The Queen & Prince Philip The Greatest Royal Love Story

As the world farewells the man who changed the monarchy, Her Majesty looks back on more than seven decades of his unwavering love and support

When the Duke of Edinburgh passed away on April 9, it brought his love story with Queen Elizabeth II to a peaceful end.

His death at Windsor Castle at the age of 99, just weeks shy of his milestone 100th birthday, has plunged Buckingham Palace into mourning – and no one is more devastated than his wife of 73 years, the Queen.

Palace insiders tell Woman’s Day Her Majesty – while as stoic as ever – is in a “wistful mood” as she reflects on a long, rich life with the man she fell for when she was just 13 years old.

It would be a few years before their friendship turned into romance in a fairytale that scandalised some and captivated many.

A NAVY MAN

During a 1939 tour of the Royal Naval College in Dartmouth, when Philip Mountbatten escorted Princess Elizabeth, alongside her sister Princess Margaret and father King George VI, the teen poised to be queen fell in love with her 18-year-old future husband.

Soon after, the dapper sailor and Princess Elizabeth, who were third cousins through their mutual great-grandmother Queen Victoria, began exchanging letters.

Elizabeth’s governess Marion Crawford famously recalled her young charge would “take more trouble with her appearance and play the tune People Will Say We’re In Love from the musical Oklahoma!” before the dashing blond navy man’s visits to Buckingham Palace, and that he would “roar into the forecourt” in his MG sports car, “hatless” and “always in a hurry to see Lilibet”.

It’s reported that in 1946 she invited him to Balmoral Castle for a three-week summer hunting holiday, which is where he proposed.