{"id":70407,"date":"2025-08-16T04:09:15","date_gmt":"2025-08-16T04:09:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/70407\/"},"modified":"2025-08-16T04:09:15","modified_gmt":"2025-08-16T04:09:15","slug":"fergies-mum-was-prince-philips-lover-this-cuckolding-scandal-claim-is-the-talk-of-the-palace-after-prince-andrew-bombshells-now-one-of-the-dukes-friends-tells-richard-kay-the-inside-story","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/70407\/","title":{"rendered":"Fergie’s mum was Prince Philip’s lover: This cuckolding scandal claim is the talk of the Palace after Prince Andrew bombshells. Now one of the Duke’s friends tells RICHARD KAY the inside story"},"content":{"rendered":"

Of all the jaw-dropping claims in Andrew Lownie\u2019s meticulously researched book about Prince Andrew \u2013 from his insatiable sexual appetite to his wife\u2019s financial recklessness \u2013 it is one of the most provocative.<\/p>\n

It forms the very opening of the whole biography, in fact, as follows: \u2018The father of the groom and mother of the bride \u2013 lovers 20 years earlier \u2013 sat in the third carriage waving to the crowds…\u2019<\/p>\n

Nowhere in this arresting description of the Duke and Duchess of York<\/a>\u2019s wedding day in 1986 does Lownie seek refuge in words such as \u2018alleged\u2019, \u2018rumoured\u2019 or even \u2018reported’.<\/p>\n

The two figures sharing the horse-drawn landau that July day were, of course, Prince Philip<\/a> and Sarah Ferguson\u2019s twice-married mother, Mrs Susan Barrantes. That they were lovers is stated as fact, plain and simple.<\/p>\n

The affair began, so Lownie asserts, after Susie, as she was known, became \u2018exasperated\u2019 by the philandering of her first husband Major Ronald Ferguson, father of the duchess.<\/p>\n

Perhaps it is convenient that the protagonists in this menage-a-trois are dead and cannot defend their names or reputations. Yet all this week, in broadcast and media appearances, the author has neither swerved from his view nor retracted a word.<\/p>\n

Challenged in interviews, indeed, Lownie doubled down.<\/p>\n

\"Sarah <\/p>\n

Sarah Ferguson with her mother, Susan Barrantes, at Windsor in 2006<\/p>\n

\"Susan <\/p>\n

Susan rides with the Duke of Edinburgh on her daughter’s wedding day to Prince Andrew<\/p>\n

Appearing on GB News, former Tory minister Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg loftily dismissed the claim as \u2018just gossip\u2019, but the author responded that the trusted and knowledgeable source behind it was a member of his own family.<\/p>\n

Lownie\u2019s wife, Angela, a similar age to Fergie, had grown up near Ascot, close to the Fergusons.<\/p>\n

\u2018They were brought up together, they were neighbours,\u2019 he said.<\/p>\n

The connections went further. Angela\u2019s father had been at Eton just before Ron Ferguson arrived there and, like the beetle-browed major, went on to become a Guards officer.<\/p>\n

\u2018I have known the story for over 30 years,\u2019 says Lownie who, as a pupil at Fettes College \u2013 the Scottish public school where Sir Tony Blair was educated \u2013 played rugby against a young Prince Andrew, then at Gordonstoun.<\/p>\n

\u2018We all gave him a kicking in the scrum because we all hated him,\u2019 he recalled.<\/p>\n

All rather compelling \u2013 but does it make the story of a liaison between Fergie\u2019s mother and her royal father-in-law true?<\/p>\n

Ron Ferguson had his suspicions. In The Galloping Major, his 1994 memoir in which he was scathing about the royals and their treatment of his daughter, he noted: \u2018I always suspected that Prince Philip had an eye for Susie. Certainly, they remain friends to this day.\u2019<\/p>\n

Behind this seemingly casual remark lies at least a hint of bitterness.<\/p>\n

For a few heady years in the 1960s, Ferguson, a career soldier who joined the Life Guards as a trooper before going to Sandhurst, and his well-born wife \u2013 Susie was granddaughter of the 8th Viscount Powerscourt \u2013 were part of a lively social circle around the young Queen Elizabeth and her husband.<\/p>\n

Ever since he married into the Royal Family, Philip had been dogged by well-informed speculation about his love life. His reaction was always the same: apparent indifference punctuated by the occasional angry denial.<\/p>\n

Yet the stories persisted \u2013 for he was incapable of hiding his interest in women, not least in the willowy Susan, nee Wright.<\/p>\n

This week I learned from another source about the prince\u2019s rumoured admiration for the first Mrs Ferguson. It came from distinguished academic and writer David Rogers, a former parliamentary adviser to Tory grandee Lord Whitelaw.<\/p>\n

Rogers told me that the rumour was common knowledge among well-connected members of the louche Thursday Club, a men-only establishment where bon viveurs included raffish figures such as actors James Robertson Justice and Peter Ustinov, American harmonica player Larry Adler, the yet-to-be-unmasked Soviet spy Kim Philby, and of course, Prince Philip. Rogers, too, was a member.<\/p>\n

Another regular at the club, which met at Wheeler\u2019s fish restaurant in Soho, was Philip\u2019s close friend and one time Equerry, Commander Mike Parker, who accompanied the prince on a controversial five-month world tour on the Royal Yacht Britannia.<\/p>\n

They sailed first to Australia, where the Duke of Edinburgh opened the 1956 Olympic Games in Melbourne. Doubtless, he was promoting Britain\u2019s image, but as the weeks went by and he and the Queen were still apart, critics suggested that the extended trip looked increasingly like a junket.<\/p>\n

\"Andrew <\/p>\n

Andrew Lownie\u2019s meticulously researched book delves into Prince Andrew, touching on his marriage to Fergie<\/p>\n

\"Susan <\/p>\n

Susan Wright and Major Ronald Ferguson’s wedding day in 1956<\/p>\n

Their prolonged separation produced a flood of speculation about a possible \u2018rift\u2019 in the royal marriage. American newspapers were the first to ask questions. All round the world, others followed. Questions were even asked in Parliament.<\/p>\n

Faced with a clamour for answers, the Queen \u2013 upset that the state of her marriage had become a public issue \u2013 authorised an official palace denial which said: \u2018It is quite untrue that there is any rift between the Queen and the Duke.\u2019<\/p>\n

Years later, these round-the-world adventures were a key storyline in an early season of the Netflix series The Crown.<\/p>\n

Rogers recalls hearing the gossip about Philip and Mrs Barrantes.<\/p>\n

\u2018It was around 1965,\u2019 he told me. \u2018As I recall, it was some time between the two general elections of 1964 and 1966.\u2019<\/p>\n

What was the gossip?<\/p>\n

\u2018That there was something going on between Prince Philip and Ferguson\u2019s wife. It was talked about openly.\u2019<\/p>\n

Clubroom tittle-tattle it might have been, but those spreading it were figures who surrounded the Duke of Edinburgh himself.<\/p>\n

The dates, too, are intriguing too because, by his own account, Major Ferguson\u2019s association with Philip \u2013 he never described it as a friendship \u2013 started in the 1960s when he was invited to join the prince\u2019s polo team.<\/p>\n

\u2018Our relationship was strictly a sporting one, but because of it, my first wife and I were invited to shooting at Sandringham a few times,\u2019 he recalled years later. There followed a more intimate encounter.<\/p>\n

\u2018One summer we were invited to join the Queen\u2019s house party at Royal Ascot,\u2019 he noted.<\/p>\n

A decade and a half later, Ron and Susie\u2019s daughter Sarah was herself invited to a Royal Ascot gathering at Windsor Castle where, set up by the match-making Princess Diana, her ill-fated romance with Prince Andrew began over chocolate profiteroles.<\/p>\n

Many will wonder if the die was actually cast all those years earlier, when Major Ferguson and the Duke of Edinburgh were two of the leading polo players in the world \u2013 and both so charismatically appealing to the opposite sex.<\/p>\n

Ferguson\u2019s later claims about Philip \u2013 he wrote caustically that he was a man \u2018without humanity or humour\u2019 \u2013 were inevitably coloured by the failure of his daughter\u2019s marriage and his own later scandals (among them an affair with a young female polo player and visits to a massage parlour for sex).<\/p>\n

Yet the Prince and the Queen considered him a friend.<\/p>\n

The dashing Fergusons were often on royal guest lists, dining at Buckingham Palace and Windsor Castle.<\/p>\n

At a summer dance at the couple\u2019s own home, Lowood House, an Edwardian pile once lived in by King Zog of Albania, the major was courteously attentive to the Queen while keeping a constant eye on his wife.<\/p>\n

In his book, he wrote: \u2018Prince Philip usually made a beeline for the prettiest girl on the dance floor. He certainly found Susie\u2019s company much more enticing than mine.\u2019<\/p>\n

The Queen always made sure her husband was seated next to Susie.<\/p>\n

\u2018She knew Philip would be much happier if her had a pretty woman to talk and dance with,\u2019 recalls an old friend from those days.<\/p>\n

Even if nothing improper did occur, could these encounters have led to such gossip about the two? There was no shortage of mischief-makers only too happy to spread stories about a so-called spark between the Queen\u2019s consort and the wife of his polo-playing pal.<\/p>\n

And the more they talked about what a handsome pair the couple made, the angrier Ron Ferguson became.<\/p>\n

This suspicion about his wife may have led to Ferguson\u2019s sudden and unexplained decision to turn down royal invitations.<\/p>\n

Looking back, he recalled in his book: \u2018That [decision] nearly caused a divorce, Susie was furious.\u2019<\/p>\n

\"Prince <\/p>\n

Prince Philip was also rumoured to have had an affair with Pat Kirkwood, a beautiful and popular musical comedy star<\/p>\n

\"Actress <\/p>\n

Actress Merle Oberon was another alleged fling of the married Duke’s<\/p>\n

\"Andrew <\/p>\n

Andrew and Fergi were married for ten years before divorcing in 1996, having separated four years earlier<\/p>\n

He never directly accused Prince Philip of adultery, of course, and his wife flatly denied it. The real story of the marriage, she said, was of her husband\u2019s womanising, which included taking one of her close friends as a mistress.<\/p>\n

And yet their life together had started with great optimism. The couple married in 1956, two years after Susie \u2018came out\u2019 as a debutante. Ferguson, who rose to command the Sovereign\u2019s Escort \u2013 accompanying the monarch on ceremonial occasions \u2013 was also something of a catch.<\/p>\n

Decades later, Susie talked of the first five \u2018wonderful\u2019 years with Ronald. Then in 1961 came signs that he was ignoring his marriage vows. In those days, her husband was considered handsome and charming. But he was also an incorrigible flirt.<\/p>\n

When Ferguson was posted to Cyprus for a year, she was left to look after their two daughters, Sarah, born in 1959, and Jane, two years older.<\/p>\n

By this time, the couple were having frequent arguments.<\/p>\n

\u2018Love had gone,\u2019 Susie wrote in a series of biographical articles for Hello! magazine.<\/p>\n

It was not Susie who was unfaithful but her husband, whose womanising, she said, drove her to despair.<\/p>\n

Susie had persuaded him that another baby might bring them together once again but claimed his philandering continued during her pregnancy. In 1969, she lost the baby in the eighth month.<\/p>\n

Soon afterwards she discovered Ferguson had started yet another affair.<\/p>\n

The marriage staggered on until 1972, when Susie met and fell in love with Argentine polo player Hector Barrantes, whose wife and unborn child had been killed in a car crash.<\/p>\n

Despite the circumstances, she was labelled a bad mother who had deserted her daughters.<\/p>\n

\u2018It was not Hector who broke up our marriage,\u2019 she wrote. \u2018My marriage had died a long time before that. [Ronald and I] were living together but there was no love. I thought about it day and night and, finally, I said I was leaving.\u2019<\/p>\n

Nor, despite Ferguson\u2019s reservations, was Philip to blame. Susie insisted she was never unfaithful with the prince.<\/p>\n

And despite the whiff of scandal, including her own divorce, the friendship with Philip survived the many hiccups in their personal lives.<\/p>\n

A little turbulence was nothing new to Philip. When he wed the future Queen Elizabeth, he had a reputation for being a ladies\u2019 man and the passing decades only added to it.<\/p>\n

Through 73 years of royal marriage, his name was associated with duchesses, princesses, county ladies, the writer Daphne du Maurier \u2013 with whom it was said he had a fling on the eve of his wedding \u2013 and even a waitress from Fortnum & Mason.<\/p>\n

Unlike most men, the prince had no particular type.<\/p>\n

\u2018He liked blondes, brunettes and redheads \u2013 he was very impartial,\u2019 observed his cousin Princess Alexandra of the Hellenes, to whom he also took a shine before marriage.<\/p>\n

On some occasions Philip denied impropriety, on others it was left to the women or their families.<\/p>\n

Among the names he was linked to over the years were Pat Kirkwood, a beautiful and popular musical comedy star, actresses Merle Oberon and Anna Massey, and Jane, Countess of Westmorland, wife of the Queen\u2019s Master of Horse.<\/p>\n

In later years, his friendship with Lady Penny Romsey, now the Countess of Mountbatten, was the subject of feverish speculation.<\/p>\n

His former carriage-driving protege became a constant companion in his final years after he retired from royal duties and moved to modest Wood Farm on the Sandringham estate.<\/p>\n

Philip could never shake the rumours off and, in the end, he stopped trying. So, perhaps we should not read too much into the fact that he never commented about Susie Barrantes.<\/p>\n

On that wedding day carriage ride, he was nothing but solicitous to Prince Andrew\u2019s new mother-in-law. Susie, radiant in yellow silk and a jaunty hat, smiled as he encouraged her to wave to the thousands of well-wishers.<\/p>\n

As their coachman turned a corner into the Mall, he whispered: \u2018Hold on to your hat! There\u2019s a good wind coming round this corner.\u2019<\/p>\n

Six years later, his son\u2019s marriage now over, there was a postscript: on the day Windsor Castle caught fire in 1992, the culmination of the Queen\u2019s famous annus horribilis, Philip was not at her side but in faraway Argentina at a polo match, where he was escorting an old friend to party.<\/p>\n

The friend was Susie Barrantes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Of all the jaw-dropping claims in Andrew Lownie\u2019s meticulously researched book about Prince Andrew \u2013 from his insatiable…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":70408,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[97,96,59,50,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-70407","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entertainment","8":"tag-dailymail","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-gb","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom","14":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70407","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=70407"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70407\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/70408"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=70407"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=70407"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=70407"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}