(Date Posted:22/11/2006 14:26:06)
"Diana, Princess of Wales" / A "Cancerian Lady" remembered by Penny Thornton, Personal
Astrologer & Friend
( Please note chronological age of Diana updated to be currently applicable )
Diana, Princess of Wales, would have been forty - eight years old on July 1st this year 2009.
12 years after her death, she is still alive and well in the hearts and minds of people the world over - those she knew
and those who watched her life unfold on television screens and through the pages of newspapers. It is tempting to
muse on where she might have been now. Would she have married Dodi Fayed? Would she have left England?
Would she have had another child? Whatever may have happened to Diana in the past 12 years, one thing is for sure
she would still have dominated the headlines and her photograph would have continued to grace magazines and
newspapers virtually on a daily basis. She was a celebrity of the greatest magnitude. Her premature and violent
death has ensured her a place unequalled in history - not just the princess the world adored but the woman who
changed the face of the British Monarchy forever.
A Personal Insight
I first met Diana in March 1986. Diana was twenty-five years old and had been married to Prince Charles for five
years. A week or so before that meeting she had telephoned me out of the blue to ask if I would do her chart.
Initially I had politely refused since I was working to a tight deadline on my second book but when she mentioned
she was just hoping for a light at the end of the tunnel' I agreed to see her immediately'.
Thus, when I arrived at Kensington Palace I was fully aware that she was unhappy and seeking specific guidance
from the astrology. I had also surmised that the reason for her unhappiness was her marriage - not because she had
already discussed this with me but because, having thoroughly appraised the charts of herself and Charles some
four years earlier in my book, "Synastry": the astrology of relationships,it was clear that there were some
potentially great difficulties between them. Over the years I have been asked many times how I felt when I met her.
Was the prospect of doing her chart daunting? Would I have to compromise my real feelings about the astrology
given that she was a member of the Royal Family - the future Queen of England, no less ... What did I think of her?
What happened during that first consultation?
By the time I met Diana I had been working as an astrological consultant for ten years. Many people from all walks
of life, including royalty, had passed through my consultancy doors so I wouldn't say I was daunted, I was
concerned that there was a real job to be done and it ought to be done well! I also decided that the only way to go
about the consultation was to treat her as any client, no more special than anyone else. It was with this attitude that
we sat down together on sofa in her small sitting room, spreading all the charts on the coffee table in front of us.
With any new client to begin with I discuss all features of the chart from a fairly superficial stance. I start from the
Ascendant point and, making my way anti-clockwise around the chart, talk about every planet and how each of
them manifest depending on their relationship with others and their house and sign position.
This procedure usually takes about twenty minutes and by the end of that time the client should be comfortable
with me and no longer alarmed about what the future held, which, of course, is not the true purpose of astrology.
This little foray into the chart usually creates a forum for discussion so that I can then open up the deeper layers of
the astrology and focus specifically on the issue of importance. A consultation is thus not a monologue delivered
from a lofty pulpit but a dialogue between two people.
During the four hours we were together, Diana talked about her childhood, her relationship with her parents, the
effects of their divorce and her feelings about her step-mother but at the heart of the consultation was her marriage
to Charles and her despair over her fate, so to speak.
This has all been so well documented that I don't think we need to spend time here trawling through the bulemia,
suicide attempts, affairs, rows, silences and hostilities. What may be of more interest to us is what made Diana so
extraordinary, such a fascinating set of contradictions.
PRINCESS DIANA 1st. July 1961, 2.00 pm GMT, Sandringham, England. I still come across discussions of Diana's
chart in periodicals that are based on the wrong time. When I began my association with Diana I was also working
on an incorrect time of birth. It was at least a year before she suddenly said to me one day:
"You know, Penny, I notice you've got my time of birth as 7.45 pm. It wasn't! I was born just before the start of the
men's finals at Wimbledon - about 2 pm." (Diana told Penny and of all people Diana should know the correct time of
her birth!)
Penny is owed an apology from the "Astrological Society of Great Britain"who have got the time incorrect as have
Buckingham Palace !Thus, instead of adventurous, extravagant and independent Sagittarius rising, Diana had
gracious, graceful, charming and diplomatic Libra on her Ascendant - a perfect recipe for the fashion icon that she
became and her involvement with the British relationship organization.
Rather importantly this change of ascending sign shunted Saturn out of its second-house position to the base of the
chart (conjunct the IC in fact) thus supplying an astrological reason for the pain she experienced in childhood over
her parents' divorce. This angular Saturn also shows that she bore a heavy cross in life. I am not going to spend time
on this occasion going over her motherly Cancerian qualities or her first house Neptune that made her so sensitive
and so able to identify with the suffering and pain of others because I want to examine a crucial features of her
chart. The Fixed "T'-square: Moon in Aquarius, opposition Uranus in Leo, square Venus in Taurus.
In 1981 at the time of the wedding and some four years before I met her, I said of this T'-square ... This T'- square is
not likely to permit her to slip easily into a conventional royal role... She requires great freedom of self-expression
and, despite her desire for security, she needs plenty on stimulation in the way of exciting and novel experiences.
On the one hand she may bring a breath of fresh air into her relationships through the sheer force of her
personality, thus never letting them stagnate or fall into dull routine. On the other hand, if her marriage becomes
too restrictive, she will break out and seek more exciting horizons.
As future Queen of England, the latter possibility is unthinkable, let alone practicable - but then twenty years ago
divorce for any member of the Royal Family was undreamed of.
It would have been obvious to any adequate astrologer that this tense set up involving the moon and Venus - the
two fundamental expressions of her femininity - and volatile Uranus would lead to emotional instability, wayward
and wilful behaviour and romantic vicissitudes. Indeed, Venus-Uranus squares all too often end up in the divorce
courts! At age twenty, when Diana married Charles, she had no idea who she was. She had no real physical
experience, nor any opportunity to explore emotional intimacy with a man. Diana did her growing up within the
marriage and Charles, thirteen years her senior and with his stiff-upper-lip', was hardly the man to initiate her, to
relate to her complex emotions and her deep-seated lack of self-esteem. In fact he helped turn a simmering internal
dilemma into a full blown psychosis!
It is fair to say that this T'-square was responsible' both for Diana's charismatic persona and her troubled
relationship with the people she became close to. We do not need to remind ourselves of that charisma, her
stunning presence, her way of reaching out to people, her instinct for taking the moment, for intuitively grasping an
issue. She left an indelible imprint on the lives of those she touched and in light of her untimely death, most will
only remember the intoxicating vibrancy she generated; the love she radiated.
By contrast countless accounts have been written about her treatment of friends and staff. Her previously warm
and affectionate feelings could turn to frosty dislike almost overnight. An incident that would have been taken
lightly on one occasion could become the source of intense rage on another. She was engaging and generous;
unpredictable and dangerous. Depending on her mood ...
[Patrick Jephson, Diana's private secretary 1988 - 1996] found she could be perceptive and thoughtful with her
praise and encouragement, if a little inconsistent. Getting a pat on the back one day did not protect you from being
kicked the day after for doing the same thing. When she was unhappy her natural suspicion and deviousness took
control. Then her verbal skills were employed to hurt and confuse. When roused she used words like tomahawks
and her aim seldom failed. She would know, with a cat's cunning, when to let you feel the claw in her velvet paw.
Like the predator she sometimes was, she would stalk her victim, waiting for his or her attention to be distracted
before striking.
( Shadows of a Princess / Patrick Jephson 2001 ) A book published by him detailing his relationship with Diana,
Princess of Wales his former employer and something upsetting William and Harry leading William to defend his
Mother's memory in a personal statement publicly speaking openly to the press and leading Diana to write to
William thanking him personally for doing so...he first being made aware by me that I channel his late mother. )
It is in all our natures to have moods, to be easy and happy one day, grumpy another. All of us put our best face
forward at the beginning of a relationship then as time goes by our less attractive features emerge and our
pathologies gain the better of us but with Diana, these behaviours were extreme and because her emotional
underpinning was so fragile and her external life so all-consuming she could not overcome them.
I spent some considerable time musing on the underlying reasons - astrological and otherwise - for her behaviour in
the final chapter of my book "With Love From Diana". An individual who has been emotionally damaged early on
can, depending on the level of trauma, become a sociopath. Just like the psychopathic killer who has no sense of
guilt or compassion for his or her victims, a sociopath is divorced from the emotions that cause him or her to act in
bizarre ways. Denial is essential for psychological survival and certainly to keep up appearances in an increasingly
threatening world. Thus, Diana's behaviour...is entirely consistent with someone whose first instinct is to head into
denial.
The Diana I met in 1986 read romantic novels and saw herself as the rejected, abused wife. Diana both longed for
her marriage to work and to be free to find real love with someone else. To this end she both worked at the marriage
and looked outside it for physical and emotional fulfilment. (One way of getting around that moon-Venus-Uranus
T'- square!) While it seems Charles was quite the wrong man for her and the marriage definitely not made in
heaven, his chart dovetails into hers with the kind of precision that takes your breath away.
Indeed his sun at 22 degrees of Scorpio provides the fourth leg' of Diana's 'T'- square turning into a Grand Cross. By
the summer of 1997, the divorce from Charles behind her and a handful of lovers languishing in the trenches of
love's battlefield she was enjoying a glorious romance with Dodi Fayed. It seemed she had finally found what she
was looking for and her hints to the press that she was about to do something...sent rumours of marriage to Dodi
ricocheting around the globe. Controversy still rages as to whether or not she was engaged to Dodi at the time of
their deaths in Paris, France on August 31st 1997.
Queen to Strip Harrods of its Royal Crest
Andrew Golden – Sunday Mirror, Aug 31, 1997
I posted this on the AOL Royal News boards last night and it was swiftly removed... without any notification... It
does show why Diana had to die...
The Royal Family may withdraw their seal of approval from Harrods ... as a result of Diana's affair with owner's son
Dodi Fayed. The top people's store - with its long and proud tradition of royal patronage - may be about to lose the
Prince of Wales royal crest. Senior Palace courtiers are ready to advise the Queen that she should refuse to renew
the prestigious royal warrants for the Knightsbridge store when they come up for review in February.
It would be a huge blow to the ego of store owner Mohammed Al Fayed - and would infuriate Diana, who was
yesterday understood to be still with Dodi aboard his yacht, near the Italian island of Sardinia. But the Royal Family
are furious about the frolics of Di, 36, and Dodi, 41, which they believe have further undermined the monarchy.
Prince Philip, in particular, has made no secret as to how he feels about his daughter-in-law's latest man, referring
to Dodi as an "oily bed-hopper".
At Balmoral next week, the Queen will preside over a meeting of The Way Ahead Group where the Windsors sit
down with their senior advisers to discuss policy matters. MI6 has prepared a special report on the Egyptian-born
Fayeds which will be presented to the meeting.
The delicate subject of Harrods and its royal warrants is also expected to be discussed. And the Fayeds can expect
little sympathy from Philip. A friend of the royals said yesterday: "Prince Philip has let rip several times recently
about the Fayeds - at a dinner party, during a country shoot and while on a visit to close friends in Germany.
"He's been banging on about his contempt for Dodi and how he is undesirable as a future stepfather to William and
Harry.
"Diana has been told in no uncertain terms about the consequences should she continue the relationship with the
Fayed boy.
"Options must include possible exile, although that would be very difficult as, all said and done, she is the mother of
the future King of England.
"She has also been warned about social ostracism. But Diana's attitude is if that means not having to deal with the
royals and their kind, then she would be delighted."
Appearing hours before her 'accident', the above article reveals the depths of royal disapproval Diana had
generated.
COMMENT – News Alliance.com
There are some who believe Diana may be past caring and has decided to look towards those who can afford to keep
her in the lifestyle to which she became accustomed. The Fayed family have all the trappings of vast wealth...
wherever it originated from.
And Dodi has told Diana what he has told many of his other beautiful girlfriends in the past: "It's my father's store
and you can have what you want. Charge it to my account and I'll just sign the bill." But now the Royal Family may
decide it is time to settle up.
After their brief trip to Paris, Diana spent virtually every free moment with Dodi at his apartment in London’s Park
Lane or together at Kensington Palace, which rankled the royals greatly. Prince Philip was enraged that the “oily
little bed-hopper” was shacked up with Diana, their constant thorn, in a royal palace. The royals went apoplectic.
When photographed arriving at Dodi’s apartment, Diana walked in without a care who saw her. She seemed to be
telling the world that her romance was for real and that she had nothing to hide. Dodi had their meals ferried in on
silver trays from the nearby Harry’s Bar. Just months before Diana was accustomed to smuggling her lover, Dr
Hasnat Khan, into KP hidden in a blanket in the back of her car driven by her butler Paul Burrell. But things had
changed and for the better and she could at last be open about her relationship with the Harrod’s heir.
When she was informed by a courtier that Prince Charles was expressing ‘concern’ about the effect the new man in
her life might be causing on their sons, Diana said his worries were ‘laughable’ in view of his own undisguised
affection for a woman other than their mother. What was good for the goose, was good for the gander and Charles
did not like it one bit.
The suave heir to Al Fayed’s vast fortune would make Diana an ideal husband, announced blonde Sky News
presenter Tania Bryer, who had dated Dodi in the past. “He is warm and gentle. Not an aggressive macho sort. I can
see why he appeals to Diana,” she warbled, paid to incite such juicy gossip 24/7. “He is absolutely charming and one
of the most genuine people you could meet.”
Diana seemed to have come to the same conclusion. She was not concerned about this latest insight of her private
life, and assured friends: “I am in good hands!” A confidante of the princess was quoted as saying, “Her friends are
in no doubt that the princess is in love. It is the real thing.”
There was real sexual chemistry between them, said one journalist when shown intimate photographs of the couple
taken aboard the Jonikal. “They are oblivious to everyone and everything around them!” The Queen’s courtiers
were equally eager to assure their press contacts that the “whole thing is an act”, to annoy the Royal Family.
In 2005, Piers Morgan, former editor of the Daily Mirror wrote in The Insider, ‘Lots of pictures of her [Diana’s]
boys, the young heirs, the men who will perhaps kill off, or secure, the very future of the monarchy’. And yet
Morgan despite his friendship with Mark Bolland, an aide to Prince Charles, was convinced that Diana and Dodi
were for real.
One of the photographs to which he was referring - of the bikini-clad princess kissing Dodi on the deck of the
Jonikal – was splashed across the front page of the Daily Mirror. Piers Morgan had bought it on a one-day-
exclusive basis from an Italian paparazzi photographer who had staked out the yacht. The following day the picture
was bought by other national newspapers and given similar premier treatment.
It made the photographer more than £1 million – a sheer indication of the incredible interest in their romance at
the time. Publication of grainy photographs did not cause the princess’s smile to wane in the slightest. In fact she
asked the photographers why the pictures were so “grainy”. She was revelling in it. Of interests also, the princess
was not complaining that her privacy was being invaded.
There was a palpable sense of relief that their relationship was right out there in the open and that the world’s press
were fixated on them. Diana was dictating the pace of events, as she loved, and the royals hated every minute of
being overshadowed again. Diana was rubbing it in and she knew it and so did the royals. The British Establishment
had reached zero tolerance with Diana and her risqué relationship with the son of their arch-enemy Al Fayed.
For one so deeply concerned that she was a target for assassination, Diana was doing everything she could think of
to invite that eventuality. A covert relationship was one thing but flaunting it so openly was another and yet it was
lost on the royals that Diana was the world’s foremost celebrity and the colossal interest of the press in her every
move was inevitable and indeed highly profitable for the press barons.
The counter-attack on the Al Fayeds and Diana in the public domain was imminent. The royals were waiting on MI6
to complete the dossier before leaking it to the press through their courtiers. The battle-lines were drawn
irrevocably and there was no turning back. The royals and Charles in particular greatly feared what Diana might
leak to Al Fayed. It was common knowledge in royal circles that Diana kept a ‘treasure trove’ of highly damaging
secrets at KP and their revelation could bring down the monarchy.
And the slightest thought of marriage between the princess and the son of Mohamed Al Fayed sent shudders of
revulsion through the ranks of Buckingham Palace courtiers. They were not impressed by the remark of Dodi’s
friend, who said: “With him, Diana can have everything the royal family gave her, without the annoyance of the
royal family.” The conflict grew wider and more serious albeit behind the scenes for the most part.
On 8 August, Diana was snapped leaving Dodi’s apartment adjacent the Dorchester Hotel at one in the morning. Just
hours later she flew to Bosnia to further her anti-landmines campaign. She had become more than a troublesome
thorn in the Royal Family’s side, she was also considered to be a menace by the majority of the world’s arms
industry. Her visit to Bosnia was a direct threat to their billons and escalation of the campaign to ban the use of
Landmines.
Diana, radiant and forever smiling in the face of adversity, had focused the world’s attention on the landmines issue.
In Bosnia, she was greeted by over sixty photographers. She highlighted the very real human misery caused by the
deployment of landmines. For three days she talked to surviving victims of random mines. People who had lost
limbs and suffered hideous debilitating injuries, were embraced by Diana and she made them feel special with her
special brand of magic.
One newspaper described Diana as a “Mother Teresa with a crown” and experienced opinion-shapers were
astonished that this not very eloquent woman had become the most influential personality in the world. At the
Pentagon and among some of America’s wealthiest arms dealers, the realisation dawned that Diana had become
their most potent and vitriolic opponent, threatening their vast power base. Former British Foreign Secretary Lord
Howe, had dubbed Diana as a “loose cannon” and at any time she could blow up in their faces.
The moneyed elite of the Western world needed to eliminate the Diana threat. Their opportunity to destroy her in
the public domain did not exist as Diana had become almost saintly in the eyes of billions of people across the
world. Attacks on Diana’s character in the media, repeatedly backfired and she seemed invulnerable. Politicians
across the West were stunned by the ease of her rise to international stardom. How could an icon be stopped?
On 15 August, Diana flew to Greece for a cruise with her good friend Rosa Monckton, and borrowed Mohamed Al
Fayed’s private jet to take them there. For one so distrustful of anything and everything to do with the State, it is
perhaps a little strange that Diana struck up such a close friendship with Rosa Monckton, given the constant
rumours that circulated about her husband’s close ‘connections’ to MI6. But ‘friends’ they were and Rosa Monckton
would later prove to be a greater friend to the British establishment than Diana could ever have imagined.
On 21 August, both Diana and Dodi were back in London, he having returned from Los Angeles, presumably on a
fact finding mission to find a suitable property to house the princess. Diana returned briefly to Kensington Palace to
freshen up before returning to Battersea Heliport and then back on to Stansted Airport and the refuelled
Gulfstream private jet. They headed back to the yacht Jonikal and another holiday together on the Côte d’Azur.
From Nice Airport the loving couple were whisked by car to where the Jonikal awaited them offshore at St. Laurent-
de-Var, and while they rested, the yacht’s captain Luigi del Tevere, motored south to St Tropez where they
anchored at 02.00hrs. Early the next morning they headed to Pamplona Bay where Dodi and Diana joined
Mohamed Al Fayed and his wife and four children for lunch. As they left late that afternoon, the Jonikal was being
tailed by a small flotilla of press boats.
The presence of the ubiquitous paparazzi didn’t faze Diana in the slightest. The next morning, Diana was up and
about long before Dodi. Bodyguard Trevor Rees-Jones recalls that she looked stunning in her bathing suit and
made absolutely no effort to hide from the rapacious snappers.
During the late afternoon they anchored off St. Jean Cap Ferrat, from where Dodi planned to take Diana shopping
and sightseeing in nearby Monaco. On their trip ashore, Dodi’s butler René says that they gave their bodyguards the
slip while they toured the chic area of Monte Carlo and popped into Alberto Repossi, Dodi’s favourite jeweller in the
Hermitage Hotel.
In his book, Trevor Rees-Jones denies a visit was made to Repossi’s even though Mohamed Al Fayed obtained the
CCTV footage of the couple actually in the store. Rees-Jones denial is irrelevant: the ring, which Dodi would collect
from the Paris branch a week later, was real enough.
Off Portofino in Italy, the next day, the young lovers chose to stay aboard the Jonikal as the paparazzi were visible
in force on the shore. The pair showed no embarrassment about being seen kissing and cuddling during their
sunbathing sessions on deck. Even when they were in full sight of the paparazzi, their intimate displays of affection
did not abate in the slightest. They were loving every moment of it and the world’s press lapped it up and their
readers were insatiable for news of the princess and her exotic lover.
By Friday, 29 August, they were anchored off Cala di Volpe, a private resort in Sardinia, where they slipped ashore
unseen by the hunting press pack. The paparazzi attention was suffocating and the couple decided to move on. The
decision to fly to Paris was made early that evening. A flight plan was filed from Sardinia’s Olbia Airport for the next
day. Staff were instructed that the couple would spend a day in Paris before going on to London.
The Ritz Hotel was advised from the Fayed nerve centre in London that the couple would be arriving in Paris on the
Saturday afternoon, a copy of the memo went to acting head of security Henri Paul! He immediately cancelled a
planned weekend away with close friends and put himself back on the rota to be in charge of the reception at Le
Bourget Airport.
The main reason for going to Paris, Dodi advised the Harrod’s HQ in London, was to pick up a ring. Dodi told his
step-uncle, Hussein Yassin, a former press attaché at the Saudi Embassy in Washington, who was stayed at the Ritz
that weekend: “Diana and I are getting married. You’ll know about it officially very soon.” And Hussein’s niece, also
in Paris, received a similar call that fateful Saturday evening. A gushing Dodi told her, “Our marriage will be
founded on true love.”
A formal announcement was planned, Dodi told them, after the princess had broken the news to her two sons when
they were reunited the following day. It was already decided that the ring he was collecting from Repossi, in the
Place Vendôme, would be her engagement ring.
Speaking to the Paget Investigation of Sir John Stevens, Dodi’s butler René Delorm said: “In the book I explain how
Dodi told me to have Champagne on ice ready for when they returned from dinner on 30th / 31st August 1997. He
told me that he was going to propose to the Princess and showed me a ring. I will explain this incident in greater
detail later in my statement. What I left out of that story was that later that evening I went to enter the living room;
I coughed to announce my presence and saw the Princess sitting on the coffee table. Dodi was on one knee in front
of her, caressing her belly and she was looking at her hand. The only thing I heard, was her say the word ‘Yes.’”
By the time the Gulfstream private jet set down at le Bourget Airport in the northern environs of Paris at 15.22hrs,
Diana was as confident as she would ever be that she was truly in love with a good man and more importantly, ready
to tell the whole world about it. When their door opened onto the area reserved for private aircraft, the contrast
with the Côte d’Azur could not have been greater. There was not the slightest hint of a wind, everything was still,
eerily so and the temperature was already soaring in the high eighties.
The British Embassy was not informed that Princess Diana was arriving but waiting by the runway, unbidden, but
provided by a ‘considerate’ government, were the motorcycle outriders and black cars of the French diplomatic
protection service – Service de Protection des Hautes Personnalité.
Normally, the princess would have been entitled to a phalanx of SPHP officers and protocol would have made it
impossible to refuse them. But Diana had made her feelings perfectly clear to Dodi. The SPHP were not needed and
Diana by then had a profound distrust of everything to do with government and state, particularly the British State.
Dodi Fayed was a passive man and readily agreed to almost anything Diana proposed or imposed. Dodi politely
refused the SPHP and insisted, on Diana’s instructions, that his own personal bodyguards were more than capable
of protecting them both. He would ensure the princess’s safety and his own. In this of course he was mistaken,
disastrously so, as events were to prove. His bodyguards were not used to the frenetic press pack and blows were
soon exchanged between the paparazzi and the Fayed security team.
And at Le Bourget a veritable army of photographers were waiting for the princess and her lover, forever hungry
for the slightest morsel of newsworthy material. With photographers making vast sums for even grainy shots of the
couple together, it was understandable they would gather en masse to ghost Diana everywhere she went. The
paparazzi had already earned a new title as the ‘stalkerazzi’ and were living up to their notoriety.
Diana rejected a final offer of SPHP protection, a decision borne of her distrust of government security officers.
Diana’s fear of official ‘security’ personnel by far outweighed her dislike of the stalkerazzi, whose preferred
transport in Paris, she would learn, was motorcycles and scooters. Their persistence and sheer aggression, would
make the antics of their Mediterranean cousins seem almost benign by comparison.
Date Posted:23/01/2007 15:37:43)
For the record.
July 1, 1961: Lady Diana Frances Spencer is born, the daughter of the 8th Earl Spencer. July 29, 1981: Married
H.R.H.Prince Charles,the Prince of Wales and direct heir to the British throne, at St. Paul's Cathedral, while
millions watched the "fairy tale wedding." He is 12 years her senior and Diana plucked from obscurity having been a
teachers helper in a nursery school and a "Sloane - Ranger", the term given to socialites living in the London
boroughs of Kensington and Chelsea. The Bridal Gown with longest Bridal Train ( 25 feet long ) in history!
June 21, 1982: Prince William Arthur Philip Louis born. September 15, 1984: Prince Harry (Henry Charles
Albert David) born. June 15, 1992: After months of speculation about the state of the royal marriage, Andrew
Morton's book "Diana: Her True Story" says Charles has had a longtime affair with a married woman, Camilla
Parker -Bowles, driving Diana to injure herself and attempt suicide. August 25, 1992: The Sun newspaper prints
transcript of phone call monitored in December 1989 between Diana and a man, James Gilbey who affectionately
calls her "Squidgy." December 9, 1992: Prime Minister John Major announces to Parliament that Diana and
Charles are separating but there are no plans for divorce. January 12, 1993: The Sun publishes transcript of an
intimate phone call between Camilla Parker -Bowles and Charles, reportedly monitored December 1989.
June 29, 1994: In a Jonathan Dimbleby TV documentary, Charles says he had committed adultery after the
marriage broke down, "us both having tried." Diana attends a function the night his confession is televised at the
"Serpentine Gallery" looking stunning in a black dress which came to be known as the " Revenge Dress ".
October 3, 1994: Anna Pasternak's book "Princess in Love" says Diana had five-year affair with her riding
instructor Major James Hewitt. November 20, 1995: In a "Panorama" television interview, Diana admits
adultery with Major James Hewitt and refers to Camilla Parker - Bowles her husbands mistress and now wife .. H.R.
H. Duchess of Cornwall...famously saying..." There were three of us in this marriage .. so it was a bit crowded!"
August 1995: Reports link Diana and rugby star Will Carling. Carling and wife separate September 29th. Denying
a relationship with him, Diana had been briefly involved with married Islamic Art dealer Oliver Hoare.
December 1995: Charles receives letter from Queen Elizabeth II urging divorce, and he agrees to bow to her
wishes. February 28, 1996: Diana reluctantly agrees to the divorce, she and Charles having lived completely
separate lives, publicly both having showed their resentment of each other on their final tour of Korea where the
Media christened them "The Glums". August 28, 1996: Final decree of divorce. Diana embarked on a serious
love affair with heart surgeon Dr. Hasnat Khan but a relationship with no future, she being white, not of his caste or
of Muslim religion and a divorced Mother of two, his Mother particularly being opposed to the relationship
sustaining. Maintaining friendship, he received his Birthday card from Diana in 1997 in the same post as a request
to attend her funeral at Westminster Abbey, London. June and July, 1997: Diana visits Angola and Bosnia to
see about land mines and the destruction to civilian populations. She works with the Red cross and towards seeing
that land mines get banned.
August 31, 1997: Diana dies as a result of injuries sustained in a Paris automobile incident. Her boyfriend, Dodi
Fayed, is killed instantly with their chauffeur Henri - Paul. Even more tragically and particularly in 1997. Diana and
Charles had become closer and as her friend and respecting she being the Mother of his children he flew to Paris to
escort her on her final journey home. September 6th 1997: Diana's London Funeral service took place here at"
Westminster Abbey"on, the day the world cried!Diana was then driven from the capital to her home county of
Northamptonshire for her final private family burial. Diana buried in the grounds of the Spencer Home of
"Althorpe"on an island in the ornamental lake called " The Oval "
OR
"Diana, Princess of Wales" / A "Cancerian Lady" remembered by Penny Thornton, Personal
Astrologer & Friend
( Please note chronological age of Diana updated to be currently applicable )
Diana, Princess of Wales, would have been forty - eight years old on July 1st this year 2009.
12 years after her death, she is still alive and well in the hearts and minds of people the world over - those she knew
and those who watched her life unfold on television screens and through the pages of newspapers. It is tempting to
muse on where she might have been now. Would she have married Dodi Fayed? Would she have left England?
Would she have had another child? Whatever may have happened to Diana in the past 12 years, one thing is for sure
she would still have dominated the headlines and her photograph would have continued to grace magazines and
newspapers virtually on a daily basis. She was a celebrity of the greatest magnitude. Her premature and violent
death has ensured her a place unequalled in history - not just the princess the world adored but the woman who
changed the face of the British Monarchy forever.
A Personal Insight
I first met Diana in March 1986. Diana was twenty-five years old and had been married to Prince Charles for five
years. A week or so before that meeting she had telephoned me out of the blue to ask if I would do her chart.
Initially I had politely refused since I was working to a tight deadline on my second book but when she mentioned
she was just hoping for a light at the end of the tunnel' I agreed to see her immediately'.
Thus, when I arrived at Kensington Palace I was fully aware that she was unhappy and seeking specific guidance
from the astrology. I had also surmised that the reason for her unhappiness was her marriage - not because she had
already discussed this with me but because, having thoroughly appraised the charts of herself and Charles some
four years earlier in my book, "Synastry": the astrology of relationships,it was clear that there were some
potentially great difficulties between them. Over the years I have been asked many times how I felt when I met her.
Was the prospect of doing her chart daunting? Would I have to compromise my real feelings about the astrology
given that she was a member of the Royal Family - the future Queen of England, no less ... What did I think of her?
What happened during that first consultation?
By the time I met Diana I had been working as an astrological consultant for ten years. Many people from all walks
of life, including royalty, had passed through my consultancy doors so I wouldn't say I was daunted, I was
concerned that there was a real job to be done and it ought to be done well! I also decided that the only way to go
about the consultation was to treat her as any client, no more special than anyone else. It was with this attitude that
we sat down together on sofa in her small sitting room, spreading all the charts on the coffee table in front of us.
With any new client to begin with I discuss all features of the chart from a fairly superficial stance. I start from the
Ascendant point and, making my way anti-clockwise around the chart, talk about every planet and how each of
them manifest depending on their relationship with others and their house and sign position.
This procedure usually takes about twenty minutes and by the end of that time the client should be comfortable
with me and no longer alarmed about what the future held, which, of course, is not the true purpose of astrology.
This little foray into the chart usually creates a forum for discussion so that I can then open up the deeper layers of
the astrology and focus specifically on the issue of importance. A consultation is thus not a monologue delivered
from a lofty pulpit but a dialogue between two people.
During the four hours we were together, Diana talked about her childhood, her relationship with her parents, the
effects of their divorce and her feelings about her step-mother but at the heart of the consultation was her marriage
to Charles and her despair over her fate, so to speak.
This has all been so well documented that I don't think we need to spend time here trawling through the bulemia,
suicide attempts, affairs, rows, silences and hostilities. What may be of more interest to us is what made Diana so
extraordinary, such a fascinating set of contradictions.
PRINCESS DIANA 1st. July 1961, 2.00 pm GMT, Sandringham, England. I still come across discussions of Diana's
chart in periodicals that are based on the wrong time. When I began my association with Diana I was also working
on an incorrect time of birth. It was at least a year before she suddenly said to me one day:
"You know, Penny, I notice you've got my time of birth as 7.45 pm. It wasn't! I was born just before the start of the
men's finals at Wimbledon - about 2 pm." (Diana told Penny and of all people Diana should know the correct time of
her birth!)
Penny is owed an apology from the "Astrological Society of Great Britain"who have got the time incorrect as have
Buckingham Palace !Thus, instead of adventurous, extravagant and independent Sagittarius rising, Diana had
gracious, graceful, charming and diplomatic Libra on her Ascendant - a perfect recipe for the fashion icon that she
became and her involvement with the British relationship organization.
Rather importantly this change of ascending sign shunted Saturn out of its second-house position to the base of the
chart (conjunct the IC in fact) thus supplying an astrological reason for the pain she experienced in childhood over
her parents' divorce. This angular Saturn also shows that she bore a heavy cross in life. I am not going to spend time
on this occasion going over her motherly Cancerian qualities or her first house Neptune that made her so sensitive
and so able to identify with the suffering and pain of others because I want to examine a crucial features of her
chart. The Fixed "T'-square: Moon in Aquarius, opposition Uranus in Leo, square Venus in Taurus.
In 1981 at the time of the wedding and some four years before I met her, I said of this T'-square ... This T'- square is
not likely to permit her to slip easily into a conventional royal role... She requires great freedom of self-expression
and, despite her desire for security, she needs plenty on stimulation in the way of exciting and novel experiences.
On the one hand she may bring a breath of fresh air into her relationships through the sheer force of her
personality, thus never letting them stagnate or fall into dull routine. On the other hand, if her marriage becomes
too restrictive, she will break out and seek more exciting horizons.
As future Queen of England, the latter possibility is unthinkable, let alone practicable - but then twenty years ago
divorce for any member of the Royal Family was undreamed of.
It would have been obvious to any adequate astrologer that this tense set up involving the moon and Venus - the
two fundamental expressions of her femininity - and volatile Uranus would lead to emotional instability, wayward
and wilful behaviour and romantic vicissitudes. Indeed, Venus-Uranus squares all too often end up in the divorce
courts! At age twenty, when Diana married Charles, she had no idea who she was. She had no real physical
experience, nor any opportunity to explore emotional intimacy with a man. Diana did her growing up within the
marriage and Charles, thirteen years her senior and with his stiff-upper-lip', was hardly the man to initiate her, to
relate to her complex emotions and her deep-seated lack of self-esteem. In fact he helped turn a simmering internal
dilemma into a full blown psychosis!
It is fair to say that this T'-square was responsible' both for Diana's charismatic persona and her troubled
relationship with the people she became close to. We do not need to remind ourselves of that charisma, her
stunning presence, her way of reaching out to people, her instinct for taking the moment, for intuitively grasping an
issue. She left an indelible imprint on the lives of those she touched and in light of her untimely death, most will
only remember the intoxicating vibrancy she generated; the love she radiated.
By contrast countless accounts have been written about her treatment of friends and staff. Her previously warm
and affectionate feelings could turn to frosty dislike almost overnight. An incident that would have been taken
lightly on one occasion could become the source of intense rage on another. She was engaging and generous;
unpredictable and dangerous. Depending on her mood ...
[Patrick Jephson, Diana's private secretary 1988 - 1996] found she could be perceptive and thoughtful with her
praise and encouragement, if a little inconsistent. Getting a pat on the back one day did not protect you from being
kicked the day after for doing the same thing. When she was unhappy her natural suspicion and deviousness took
control. Then her verbal skills were employed to hurt and confuse. When roused she used words like tomahawks
and her aim seldom failed. She would know, with a cat's cunning, when to let you feel the claw in her velvet paw.
Like the predator she sometimes was, she would stalk her victim, waiting for his or her attention to be distracted
before striking.
( Shadows of a Princess / Patrick Jephson 2001 ) A book published by him detailing his relationship with Diana,
Princess of Wales his former employer and something upsetting William and Harry leading William to defend his
Mother's memory in a personal statement publicly speaking openly to the press and leading Diana to write to
William thanking him personally for doing so...he first being made aware by me that I channel his late mother. )
It is in all our natures to have moods, to be easy and happy one day, grumpy another. All of us put our best face
forward at the beginning of a relationship then as time goes by our less attractive features emerge and our
pathologies gain the better of us but with Diana, these behaviours were extreme and because her emotional
underpinning was so fragile and her external life so all-consuming she could not overcome them.
I spent some considerable time musing on the underlying reasons - astrological and otherwise - for her behaviour in
the final chapter of my book "With Love From Diana". An individual who has been emotionally damaged early on
can, depending on the level of trauma, become a sociopath. Just like the psychopathic killer who has no sense of
guilt or compassion for his or her victims, a sociopath is divorced from the emotions that cause him or her to act in
bizarre ways. Denial is essential for psychological survival and certainly to keep up appearances in an increasingly
threatening world. Thus, Diana's behaviour...is entirely consistent with someone whose first instinct is to head into
denial.
The Diana I met in 1986 read romantic novels and saw herself as the rejected, abused wife. Diana both longed for
her marriage to work and to be free to find real love with someone else. To this end she both worked at the marriage
and looked outside it for physical and emotional fulfilment. (One way of getting around that moon-Venus-Uranus
T'- square!) While it seems Charles was quite the wrong man for her and the marriage definitely not made in
heaven, his chart dovetails into hers with the kind of precision that takes your breath away.
Indeed his sun at 22 degrees of Scorpio provides the fourth leg' of Diana's 'T'- square turning into a Grand Cross. By
the summer of 1997, the divorce from Charles behind her and a handful of lovers languishing in the trenches of
love's battlefield she was enjoying a glorious romance with Dodi Fayed. It seemed she had finally found what she
was looking for and her hints to the press that she was about to do something...sent rumours of marriage to Dodi
ricocheting around the globe. Controversy still rages as to whether or not she was engaged to Dodi at the time of
their deaths in Paris, France on August 31st 1997.
Queen to Strip Harrods of its Royal Crest
Andrew Golden – Sunday Mirror, Aug 31, 1997
I posted this on the AOL Royal News boards last night and it was swiftly removed... without any notification... It
does show why Diana had to die...
The Royal Family may withdraw their seal of approval from Harrods ... as a result of Diana's affair with owner's son
Dodi Fayed. The top people's store - with its long and proud tradition of royal patronage - may be about to lose the
Prince of Wales royal crest. Senior Palace courtiers are ready to advise the Queen that she should refuse to renew
the prestigious royal warrants for the Knightsbridge store when they come up for review in February.
It would be a huge blow to the ego of store owner Mohammed Al Fayed - and would infuriate Diana, who was
yesterday understood to be still with Dodi aboard his yacht, near the Italian island of Sardinia. But the Royal Family
are furious about the frolics of Di, 36, and Dodi, 41, which they believe have further undermined the monarchy.
Prince Philip, in particular, has made no secret as to how he feels about his daughter-in-law's latest man, referring
to Dodi as an "oily bed-hopper".
At Balmoral next week, the Queen will preside over a meeting of The Way Ahead Group where the Windsors sit
down with their senior advisers to discuss policy matters. MI6 has prepared a special report on the Egyptian-born
Fayeds which will be presented to the meeting.
The delicate subject of Harrods and its royal warrants is also expected to be discussed. And the Fayeds can expect
little sympathy from Philip. A friend of the royals said yesterday: "Prince Philip has let rip several times recently
about the Fayeds - at a dinner party, during a country shoot and while on a visit to close friends in Germany.
"He's been banging on about his contempt for Dodi and how he is undesirable as a future stepfather to William and
Harry.
"Diana has been told in no uncertain terms about the consequences should she continue the relationship with the
Fayed boy.
"Options must include possible exile, although that would be very difficult as, all said and done, she is the mother of
the future King of England.
"She has also been warned about social ostracism. But Diana's attitude is if that means not having to deal with the
royals and their kind, then she would be delighted."
Appearing hours before her 'accident', the above article reveals the depths of royal disapproval Diana had
generated.
COMMENT – News Alliance.com
There are some who believe Diana may be past caring and has decided to look towards those who can afford to keep
her in the lifestyle to which she became accustomed. The Fayed family have all the trappings of vast wealth...
wherever it originated from.
And Dodi has told Diana what he has told many of his other beautiful girlfriends in the past: "It's my father's store
and you can have what you want. Charge it to my account and I'll just sign the bill." But now the Royal Family may
decide it is time to settle up.
After their brief trip to Paris, Diana spent virtually every free moment with Dodi at his apartment in London’s Park
Lane or together at Kensington Palace, which rankled the royals greatly. Prince Philip was enraged that the “oily
little bed-hopper” was shacked up with Diana, their constant thorn, in a royal palace. The royals went apoplectic.
When photographed arriving at Dodi’s apartment, Diana walked in without a care who saw her. She seemed to be
telling the world that her romance was for real and that she had nothing to hide. Dodi had their meals ferried in on
silver trays from the nearby Harry’s Bar. Just months before Diana was accustomed to smuggling her lover, Dr
Hasnat Khan, into KP hidden in a blanket in the back of her car driven by her butler Paul Burrell. But things had
changed and for the better and she could at last be open about her relationship with the Harrod’s heir.
When she was informed by a courtier that Prince Charles was expressing ‘concern’ about the effect the new man in
her life might be causing on their sons, Diana said his worries were ‘laughable’ in view of his own undisguised
affection for a woman other than their mother. What was good for the goose, was good for the gander and Charles
did not like it one bit.
The suave heir to Al Fayed’s vast fortune would make Diana an ideal husband, announced blonde Sky News
presenter Tania Bryer, who had dated Dodi in the past. “He is warm and gentle. Not an aggressive macho sort. I can
see why he appeals to Diana,” she warbled, paid to incite such juicy gossip 24/7. “He is absolutely charming and one
of the most genuine people you could meet.”
Diana seemed to have come to the same conclusion. She was not concerned about this latest insight of her private
life, and assured friends: “I am in good hands!” A confidante of the princess was quoted as saying, “Her friends are
in no doubt that the princess is in love. It is the real thing.”
There was real sexual chemistry between them, said one journalist when shown intimate photographs of the couple
taken aboard the Jonikal. “They are oblivious to everyone and everything around them!” The Queen’s courtiers
were equally eager to assure their press contacts that the “whole thing is an act”, to annoy the Royal Family.
In 2005, Piers Morgan, former editor of the Daily Mirror wrote in The Insider, ‘Lots of pictures of her [Diana’s]
boys, the young heirs, the men who will perhaps kill off, or secure, the very future of the monarchy’. And yet
Morgan despite his friendship with Mark Bolland, an aide to Prince Charles, was convinced that Diana and Dodi
were for real.
One of the photographs to which he was referring - of the bikini-clad princess kissing Dodi on the deck of the
Jonikal – was splashed across the front page of the Daily Mirror. Piers Morgan had bought it on a one-day-
exclusive basis from an Italian paparazzi photographer who had staked out the yacht. The following day the picture
was bought by other national newspapers and given similar premier treatment.
It made the photographer more than £1 million – a sheer indication of the incredible interest in their romance at
the time. Publication of grainy photographs did not cause the princess’s smile to wane in the slightest. In fact she
asked the photographers why the pictures were so “grainy”. She was revelling in it. Of interests also, the princess
was not complaining that her privacy was being invaded.
There was a palpable sense of relief that their relationship was right out there in the open and that the world’s press
were fixated on them. Diana was dictating the pace of events, as she loved, and the royals hated every minute of
being overshadowed again. Diana was rubbing it in and she knew it and so did the royals. The British Establishment
had reached zero tolerance with Diana and her risqué relationship with the son of their arch-enemy Al Fayed.
For one so deeply concerned that she was a target for assassination, Diana was doing everything she could think of
to invite that eventuality. A covert relationship was one thing but flaunting it so openly was another and yet it was
lost on the royals that Diana was the world’s foremost celebrity and the colossal interest of the press in her every
move was inevitable and indeed highly profitable for the press barons.
The counter-attack on the Al Fayeds and Diana in the public domain was imminent. The royals were waiting on MI6
to complete the dossier before leaking it to the press through their courtiers. The battle-lines were drawn
irrevocably and there was no turning back. The royals and Charles in particular greatly feared what Diana might
leak to Al Fayed. It was common knowledge in royal circles that Diana kept a ‘treasure trove’ of highly damaging
secrets at KP and their revelation could bring down the monarchy.
And the slightest thought of marriage between the princess and the son of Mohamed Al Fayed sent shudders of
revulsion through the ranks of Buckingham Palace courtiers. They were not impressed by the remark of Dodi’s
friend, who said: “With him, Diana can have everything the royal family gave her, without the annoyance of the
royal family.” The conflict grew wider and more serious albeit behind the scenes for the most part.
On 8 August, Diana was snapped leaving Dodi’s apartment adjacent the Dorchester Hotel at one in the morning. Just
hours later she flew to Bosnia to further her anti-landmines campaign. She had become more than a troublesome
thorn in the Royal Family’s side, she was also considered to be a menace by the majority of the world’s arms
industry. Her visit to Bosnia was a direct threat to their billons and escalation of the campaign to ban the use of
Landmines.
Diana, radiant and forever smiling in the face of adversity, had focused the world’s attention on the landmines issue.
In Bosnia, she was greeted by over sixty photographers. She highlighted the very real human misery caused by the
deployment of landmines. For three days she talked to surviving victims of random mines. People who had lost
limbs and suffered hideous debilitating injuries, were embraced by Diana and she made them feel special with her
special brand of magic.
One newspaper described Diana as a “Mother Teresa with a crown” and experienced opinion-shapers were
astonished that this not very eloquent woman had become the most influential personality in the world. At the
Pentagon and among some of America’s wealthiest arms dealers, the realisation dawned that Diana had become
their most potent and vitriolic opponent, threatening their vast power base. Former British Foreign Secretary Lord
Howe, had dubbed Diana as a “loose cannon” and at any time she could blow up in their faces.
The moneyed elite of the Western world needed to eliminate the Diana threat. Their opportunity to destroy her in
the public domain did not exist as Diana had become almost saintly in the eyes of billions of people across the
world. Attacks on Diana’s character in the media, repeatedly backfired and she seemed invulnerable. Politicians
across the West were stunned by the ease of her rise to international stardom. How could an icon be stopped?
On 15 August, Diana flew to Greece for a cruise with her good friend Rosa Monckton, and borrowed Mohamed Al
Fayed’s private jet to take them there. For one so distrustful of anything and everything to do with the State, it is
perhaps a little strange that Diana struck up such a close friendship with Rosa Monckton, given the constant
rumours that circulated about her husband’s close ‘connections’ to MI6. But ‘friends’ they were and Rosa Monckton
would later prove to be a greater friend to the British establishment than Diana could ever have imagined.
On 21 August, both Diana and Dodi were back in London, he having returned from Los Angeles, presumably on a
fact finding mission to find a suitable property to house the princess. Diana returned briefly to Kensington Palace to
freshen up before returning to Battersea Heliport and then back on to Stansted Airport and the refuelled
Gulfstream private jet. They headed back to the yacht Jonikal and another holiday together on the Côte d’Azur.
From Nice Airport the loving couple were whisked by car to where the Jonikal awaited them offshore at St. Laurent-
de-Var, and while they rested, the yacht’s captain Luigi del Tevere, motored south to St Tropez where they
anchored at 02.00hrs. Early the next morning they headed to Pamplona Bay where Dodi and Diana joined
Mohamed Al Fayed and his wife and four children for lunch. As they left late that afternoon, the Jonikal was being
tailed by a small flotilla of press boats.
The presence of the ubiquitous paparazzi didn’t faze Diana in the slightest. The next morning, Diana was up and
about long before Dodi. Bodyguard Trevor Rees-Jones recalls that she looked stunning in her bathing suit and
made absolutely no effort to hide from the rapacious snappers.
During the late afternoon they anchored off St. Jean Cap Ferrat, from where Dodi planned to take Diana shopping
and sightseeing in nearby Monaco. On their trip ashore, Dodi’s butler René says that they gave their bodyguards the
slip while they toured the chic area of Monte Carlo and popped into Alberto Repossi, Dodi’s favourite jeweller in the
Hermitage Hotel.
In his book, Trevor Rees-Jones denies a visit was made to Repossi’s even though Mohamed Al Fayed obtained the
CCTV footage of the couple actually in the store. Rees-Jones denial is irrelevant: the ring, which Dodi would collect
from the Paris branch a week later, was real enough.
Off Portofino in Italy, the next day, the young lovers chose to stay aboard the Jonikal as the paparazzi were visible
in force on the shore. The pair showed no embarrassment about being seen kissing and cuddling during their
sunbathing sessions on deck. Even when they were in full sight of the paparazzi, their intimate displays of affection
did not abate in the slightest. They were loving every moment of it and the world’s press lapped it up and their
readers were insatiable for news of the princess and her exotic lover.
By Friday, 29 August, they were anchored off Cala di Volpe, a private resort in Sardinia, where they slipped ashore
unseen by the hunting press pack. The paparazzi attention was suffocating and the couple decided to move on. The
decision to fly to Paris was made early that evening. A flight plan was filed from Sardinia’s Olbia Airport for the next
day. Staff were instructed that the couple would spend a day in Paris before going on to London.
The Ritz Hotel was advised from the Fayed nerve centre in London that the couple would be arriving in Paris on the
Saturday afternoon, a copy of the memo went to acting head of security Henri Paul! He immediately cancelled a
planned weekend away with close friends and put himself back on the rota to be in charge of the reception at Le
Bourget Airport.
The main reason for going to Paris, Dodi advised the Harrod’s HQ in London, was to pick up a ring. Dodi told his
step-uncle, Hussein Yassin, a former press attaché at the Saudi Embassy in Washington, who was stayed at the Ritz
that weekend: “Diana and I are getting married. You’ll know about it officially very soon.” And Hussein’s niece, also
in Paris, received a similar call that fateful Saturday evening. A gushing Dodi told her, “Our marriage will be
founded on true love.”
A formal announcement was planned, Dodi told them, after the princess had broken the news to her two sons when
they were reunited the following day. It was already decided that the ring he was collecting from Repossi, in the
Place Vendôme, would be her engagement ring.
Speaking to the Paget Investigation of Sir John Stevens, Dodi’s butler René Delorm said: “In the book I explain how
Dodi told me to have Champagne on ice ready for when they returned from dinner on 30th / 31st August 1997. He
told me that he was going to propose to the Princess and showed me a ring. I will explain this incident in greater
detail later in my statement. What I left out of that story was that later that evening I went to enter the living room;
I coughed to announce my presence and saw the Princess sitting on the coffee table. Dodi was on one knee in front
of her, caressing her belly and she was looking at her hand. The only thing I heard, was her say the word ‘Yes.’”
By the time the Gulfstream private jet set down at le Bourget Airport in the northern environs of Paris at 15.22hrs,
Diana was as confident as she would ever be that she was truly in love with a good man and more importantly, ready
to tell the whole world about it. When their door opened onto the area reserved for private aircraft, the contrast
with the Côte d’Azur could not have been greater. There was not the slightest hint of a wind, everything was still,
eerily so and the temperature was already soaring in the high eighties.
The British Embassy was not informed that Princess Diana was arriving but waiting by the runway, unbidden, but
provided by a ‘considerate’ government, were the motorcycle outriders and black cars of the French diplomatic
protection service – Service de Protection des Hautes Personnalité.
Normally, the princess would have been entitled to a phalanx of SPHP officers and protocol would have made it
impossible to refuse them. But Diana had made her feelings perfectly clear to Dodi. The SPHP were not needed and
Diana by then had a profound distrust of everything to do with government and state, particularly the British State.
Dodi Fayed was a passive man and readily agreed to almost anything Diana proposed or imposed. Dodi politely
refused the SPHP and insisted, on Diana’s instructions, that his own personal bodyguards were more than capable
of protecting them both. He would ensure the princess’s safety and his own. In this of course he was mistaken,
disastrously so, as events were to prove. His bodyguards were not used to the frenetic press pack and blows were
soon exchanged between the paparazzi and the Fayed security team.
And at Le Bourget a veritable army of photographers were waiting for the princess and her lover, forever hungry
for the slightest morsel of newsworthy material. With photographers making vast sums for even grainy shots of the
couple together, it was understandable they would gather en masse to ghost Diana everywhere she went. The
paparazzi had already earned a new title as the ‘stalkerazzi’ and were living up to their notoriety.
Diana rejected a final offer of SPHP protection, a decision borne of her distrust of government security officers.
Diana’s fear of official ‘security’ personnel by far outweighed her dislike of the stalkerazzi, whose preferred
transport in Paris, she would learn, was motorcycles and scooters. Their persistence and sheer aggression, would
make the antics of their Mediterranean cousins seem almost benign by comparison.
Date Posted:23/01/2007 15:37:43)
For the record.
July 1, 1961: Lady Diana Frances Spencer is born, the daughter of the 8th Earl Spencer. July 29, 1981: Married
H.R.H.Prince Charles,the Prince of Wales and direct heir to the British throne, at St. Paul's Cathedral, while
millions watched the "fairy tale wedding." He is 12 years her senior and Diana plucked from obscurity having been a
teachers helper in a nursery school and a "Sloane - Ranger", the term given to socialites living in the London
boroughs of Kensington and Chelsea. The Bridal Gown with longest Bridal Train ( 25 feet long ) in history!
June 21, 1982: Prince William Arthur Philip Louis born. September 15, 1984: Prince Harry (Henry Charles
Albert David) born. June 15, 1992: After months of speculation about the state of the royal marriage, Andrew
Morton's book "Diana: Her True Story" says Charles has had a longtime affair with a married woman, Camilla
Parker -Bowles, driving Diana to injure herself and attempt suicide. August 25, 1992: The Sun newspaper prints
transcript of phone call monitored in December 1989 between Diana and a man, James Gilbey who affectionately
calls her "Squidgy." December 9, 1992: Prime Minister John Major announces to Parliament that Diana and
Charles are separating but there are no plans for divorce. January 12, 1993: The Sun publishes transcript of an
intimate phone call between Camilla Parker -Bowles and Charles, reportedly monitored December 1989.
June 29, 1994: In a Jonathan Dimbleby TV documentary, Charles says he had committed adultery after the
marriage broke down, "us both having tried." Diana attends a function the night his confession is televised at the
"Serpentine Gallery" looking stunning in a black dress which came to be known as the " Revenge Dress ".
October 3, 1994: Anna Pasternak's book "Princess in Love" says Diana had five-year affair with her riding
instructor Major James Hewitt. November 20, 1995: In a "Panorama" television interview, Diana admits
adultery with Major James Hewitt and refers to Camilla Parker - Bowles her husbands mistress and now wife .. H.R.
H. Duchess of Cornwall...famously saying..." There were three of us in this marriage .. so it was a bit crowded!"
August 1995: Reports link Diana and rugby star Will Carling. Carling and wife separate September 29th. Denying
a relationship with him, Diana had been briefly involved with married Islamic Art dealer Oliver Hoare.
December 1995: Charles receives letter from Queen Elizabeth II urging divorce, and he agrees to bow to her
wishes. February 28, 1996: Diana reluctantly agrees to the divorce, she and Charles having lived completely
separate lives, publicly both having showed their resentment of each other on their final tour of Korea where the
Media christened them "The Glums". August 28, 1996: Final decree of divorce. Diana embarked on a serious
love affair with heart surgeon Dr. Hasnat Khan but a relationship with no future, she being white, not of his caste or
of Muslim religion and a divorced Mother of two, his Mother particularly being opposed to the relationship
sustaining. Maintaining friendship, he received his Birthday card from Diana in 1997 in the same post as a request
to attend her funeral at Westminster Abbey, London. June and July, 1997: Diana visits Angola and Bosnia to
see about land mines and the destruction to civilian populations. She works with the Red cross and towards seeing
that land mines get banned.
August 31, 1997: Diana dies as a result of injuries sustained in a Paris automobile incident. Her boyfriend, Dodi
Fayed, is killed instantly with their chauffeur Henri - Paul. Even more tragically and particularly in 1997. Diana and
Charles had become closer and as her friend and respecting she being the Mother of his children he flew to Paris to
escort her on her final journey home. September 6th 1997: Diana's London Funeral service took place here at"
Westminster Abbey"on, the day the world cried!Diana was then driven from the capital to her home county of
Northamptonshire for her final private family burial. Diana buried in the grounds of the Spencer Home of
"Althorpe"on an island in the ornamental lake called " The Oval "
OR
