Charles arrives at ‘Colditz with kilts’

GORDONSTOUN, 1963, and a pivotal moment in the life of the young Prince Charles. Philip had decided that his son would be educated at the same spartan Scottish school where he himself had flourished. He thought it would be the making of his timorous son. The Queen Mother, displaying the wisdom of her years, had suggested that Eton, close to Windsor, would suit Charles’s temperament better. As she had suspected, her sensitive, art-loving grandson hated Gordonstoun, later characterising the place as ‘Colditz with kilts’. He was bullied and miserable, and begged to leave. His parents refused.