The only members of the Mountbatten family to attend the wedding were the Countess Mountbatten of Burma, her son and daughter-in-law, Lord and Lady Brabourne, and her sister, Lady Pamela Hicks. Lord Brabourne, is Prince William's godfather. None of the other of Lady Mountbatten's children nor the children of Lady Pamela Hicks were invited to the wedding. Lord and Lady Brabourne are estranged, and did not sit together.
Ian Liddell-Grainger, a Conservative member of Parliament, was the only descendant of the late Princess Alice, Countess of Athlone, to receive an invitation to the wedding.
The dinner-dance hosted by the Prince of Wales at Buckingham Palace was limited to 300 family members and friends. But the family list did not include all the members of the royal family. Princess Alexandra, a godmother of William, and her son and daughter-in-law, James and Julia Ogilvy, were among those who received the coveted invitations. But invitations were not sent to Alexandra's brother, Prince Michael of Kent and his family.
Prince and Princess Michael, Lord and Lady Frederick Windsor and Lady Gabriella Windsor were guests at a party held that evening at the Chelsea home of Crown Prince and Crown Princess Pavlos of Greece. Crown Princess Victoria and her husband, Prince Daniel, were also invited to this event, as were Prince and Prince Nikolaos of Greece and Denmark. Prince and Princess Nikolaos were not invited to the royal wedding, but did attend the pre-wedding gala at the Mandarin Hotel.
4 comments:
Whilst the wedding was very popular here and went down well, I do find it sad the way the foreign royals, as well as several of Charles' 1st cousins were left a bit high and dry and apart from the dinner given by Lady Elizabeth Anson, were left feeling like spare parts. I think it was a poor show for them not to be invited to the evening function having for the most part flown in from overseas. It was left to Pavlos to entertain them, for shames sake, and even his own brother didn't make the hallowed 1900 ! How comes Alexandra and her family were invited to the evening and the Michaels for example weren't ?
I'm sorry but I don't buy this it wasn't a state occasion and he's not the heir but the next one after that. He is going to be king and if it wasn't a state occasion, then why did we get the day off work which caused huge disruption and at a time when the economy can ill afford it. Why the huge police presence, why were reoads in Central London closed off causing massive disruption ?
State occasion or not, someone goofed in not asking Blair and Brown and then came out with hogwash about Garter members. I actually sympathise with the Beckhams and Elton, having flown from the west coast of the USA for an hour or so and then bog off. There could at least have been a ball at the palace beforehand for all, or a good number of the guests.
All in all I think it was poorly handled.
Paul
Alexandra is William's godmother, and James was his mentor at St. Andrews. William spent a lot of time with James and Julia. But there is no relationship with the Michaels and the kids. Alexandra is also close to the Queen, Philip and Charles and Camilla. The Michaels are not. William and Catherine did not want a huge event. They made the decisions. All of the foreign royals were at the afternoon reception. The day before the Duke and Duchess of Gloucester hosted a lunch for the foreign royals, including Michael. William did not want a big wedding. Personally, I think he would have preferred a ceremony at St. George's, but someone put the kibosh on that idea. You have to blame the groom and bride. William is second in line. His father had a ball and a huge wedding, and a lot more people (and that marriage failed.) We do not know who else attended the function in Chelsea .. I think there would have been photos of the Brabants if they had attended. I think only one of Charles' first cousins attended (the Margrave of Baden). Moritz of Hesse is the nephew of Sophie's first husband. Yvonne, the wife of Georg, came with her daughter, Irina. Philip and Xenia are children of a first cousin. We also do not know if the Gloucester kids were invited to the dinner dance at the palace. Do we know if the foreign cousins were invited to dinner at the Mandarin. They could have been staying there so would not have been seen outside. At the afternoon reception, there would have been little time to get to know the heirs who were there. One photo of the reception was released, I think, and it was of William and Catherine meeting the leaders of the Commonwealth countries, which makes perfect sense as William will one day be king of several of those countries too
If the Mountbatten sisters attended, how come there are no pictures of them at all? Also why were they not included in the royal family list when Lady Saltoun was, dont they share a similar relation?
you can see Lady Mountbatten, Lord Brabourne and Lady Pamela several rows behind the royal family, but they are not members of the royal family. They descend from a British princess who married into a foreign royal house.
Lady Saltoun is the widow of the son of a British princess who married a Briton.
Post a Comment