LONDON – Prince Philip, the husband of Queen Elizabeth II and the longest serving of any British monarch, has died at the age of 99.
Philip supported the Queen for 65 years, stepping down from his public role in 2017 and having remained largely out of sight ever since. In his active years he helped to set a new course for the monarchy under a young queen, who advocated Britain itself, as well as causes, science and technology.
Philip’s relationship with the young princess Elizabeth began as a story of young love.
“We act as if we have belonged to each other for years,” Elizabeth wrote in a letter to her parents shortly after they were married.
Over the years, Queen Philip acknowledged her deep influence on her and called him ‘strong and happy’ in a speech at their 50th wedding anniversary in 1997.
“I and his whole family and this country and many other countries have a greater debt to him than he would ever claim, or we will ever know,” she said at the time.
The intensely private prince will probably be remembered for his early efforts to modernize the royal family’s image during a time of great change for Britain and the world, especially at the beginning of Elizabeth’s government in 1952. He also has a reputation. developed for the occasional abusive comments and harsh, if not racist jokes.
“The queen inherited a model of her father’s monarchy that was very handy, old-fashioned and slightly invisible,” said Sarah Gristwood, a historian and author of Elizabeth: The Queen and the Crown.
“It was not equipped to handle a new media era, and Prince Philip played a major role in promoting it.”
Philip helped bring the royals to life on television rather than through radio reports. He was the first member of the royal family to conduct a television interview and he presented a show during a royal tour of the Commonwealth. It is also said that he had a hand in watching the Queen’s coronation on television in 1953 and arranging a groundbreaking television documentary from 1969 about the family.
“He helped create the model of the British royal family that enabled it to continue into the 21st century,” Gristwood said. “We may have lost sight of it now, but I hope we will remember him for it.”
Despite being born into a royal family, Philip’s early childhood was not typically royal.
Born on June 10, 1921 on the Greek island of Corfu, he was the only son of Prince Andrew of Greece and Denmark, and Princess Alice of Battenberg. Greece’s king, Philip’s uncle, was forced to abdicate when Philip was a baby, and the family fled to Paris, with the fact that Philip was brought to safety in a crib from an orange box.
At the age of 7 he moved to England, where he lived in Kensington Palace, now home to Prince William. Philip lived there with his paternal grandmother, Victoria Mountbatten, and later attended Gordonstoun, a boarding school in Scotland.
At 18, Philip joined the Royal Navy and achieved a top cadet at the Britannia Royal Naval College. He saw active service from the Indian Ocean to the Mediterranean, and in 1945 at the end of World War II he was in Tokyo Bay when the Japanese surrendered.
According to Ashley Jackson, a professor of imperial and military history at King’s College London, Philip’s military career was truly central to his character, unlike perhaps other royals.
“It’s easy to look at the royal career of a royal man and consider it a rite of passage, but with Philip one has to look further,” he said. ‘He joined when he was not nearly married to the future queen. It was a career for a Greek prince, ‘he added. “It was not a short time in the army. It is important to note that he is clearly an extraordinary officer. ”
When he became known as Philip Mountbatten, he first met his cousin Elizabeth in 1934 during a family wedding. The two are both great-grandchildren of Queen Victoria.
The couple exchanged letters while Philip was overseas during the war and only saw each other occasionally. They would ride in Philip’s ‘small’ MG sports car and dance at London nightclubs.