Family will move into a new era
AFTER being born in 1921, Prince Philip lived through 100 years of the most monumental changes the world has ever experienced.
When his father-in-law King George VI died and his wife Princess Elizabeth had to step into her father’s shoes and become Queen, it was the end of one era and the beginning of another. And now, 100 years on from his birth, his death marks the end of another era for the Royal Family, which will never be the same again.
Philip made himself indispensable to his wife and his inner strength enabled him to ignore the brickbats of the oldstyle courtiers who considered him to be too intelligent and too foreign.
Survive
Gradually he modernised the institution, as well as the family’s creaking buildings.
And he famously decided that the Royal Family should be more visible if they were to survive, championing the era of televised interviews and documentaries about his family.
Philip realised the foundations beneath the House of Windsor had shifted with the demands and pressures of the modern age and now, as the family faces fresh challenges, they are moving again.
In order to survive the royals need to maintain Philip’s zest for modernism and change.
He was the last of a generation that put duty before self.
It was at the core of his being and it was the centre of everything for him. It was not a choice, but it was a structure that he followed to the word.
When the Duke of Edinburgh officially retired at the age of 96, he trusted his son Charles and grandson William to guide the monarchy into the future.
They will not let him down.
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