The Duke of Edinburgh met a group of Royal Marines yesterday at the end of an arduous trek they had undertaken for charity. It was the end too of a mountainous workload that the duke has undertaken in 65 years as consort to the head of state. This was his final official engagement.
The statistics are remarkable. Prince Philip is 96 and is the longest-serving royal consort in the country’s history. In his public duties since 1952, he has recorded more than 22,000 solo public engagements, often in support of his chosen causes, including his admirable youth awards scheme. He has done all this with almost unfailing grace. No discussion of the duke as a public figure is complete without referring to his sometimes idiosyncratic contributions to international comity, occasionally upset by tactless comments made to hosts and other audiences. These should be seen in the context of a shift in cultural mores in the years of his and the Queen’s public duties.
When the Queen and Prince Philip were married in 1947, the public mood, amid post-war austerity, was far from universally friendly to the monarchy. One Labour MP, in a debate on the civil list, contrasted wounded war veterans with the duke, who was “being handed £10,000 a year, in addition to a cushy job at the Admiralty”. The habits of deference have withered further in the Queen’s long reign, yet the monarchy has become more, not less, popular.
That fact testifies to the dignity and diligence with which the Queen and Prince Philip have undertaken their duties. Nor have they been in a position to respond to public criticism, which must on occasion have been wounding. It would have been more difficult for the Queen, and to the detriment of Britain’s public life, if the duke had not been at her side. He merits a long and serene retirement.