The Times view on Prince Philip: The Monarchy’s Rock

Comparisons are inevitable with Prince Albert, Queen Victoria’s consort, who had to invent the role that gave him immense influence in Britain’s politics, mores and culture more than 150 years ago. The parallels are misleading, as Prince Philip himself acknowledged. The duke, though quoted, photographed and pictured far more often and for many years longer than Albert, was not an executive consort. He did not share in the monarch’s duties, read the official dispatches or offer advice in the governance of the country; the new Queen drew lines of demarcation in their marriage. Prince Philip had therefore to find a role that not only satisfied his determination to be his own man, but one that could contribute to the success and wellbeing of his adopted nation.

The duke lived so long and seemed such a familiar pillar of the British state that a younger generation today cannot imagine him as anything but an old man, with an old man’s foibles and whims. They have little appreciation, apart from films and television, of how strikingly at odds the young and dashing prince was with the British establishment of the 1950s, how hard he found it to prevail in his battles over protocol and stuffy tradition and how radical were his challenges to British society, industry and complacency. But in his dismissal of flummery, his impatience with incompetence and his insistence on reform of practices and institutions encased in an earlier age he did more to modernise the monarchy than advisers or officials paid to serve the Queen.

The prince worked behind the scenes. He may at first have found the going tough amid the conservatism of the palace establishment that he and the Queen inherited, but gradually his ideas prevailed. The Queen appeared to remain in an unchanging role, never seen to bow to the fads of fashion. Yet quietly and seamlessly she shifted her positions in tune with prevailing standards and assumptions. Over more than half a century the change in the practices and expectations of the monarchy is as extraordinary as any snapshot of 1952 set beside life in Britain in 2021. And Prince Philip played a decisive if unobtrusive role in the institution’s evolution.

Where he decided to intervene, he did so with complete commitment. His strange and lonely upbringing as an impoverished refugee princeling, certain neither of his background nor his destiny, taught him a self-reliance he was determined to instil in others. It has worked for more than six million young Britons who have taken part in the Duke of Edinburgh awards. The programme, Prince Philip’s most enduring legacy and one of the charities closest to his heart, began in 1956. Since then young people from all over the country have pitted themselves against the weather, the outdoors and challenges designed to encourage grit, endurance, pride and independence.

His other great area of interest was science, technology and British industry. He was innovative and goal-oriented; British industry, he believed, should be the same. He heckled and cajoled management, he encouraged technology and enterprise, he visited scientific establishments and exporters around the country. Many of the Queen’s awards in the field were inspired by his enthusiasms. Charities also were taken under his patronage if he believed they were effective, and he was an engaged patron or president of many.

He had strong views, a quick wit and a sharp tongue. He could be startlingly frank or off-the-cuff with those he met who were nervously unsure how to respond. The press picked up some of his bons mots, but it delighted more often in picking up remarks that betrayed an age and mindset very different from the political and racial sensitivities of today.

The prince, however, had a thick skin, a sense of humour and a self-awareness that went a long way in mitigating his lack of tact. Way back in 1960, he told the General Dental Council: “Dontopedology is the science of opening your mouth and putting your foot in it, a science which I’ve practised for a good many years.”

Like most of his family, Prince Philip had a love-hate relationship with the press. He knew the uses of publicity. He knew how to catch attention and how to champion a cause. His press conferences on such issues as the environment, wildlife protection or scientific innovation were model expositions of briefs he had mastered: facts, details, histories and quips poured out with the prince’s enthusiasm. He was less forthcoming than he may have wanted to be over the press hounding of his family, the invasion of privacy and the permanent antagonistic relationship with some royal watchers.

One issue the press never tired of rehashing was the fruitless attempt to link Prince Philip with glamorous women. Speculation was endless. Rumours abounded; none was ever substantiated. Whatever the gossip, the prince’s devotion to his wife and their deep and enduring bond were matters of public record. Their marriage was the longest of any British monarch.

The Queen paid public tribute to him on several occasions. At a party in Windsor for 33 members of the royal family and 20 of his German relations to celebrate his 80th birthday, she expressed her gratitude for his devotion as a husband and father, adding: “I speak for all the family and everyone here. Thank you from all of us.” On his 90th birthday she bestowed the title of Lord High Admiral on him, although his active career in the Navy had ended in July 1951.

Neither he nor the Queen would have claimed to be intellectuals; they did not have the passion for art, music or literature that marked the marriage of Victoria and Albert. The duke, as always, was in attendance at cultural events where a royal presence was required, either on visits overseas or at particularly prestigious performances in Britain. But his interests were technical, practical and scientific. He did not share the Queen’s passion for horses but dutifully accompanied her each year to Ascot. In later life, after his vigorous participation in sailing and sport, he took up the equestrian event of carriage driving, a somewhat rarefied sport in which he quickly excelled.

Duty, dependability and steadfastness were the watchwords for how he interpreted his role as the Queen’s consort. Formality, ceremony and protocol may have irked the young and impatient prince; by middle age he had settled comfortably into the routines by which the royal family measured out the year: the summer visit to Balmoral, the annual ceremony of remembrance at the Cenotaph, the Christmas family gathering at Sandringham (or, occasionally, Windsor), the state visits overseas and the occasions when he and the Queen hosted whichever head of state the government thought advantageous to honour with a state visit, state banquet and full ceremonial in Britain. Both he and the Queen met every American president since Eisenhower apart from Lyndon B Johnson; few, however, seemed to strike up as much rapport as Barack Obama, and especially his wife, Michelle.

The duke carried out his last formal duty at the age of 96, when, as Captain General of the Royal Marines, a role he held since he was appointed in succession to the late King George VI at the Queen’s coronation in 1953, he stepped on to the forecourt of Buckingham Palace, in the pouring rain, to attend a parade. It marked the regiment’s 1664 Global Challenge, during which marines ran 16.64 miles around Britain for 100 days. It was the kind of challenge that would have appealed to the prince at any point in his life. And with a bluff remark to them afterwards that “you should all be locked up”, he gave a laconic wave and went indoors to get dry.

In retirement he spent his time mostly at Sandringham while the Queen lived at Buckingham Palace. While driving there in January 2019 he was involved in an accident when he came from a side road and hit a passing car. His Land Rover vehicle overturned but he somehow emerged unscathed. There was criticism that it took a few days before he apologised to those in the other car who suffered minor injuries. He voluntarily then stopped driving on public roads.

The prince moved to Windsor Castle to be with the Queen during lockdown last year and was seen only in occasional public appearances such as the ceremony at Windsor Castle to transfer the title of Colonel-in-Chief of The Rifles to Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall, or the wedding of his granddaughter, Princess Beatrice.

He was almost certainly involved in the protracted discussions within the royal family over the future of Prince Harry and his wife Meghan after they announced their wish to lay aside their royal duties and live abroad; but any advice he gave to the Queen or his grandson was private and discreet.

There are few members of any royal family in the world today who have distinguished themselves in battle or been witness to the horrors of the Second World War. From his early days at school in Nazi Germany, through his wartime engagements as a young officer in the Royal Navy to the challenges of the nuclear age and climate change, Prince Philip lived through the turbulence of the 20th century.

As much as the Queen, he was a symbol of continuity from the time of Britain’s greatest danger right up until the present day. He was the longest living and most successful consort of any monarch in British history. On him has rested the stability, popular acceptance and common sense of the House of Windsor-Mountbatten for almost three quarters of a century. He will be mourned and missed by the entire nation.