Earl Spencer has spoken about his sister, Diana, Princess of Wales’ funeral and revealed he had initially written a ‘very different’ eulogy to the one he read out at Westminster Abbey
Diana, Princess of Wales’ brother had a very different eulogy planned for her funeral. On September 6, 1997, Earl Spencer delivered a powerful eulogy to the 2,000 people who attended the service at Westminster Abbey, and made a subtle swipe at Diana’s former in-laws, The Royal Family.
But now, her brother, Charles, the ninth Earl Spencer, 61, has revealed he had a very different eulogy planned. Ahead of the royal ceremonial funeral, Earl Spencer had been travelling to London from Cape Town, where he was living at the time, and a flight attendant had helped him due to him being “in bits”.
He had also been searching through his contact book to find people who could help him write the emotional tribute to his sister. “I had a big, thick address book, and I thought, ‘I want to find someone who’s going to make the speech for her.’ And I got to ‘Z’ and I hadn’t found anyone,” he said.
Speaking to Gyles Brandreth on his Rosebud podcast, Earl Spencer went on to say: “[I] got off the plane in Heathrow [Airport], called my mother, I said, ‘I can’t think who’s going to give the eulogy. And I’ve got an awful feeling it’s going to have to be me, and she said, ‘Well, it is going to be you. Your sisters and I have decided it.'”
He continued: “[It was a] very traditional eulogy, almost … ‘She was very good at this as a child’ and all that. And then I thought, ‘Well, this is ridiculous, that’s not who she was.'” Earl Spencer instantly “realised” that his job wasn’t to speak about the late Princess, but to “speak for” her, after she died aged just 36 in a car crash in Paris.
He said: “And I knew I’d been left at that stage – it had no legal standing – but I knew she’d left me as guardian of her sons [Prince William and Prince Harry], obviously, the other parent being alive, that meant nothing, but it meant something to me.
“That sort of duty, I think. And then I wrote it in an hour and a half and, yeah, that was it, really.” He did “take one bit out,” referencing media mogul Rupert Murdoch, as he saw it “rather unnecessary”. During the eulogy, Earl Spencer spoke about Diana’s impact across the world, praising her for her humanitarian lifestyle and philanthropy.
He told the congregation: “Diana was the very essence of compassion, of duty, of style, of beauty. All over the world she was a symbol of selfless humanity. All over the world, a standard bearer for the rights of the truly downtrodden, a very British girl who transcended nationality. Someone with a natural nobility who was classless and who proved in the last year that she needed no royal title to continue to generate her particular brand of magic.
“Today is our chance to say thank you for the way you brightened our lives, even though God granted you but half a life. We will all feel cheated always that you were taken from us so young and yet we must learn to be grateful that you came along at all. Only now that you are gone do we truly appreciate what we are now without and we want you to know that life without you is very, very difficult.”
His comment relating to Diana “needing no royal title,” appeared to be a swipe after she lost the Her Royal Highness status following her divorce from the then Prince Charles.
He also went on to say that he and his family, would not allow William and Harry to be subjected to “anguish”. He commented: “On behalf of your mother and sisters, I pledge that we, your blood family, will do all we can to continue the imaginative way in which you were steering these two exceptional young men so that their souls are not simply immersed by duty and tradition but can sing openly as you planned.
“We fully respect the heritage into which they have both been born and will always respect and encourage them in their royal role but we, like you, recognise the need for them to experience as many different aspects of life as possible to arm them spiritually and emotionally for the years ahead. I know you would have expected nothing less from us. William and Harry, we all cared desperately for you today.”
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