She remained steadfast to Andrew’s side through it all and in doing so, sealed her own fate
Thirty years ago, a friend, then in her twenties, was staying in a house in Yorkshire when Prince Andrew – still young, dashing and still the Duke of York – was invited to dinner.
Nervous, in a bit of a tizz, she curtseyed to him when he walked into the room.
“No,” he said. “Not right. I’m going to go out of the room, come back in and you’re going to curtsey properly.”
And so he did. She dropped even lower when he came back in. But she has loathed him ever since – and would never have curtseyed to him ever again.
Now no one needs curtsey or bow to Andrew or show any of the deference expected to a senior Royal like him. And so no one, including my friend, who’d learnt the code, need call him “Your Royal Highness” on first meeting and “Sir” after that.
With his titles gone – except as a pound-shop prince – he is finished: a dull, dim, plump, pompous, long-retired naval officer.
The same goes for Fergie. As long as she was Duchess of York, she could cling on to the vestiges of the respect that came from being associated with the Royal Family, even if she was no longer a working Royal. As a duchess, too, albeit the divorced wife of a Duke, a sprinkling of stardust still hung in the air.
Prince Andrew and his former wife Sarah Ferguson, Duchess of York, at the funeral of the Duchess of Kent (Picture: Toby Melville/Reuters)
All gone. Now she is just plain old Sarah Ferguson. Fergie, the grifter who’s been flogging diets, New York deli sandwiches and access to the Firm for decades.
The final nail in her coffin was the leak last month of her 2011 email to Jeffrey Epstein – the ultimate in odious reverse ferrets. Having denounced him to save her skin, the Mail on Sunday reported she then wrote to him, calling him a “supreme friend” who had been “hellaciously let down” by her. The email is Fergie in full sight – venal, mendacious, obsessed with money and convinced her happy-go-lucky, Sloaney slang somehow makes her lovable.
But what about their two children, Beatrice and Eugenie? Their status is essentially unchanged. They, too, will remain princesses. They weren’t working members of the Royal Family and have civilian jobs. Both married, they have no need to use the York surname their parents will no longer employ.
The astonishing thing is that the appallingly self-serving Andrew and Fergie have managed to bring up two very polite daughters. A long-retired courtier once told me how they sent thank you letters to him every time he did the tiniest thing for them. Fergie had been scrupulous in teaching them the p’s and q’s their father never possessed.
Still, Andrew Lownie’s biography of Andrew and Fergie, Entitled, makes it clear Beatrice and Eugenie, who have remained close to their parents throughout, could never escape the people or associations their parents either knew or were caught up in.
Andrew invited Epstein to Beatrice’s 18th birthday party. And a millionaire gave £750,000 to the family, which Andrew said was for her wedding. Eugenie got £25,000 from the same benefactor.
Still, both daughters remain in favour with the King and Prince William. They are still on the royal invitation list for Christmas and other family gatherings, unlike their disgraced parents.
There is none of the public opprobrium for them that Andrew and Fergie have brought on themselves. I bet many people feel sorry for them – I certainly do. The best move they can make is to carry on their own private lives quietly, with their young families, and never put their heads above the parapet.
They are both well-off and in enviable houses. Eugenie lives in a charming cottage at Kensington Palace. Beatrice has a £3.5m mansion in the Cotswolds.
It’s hard to shed tears for people living in such comfort. But, still, the princesses have gone through a kind of double suffering.
They’ve managed to make it through being raised by money-grubbing, self-delusional parents. Having come out the other side of that purgatory, they now face the indignity of being tarred forever by their father’s actions, over which they had no control.
But there is still time to recover.
At 37 and 35, Beatrice and Eugenie have decades ahead of them to develop a discreet life, separating themselves in the public mind from their parents. Of course, they will go on seeing them – as all children should. But there is no need for them to be photographed together or publicly associated with them.
The princesses are still young enough to shake off the burden of shame their grotesque parents laid on their shoulders.
The Duchess of Kent’s funeral looks like being the last time Andrew and Fergie will ever be pictured at the heart of the Royal Family.
In later life, the Duchess of Kent put aside her royal life and dedicated herself to teaching music to schoolchildren in Hull.
If they are wise enough, Beatrice and Eugenie will follow the admirable example of their late cousin.
Harry Mount is author of How England Made the English.