Queen Elizabeth ‘struggled privately’ with royal divorces

Queen Elizabeth may look like she isn’t fazed by adversity, however, she was actually left distraught when three of her children, Prince Charles, Andrew, and Princess Anne, got divorced, reported People.

The revelations come in royal author Robert Hardman’s biography Queen of Our Times: The Life of Queen Elizabeth II, in which he explores the Queen’s private struggles as her sons Prince Charles and Andrew, and daughter Anne struggled to maintain their marriages.

In an excerpt from the book, Hardman writes: “Outwardly stoical, as ever, the Queen was finding the divorce talks deeply upsetting.”

“Another former member of the Household recalls that, every now and then, there would be a glimpse of her despair. It distressed her much more than she let on,” Hardman claims.

The former royal staffer also recalled a conversation with the Queen, quoted in the book: “I said, 'Ma'am, it seems to be happening everywhere. This is almost common practice.' But she just said, 'Three out of four!' in sheer sadness and exasperation. One shouldn't underestimate the pain she's been through.”

1992 is often regarded as one of the most horrible years for the Queen, after all three of Charles, Anne, and Andrew’s marriages ended that year. However, the now 95-year-old monarch ‘chose stillness’.

“The issue was sometimes embarrassing, but she got on with it. It is immensely reassuring in those situations to work for someone who isn't knocked back,” her former press secretary Charles Anson tells Hardman in the book, adding that she was “never short; never irritable; completely steady.”

Sir John Major, who worked closely with the Queen during this time, tells Hardman, “Storms will come and go, some worse than others. But she will always put her head down and plough through them. The Queen has always lived by the doctrine, 'This too shall pass.'”