“It Has Taken Them a Very Long Time”

by Laird o’Thistle
November 20 2010

I think Her Majesty the Queen summed up the news of Prince William’s engagement to Catherine Middleton quite succinctly. It has taken them a long time to get to November 16, 2010… back to the first notices of William and Kate in 2001-2002.

My intention for this column is just to share some random “noticings” and thoughts I have had over the last few days.

I think it was grand for them to announce their engagement in the week that includes both Prince Charles’ 62nd birthday and the Queen and Prince Philip’s 63rd wedding anniversary.  I also liked it that the announcement came on the feast day of St. Margaret of Scotland, an important ancestress of the royal family.

I love the picture in which Prince William is absolutely beaming at Kate, very different from the rather awkward engagement photos of William’s parents. And the symbolism of giving her his mother’s ring was just right.

One of the advantages of the longstanding relationship between William and Catherine is that the media attention will probably be more on the wedding arrangements than intrusively on her, thus sparing her many of the trials suffered by Diana thirty years ago. As with Diana, Kate’s younger brother may be a bit of a problem at times… hopefully, there aren’t any more embarrassing old pictures of him in (or semi-out of) that skimpy French maid’s costume waiting to surface.

William’s marriage will be the first marriage of “the heir of the heir” to the throne since that of the future George V and Queen Mary in 1893. Both cases involve the grandsons of long-lived queens, and sons of long-waiting Princes of Wales. (I noted, anew, in the published pictures of last week’s Remembrance Sunday that when she’s being solemn the Queen really does resemble Victoria.)

The suggestion touted in some reports that the Guards Chapel is a possible venue for the wedding is intriguing. It would cut down the guest list, but wouldn’t have the odd Charles & Diana karma of either St. Paul’s Cathedral or Westminster Abbey.

Although the betting money seems to be on William and Kate becoming the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, I wouldn’t count the Clarence title out of the running. The future William V might like the title once held by William IV. It’s really too bad that the old Scottish title of Duke of Albany is still considered as either unavailable or undesirable. It would be very appropriate for the couple whose relationship began and was formed at St. Andrews.

Rather than the Spencer tiara worn by Diana, my guess about the tiara Catherine may wear for the wedding is Queen Mary’s “Lover’s Knot” tiara that the Queen gave to Princess Diana in 1981.

Hopefully, Princess Anne will NOT choose to wear the exact same outfit she wore to Charles and Diana’s wedding to this one. (She did wear it to the most recent Gloucester wedding a couple of years ago.)

The coincidence of this royal engagement and approaching wedding with austere times in Britain has interesting resonances with both the post-war wedding of the Queen and Prince Philip and the social turmoil of the early Thatcher years when Charles and Diana were married.

I wonder since William is familially headquartered at Clarence House, if Catherine and her family will end up staying as guests of the Queen at Buckingham Palace the night before the wedding? (Some old proprieties are worth the respectful ceremonial nod, even if the couple has been together for nearly a decade.)  Kate’s carriage or coach emerging from the central archway — actually following behind the Queen — en route to the wedding would be the most dramatic entrance imaginable.

The issue of providing a long term country home for Prince William and Catherine has most commentators looking toward the Harewood Park estate in Herefordshire owned by the Duchy of Cornwall (not to be confused with the Harewood in Yorkshire that is home to the Queen’s cousin). The planned “green” mansion there would provide a suitable retreat from London, and William has shown some farming interest in the past. A fascinating alternative suggestion is that IF the Queen might be willing to turn Sandringham over to Prince Charles (who apparently covets it) then William and Catherine could have Highgrove. Somehow I can’t quite see that happening right now. Albeit, with Prince Philip coming up on 90 next year the prospect of someone else taking on the management of Sandringham can’t be too far distant.

The next few months will provide many answers to these speculations. My sincere hope is that the coming years will provide great happiness to Prince William and Ms. Middleton. Just as people they seem like a fine young couple, and good representatives of the rising generation to carry the old institution of the monarchy ahead into a new chapter.

Yours aye,
Ken Cuthbertson