prove this. Furthermore, she was speechless when she learned from Ken Wharfe – who severely admonished the boy for the offence – that during a scheduled flight Harry had placed his hand down Tiggy’s top to touch her breasts. It didn’t help matters when Diana was assured that Tiggy had laughed it off, saying: ‘Boys will be boys; I suppose he’s got to learn.’
That incident actually caused a blistering row between Tiggy and her normally supportive employer, Prince Charles. Although hurt, she soon recovered whereas Harry was angry at his father for ‘picking on her’ and refused to talk to him for days.
Under Tiggy’s free-spirited guidance, Harry became even louder and more self-confident while William retreated further into his shell. Harry and Tiggy would have pillow fights and engage in mock battles on the sofa. This woman was fun and despite his young age Harry clearly had a crush on her. He did everything he could to impress Tiggywhich was just what Charles had wished for when he told her that he wanted them to enjoy their young lives in a way that he had never been allowed to, although he did warn her to be cautious when anyone likely to report back to Diana was around.
And what a sound piece of advice that turned out to be for when she saw, or at least thought, that she was losing her sons – especially Harry – to the boisterous, fun-loving, if slightly unorthodox, Sloane, Diana reportedly composed a set of rules: ‘Miss Legge-Bourke will not spend unnecessary time in the children’s rooms. She may not read to them at night, nor supervise their bath time or bedtime. She is to carry out a secretarial role in the arrangement of their time with their father [and] that is all.’ In another she instructed: ‘Miss Legge-Bourke is to stay in the background on any occasion when the boys are seen in public. She is neither to be seen with them in the same car, nor to be photographed close to them.’ Apparently Charles told Tiggy to ignore the eccentric instructions.
But it was that ski-slope kiss in 1995 that festered in Diana. She became convinced that the new royal employee was having an affair with the man she was still married to – a view confirmed in her mind when she saw Tiggy wearing a diamond fleur-de-lis brooch of the kind that Charles had given to previous girlfriends. Diana had one herself. Things came to a head at the Christmas party for St James’s Palace staff in the Lanesborough on Hyde Park Corner. Flushed with the success of a trip to New York where she had received the Humanitarian of the Year award from the United CerebralPalsy Foundation and made a triumphant speech declaring ‘Today is the day of compassion’, she bore down on Tiggy and said in as sarcastic a voice as anyone can remember her ever using: ‘Hello Tiggy, how are you? So sorry to hear about the baby.’ The insulted nanny fled the room in tears and returned to the safety of Kensington Palace where she could be with Harry and William.
The implication that Tiggy – who Diana referred to as ‘the woman who looks like a man’ – had aborted a child fathered by the heir to the throne was a serious sign that Diana was losing it. As for Tiggy, the following morning she decided she had had enough: she instructed libel lawyer Peter Carter-Ruck to write to the Princess’s law firm, Mishcon de Reya, accusing her of circulating ‘malicious lies which are a gross reflection on our client’s moral character’. The Queen’s private secretary Robert Fellowes wrote to Diana telling her that the allegations against Tiggy were completely unfounded – on the date of the implied abortion the nanny was at Highgrove looking after Harry who, despite his tender years, could have been called as a witness against his mother had the case gone to court. Diana was furious but she wasted no time in settling, telling one close to her, ‘The bitch can have all the money she wants, but never my sons. I gave birth to them, they belong to
That incident actually caused a blistering row between Tiggy and her normally supportive employer, Prince Charles. Although hurt, she soon recovered whereas Harry was angry at his father for ‘picking on her’ and refused to talk to him for days.
Under Tiggy’s free-spirited guidance, Harry became even louder and more self-confident while William retreated further into his shell. Harry and Tiggy would have pillow fights and engage in mock battles on the sofa. This woman was fun and despite his young age Harry clearly had a crush on her. He did everything he could to impress Tiggywhich was just what Charles had wished for when he told her that he wanted them to enjoy their young lives in a way that he had never been allowed to, although he did warn her to be cautious when anyone likely to report back to Diana was around.
And what a sound piece of advice that turned out to be for when she saw, or at least thought, that she was losing her sons – especially Harry – to the boisterous, fun-loving, if slightly unorthodox, Sloane, Diana reportedly composed a set of rules: ‘Miss Legge-Bourke will not spend unnecessary time in the children’s rooms. She may not read to them at night, nor supervise their bath time or bedtime. She is to carry out a secretarial role in the arrangement of their time with their father [and] that is all.’ In another she instructed: ‘Miss Legge-Bourke is to stay in the background on any occasion when the boys are seen in public. She is neither to be seen with them in the same car, nor to be photographed close to them.’ Apparently Charles told Tiggy to ignore the eccentric instructions.
But it was that ski-slope kiss in 1995 that festered in Diana. She became convinced that the new royal employee was having an affair with the man she was still married to – a view confirmed in her mind when she saw Tiggy wearing a diamond fleur-de-lis brooch of the kind that Charles had given to previous girlfriends. Diana had one herself. Things came to a head at the Christmas party for St James’s Palace staff in the Lanesborough on Hyde Park Corner. Flushed with the success of a trip to New York where she had received the Humanitarian of the Year award from the United CerebralPalsy Foundation and made a triumphant speech declaring ‘Today is the day of compassion’, she bore down on Tiggy and said in as sarcastic a voice as anyone can remember her ever using: ‘Hello Tiggy, how are you? So sorry to hear about the baby.’ The insulted nanny fled the room in tears and returned to the safety of Kensington Palace where she could be with Harry and William.
The implication that Tiggy – who Diana referred to as ‘the woman who looks like a man’ – had aborted a child fathered by the heir to the throne was a serious sign that Diana was losing it. As for Tiggy, the following morning she decided she had had enough: she instructed libel lawyer Peter Carter-Ruck to write to the Princess’s law firm, Mishcon de Reya, accusing her of circulating ‘malicious lies which are a gross reflection on our client’s moral character’. The Queen’s private secretary Robert Fellowes wrote to Diana telling her that the allegations against Tiggy were completely unfounded – on the date of the implied abortion the nanny was at Highgrove looking after Harry who, despite his tender years, could have been called as a witness against his mother had the case gone to court. Diana was furious but she wasted no time in settling, telling one close to her, ‘The bitch can have all the money she wants, but never my sons. I gave birth to them, they belong to
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