Who's A Big Boy Now?! George's King Of The ClassRoom

The prince is a class act on his first day

- Sebastian Van Der Zwan

It was an historic royal event and a precious family milestone as the future king, Prince George, started his first day at school.

The newly pregnant Duchess of Cambridge, also mum to Princess Charlotte, two, was determined to be there as her little man walked through the gates of Thomas’s Battersea, despite her acute morning sickness. Alas, it was not to be.

Although Kate had spent the previous few days in bed, cancelling two official engagements and doing her best to ward off the worst of the hyperemesis gravidarum that also blighted her first two pregnancies, on the morning of her four-year-old boy’s big day, the teary royal realised she was simply too unwell for the traditional first school run.

A Kensington Palace insider tells Woman’s Day, “Kate was very poorly and was cursing her luck that it should happen just when she wanted to be there for George. It was such a landmark moment in his life that she didn’t want to miss it for the world, but at the last minute, Kate realised there was no way she was going to make the trip across town.

“In the days beforehand, George and Charlotte had been really sweet, playing nurse by getting their mum drinks and looking after her as best they could. They even put a thermometer in her mouth and helped to take her temperature.”

Snap decision

On the wee prince’s first day of school, on September 7, Kate – also being looked after by her mum Carole Middleton – managed to get out of bed for a few family photos, although due to her crippling nausea, it was decided just proud dad Prince William and his excited son would feature in the official portrait.