Prince Philip, The Duke Of Edinburgh

Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh (born Prince Philip of Greece and Denmark, later Philip Mountbatten; 10 June 19219 April 2021), was the husband of Queen Elizabeth II. As such, he was the consort of the British monarch from his wife's accession on 6 February 1952 until his death in 2021, making him the longest-serving royal consort in history.

Philip was born in Greece into the Greek and Danish royal families; his family was exiled from the country when he was eighteen months old. After being educated in France, Germany, and the United Kingdom, he joined the Royal Navy in 1939, when he was 18 years old. In July 1939, Philip began corresponding with the 13-year-old Princess Elizabeth, the elder daughter and heir presumptive of King George VI. During the Second World War, he served with distinction in the British Mediterranean and Pacific fleets.

In the summer of 1946, the King granted Philip permission to marry Elizabeth, then aged 20. Before the official announcement of their engagement in July 1947, Philip stopped using his Greek and Danish royal titles and styles, became a naturalised British subject, and adopted his maternal grandparents' surname Mountbatten. In November 1947, he married Elizabeth, was granted the style ''His Royal Highness'' and was created Duke of Edinburgh, Earl of Merioneth, and Baron Greenwich. Philip left active military service when Elizabeth ascended the throne in 1952, having reached the rank of commander. In 1957, he was created a British prince. Philip had four children with Elizabeth: Charles, Anne, Andrew, and Edward.

A sports enthusiast, Philip helped develop the equestrian event of carriage driving. He was patron, president, or member of over 780 organisations, including the World Wide Fund for Nature, and served as chairman of The Duke of Edinburgh's Award, a youth awards programme for people aged 14 to 24. Philip is the longest-lived male member of the British royal family. He retired from royal duties in 2017, aged 96, having completed 22,219 solo engagements and 5,493 speeches since 1952, and died at the age of 99 at Windsor Castle.

Early life and education

Family, infancy and exile from Greece

Prince Philip () of Greece and Denmark was born on 10 June 1921 on the dining room table in Mon Repos, a villa on the Greek island of Corfu. He was the only son and fifth and final child of Prince Andrew of Greece and Denmark and his wife, Princess Alice of Battenberg. Philip's father was the fourth son of King George I and Queen Olga of Greece, and his mother was the eldest child of Louis Mountbatten, 1st Marquess of Milford Haven, and Victoria Mountbatten, Marchioness of Milford Haven (formerly Prince Louis of Battenberg and Princess Victoria of Hesse and by Rhine). A member of the House of Glücksburg, Philip was a prince of both Greece and Denmark by virtue of his patrilineal descent from George I of Greece and George's father, Christian IX of Denmark; he was from birth in the line of succession, Theodora, Cecilie, and Sophie. He was baptised in the Greek Orthodox rite at St. George's Church in the Old Fortress in Corfu. His godparents were his paternal grandmother, Queen Olga of Greece; his cousin George, Crown Prince of Greece; his uncle Lord Louis Mountbatten; and the municipality of Corfu, represented by its mayor, Alexandros Kokotos, and by the president of the council, Stylianos Maniarizis.

Shortly after Philip's birth, his maternal grandfather died in London. The Marquess of Milford Haven was a naturalised British subject who, after a career in the Royal Navy, had renounced his German titles and adopted the surname Mountbatten—an Anglicised version of Battenberg—during the First World War, owing to anti-German sentiment in the United Kingdom. After visiting London for his grandfather's memorial service, Philip and his mother returned to Greece, where Prince Andrew had remained to command a Greek Army division embroiled in the Greco-Turkish War.

Greece suffered significant losses in the war and the Turks made substantial gains. Philip's uncle and high commander of the Greek expeditionary force, King Constantine I, was blamed for the defeat and was forced to abdicate in September 1922. The new military government arrested Andrew, along with others. General Georgios Hatzianestis, who was commanding officer of the army, and five senior politicians were arrested, tried, and executed in the Trial of the Six. Andrew's life was also believed to be in danger and Alice was under surveillance. Finally, in December, a revolutionary court banished Andrew from Greece for life. The British naval vessel evacuated Andrew's family, with Philip carried to safety in a fruit box.

Upbringing in France, Britain and Germany

Philip's family settled in a house in the Paris suburb of Saint-Cloud lent to them by his wealthy aunt, Princess George of Greece and Denmark. During his time there, Philip was first educated at The Elms, an American school in Paris run by Donald MacJannet, who described Philip as a "know it all smarty person, but always remarkably polite". In 1930 Philip was sent to Britain to live with his maternal grandmother at Kensington Palace and his uncle George Mountbatten, 2nd Marquess of Milford Haven, at Lynden Manor in Bray, Berkshire. He was then enrolled at Cheam School. Over the next three years, his four sisters married German princes and moved to Germany, his mother was diagnosed with schizophrenia and placed in an asylum, and his father took up residence in Monte Carlo. Philip had little contact with his mother for the remainder of his childhood.

In 1933 Philip was sent to Schule Schloss Salem in Germany, which had the "advantage of saving school fees", because it was owned by the family of his brother-in-law Berthold, Margrave of Baden. With the rise of Nazism in Germany, Salem's Jewish founder, Kurt Hahn, fled persecution and founded Gordonstoun School in Scotland, to which Philip moved after two terms at Salem. In 1937, his sister Cecilie; her husband, Georg Donatus, Hereditary Grand Duke of Hesse; their two sons; and Georg Donatus's mother were killed in an air crash at Ostend; Philip, then 16 years old, attended the funeral in Darmstadt. Cecilie and Georg Donatus were members of the Nazi Party. The following year, Philip's uncle and guardian Lord Milford Haven died of bone marrow cancer. Milford Haven's younger brother Lord Louis took parental responsibility for Philip for the remainder of his youth.

Philip did not speak Greek because he had left Greece as an infant. In 1992 he said that he "could understand a certain amount". He stated that he thought of himself as Danish and spoke mostly English, while his family was multilingual. Known for his charm in his youth, Philip was linked to several women, including Osla Benning.

Naval and wartime service

After leaving Gordonstoun in early 1939, Philip completed a term as a cadet at the Royal Naval College, Dartmouth, then repatriated to Greece, living with his mother in Athens for a month in mid-1939. At the behest of King George II of Greece, his first cousin, he returned to Britain in September to resume training for the Royal Navy. He graduated from Dartmouth the next year as the best cadet in his course. During the Second World War, he continued to serve in the British forces, while two of his brothers-in-law, Prince Christoph of Hesse and Berthold, Margrave of Baden, fought on the opposing German side. Philip was appointed as a midshipman in January 1940. He spent four months on the battleship , protecting convoys of the Australian Expeditionary Force in the Indian Ocean, followed by shorter postings on , on , and in British Ceylon. After the invasion of Greece by Italy in October 1940, he was transferred from the Indian Ocean to the battleship in the Mediterranean Fleet.

Philip was commissioned as a sub-lieutenant on 1 February 1941 after a series of courses at Portsmouth, in which he gained the top grade in four out of five sections of the qualifying examination. Among other engagements, he was involved in the Battle of Crete and was mentioned in dispatches for his service during the Battle of Cape Matapan, in which he controlled the battleship's searchlights. He was also awarded the Greek War Cross. In June 1942, he was appointed to the destroyer , which was involved in convoy escort tasks on the east coast of Britain, as well as the Allied invasion of Sicily.

Promotion to lieutenant followed on 16 July 1942. In October of the same year, aged 21, Philip became first lieutenant of HMS ''Wallace''. He was one of the youngest first lieutenants in the Royal Navy. During the invasion of Sicily, in July 1943, as second-in-command of ''Wallace'', he saved his ship from a night bomber attack. He devised a plan to launch a raft with smoke floats that successfully distracted the bombers, allowing the ship to slip away unnoticed. In 1944, he moved on to the new destroyer, , where he saw service with the British Pacific Fleet in the 27th Destroyer Flotilla. He was present in Tokyo Bay when the Japanese Instrument of Surrender was signed. Philip returned to the United Kingdom on the ''Whelp'' in January 1946 and was posted as an instructor at , the Petty Officers' School in Corsham, Wiltshire.

Marriage

In 1939 King George VI and Queen Elizabeth toured the Royal Naval College, Dartmouth. During the visit, the Queen and Lord Louis Mountbatten asked his nephew Philip to escort the royal couple's daughters, 13-year-old Elizabeth and 9-year-old Margaret, who were Philip's third cousins through Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom and second cousins once removed through King Christian IX of Denmark.Alexandra of Yugoslavia quoted in Philip and Elizabeth had first met as children in 1934 at the wedding of Elizabeth's uncle Prince George, Duke of Kent, to Philip's first cousin, Princess Marina of Greece and Denmark. After their 1939 meeting, Elizabeth fell in love with Philip, and they began to exchange letters.

Eventually, in the summer of 1946, Philip asked George VI for his daughter's hand in marriage. The King granted his request, provided that any formal engagement be delayed until Elizabeth's 21st birthday the following April. By March 1947, Philip had adopted the surname Mountbatten from his mother's family and had stopped using his Greek and Danish royal titles upon becoming a naturalised British subject.." The British press reported on the remark as indicative of racial intolerance, but the Chinese authorities were reportedly unconcerned. Chinese students studying in the UK, an official explained, were often told in jest not to stay away too long, lest they go "round-eyed". His comment did not affect Sino-British relations, but it shaped his reputation. Philip also made comments on the eating habits of Cantonese people, stating: "If it has four legs and is not a chair, has wings and is not an airplane, or swims and is not a submarine, the Cantonese will eat it." In Australia he asked an Indigenous Australian entrepreneur: "Do you still throw spears at each other?"

In 2011 historian David Starkey described Philip as a kind of "HRH Victor Meldrew". For example, in May 1999, British newspapers accused Philip of insulting deaf children at a pop concert in Wales by saying: "No wonder you are deaf listening to this row." Later, Philip wrote: "The story is largely invention. It so happens that my mother was quite seriously deaf and I have been Patron of the Royal National Institute for the Deaf for ages, so it's hardly likely that I would do any such thing." When he and Elizabeth met Stephen Menary, an army cadet blinded by a Real IRA bomb, and Elizabeth enquired how much sight he retained, Philip quipped: "Not a lot, judging by the tie he's wearing." Menary later said: "I think he just tries to put people at ease by trying to make a joke. I certainly didn't take any offence." Philip's comparison of prostitutes and wives was also perceived as offensive after he reportedly stated: "I don't think a prostitute is more moral than a wife, but they are doing the same thing."

Centenary

To mark the centenary of Philip's birth in June 2021, the Royal Collection Trust held an exhibition at Windsor Castle and the Palace of Holyroodhouse. Titled ''Prince Philip: A Celebration'', it showcased around 150 personal items related to him, including his wedding card, wedding menu, midshipman's logbook from 1940 to 1941, Chair of Estate, and the coronation robes and coronet that he wore for his wife's coronation in 1953. George Alexis Weymouth's portrait of Philip in the ruins of Windsor Castle after the fire of 1992 formed part of a focus on Philip's involvement with the subsequent restoration.

The Royal Horticultural Society also marked Philip's centenary by breeding a new rose in his honour, christened " The Duke of Edinburgh Rose", created by British rose breeder Harkness Roses. Elizabeth, as patron of the society, was given the deep pink commemorative rose in honour of her husband, and she remarked that "It looks lovely". A Duke of Edinburgh Rose has since been planted in the mixed rose border of Windsor Castle's East Terrace Garden. Philip played a major role in the garden's design.

In September 2021, the Royal National Lifeboat Institution honoured Philip by naming their new state-of-the-art lifeboat ''Duke of Edinburgh''. The tribute was initially planned to mark his 100th birthday. In the same month, a documentary initially planned for his centenary was broadcast on BBC One under the title ''Prince Philip: The Royal Family Remembers'', with contributions from his children, their spouses, and seven of his grandchildren.

Portrayals

Philip has been portrayed by several actors, including Stewart Granger (''The Royal Romance of Charles and Diana'', 1982), Christopher Lee (''Charles & Diana: A Royal Love Story'', 1982), David Threlfall ('' The Queen's Sister'', 2005), James Cromwell ('' The Queen'', 2006), and Finn Elliot, Matt Smith, Tobias Menzies, and Jonathan Pryce (''The Crown'', 2016 onwards). He also appears as a fictional character in Nevil Shute's novel '' In the Wet'' (1952), Paul Gallico's novel ''Mrs. 'Arris Goes to Moscow'' (1974), Tom Clancy's novel ''Patriot Games'' (1987), and Sue Townsend's novel '' The Queen and I'' (1992).

Books

Philip authored:

* ''Selected Speeches – 1948–55'' (1957; revised paperback edition published by Nabu Press, 2011),
* ''Selected Speeches – 1956–59'' (1960)
* ''Birds from Britannia'' (1962; published in the United States as ''Seabirds from Southern Waters''),
* ''Wildlife Crisis'' with James Fisher (1970),
* ''The Environmental Revolution: Speeches on Conservation, 1962–1977'' (1978),
* ''Competition Carriage Driving'' (1982; published in France, 1984; second edition, 1984; revised edition, 1994),
* ''A Question of Balance'' (1982),
* '' Men, Machines and Sacred Cows'' (1984),
* ''A Windsor Correspondence'' with Michael Mann (1984),
* ''Down to Earth: Collected Writings and Speeches on Man and the Natural World 1961–87'' (1988; paperback edition, 1989; Japanese edition, 1992),
* ''Survival or Extinction: A Christian Attitude to the Environment'' with Michael Mann (1989),
* ''Driving and Judging Dressage'' (1996),
* ''30 Years On, and Off, the Box Seat'' (2004),

Forewords to:

* ''Royal Australian Navy 1911–1961 Jubilee Souvenir'' issued by authority of the Department of the Navy, Canberra (1961)
* ''The Concise British Flora in Colour'' by William Keble Martin, Ebury Press / Michael Joseph (1965)
* ''Birds of Town and Village'' by William Donald Campbell and Basil Ede (1965)
* ''Kurt Hahn'' by Hermann Röhrs and Hilary Tunstall-Behrens (1970)
* ''The Doomsday Book of Animals'' by David Day (1981)
* ''Saving the Animals: The World Wildlife Fund Book of Conservation'' by Bernard Stonehouse (1981)
* ''The Art of Driving'' by Max Pape (1982),
* ''Yachting and the Royal Prince Alfred Yacht Club'' by Graeme Norman (1988),
* ''National Maritime Museum Guide to Maritime Britain'' by Keith Wheatley (2000)
* ''The Royal Yacht Britannia: The Official History'' by Richard Johnstone-Bryden, Conway Maritime Press (2003),
* ''1953: The Crowning Year of Sport'' by Jonathan Rice (2003)
* ''British Flags and Emblems'' by Graham Bartram, Tuckwell Press (2004),
* ''Chariots of War'' by Robert Hobson, Ulric Publication (2004),
* ''RMS Queen Mary 2 Manual: An Insight into the Design, Construction and Operation of the World's Largest Ocean Liner'' by Stephen Payne, Haynes Publishing (2014)
* ''The Triumph of a Great Tradition: The Story of Cunard's 175 Years'' by Eric Flounders and Michael Gallagher, Lily Publications (2014),

Titles, styles, honours, and arms

Philip held many titles throughout his life. Originally holding the title and style of a prince of Greece and Denmark, Philip abandoned these royal titles before he married and was thereafter created a British duke, among other noble titles. Elizabeth formally issued letters patent in 1957 making him a British prince.

Honours and honorary military appointments

Philip was awarded medals from Britain, France, and Greece for his service during the Second World War, as well as ones commemorating the coronations of George VI and Elizabeth II and the silver, gold and diamond jubilees of Elizabeth. George VI appointed him to the Order of the Garter on the eve of his wedding on 19 November 1947. Since then, Philip received 17 appointments and decorations in the Commonwealth and 48 from foreign states. The inhabitants of some villages on the island of Tanna, Vanuatu, worship Philip as a god-like spiritual figure; the islanders possess portraits of him and hold feasts on his birthday.

Upon his wife's accession to the throne in 1952, Philip was appointed Admiral of the Sea Cadet Corps, Colonel-in-Chief of the British Army Cadet Force, and Air Commodore-in-Chief of the Air Training Corps. The following year, he was appointed to the equivalent positions in Canada and made Admiral of the Fleet, Captain General Royal Marines, Field marshal (United Kingdom), Field Marshal, and Marshal of the Royal Air Force in the United Kingdom. Subsequent military appointments were made in New Zealand and Australia. In 1975 he was appointed Colonel (United Kingdom), colonel of the Grenadier Guards, a position he handed over to his son Andrew in 2017. On 16 December 2015, he relinquished his role as Honorary Air Commodore-in-Chief and was succeeded by his granddaughter-in-law Catherine, then Duchess of Cambridge, as Honorary Air Commandant.

To celebrate Philip's 90th birthday, Elizabeth appointed him Lord High Admiral, as well as to the highest ranks available in all three branches of the Canadian Armed Forces. On their 70th wedding anniversary, 20 November 2017, she appointed him Knight Grand Cross of the Royal Victorian Order, making him the first British national since his uncle Lord Mountbatten of Burma to be entitled to wear the breast stars of four orders of chivalry in the United Kingdom.

Arms

Issue

Ancestry

Both Philip and Elizabeth were great-great-grandchildren of Queen Victoria, Elizabeth by descent from Victoria's eldest son, King Edward VII, and Philip by descent from Victoria's second daughter, Princess Alice of the United Kingdom, Princess Alice. Both were also Descendants of Christian IX of Denmark, descended from King Christian IX of Denmark.
Philip was also related to the House of Romanov through all four of his grandparents. His paternal grandmother was the granddaughter of Emperor Nicholas I of Russia. His paternal grandfather was a brother of Maria Feodorovna (Dagmar of Denmark), wife of Emperor Alexander III. His maternal grandmother was a sister of Alexandra Feodorovna (Alix of Hesse), wife of Emperor Nicholas II, and Elizabeth Feodorovna (Elisabeth of Hesse), wife of Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich of Russia. His maternal grandfather was the nephew of Maria Alexandrovna (Marie of Hesse), who was the wife of Emperor Alexander II.

In 1993 scientists were able to confirm the identity of the remains of several members of the Romanov family, more than seventy years after Murder of the Romanov family, their murder in 1918, by comparing their mitochondrial DNA to living matrilineal relatives, including Philip. Philip, Alexandra Feodorovna, and her children were all descended from Princess Alice through a purely female line.

Notes

References

Citations

Bibliography

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External links

The Duke of Edinburgh
at the Royal Family website

Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh
at the website of the Royal Collection Trust

The Duke of Edinburgh's Award

Obituary
at BBC News Online
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