-old playboy "Dodi" Fayed (Emad Mohammed al-Fayed). His father, Mohammed al-Fayed, owned Harrod's department store and the Ritz Hotel in Paris, among other properties.

On August 30, 1997, Diana and Fayed left the Ritz Hotel in Paris, accompanied in a car by a driver and Dodi's bodyguard. They were pursued by paparazzi. Just after midnight, the car spun out of control in a Paris tunnel and crashed. Fayed and the driver were killed instantly; Diana died later in a hospital despite efforts to save her. The bodyguard survived despite critical injuries.

The world quickly reacted. First came horror and shock. Blame was next, much of which was directed at the paparazzi who were following the princess's car and from whom the driver was apparently trying to escape. Later tests showed the driver had been well over the legal alcohol limit, but immediate blame was placed on the photographers and their seemingly incessant quest to capture images of Diana that could be sold to the press.

Then came an outpouring of sorrow and grief. The Spencers, Diana's family, established a charitable fund in her name, and within a week $150 million in donations had been raised. Princess Diana's funeral on September 6 drew worldwide attention. Millions turned out to line the path of the funeral procession.

In many ways, Diana and her life story paralleled much in popular culture. She was married near the beginning of the 1980s, and her fairy-tale wedding, complete with a glass coach and a dress that could not quite fit inside, was in sync with the ostentatious wealth and spending of the 1980s.

Her struggles with bulimia and depression shared so publicly in the press were also typical of the 1980s' focus on self-help and self-esteem. That she seemed to have finally begun to transcend many of her problems made her loss seem all the more tragic.

The 1980s realization of the AIDS crisis was one in which Diana played a significant part. Her willingness to touch and hug AIDS sufferers—at a time when many in the public wanted to quarantine those with the disease based on irrational and uneducated fears of easy communicability—helped change how AIDS patients were treated.

Today, Diana is still remembered as the "People's Princess," a woman of contradictions who was born into wealth yet seemed to have a "common touch"; a woman who struggled with her self-image yet was a fashion icon; a woman who sought attention but often stayed at hospitals and other charity sites long after the press had left. Her life has been the subject of numerous books and films, including "Diana: Her True Story," "Diana: Last Days of a Princess," and "Diana, 7 Days."

• Bumiller, Elisabeth, et al. “Death of Diana: Times Journalists Recall Night of the Crash.” The New York Times, 31 Aug. 2017.
• Clayton, Tim, and Phil Craig. "Diana: Story of a Princess." Atria Books, 2003.
• Lyall, Sarah. “Diana's Legacy: A Reshaped Monarchy, a More Emotional U.K.” The New York Times , 31 Aug. 2017.
• Morton, Andrew. "Diana: Her True Story - in Her Own Words." Michael O'Mara Books Limited, 2019.
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Princess Diana’s Death

By: History.com Editors

Updated: November 13, 2023 | Original: August 3, 2017

Princess Diana —who married into British royalty, only to later be divorced from it—devoted herself to charitable causes and became a global icon before dying in a car accident in Paris in 1997. When she married Prince Charles in 1981, Lady Diana Spencer became the first Englishwoman to marry an heir to the throne in more than 300 years. Although their wedding was watched by millions worldwide, and their marriage produced two sons—both potential heirs to the throne—it is for her untimely death that Diana is perhaps best remembered.

Lady Diana Spencer: From Teacher to Princess

Diana was born on July 1, 1961, to Edward John Spencer and his wife Frances. At the time of her birth, in Britain’s peerage system, her father held the title of Viscount Althorp. Her parents were divorced in 1969, when she was eight, and her father won sole custody.

In 1975, when Diana was 14, her father inherited the title of Earl from his own father, who passed away that year. The title has been awarded since 1765, as the Spencers have been wealthy landowners in England for centuries.

Her family rented Park House, an estate owned by Queen Elizabeth II , Prince Charles’ mother. During Diana’s time as a child on the estate, she may have played with Charles’ younger brothers, Prince Andrew and Prince Edward. (Charles was 13 years older than Diana.)

Although she lost touch with him as a result of spending much of her youth attending prestigious boarding schools, Diana became re-acquainted with Prince Charles after moving to London to live and work in 1978. In the capital, she initially worked as a nanny before taking a job as a kindergarten teacher at the Young England School.

The courtship of Charles and Diana lasted several years before they were married at St. Paul’s Cathedral in London on July 29, 1981 . With the wedding, Diana was granted the title of Princess of Wales, as Charles’ official royal title was then the Prince of Wales. Charles ascended to the throne on September 8, 2022, after the death of his mother, Queen Elizabeth II.

Prince Charles and Princess Diana had two sons—Prince William in 1982 and Prince Henry (Harry) in 1984. Their marriage, however, was an unhappy one marked by extramarital affairs. In 1992, they announced their separation, and they divorced officially in 1996.

Princess Diana’s Humanitarian Causes

Diana, who had developed an interest in music and fashion as a child, quickly became a global icon of popular culture as she developed relationships with a number of entertainment personalities, including singers George Michael and Elton John .

She was also admired because she used her fame to raise public awareness—and charitable funds—for issues that mattered to her. As a former teacher, she was a lifelong advocate for children and supported efforts to abolish the use of land mines.

She also advocated for AIDS -related causes (she was the guest of honor at the opening of the United Kingdom’s first dedicated HIV/AIDS unit in 1987), and she is credited with helping to change the public’s perception of those who suffer from the disease.

She famously shook the hands of a patient with AIDS, in front of the media, without wearing gloves, dispelling the notion that the disease is transmitted via touch.

After her divorce from Prince Charles was finalized, Diana’s relationship with Egyptian film producer Dodi Al-Fayed , the son of a billionaire and former owner of London’s iconic Harrod’s department store and the city’s soccer team Fulham F.C. Dodi is perhaps best known as the producer of the film Chariots of Fire .

The couple’s relationship quickly became the subject of tabloid fodder, and they were routinely harassed by the paparazzi wherever they went.

Death of Princess Diana

On the evening of August 31, 1997 , Diana and Al-Fayed were dining privately in the Imperial Suite at Paris’ famous Ritz Hotel. They had planned to have a quiet, romantic meal at the hotel’s restaurant—Al-Fayed had reportedly purchased a ring for Diana earlier in the day—but they had to leave after 10 minutes because they were being disturbed by the press and other patrons.

At 11:30 that night, as they left the hotel to return to Al-Fayed’s Paris apartment, they were hounded by paparazzi, despite the fact that significant security precautions had been taken, including the use of a decoy vehicle, which left from the front of the hotel.

Diana and Al-Fayed left the hotel using a rear entrance, with French driver Henri Paul and one of the Princess’ bodyguards, Trevor Rees-Jones.

Driving a Mercedes S-280 limousine, Paul took Rees-Jones, Diana and Al-Fayed on a high-speed trip through the boulevards and narrow streets of central Paris. Investigators later estimated that the car may have been traveling in excess of 60 miles per hour.

At 12:19 a.m., the Mercedes carrying the couple, Paul and Rees-Jones, crashed into the 13th pillar of the Pont d’Alma Bridge, which traverses the River Seine. They were less than two miles from the Ritz Hotel.

Al-Fayed and Paul died at the scene. Diana was taken to Paris’ La Pitie Salpetriere Hospital, but several hours later, at 4 a.m., she died as a result of injuries she sustained in the crash, including a severed pulmonary vein. She was 36 years old.

The bodyguard, Rees-Jones, survived, despite suffering significant injuries. He recovered and returned to England, where he works in a family business and has published a book on his experiences with Diana.

Princess Diana’s Funeral

Princess Diana's death prompted an immediate—and unprecedented—outpouring of grief from all over the world.

Her funeral took place in London, five days after her death. An estimated 1 million people lined the funeral route from her London home in Kensington Palace to Westminster Abbey , where her funeral was held.

Diana is buried on a small island surrounded by a lake at Althorp, her family’s ancestral estate in Northamptonshire, England.

Investigating Princess Diana’s Death

Initially, the incident had been blamed on their French chauffeur, Henri Paul, who may have been exceeding the speed limit to avoid tabloid photographers.

A subsequent inquest on the crash performed by the British police, and released in 2006, ruled Diana’s death a “tragic accident.” The inquest found that Paul had been drunk at the time of the accident, and that his condition may have been worsened by prescription anti-depressants he was taking.

In fact, tests of Paul’s blood following the crash revealed that his alcohol levels were more than three times the legal limit in France for drunk driving. Investigators believe this caused him to lose control of the Mercedes.

The inquest jury ruled that both Paul and the paparazzi chasing Diana and Al-Fayed were responsible for the crash due to “gross negligence.” The deaths of Diana and Al-Fayed were also ruled “unlawful killings”—the court equivalent of manslaughter.

In addition, the jury ruled that the couple might have survived the crash had they been wearing seatbelts.

No one was charged in the deaths of Diana and Al-Fayed, as Paul was himself killed. Several members of the paparazzi were questioned immediately after the accident, but were released.

Diana’s Legacy

In addition to her accomplishments on behalf of those with HIV/AIDS while she was alive, Diana is fondly remembered as a patron of the United Kingdom’s National AIDS Trust, an advocacy organization for people with the disease and their families. Many of the organization’s initiatives are named in her honor.

Diana is also credited, by at least one biographer, with effectively modernizing the royal family in their relations with the British public.

Generally reserved, the royal family, and in particular Queen Elizabeth, have arguably been more engaged with the public since Diana’s passing, visiting with victims of terrorist attacks in London, for example.

Her sons William and Harry have also credited their late mother with shaping their own charitable efforts, which include HIV/AIDS and wildlife conservation work in Africa, among other initiatives.

Diana, Princess of Wales. The Home of the Royal Family. A Family History. Spencer of Althorp. How Princess Diana changed attitudes to Aids. BBC News. Diana death a ‘tragic accident.’ BBC News. Princess Diana’s Life and Legacy. ABC News.

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A Look at Princess Diana’s Life, 25 Years After Her Death

The royal captured the public's attention from her engagement to her funeral

Lady Diana Frances Spencer was born on July 1, 1961, in Norfolk, England. The third of four children born to the 8th Earl Spencer and his then-wife, Frances, Lady Diana developed a love of and talent for music and dancing, according to the royal family’s website.

After a whirlwind courtship, Lady Diana married Prince Charles, the heir to the British throne, on July 29, 1981, in one of the most-watched events in royal history. The 20-year-old wore a voluminous silk taffeta dress with a 25-foot train that filled the aisle of St. Paul's Cathedral.

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The couple spent their honeymoon at the Mountbatten family home at Broadlands, in Hampshire, England, and then on a 12-day cruise through the Mediterranean. They finished their trip at Balmoral Castle in Scotland, shown here.

On June 21, 1982, Princess Diana gave birth to Prince William Arthur Philip Louis, her first child. As the new family of three departed St. Mary's Hospital in London the next day, Princess Diana wore a polka-dot dress.

PA Wire/Zuma

William’s wife, Kate Middleton, also appeared in a polka-dot dress after the birth of their first son decades later.

Parsons Media/Zuma

Kirsty Wigglesworth/AP

In 1984, Princess Diana gave birth to her second son, Henry Charles Albert David—Prince Harry.

John Shelley Collection/Avalon/Zuma

As a royal, Princess Diana emerged as a glamorous figure with star power. In 1985, she danced with actor John Travolta at a White House dinner event in the royal couple’s honor. Later that year, she performed on stage at London’s Royal Opera House with dancer Wayne Sleep.

Pete Souza/Ronald Reagan Library/AP

Princess Diana took on charities and causes as part of her duties, eventually becoming president or patron for over 100 charities during her marriage to Prince Charles. In 1987, during a time of stigma and misinformation around AIDS, she was photographed shaking the hand of an AIDS patient in London.

John Redman/AP

Princess Diana was a glamorous figure but also charmed the public. She was seen as someone they could relate to, a mother who loved her children. She competed in a race with other parents at Prince Harry’s school in 1991.

Anwar Hussein/WireImage/Getty

Amid speculation about the state of the royals’ marriage, royal reporter Andrew Morton’s "Diana: Her True Story" was published in 1992. The best-selling tell-all book, produced with the princess’s cooperation, discussed Charles’s longtime affair with Camilla Parker Bowles and Diana’s struggles with the affair, bulimia and celebrity.

Ben Curtis/PA Wire/Reuters

Peter Jordan/AP

After news of Prince Charles’s infidelity, which he made public in a television special, Princess Diana made a public appearance at a fundraising dinner hosted by Vanity Fair in what became known as her “revenge dress.”

Ian Jones/Zuma

In 1995, Princess Diana talked about many of her struggles, as well as her own infidelity, during an interview with journalist Martin Bashir on BBC’s “Panorama.” In one memorable moment, she was asked if Ms. Parker Bowles was a factor in the breakdown of her marriage. “Well there were three of us in this marriage, so it was a bit crowded," she said. The BBC has since apologized for unethical methods and fake documents used to obtain the interview.

BBC/PA Wire/Reuters

Months later, Prince Charles received a letter from his mother, urging divorce, and he agreed. By February 1996, Princess Diana had also agreed. The couple received a final decree of divorce in August 1996.

After her divorce, Diana resigned from many of the charity positions she had held as a working member of the royal family. But she continued to work on certain humanitarian issues. In January 1997, she visited Angola as part of a campaign to ban land mines.

Express Newspapers/AP

John Stillwell/PA Wire/Zuma

She began a relationship with Dodi Fayed, the son of the billionaire and former owner of Harrods, Mohamed al-Fayed. The two, often photographed by paparazzi, sailed around the Mediterranean, stopping in the French Riviera resort of St. Tropez.

Patrick Bar/Nice-Matin/AP

Diana, Princess of Wales, and Mr. Fayed both died on Aug. 31, 1997, in a high-speed accident in Paris. The vehicle crashed in the Pont de l'Alma underpass as the driver, who French authorities said was inebriated, was trying to evade paparazzi. She was 36 years old.

Diana, Princess of Wales, and Mr. Fayed both died on Aug. 31, 1997, in a high-speed accident in Paris. The vehicle crashed in the Pont de l'Alma underpass as the driver, who French authorities said was inebriated, was trying to evade paparazzi. She was 36.

Jerome Delay/AP

Pierre Boussel/AFP/Getty

A funeral for Princess Diana, who former Prime Minister Tony Blair called the “people’s princess,” took place on Sept. 6 in Westminster Abbey. Elton John performed a rewritten version of his song “Candle in the Wind” dedicated to her. The song, later released as a single, topped charts in the U.K. and U.S.

Princess Diana’s tensions with the royal family outlived her. Many considered their initial response to her death inadequate. Tony Blair, the former prime minister, has said he spoke with the family about how to react, and that he thought a televised statement the queen gave ahead of Diana’s funeral was “near perfect.”

Ian Waldie/Reuters

Her sudden death shocked the world. An estimated 2 billion people watched her funeral , making it one of the most-viewed events in television history. Even today, people leave bouquets and other gifts outside the gates of Kensington Palace on the anniversary of her death.

John Stillwell/PA Wire/Reuters

Interest in Diana persists 25 years after her death. In recent years, documentaries, movies and TV shows about her life have been made , including the film “Spencer,” shown here, and the opulent Netflix series on the royal family, “The Crown.”

Frederic Batier/Neon/Everett Collection

Produced by Matthew Riva

Cover photo: Keystone Press Agency/Zuma Credits photo: Johnny Eggitt/AFP/Getty

The Final Years of Princess Diana

Before her untimely death in 1997, the People's Princess was determined to forge her own path.

Diana's marriage to Charles dissolved

On December 9, 1992, Prime Minister John Major announced to the House of Commons that Charles and Diana had separated. It wasn't a big surprise: estrangement between the two had been evident, and a recent book by Andrew Morton, entitled Diana: Her True Story , had detailed her unhappiness (Diana denied involvement with the book but had in fact cooperated).

Yet the separation placed Diana in an awkward position, as it was Charles who had the defined role as heir to the throne. Though she remained extremely popular, and she'd always be the mother of a future king, she was no longer considered a true member of the royal family.

She was on a quest for normality

In 1993, Diana successfully headed a Remembrance Day service in Northern Ireland, among other duties. But she also remained an object of tabloid fascination — in November, photos taken of her exercising in a leotard appeared in the Daily Mirror . On December 3, she announced she was temporarily stepping away from public life and its "overwhelming" media attention.

Soon afterward, wanting more privacy and normality in her life, Diana also relinquished her police protection. From 1994 onward, she usually had no official bodyguard. Paparazzi, who loved the fact that Diana was unguarded, began to take more and more photos — a practice that continued right up to the night of her death.

As Charles' camp tried to boost his reputation, Diana was seen as emotionally volatile

Today Diana's reputation shines, but critical stories often appeared about her. In 1994, the press stated she'd been making nuisance phone calls to the home of a married man. And the publication of Princess in Love revealed details about Diana's affair with army officer James Hewitt.

People in her husband's camp were also determined to bolster Charles' reputation, making him the subject of a positive biography and documentary to celebrate his 25th anniversary as Prince of Wales in 1994 (though an on-camera admission of adultery didn't help the prince). For some, Diana and Charles were a zero-sum game: Diana had to be seen as emotionally volatile in order to explain Charles' actions. All this made Diana determined to reveal her side of things once more.

She did a secret TV interview to tell her truth

Many friends cautioned Diana not to get on the wrong side of the royal family, and the princess knew the establishment wouldn't approve of an on-camera interview. But she struck a deal with BBC's Panorama, and on November 5, 1995, interviewer Martin Bashir and crew came to Kensington Palace to talk to Diana (she'd given her staff time off to maintain secrecy). She didn't tell Buckingham Palace what she'd done until less than a week before the interview was scheduled to air.

On November 20, the program was seen by 23 million people in Britain. In it, Diana talked about her marriage, infidelity, bulimia and depression, and stated, "I'd like to be a queen of people's hearts, in people's hearts, but I don't see myself being Queen of this country." She also questioned Charles's ability to rule. The interview did boost the princess's popularity, but it also precipitated a final exit from the royal roost.

READ MORE: Was Princess Diana a Commoner Before Marrying Prince Charles?

Diana and Charles officially divorced just one year before her death

In December 1995, the Queen wrote to Charles and Diana to say it would be better if they divorced. The pair agreed to do so in February 1996, and their marriage officially ended on August 28, 1996.

Diana ended up receiving a lump sum payment of £17 million and shared custody of Princes William and Harry . However, though she would still be known as the Princess of Wales, she no longer had the title "Her Royal Highness." She'd been fully kicked out of the royal family.

READ MORE: How Princes William and Harry Are Carrying out Princess Diana's Legacy

She found love again

While her divorce was happening, Diana had a bright spot in her life: She'd fallen in love again. In 1995, she met Dr. Hasnat Khan, a cardiac surgeon who was tending to the husband of a friend. Through him, Diana experienced some of the normality she'd always craved — she got to order drinks at a pub and stand in a line. According to one friend, the princess noted, "You meet such interesting people queuing!"

Diana may even have hoped to marry Khan. She traveled to Pakistan to meet his family and saw them when they visited England. But her lover was devoted to his medical career, and the spotlight that came with Diana would be a huge burden. The relationship ended in the summer of 1997.

About two months after their split, Diana began dating Dodi Fayed , who was also involved in the car crash that took their lives.

READ MORE: Why Princess Diana Risked Her Life for Humanitarian Causes in Africa

Diana devoted her time to support worthwhile causes

Diana continued to support humanitarian causes following her divorce. In January 1997, she traveled to Angola with a BBC film crew to bring attention to the problem of landmines, which remained across the country following a civil war.

During her trip, Diana spent time with landmine victims and visited a prosthesis clinic. She also walked across a cleared minefield (still a dangerous decision, as mines could have been left behind). And when photographers complained they didn't have the shots they needed, she walked through the field again.

Diana's celebrity brought attention to an important cause. After she died, 122 governments signed the Ottawa Mine Ban Treaty in December 1997. The impact of just one trip highlights again what a tragedy her early death was, and how much more she could have done for the world.

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Princess Diana Changed the Idea of What a Princess Should Be

Decades after her tragic death, Lady Di's influence is still felt.

Lady Diana Spencer was only 20 years old when she married Prince Charles and became the United Kingdom’s own Princess of Wales. To the 750 million viewers who watched her 1981 wedding on television, Diana was a charming, down-to-earth princess who’d won her fairy tale marriage. But a decade later she sadly described the wedding as “the worst day of my life.”

Princess Di, as she was affectionately known, made that confession during a series of taped interviews with journalist Andrew Morton, who was writing a book about her life. She spoke candidly about her troubled marriage, her struggle with bulimia, and her difficulty handling life in the public eye. Most of the material has never been broadcast, but viewers can hear the interviews in the National Geographic documentary Diana: In Her Own Words .

The film came 20 years after Lady Di’s shocking death in a car crash. Although by that time she had divorced Charles, she remained an international icon and mother to two princes.

We spoke with Tom Jennings , executive producer of the new film, about the humanitarian causes Lady Di championed and how she changed the role of the royal family. ( See “Queen Elizabeth's Record-Breaking Reign in 14 Pictures.” )

How did the world react to the news of her sudden death?

When Princess Diana died, the whole world stopped. It was a remarkable and very sad series of events. The funeral was broadcast live around the world. People in the U.K. were putting flowers at the gates of Kensington Palace, so much so that for hundreds of yards you couldn’t even get to the palace gates.

Was the public always so infatuated with her?

People were fascinated by her to begin with. We grow up with this fairy tale fantasy of princes and princesses and castles, and all of sudden you had this very beautiful, very young woman living it. She almost instantaneously became more popular than Prince Charles. ( Read “Prince Charles's Newest Cause: Combating Ocean Trash.” )

Into the 1990s the pressures of her marriage started to weigh down on her. After Morton’s book came out, she became kind of a polarizing figure. Some people thought that a royal should not be talking in public about what’s going on in their private lives. But other people who believed in her and who truly loved her became even more staunch supporters of her.

Her humanitarian work was also divisive, particularly when she shook hands with AIDS patients in 1987 .

There was this unproven fear that if you just shook the hand of someone who had HIV or AIDS you would contract the disease, and Diana believed that not to be true. The people who loved her at that time loved her even more because here was a very public figure willing to show the world that these individuals need attention and care too. But some grumbled that a royal person shouldn’t be doing that. (See Remembering Diana: A Life in Photographs . )

Also during that time in the late ‘80s she took on homelessness, especially in the U.K. There’s footage of her going around and talking with people who are homeless, living in tents under bridges—and a lot of people just couldn’t believe it. She made a big point of saying that in the modern world people shouldn’t have to live like this. Right before she died, she took on the issue of landmines in war-torn countries in Africa, specifically Angola.

There was a conscious decision made on her part: ‘If I’m going to have cameras pointed at me the whole time, I might as well use all this publicity for good.’ And that’s what she did. She knew that her going out to hospitals or to fields filled with landmines would immediately draw the world’s attention to the problem. ( Read “Meet the Giant Rats That Are Sniffing out Landmines.” )

How did her humanitarian work and willingness to talk about her personal life change the royal family?

Princess Diana had a tremendous impact on the royal family, and the people of the U.K., and their opinions of what the royal family meant to them. I think it carries on most significantly with her two sons, the princes William and Harry. She even says in our film toward the end that she’s altering the monarchy in a subtle way—for especially William, the older of the two—by doing all of the things that she’s doing, by taking on causes that the royal family would not normally take on.

Some people give her a lot of credit for modernizing the royal family by making it more engaged. It certainly has taken on a much more modern spin, and that modern spin started with Princess Diana. No one else had changed it quite as much as she did before then. And I think it is seen now as a much more accessible British institution. The two princes are often out interacting with the public in a way that Diana did. She was never afraid to go and shake hands with people.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

For Hungry Minds

Related topics.

• HISTORY AND CIVILIZATION
• MODERN HISTORY
• PEOPLE AND CULTURE

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25 Years After Princess Diana’s Death, She’s Still Shaping the Royal Family

T wenty-five years ago on Aug. 31, Princess Diana’s sudden death in a car crash in Paris at the age of 36 shocked the world.

It sparked a period of mourning around the world—so many were charmed by her glamour, but also saw her as the most relatable royal. She openly talked about her mental health struggles and was not afraid to meet with the most vulnerable populations—including famously HIV/AIDS and leprosy patients . The anniversary of her death comes at a time of controversy and tension within the royal family, and TIME asked experts on the royals to weigh in on the similarities between then and now—as well as on Diana’s enduring legacy.

At the time of her death, Diana was the glue that held the royal family together—and the magnet that kept both British subjects and fans abroad feeling a connection to the monarchy. She represented a vision of the royals that it could and should be. In many ways, that dynamic has only grown stronger in the quarter-century since her death—not least because her sons are now two of the most visible members of the family.

In a special report on Diana’s death at age 36 that ran in the Sep. 8, 1997, issue of TIME, the magazine recapped the raw reactions to her death and noted a certain coolness within the royal family:

Diana’s family was outraged at the circumstances surrounding her death. Her only brother Charles, the current Earl Spencer , bitterly declared, “I always believed the press would kill her in the end. Not even I could imagine that they would take such a direct hand in her death, as seems to be the case.” He added, “It would appear that every proprietor and editor of every publication that has paid for intrusive and exploitative photographs of her, encouraging greedy and ruthless individuals to risk everything in pursuit of Diana’s image, has blood on his hands today.” As for Diana’s former in-laws, they kept a regal silence. Members of the royal family, including Queen Elizabeth and Prince Charles, vacationing with his sons—her sons—William and Harry at Balmoral Castle, were notified by phone. None made any public statement. Actually, for several weeks, Britain’s first family had been maintaining a studied silence on the topic of Diana. Almost a year to the day after a final divorce decree ended her arid marriage to Prince Charles, the princess had exploded back onto the pages of the tabloids, on the arm—and in the arms—of the wealthy [Dodi] Al Fayed [who was also killed in the crash]. The photographs were the purest paparazzi stuff—grainy images furtively snapped through telephoto lenses the size of bazookas. The story they told, however, was unmistakable. After years of smiling bravely and brittlely by the side of a man she was no longer in love with, the princess just may have found one she did love.

The royal family’s silence drew criticism that they did not realize the pain many people in the public felt about Diana’s death. “If you’re looking for the moment when the British monarchy was most severely challenged and found itself most at odds with public opinion, it has to be following the death of Diana and the perception that the Queen and the royal family didn’t care,” says Robert Lacey, author of Battle of Brothers: William, Harry and the Inside Story of a Family in Tumult, and a historical consultant to the Netflix TV show The Crown. (Former Buckingham Palace press secretary Dickie Arbiter slammed the program’s portrayal of Diana as a “hatchet job” on the royal family.)

Read more: Read TIME’s Original 1997 Special Report on Princess Diana’s Death

As TIME pointed out, the royal family had been cool towards Diana even before her divorce from Charles, due to the attention she attracted from the tabloids. While the precise reasons for the coolness are “still ultimately a matter of speculation,” Lacey says, “there was no doubt it was there.“ The headlines and media attention Diana generated “was not approved by the Queen and the Royal establishment,” he says.

But, 25 years later, Diana’s impact on the royal family endures, in ways both big and small. Royal historians see Diana’s legacy in the engagement rings made from Diana’s jewelry that Prince William and Prince Harry gave their wives Kate Middleton and Meghan Markle —but also in the charitable causes championed by her children, like their Heads Together initiative to promote mental health awareness. “One of the things that Diana introduced into modern royalty was the concept of conveying a sense of caring for people,” as Lacey puts it. For example, this summer, Kate Middleton and Prince William visited a children’s hospice in East Anglia that Diana opened in the 1980s. As Carolyn Harris, author of Raising Royalty: 1,000 Years of Royal Parenting , explains: “We’ve seen both William and Harry are very concerned with vulnerable people, people with disabilities, [and] people suffering from mental health crises.”

Perhaps the most striking similarity to the time of Diana’s death and the current state of royal affairs is the power of the tell-all interview. The royal family was still reeling from Diana’s 1995 BBC interview with Martin Bashir, in which she had revealed her struggles with bulimia, expressed doubts about Prince Charles’ readiness to be King, and admitted to knowing about his affair with Camilla Parker-Bowles.

The royal family is continuing to reel from tell-all interviews. In 2019, the Queen’s second son, Prince Andrew, gave an interview to the BBC’s Newsnight news show about his association with Jeffrey Epstein and allegations that he had sex with a teenage girl who was trafficked. That interview was widely seen as disastrous for the prince, and he later settled a sex abuse lawsuit with the alleged victim.

The interview has been compared to Prince Harry and Meghan Markle ‘s sit-down with Oprah Winfrey in 2021 after giving up their royal duties and moving to the U.S. Markle said that a member of the royal family expressed concerns about what the color of her son Archie’s skin would be when he was born. And, in an Aug. 29 profile for New York magazine’s The Cut, Markle discussed how “toxic tabloid culture” strained the relationship between Prince Harry and his father.

Read more: Meghan and Harry’s Interview Won’t End the Monarchy. But a Reckoning Is Coming

While Princess Diana and Meghan Markle may have both spoken out against the monarchy, Lacey argues that Diana would have believed more in the institution of the monarchy as a force for good than Markle. Prince Harry and Meghan Markle , he says, “have not managed to capture the emotional pull that Diana exercised over Britain until the moment of her death.” Royal family members understand that the institution is “bigger than they are,” he says, and “Diana would have felt that Meghan failed to understand that.” Moreover, he maintains that “Diana would have been heartbroken by the rift that developed between her sons.”

However, in his Oprah interview , Prince Harry compared the scrutiny that Meghan has received in the tabloids to the way the press hounded his mother, and has condemned harassment directed at Markle since his first statement confirming their relationship in 2016.

Both sons had an opportunity to reflect on the significance of their mother’s death and what kind of impact she had on them earlier this summer at the 2022 Diana Award ceremony, which honors young activists doing humanitarian work. “I believe there’s no better way to celebrate her life and work than through recognizing incredible people who dedicate so much time and effort to helping those around them,” Prince William said.

And as his brother Prince Harry explained the main lesson he learned from Diana, “My mother instilled in me, and in all of us, a drive to speak up and fight for a better world.”

Correction, Sep. 1

The original version of this story misstated the BBC news program that interviewed Prince Andrew in 2019. It is Newsnight, not Panorama.

More Must-Reads from TIME

• Javier Milei’s Radical Plan to Transform Argentina
• The New Face of Doctor Who
• How Private Donors Shape Birth-Control Choices
• What Happens if Trump Is Convicted ? Your Questions, Answered
• The Deadly Digital Frontiers at the Border
• Scientists Are Finding Out Just How Toxic Your Stuff Is
• The 31 Most Anticipated Movies of Summer 2024
• Want Weekly Recs on What to Watch, Read, and More? Sign Up for Worth Your Time

Write to Olivia B. Waxman at [email protected]

History | November 15, 2023

How Princess Diana’s Death Transformed the Royal Family

The last season of “The Crown” will examine the aftermath of the beloved royal’s death in a car accident in 1997

Meilan Solly

Associate Editor, History

Diana, Princess of Wales, had a complicated relationship with the press. As the spouse and later ex-wife of Prince Charles, heir to the British throne, she was a magnet for the paparazzi, who earned upwards of £500,000 for each grainy snapshot. In 1993, Diana reportedly confronted a photographer who was waiting for her outside of a movie theater in London, yelling , “You make my life hell!”

But Diana also recognized the power of the press as a tool to transform public opinion. She had photographers on standby when she shook hands with AIDS patients in 1987 amid homophobic myths that the virus spread through casual touch. A decade later, Diana walked through a minefield in Angola to raise awareness of efforts to clear landmines around the world. “When she realized some photographers didn’t get the shot, she turned around and did it again,” the Associated Press recounted in 2022.

Diana’s oft-contentious, sometimes symbiotic dynamic with Britain’s tabloids reached its peak on August 31, 1997, when an early morning car chase with photographers eager to capture footage of her and her new beau, Dodi al-Fayed , took a fatal turn. The British public awoke to the news that the 36-year-old royal was dead, killed in a crash that also claimed the lives of Dodi and the couple’s driver. Prime Minister Tony Blair eulogized Diana as “the people’s princess,” and the outpouring of grief that followed underscored the accuracy of his assessment.

Diana “had such a compressed life,” says Arianne Chernock , a historian at Boston University. “The fact that she died in her 30s, with so much possibility, is part of her enduring mystique, … but it’s also that she wore so many different hats in that short life, and that we really saw this woman coming into her own in full public view.”

Twenty-six years after Diana’s death, the hit Netflix series “ The Crown ” is set to revisit the tragedy, examining the events that led to the fatal accident and reflecting on how it changed the lives of Elizabeth II and the royal family. Covering the years 1997 to 2005, the show’s sixth season will air in two parts, with the first four episodes debuting on November 16 and the remaining six on December 14. Ahead of the premiere, here’s what you need to know about the real history behind the final season of the acclaimed show.

How “The Crown” is addressing Diana’s death

Season five of “ The Crown ” focused on the dissolution of Charles and Diana’s marriage , highlighting the couple’s infidelity and their battle for the public’s affection following their separation in 1992—a period Elizabeth deemed an annus horribilis , or “horrible year.” The new season picks up in the summer of 1997, when Diana (played by Elizabeth Debicki) and her young sons join business tycoon Mohamed al-Fayed (Salim Daw) on a vacation to southern France. During the trip, Diana grows close to Mohamed’s son Dodi (Khalid Abdalla), embarking on a whirlwind romance with the 42-year-old film producer.

As Deadline reported last October, the show will depict the moments before Diana’s death, including the beginning of the paparazzi car chase, but not the accident itself. “The show might be big and noisy, but we’re not,” executive producer Suzanne Mackie told reporters in August. “We’re thoughtful people and we’re sensitive people. There were very careful, long conversations about how we were going to do it.”

However the showrunners portray Diana’s final days, their dramatization is sure to generate controversy—and, in fact, already has , with reports that Diana’s ghost would appear to Charles (played by Dominic West) and Elizabeth (Imelda Staunton) after her death proving most divisive . In response to the criticism, series creator Peter Morgan told Variety that he “never imagined it as Diana’s ‘ghost’ in the traditional sense.” He added, “It was her continuing to live vividly in the minds of those she has left behind. Diana was unique, and I suppose that’s what inspired me to find a unique way of representing her. She deserved special treatment narratively.”

In these episodes, Morgan is revisiting the topic that brought him his first brush with critical acclaim. His 2006 Oscar-nominated screenplay for The Queen focused on Elizabeth’s muted response to Diana’s death. Starring Helen Mirren in the titular role, the movie earned accolades for humanizing the monarch as she guided her grandsons through an unimaginable tragedy.

Dodi and Diana

Exactly when Diana and Dodi first crossed paths is unclear, but a 1986 polo match in which he and Charles competed on different teams is a promising candidate. At the time, Diana was five years into her marriage with the prince. The relationship was an unhappy one; that year, both Charles and Diana engaged in extramarital affairs . Dodi, meanwhile, was embarking on a marriage of his own, wedding model Susanne Gregard. Their union lasted just eight months , and Dodi soon returned to his playboy ways , romancing high-profile actresses, models and celebrities. “He had the attitude that the woman he was with reflected on him,” longtime friend Michael White told Vanity Fair in 1997. As the magazine concluded, “Diana represented Dodi’s lifetime achievement.”

Dodi’s relationship with the princess also marked the pinnacle of his father’s ambitions. Mohamed , a self-made billionaire who got his start in the shipping industry, made a name for himself in the 1970s and ’80s as an upstart businessman in his adoptive country of the United Kingdom. After the government repeatedly rejected his applications for citizenship, Mohamed sought to ingratiate himself with members of the upper echelons of British society. Among them were Diana’s father, who reportedly asked Mohamed to look after his family on his deathbed, and her stepmother , who served on the board of one of Mohamed’s most prestigious acquisitions, the department store Harrods.

According to an unauthorized biography of Mohamed, the entrepreneur went out of his way to befriend Diana, whose turbulent personal life, from her marital separation in 1992 to her tell-all interview with the BBC in 1995, provided nonstop tabloid fodder. “Fayed felt genuine sympathy for the isolated woman, who he could see was made almost frantic by her predicament,” writes biographer Tom Bower. “She was a natural target for the generosity which a tycoon could offer.”

The summer of 1997 found Diana, by now officially divorced, coming to terms with her failed marriage. “Diana was starting a new life,” biographer Judy Wade told People . “She had said, ‘I’m spreading my wings.’ She was being quite positive about her divorce.” While the situation with Charles had improved, Diana’s love life was far from settled. She’d recently split from heart surgeon Hasnat Khan , a man she nicknamed “ Mr. Wonderful ” and may have hoped to marry , and she was in need of a distraction. When Mohamed invited her, 15-year-old William and 12-year-old Harry to join his family on a vacation in St.-Tropez that July, Diana readily accepted. It was during this period of “jet skiing, swimming, sunshine and lavish hospitality,” in the words of the Guardian , that the princess formed a new connection with Dodi.

Max Clifford, a public relations expert and friend of the Fayed family, later told the Washington Post that despite their cultural differences, Diana and Dodi “shared an attitude toward the establishment and the royal family, a distaste for what Diana would call ‘the Firm,’ the people who surround the royals.” The Post also reported that the pair “were not inclined toward intellectual matters; they relished a joint visit to a clairvoyant.”

The extent to which Mohamed pushed his son to pursue Diana is the subject of debate. But royal historian Sally Bedell Smith told Vanity Fair that Mohamed “engineered the romance with Dodi. And Dodi basically did whatever his father told him to do,” even breaking off his relationship with (and perhaps even engagement to) model Kelly Fisher to focus his attention on the princess.

“If it was love, it also would have been the sweetest revenge,” the Post reported in September 1997. “The British royal family that Diana believed had treated her so shabbily would have had to watch as she brought a garishly wealthy Arab family into the heart of aristocracy. And the British establishment that had snootily dismissed [Mohamed’s] pleas for acceptance would then have had to honor him as patriarch of Di’s new family.”

Diana’s deadly car crash

In August, William and Harry joined their father and grandparents at Balmoral Castle in Scotland. Separated from her boys, Diana reunited with Dodi on his family’s yacht, where paparazzi captured photos of them kissing, sparking a media frenzy over the princess’s latest love interest. On August 30, Diana and Dodi left Sardinia and flew to Paris, where Dodi picked up what may have been a diamond engagement ring . Whether Dodi planned on proposing, let alone if Diana would have said yes, remains unclear, with friends of the couple offering conflicting opinions on the seriousness of their relationship.

Photographers followed Diana relentlessly throughout her time in Paris, preventing the princess and Dodi from enjoying dinner at the Chez Benoit bistro. The couple relocated to the restaurant at the Paris Ritz (one of Mohamed’s properties), hoping its security team could keep the paparazzi in check, but moved to a private suite after continuing to attract unwanted attention. Planning to end the night at Dodi’s apartment, they came up with a plan to trick the press into following two decoy vehicles departing from the front of the hotel. Around 12:20 a.m., Diana and Dodi climbed into the back seat of a black Mercedes driven by Henri Paul , acting head of security at the Ritz. Dodi’s bodyguard, Trevor Rees-Jones , rode in the front passenger seat.

Several photographers undeterred by the car switch ruse hopped onto motorcycles and started chasing the Mercedes, prompting Paul to drive erratically, at more than double the speed limit of 30 miles per hour. As the Guardian reported on the day after the crash, Paul’s “attempts to outmaneuver the photographers failed. They, after all, were old hands at car chasing, and he was not.” Paul’s blood alcohol level was also three times as high as the legal limit for driving in France.

A few minutes into the car chase, Paul lost control of the Mercedes, striking a white Fiat Uno and swerving into the left lane of the Pont de l’Alma underpass, where his vehicle collided with the 13th pillar supporting the roof. Dodi and Paul died instantly, but Diana and Rees-Jones survived the initial impact. (The bodyguard spent more than a month in the hospital but eventually recovered from his injuries.)

“Four people, two of them were apparently dead, no reaction, no breathing,” Frederic Mailliez, a medic who was one of the first people on the scene, later told France 24 . “And the two others, on the right side, were living but in severe condition. … The female passenger, the young lady, was on her knees on the floor of the Mercedes. She had her head down, she had difficulty [breathing]. She needed quick assistance.”

First responders arrived in the tunnel around 12:40 a.m. As rescuers removed Diana from the wreckage, police documented the scene and confiscated the paparazzi’s cameras and cellphones. Though Diana went into cardiac arrest, firefighters managed to resuscitate her before moving her to a hospital. Despite doctors’ best efforts, Diana was declared dead at 4 a.m. Newspapers around the world rushed to inform readers of the tragedy, publishing variations of the headline “Diana dead” in stark bold text on their front pages .

The aftermath of Diana’s death

The sudden, violent death of a beloved royal prompted an “unprecedented outpouring of emotion from many British subjects,” says Chernock. Struggling to come to terms with the news, the royal family underestimated “how hungry people were for some leadership in that moment,” she adds. It was Blair, the Labor Party prime minister, who provided the leadership the public needed, delivering a moving tribute to Diana on the morning of her death.

“How many times shall we remember her in how many different ways—with the sick, the dying, with children, with the needy?” Blair asked. “With just a look or a gesture that spoke so much more than words, she would reveal to all of us the depth of her compassion and her humanity.” The prime minister said, “She was the people’s princess, and that is how she will stay, how she will remain in our hearts and our memories forever.”

Elizabeth’s public response to her ex-daughter-in-law’s death arrived belatedly, on September 5. Addressing the nation live, Elizabeth spoke to her subjects as both “your queen and as a grandmother,” eulogizing Diana as “an exceptional and gifted human being … [who] never lost her capacity to smile and laugh.” Alluding to the public outcry over the royal family’s failure to speak out sooner, the queen emphasized that she, Charles and Prince Philip had spent the past few days “trying to help William and Harry come to terms with the devastating loss.”

The day after Elizabeth’s speech, the royal family laid Diana to rest with a funeral watched by some 2.5 billion television viewers around the world. Diana’s brother, Charles Spencer, described his sister as “the most hunted person of the modern age” and pledged to protect her sons from suffering similar fates. As the princess’s coffin passed Elizabeth, the queen bowed her head , breaking from protocol with a gesture that helped redeem her earlier silence in the eyes of the grieving public.

Diana’s legacy

Diana’s life and death radically changed both the British press and the royal family, including the country’s new king . “If you look at the way Charles tries to engage with the public now, he has taken real cues from Diana, and I think he would acknowledge that, in terms of trying to connect with people, to be human and relatable,” says Chernock. Harry has followed in his mother’s footsteps , too, setting boundaries with the paparazzi and even stepping back from royal duties to shield his wife, Meghan , Duchess of Sussex, from invasive public scrutiny.

In the immediate aftermath of the fatal crash, a Gallup poll found that 43 percent of British respondents assigned “extreme” blame for the accident to the paparazzi. Another 33 percent attributed the crash to the driver. Both then and now, the shocking tragedy spawned an array of conspiracy theories , with some observers suggesting the princess was murdered by the royal family or the British government in retaliation for speaking out against the establishment. Mohamed believed as much , claiming that his son and Diana had been killed by “people who did not want [them] to be together.”

An official inquest found otherwise, concluding in 2008 that Diana, Dodi and Paul had been unlawfully killed by Paul’s reckless driving and the paparazzi who chased them into the tunnel. No one faced criminal charges for the deaths, but three photographers were convicted in 2006 of invading the couple’s privacy by taking photos of the wreckage, and the court ordered them to pay symbolic damages to Mohamed.

“People accepted that what happened to Diana was wrong and, as a consequence, new notions of privacy which had been historically alien to us were applied,” Mark Stephens , a media law specialist at the firm Howard Kennedy, told Time in 2017. Prior to the princess’s death, privacy laws “did not exist, except in exceptional circumstances,” he said. “Privacy only existed in places like a doctor’s surgery, a confessional, a marital bed or the death bed.”

After the tragedy, however, a revised code of ethics issued by the Press Complaints Commission placed stringent limits on acceptable paparazzi photography, protecting the privacy of school-age children (including William and Harry) and barring the use of long-lens cameras to take photos of individuals in private places without their consent. Though “an unseemly culture of media invasiveness still exists” in the U.K., Time noted that “the battle lines have been redrawn,” with the royal family asserting its right to privacy by cutting off photographers’ access or threatening to take legal action against the press.

“There’s something so singular about Diana, so we tend to just really focus on [her as a] person,” says Chernock. But Diana was far from the first “royal wronged woman,” as the historian calls her. From Anne Boleyn , the spurned Tudor queen beheaded on Henry VIII’s orders, to Caroline of Brunswick , who fought back when her husband, George IV, tried to divorce her in 1820, British history is filled with the stories of women whose mistreatment by men elicited powerful responses from the public. “Some of the strong emotions that Diana tapped into, and that we continue to feel in thinking through her life and death, we’ve seen in different forms at other moments,” Chernock says.

Ultimately, Chernock explains, Diana “really was the people’s princess,” an individual who drew on the “soft power of the royal family to channel emotion, love, support, connection and humanitarianism, and it’s that dimension of her role that came to the fore after her death.” The historian adds, “People have always used Diana to explore their own grievances and anxieties, and we see that on display in 1997 and the months that followed.”

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Meilan Solly | | READ MORE

Meilan Solly is Smithsonian magazine's associate digital editor, history.

Princess Diana

• Born July 1 , 1961 · Park House, Sandringham, Norfolk, England, UK
• Died August 31 , 1997 · Paris, France (road accident)
• Birth name Diana Frances Spencer
• The People's Princess
• Princess Di
• The Queen of Hearts
• The Princess of Hearts
• England's Rose
• Height 5′ 10″ (1.78 m)
• Princess Diana was a member of the British royal family. She was the first wife of Charles, Prince of Wales, and the mother of Prince William and Prince Harry. Diana's activism and glamour made her an international icon and earned her an enduring popularity. Diana was born into the British nobility and grew up close to the royal family on their Sandringham estate. She did not distinguish herself academically, but was talented in music, dance, and sports. Diana came to prominence in 1981 upon her engagement to Prince Charles, the eldest son of Queen Elizabeth II, after a brief courtship. Their wedding took place at St Paul's Cathedral in 1981 and made her Princess of Wales, a role in which she was enthusiastically received by the public. The couple had two sons, the princes William and Harry, who were then second and third in the line of succession to the British throne. The couple separated in 1992, soon after the breakdown of their relationship became public knowledge. The details of their marital difficulties became increasingly publicized, and the marriage ended in divorce in 1996. As Princess of Wales, Diana undertook royal duties on behalf of the Queen and represented her at functions across the Commonwealth realms. She was celebrated in the media for her unconventional approach to charity work. Her patronages initially centered on children and youth but she later became known for her involvement with AIDS patients and campaign for the removal of landmines. She also raised awareness and advocated ways to help people affected with cancer and mental illness. Considered to be very photogenic, she was a leader of fashion in the 1980s and 1990s. Media attention and public mourning were extensive after her death in a car crash in a Paris tunnel in 1997 and televised funeral. Her legacy has had a deep impact on the royal family and British society. - IMDb Mini Biography By: Tango Papa
• Spouse King Charles III (July 29, 1981 - August 28, 1996) (divorced, 2 children)
• Children Prince Harry Prince William of Wales
• Parents Earl John Spencer Frances Shand Kydd
• Relatives Princess Charlotte of Wales (Grandchild) Prince Louis of Wales (Grandchild) Charles Spencer (Sibling) Sarah McCorquodale (Sibling) Jane Fellowes (Sibling) Prince George of Wales (Grandchild) Archie Harrison Mountbatten-Windsor (Grandchild) Lilibet Diana Mountbatten-Windsor (Grandchild)
• Blonde hair, often short
• Statuesque, model-like figure
• Once referred to Queen Camilla as a rottweiler.
• Told an intimate friend that, while walking down the aisle in Saint Paul's Cathedral, she thought about turning back like "Elaine" did in The Graduate (1967) .
• She was a close friend of Michael Jackson and Elton John . "Candle in the Wind", John's song about Marilyn Monroe , was changed to fit her, and performed by him at her funeral. Coincidentally, both women died at age 36.
• When Diana went to the LA Fitness Centre in Isleworth, the owner Bryce Taylor planted a camera and caught her exercising in a leotard. The photos were sold for over £100,000 to The Mirror. They printed them saying they were exposing the lapse in royal security, but Diana didn't buy the explanation and took them to court. They reached an out-of-court settlement. This incident impelled Diana to withdraw from public life.
• Invited Supermodel Cindy Crawford to Buckingham Palace for dinner, when Prince William of Wales had a secret crush on the model.
• [interview in "Panorama" magazine, 1995] There were three of us in this marriage, so it was a bit crowded.
• Any sane person would have left long ago. But I cannot. I have my sons.
• I'd like to be a queen in people's hearts but I don't see myself being queen of this country.
• My role is about 80% slog and 20% fantastic.
• If I'm going to comfort the suffering, I have to understand what they've been through.

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All About Charles Spencer, Princess Diana’s Brother and Closest Sibling

Charles Spencer, Princess Diana’s younger brother, delivered her eulogy in 1997

Tim Graham Photo Library/Getty

Charles Spencer may have been Princess Diana’s younger brother — but the 9th Earl Spencer has always felt “intensely protective” of his late sister.

Though Charles grew up with three older siblings — Lady Sarah McCorquodale, Lady Jane Fellowes and the future people’s princess — he was closest with Diana , who was three years his senior. Sarah and Jane , who were nine and seven years older than Charles, were away at boarding school for most of his childhood. That left Diana and Charles in the care of their father, John Spencer, who received custody of the children following his 1969 divorce from their mother, Frances Shand Kydd .

“Diana and I had two older sisters who were away at school, so she and I were very much in it together and I did talk to her about it,” Charles told The Sunday Times about their parents’ split. “Our father was a quiet and constant source of love, but our mother wasn’t cut out for maternity. Not her fault, she couldn’t do it.”

As a result, the bond between Diana and Charles was strong throughout their childhood — and remained that way as they became adults, despite tabloid rumors to the contrary . When Princess Diana was killed in a car crash on Aug. 31, 1997, it was Charles who stood at the pulpit of Westminster Abbey and delivered her eulogy .

Following her death, Charles revealed to PEOPLE that he was haunted by thoughts that there was something more he could have done to save his older sister.

“You always think, God, I wish I could’ve protected her. It was just ... it was devastating,” he told PEOPLE in 2017. “I always felt ... intensely protective towards her.”

In the decades since Diana’s tragic death, Charles has continued to protect his older sister’s memory — becoming an outspoken defender of her legacy and champion of her causes . From his traumatic upbringing to his tireless devotion to Diana, here is everything to know about Princess Diana’s younger brother, Charles Spencer.

He is Princess Diana’s younger sibling

PA Images/Getty

Born on May 20, 1964, in London, Charles Edward Maurice Spencer is the youngest of five children born to John Spencer and Frances Shand Kydd. He grew up with his three older sisters : Sarah, the eldest, born in 1955, followed by Jane in 1957 and Diana in 1961. Charles also had an older brother named John, who was born in 1960 but died just hours later — making Charles the only son and the heir to the earldom.

Though Charles never met his late brother, he honored his memory in May 2022 by having his tombstone restored. Charles shared before and after photos of the restoration on Instagram , along with a touching tribute to his older brother.

“Looking as it should, now,” Charles wrote alongside two photos of the grave. “I never knew my older brother, John, and live 100 miles from his grave — but, seeing it last summer, realised serious action was required. Thank you, BB, for making it look as it should.”

His parents divorced when he was a toddler

Charles’ parents, John and Frances, divorced in 1969 when Charles was just 3 years old. John was awarded full custody of his four children — but while Sarah and Jane attended boarding school, Diana and Charles lived at Althorp (the 500-year-old Spencer family estate) in Northamptonshire, England with their father.

The split was particularly “tough on Diana,” Charles previously told PEOPLE.

“While she [Frances] was packing her stuff to leave, she promised Diana [then aged 5] she’d come back to see her. Diana used to wait on the doorstep for her, but she never came,” he told The Sunday Times .

Charles also had his own issues as a result of his parents’ divorce, telling The Sunday Times that he’d been “in and out of therapy for 20 years” and had done “a lot of very profound work on my unhappy childhood.”

But “coming out the other side has been good,” he shared.

He has said there are “many myths” about his childhood with Diana

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In 2017, Charles shared with PEOPLE that there are “many myths” about his upbringing — especially regarding his late sister, Diana.

“First of all, none of us ever called her ‘Di’ at home. In fact, there are so many myths from our childhood that are just so ridiculous. That's one of them,” Charles told PEOPLE.

He continued, “I just think she was never shy, but she was canny about people and she was reserved to start with. And she would take a judgment of somebody before reacting to them. So, that’s not shy ... that’s actually quite clever.”

Charles also described Princess Diana as “incredibly brave,” sharing an example from their childhood when he and his sisters were catching lobsters while visiting their mother in Scotland.

“We pulled up [a pot] and there was a really massive conger eel,” he said. “It was black and it had teeth was very long and it was flapping around the boat. And Diana just got a pen knife out and just dealt with it. It was hand-to-hand and she just got stuck in. This thing was really a creature from the deep. And she just dealt with it.”

He revealed he was sexually abused as a child while in boarding school

Charles Spencer Instagram

In March 2024, Charles revealed that he was sexually abused as a child while a student at Maidwell Hall, one of Britain’s most prestigious boarding schools. He provided more details on the physical, verbal and sexual abuse he experienced at the school in his memoir A Very Private School. He described how, at the age of 11, he was groomed and sexually abused by a 19 or 20-year-old assistant matron at the boarding school.

“[She] seemed to have an unofficial hierarchy among her prey: We learned, from our secret conversations, that she chose one of us each term to share her bed and would use him for intercourse ... She added me to the second rank of her victims: those she intimately touched," Charles wrote.

He added, “The effect of what she did to me was profound and immediate, awakening in me basic desires that had no place in one so young.”

And although Charles was incredibly close with his sister Diana growing up, neither she nor his other sisters knew of the abuse that he endured. When he did finally tell his sisters, Lady Jane and Lady Sarah, it wasn’t until the end of 2022 — and they were both “stunned and appalled,” Charles told PEOPLE.

He is a father of seven — and a grandfather

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Charles, who has been married three times, is the father of seven children.

He shares four children with his first wife, Victoria Lockwood: daughters Lady Kitty Eleanor Spencer , Lady Eliza Victoria Spencer and Lady Katya Amelia Spencer and son Louis Spencer, Viscount Althorp .

His second marriage to Caroline Freud resulted in two more children: A son, the Honourable Edmund Spencer, and a daughter, Lady Lara Spencer. But after six years of marriage, Charles and Freud separated in 2007 and eventually divorced.

Charles married for the third time in 2011 to Canadian philanthropist Karen Spencer (née Gordon) . His six children were all present at the nuptials, which were held at Althorp Estate. Charles and Karen have one child together, a daughter named Lady Charlotte Diana Spencer — after Charles’ late sister Princess Diana.

His eldest daughter, Kitty, married Michael Lewis in Italy in 2021. In March 2024, Kitty revealed that she and her husband had welcomed a daughter, making Charles a first-time grandparent. One of his other daughters, Amelia, is also married: She wed Greg Mallett , her boyfriend of 11 years, in March 2023.

He delivered Princess Diana’s eulogy

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At Princess Diana’s funeral on Sept. 6, 1997, Charles stood in front of the thousands of gathered mourners (and the millions watching on television worldwide) to deliver her heart-wrenching eulogy.

Serving as “the representative of a family in grief, in a country in mourning, before a world in shock,” Charles paid tribute to his late sister as the “very essence of compassion, of duty, of style, of beauty.” But he also took the opportunity to condemn the treatment Diana had received from the tabloid media, describing her as “the most hunted person of the modern age.”

Charles previously told PEOPLE that the now iconic line “summed up so much of the anger I felt toward those who had done that to her.” In addition to the anger he felt, Charles also described the experience as physically and emotionally draining.

“In the final paragraph I had run out of energy, almost out of oxygen,” he shared with PEOPLE. “I had to punch each syllable out of the base of my stomach.”

He has written nine books

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Charles is a renowned historian and best-selling author who has written nine books over the course of his career. In addition to his 2024 memoir, A Very Private School , Charles is the author of eight other non-fiction books — focusing much of his work on British history. Three of his books were Sunday Times bestsellers: Killers of the King , The White Ship and Blenheim: Battle for Europe (which was also shortlisted for History Book of the Year at the 2005 National Book Awards).

“It is a compulsion,” Charles said in a 2017 interview about his writing. “It’s hard work, it’s solitary, and it’s sometimes exasperating. But, at the end of the day, holding a new book that you’ve written remains one of life’s more thrilling experiences.”

In addition to his writing, Charles, who studied at Oxford, has also worked as a journalist and broadcaster.

He lives at his family’s 500-year-old estate Althorp

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When Charles’ father John died in 1992, Charles became the 9th Earl Spencer and inherited Althorp, his family’s 500-year-old estate in Northamptonshire, England. It was built in 1508 and has housed 19 generations of the Spencer family —  including Charles and his sister Diana .

Althorp is also the final resting place of Princess Diana , who is buried at Oval Lake Grave — a small, secluded island found on the property’s 550 acres. Charles selected that location, as opposed to the family vault at St. Mary the Virgin church in Great Brington, due to concerns over public safety and privacy. He also oversaw a multimillion-dollar renovation of the burial site in 2016.

“We all agreed that, with its beauty and tranquility, this was the place for Diana to be,” he wrote in his 1998 book, Althorp: The Story of an English House .

He helps keep Diana’s memory and legacy alive

Amanda Edwards/WireImage ; Bettmann

Charles’ powerful bond with his sister Diana remains strong, even decades after her 1997 death. Though his older sisters rarely speak about Diana publicly, he regularly shares photographs from their childhood and memories of his late sister on his social media, commemorating events like her birthday , All Souls’ Day and the anniversary of her death .

Outside of social media, Charles speaks often about Diana and how her memory lives on today — especially in her two sons, Prince William and Prince Harry , with whom he remains close.

“I love seeing the sort of uncomplicated way that they deal with people, and put them at their ease,” he told PEOPLE in 2017. “It’s so easy to connect the dots between them and their mother.

He continued, “I love the fact that there’s still such veneration inside her immediate family for what she was, and what she meant. I think that’s fantastic.”

The Earl Spencer also visits his sister’s grave frequently throughout the year. “Every landmark day, such as birthday, Mother’s Day, I always take flowers,” he told Good Morning Britain in 2021. “I do go a lot, and it’s an oasis of calm, and it's a lovely place to go.”

Princess Diana’s Iconic Portraits Come ‘Full Circle’ as Royal Photographers Show Images in London

Pictures of Kate Middleton, Prince William, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle are included in the show in London

Some iconic portraits of Princess Diana  have come home.

The pictures, including her famous moment in front of India’s Taj Mahal, are displayed along with the stories behind the photos in a new exhibition in London.

The show, which kicked off in three U.S. cities in 2023, and includes 75 life-size prints, has come to Diana’s home city to the delight of three photographers from one family.

Anwar Hussein took some of the most famous images of the late princess during a decades-long career as a photographer. His sons Samir and Zak have followed in his footsteps to take images of today’s royal family – with some of their favorite shots of Kate Middleton , Prince William , Prince Harry and Meghan Markle included in the show too.

The trio have collectively spent over four decades working side-by-side with the Princess and her family. Their show, Princess Diana: Accredited Access Exhibition  is an immersive, “walk-through" 60-minute experience and includes complimentary access to the audio guide.

“[London] is where Diana lived and so many of the iconic photos of Princess Diana were taken here," Samir – whose image of King Charles was issued by Buckingham Palace at his cancer announcement — tells PEOPLE. "From her wedding, to the births of William and Harry to key style moments such as the revenge dress.”

“We’re excited people in London can now hear the stories behind them. Seeing these photos displayed and celebrating her legacy will be extra special for all of us.”

“It really means a lot to all of the family to have our pictures on show [here]," adds Zak. "Although a global star, Diana does have a special place in the hearts of the British people and my dad is honestly so proud to have his amazing pictures of Diana displayed alongside mine and Sam’s pictures of the younger royals.” 

Related: Princess Diana's Hairdresser Reveals Why She Once Wore a Necklace as a Headband — with 'Knicker Elastic!'

When the show opened in the U.S. Anwar told PEOPLE, "I saw every side of Diana. She was a genuine, good human being."

"You could see her go from Shy Di, looking down, to becoming stronger — which she had to do. She wanted to prove she was brave enough to do what she wanted.”

Samir adds, “We show how Diana’s humanitarian side has passed into her sons.”

“What works so well about the exhibition is that we’re able to juxtapose two generations of Diana and her sons and the photos my father took of Diana and us of the younger Royals.”

Related: Princess Diana's Personal Hairdresser Reveals the Reason Prince William Liked Childhood Haircuts

“Displaying and talking about historical events such as their royal weddings and children’s births side-by-side show how we have come full circle.”

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Zak, who like Samir has taken pictures of the royals around the world, tells PEOPLE, "It really means a lot to all of the family to have our pictures on show in a city that was Diana’s home.”

“Whilst this exhibition celebrates the life of Diana through so many iconic pictures taken by my dad, I’m exciting to have the opportunity to showcase some of my favourite images of William and Kate, Harry and Meghan which adds another dimension to the experience."

Tickets, for the exhibition at St. Katherine's Dock, in London are available now .

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Princess Diana’s Former Hairdresser Reveals The Real Reason She Decided to Wear a Necklace as a Headband

By Erin Vanderhoof

For decades, the night in 1985 when Princess Diana wore an emerald necklace as a headband at a banquet has been remembered as an example of her unmatched approach to style. But according to Richard Dalton, a hairdresser who worked with the princess for nearly a decade in the 1980s, the choice had its origins in a practical concern during a royal tour to Australia.

“I think she had sunburn on her neck so we said, ‘Let’s make a headband of it,’” Dalton said at a People magazine panel event on Tuesday. He also explained how they got the necklace to stay affixed to her forehead. “I asked Evelyn, her dresser, for six inches of knicker elastic, [the kind used by] grannies.”

That night Diana wore an Art Deco-style bandeau with cabochon emeralds, each set in a ring of diamonds. According to jewelry historian Leslie Field, the necklace was designed by Queen Mary using stones that once belonged to Queen Victoria. Left to Queen Elizabeth II after Mary’s 1953 death, it was given to Diana as a wedding present. In December 2022 , the necklace made its first appearance in decades when Kate Middleton paired it with a rented bright green dress at the Earthshot Awards ceremony in Boston.

During his panel discussion with People, Dalton said that another adorned hairstyle was his favorite look he did with Diana "My favorite would be Thailand," he said, describing a look from a 1988 tour to the nation in Southeast Asia. "[She wore a] purple and shocking pink dress and I said, ‘Why don’t we do orchids?’ I went into the hotel, stealing flowers for the princess. This was my favorite. She loved it."

Another story he told involved a clever way that Diana was able to change her hairstyle drastically without the notice of the news media. “We decided whatever charity she was representing, the hair would sometimes take away from what she was doing," Dalton recalled. “Saudi Arabia—she wanted it short. We would cut it every day about a quarter of an inch,” he said. “[After] eight weeks, nobody noticed!”

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Charles Spencer in tears over 'overwhelmingly beautiful' tribute to Princess Diana on 60th birthday

The late princess of wales is buried at the oval lake at althorp house.

Charles Spencer was left tearful when he marked his 60th birthday with close friends and family over the weekend.

The 9th Earl Spencer explained that some of his loved ones had secretly handcrafted a birthday present that paid tribute to his late sister Princess Diana , who died in a car crash in 1997.

A beautiful canoe was positioned on the bank next to the Oval Lake at his ancestral home Althorp House, the sprawling 13,000-acre estate where Diana and Charles grew up with their siblings.

Diana was buried on a small island in the middle, only accessible via boat for family members. Charles said it was "overwhelmingly beautiful" that his friends had kept the late Princess of Wales in their thoughts for his milestone birthday.

"Today I turn 60. I had 30 friends and family to stay over the weekend. The speech at dinner on Saturday was given by 'William Purefoy', who was a fellow new boy at Maidwell - those who’ve read A Very Private School will know him.

"I was brought down to the lake at Althorp by a friend, on Saturday. Her husband handmade this astonishingly beautiful canoe for me, as a surprise, over many months. I cried on seeing it. It’s almost too exquisite to paddle.

"The husband said: 'I just thought it’d be useful, when you visit your sister'. Such an overwhelmingly beautiful thought," he captioned the sun-drenched photos.

Princess Diana's final resting place

Charles often shares pictures of the beautiful scenery of the Oval Lake, from the "achingly beautiful" mist at the water's surface to the dappled sunlight through the trees.

Althorp is open to the public from 1 July to 31 August, which happens to be the anniversaries of Princess Diana's birth and death – a "strange coincidence" agreed five years before she passed away. During those months, guests can leave floral tributes and letters to Diana at a special memorial near her resting place.

Explaining his reason for burying Diana so close to home, Charles previously said: "It has been decided to bury Diana, Princess of Wales, in the grounds of Althorp Park, where her grave can be properly looked after by her family and visited in privacy by her sons."

He had originally planned to lay Diana to rest in the family tombs at a local church, but he told  BBC he was "very worried" about her safety, considering her global status. Charles was later confident in his decision to choose Althorp instead, telling People: "She’s in a happy and secure place."

READ: Charles Spencer's children: everything you need to know about the Earl of Spencer family life  

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Rihanna Just Borrowed From Princess Diana’s Style Playbook

By Daniel Rodgers

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As the fall 2024 collections proved–in Prada’s technical cocoon coats and Aaron Esh’s three-quarter-length blazers worn with bootleg GAP hoodies–a static jolt takes place when the street and the salon intersect. Some of Rihanna’s most successful experiments in fashion are the result of screwing with these ladylike aesthetics. Think: two-tone Chanel flats and wide-legged jeans , tweed Gucci jackets and basketball jerseys , pearl necklaces and lingerie , wasp-waisted bar jackets and sideways caps .

This seems to be the musician’s M.O. at the moment, grabbing–with acrylic-tipped fingers–just about every classic fashion piece at her disposal. For example, she was last night photographed in New York wearing a diaphanous slip and a leather jacket with a box-like Dior bag named after Diana, Princess of Wales. Originally called the Chouchou, the purse was gifted to Diana by the First Lady of France in September 1995 and “because it suited [her] well”– Diana’s words –it was renamed the Lady Dior 12 months later. In the hands of someone like Rihanna, it sets up a direct bloodline between the cockiness of Paris’s snobbish mesdames and the cockiness of being, well, Rihanna.

It helps that she was also papped with a shoal of assistants carrying Goyard shopping bags and boxes of Veuve Clicquot champagne–appropriately named “La Grande Dame”–in the background. (She had bought a few gifts with her to celebrate her brother’s graduation at New York’s Mamo restaurant.) The caption could have read: “Treat me like the businesswoman I am,” an attitude that Rihanna is beginning to lean further and further into. “I’ve done so much shit in my life,” she said back in April. “I’ve had my nipples out, my panties out. But now, those are the things which, I guess as a mum and an evolved young lady–emphasis on the young–there are things I would never do again. Like, ‘Oh my God, I really did that? Nips out?’”

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