Queen paid off my mortgage for saving Princess Anne’s life
EXCLUSIVE: Hero breaks silence after 46 years
A HERO who saved Princess Anne in a kidnap bid told how the Queen paid off his mortgage in gratitude.
Ronnie Russell, now 72, tackled gunman Ian Bell after he shot four people in the 1974 London drama. The ex-boxer revealed police visited him before he was given a medal and said she would pay for his house “as a gift”.
He said: “I was close to repossession.” But debt-ridden Ronnie is now selling the gong to pay his funeral costs.
RONNIE Russell told how the Queen got him out of a big financial hole by paying off his mortgage after his Princess Anne kidnap heroics.
But, 46 years on, the former boxer has revealed he is again struggling to make ends meet and is reluctantly putting the George Medal he received for bravery up for auction to pay for his funeral.
Breaking his silence for the first time since, Ronnie recalled the Queen’s kindness in helping him out after he bravely stepped in and saved Anne’s life – as the Palace insisted the cash would have come from private funds.
Crazed gunman Ian Bell, then 26, had already shot the Princess’s chauffeur, minder, a policeman and a passing Mirror reporter as he tried to drag her from a car in Central London in 1974.
But in recent years the 72-year-old has suffered a string of serious health problems and run up a mountain of debt due to being unable to work.
Ronnie said: “I’ve been very, very unwell, it’s rough. I have been realising I have to make provision for a funeral at some stage. I want to know that’s all done for and not leave that burden to someone else.
“It was something I said I would never, ever do. I am so proud and honoured to have done such a thing that I would never, ever sell it [the medal].”
Ronnie recalled the moment he discovered the Queen was going to rescue him as he stood on the brink of losing his home in Strood, Kent, because he could not pay the mortgage.
He was visited by police before he was due to receive his medal at Buckingham
Palace. Ronnie added: “They were looking round my home and saying, ‘Oh this is a nice house.’ They asked if I had a mortgage and I said yes, yes, why?
“They said, ‘Well we are really telling you this a bit early but the Queen is going to pay off your mortgage as a gift for what you have done.’
“I thought that was wonderful. I was actually close to repossession at the time. They were going to repossess my home. So I dug myself out of that one.”
Ronnie, who lives in a rented Bristol council flat with partner Mandy and runs Swindon Speedway club, kept details of the Queen’s generosity to himself, until now. And a royal source said: “This would have been a deeply private matter and certainly no publicity would have been sought from the Palace or the Queen.” Another added: “Any such instance of generosity would have been made from the Queen’s private funds.”
Dad-of-three Ronnie told of the dramatic day he helped save Princess Anne on March 20, 1974, when he was 28, weighed 17st and was super fit.
He came across the drama by chance after taking a shortcut down the Mall on his way to work with a cleaning firm. Bell had blocked Anne’s car and fired several shots through the rear window.
Armed with two revolvers, he shot her protection team and passing Mirrorman Brian McConnell. Ronnie said: “I wasn’t frightened. I had no idea who was in the car but I when I saw him shoot the copper I thought, that’s taking the p*ss, so I went for him.
“I went to hit him around the back of the head and he turned and fired. It went through a taxi windscreen.” Ronnie, who has beaten cancer twice, had seven strokes and has arthritis, told how Bell tried to grab Anne, who was 23, while husband Mark Phillips pulled her away.
He said: “There was banging and smashing going on. He had Princess Anne by the arm. There was a tug of war.
“She was calm. She said: ‘Go away you silly man.’ I saw a door was open. I said: ‘Come this way, Anne, you will be safe.
Ronnie then realised Bell was behind him with a loaded gun. He said: “At that point I thought it was now or never. I hit Ball very hard, square on the chin.
“He was flat on the floor face down. I jumped on his back for good measure. I could have died, yeah, but I knew what I was doing. The only person I did not want to get shot was Princess Anne.”
Bell was detained under the Mental Health Act and remains in Broadmoor high-security hospital to this day.
Ronnie’s medal will be sold in London by Dix Noonan Webb next month.
He said: “I just hope whoever buys it will invite me to lunch or something, where I could tell the story properly.”
THE Queen quietly paid off the mortgage of Ronnie Russell to thank him for saving the life of Princess Anne.
Once more we see how Her Majesty is as generous in private as she is in public.