Engagements, Affairs & An Attempted Kidnapping: A Look Inside Princess Anne’s Life

Sep 29, 2022 by apost team

Although the late Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip's only daughter, Princess Anne, may appear to have led a quiet and more private life than her brothers and many of her nieces and nephews, she is actually one of the busiest working senior members of the royal family. Her daily schedule is usually packed with functions and events, particularly as she plays a key role in numerous charities. 

Alongside her naturally charitable nature, Anne is known for her sharp wit and steady head and the fact that she does not suffer fools. In her youth, she earned a reputation as being the more rebellious of her siblings, unafraid to speak her mind or to break with royal tradition, should the circumstances allow. This streak for the unconventional puts her in good company with her nephew Prince Harry, who has also been known to follow his heart in times of conflict with royal tradition. 

Also unafraid to go against the grain, Anne paved the way for a new kind of modern royal by participating in the Olympics, remarrying in Scotland after being left with little choice, and even keeping her cool in the face of unspeakable danger during a kidnapping attempt. While Harry and his wife Meghan Markle made their royal exit in March 2020, it's not hard to believe that Anne could have done the same in her younger years if in a similar situation.

Let's take a look back at how Anne's early years molded her into the inspiring royal she is today, as well as her numerous achievements and the times her sharp thinking saved the day.

Elizabeth and Philip welcomed their second child and only daughter Princess Anne on Aug. 15, 1950. By the time their second child was due, the royal couple had moved to Clarence House. There, Princess Anne was born weighing 6 lbs. According to the BBC, news of the birth was posted on the gates of Clarence House, on a board outside the Home Office in Whitehall and at Mansion House in the city. It went on to report that "The Duke of Edinburgh toasted the new princess' health in champagne with his staff" before telephoning Balmoral Castle to inform the king. It also added, "The Royal Salute was fired at 1530 in Hyde Park by the King's Troop of the Royal Horse Artillery. According to tradition, the case of the first round fired will be engraved and sent to Princess Elizabeth," as the world erupted with cheer at the news.

At the time of her birth, she was third in line to the throne behind her mother, who was not yet queen, and her older brother King Charles III. Since her mother's tragic passing in September 2022, she is now 16th in line to the British throne. Anne is also the older sister of Prince Andrew, Duke of York and Prince Edward, Early of Wessex.

Anne began undertaking royal duties when she turned 18 in 1969, sometimes accompanying her mother at public engagements. Now 72 years old, Anne remains steadfast in carrying out her engagements on behalf of the sovereign. Then Canadian secretary to the queen Kevin S. MacLeod praised Anne's discipline and work ethic, telling CBC in 2014:

"Her credo is 'Keep me busy. I'm here to work. I'm here to do good things. I'm here to meet as many people as possible.'"

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That same focus on royal engagements naturally extends to the more than 200 charities and trusts Anne is involved with in an official capacity. A patron for over 50 years for Save the Children, she also served as its president from 1970 to 2017. Her work with the organization has taken her across the world to countries such as Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bangladesh, South Africa, Sierra Leone, Ethiopia and Mozambique. Her work also earned her a Nobel Peace Prize nomination in 1990.

Anne champions a variety of causes ranging from women's and children's rights to sports and affordable transport and serves organizations including the Princess Royal Trust for Carers, St. Andrew's First Aid, British Olympic Association, BAFTA, Riding for the Disabled Association, Royal National Children's Foundation and many more. Like her work with Save the Children, Anne's engagements with charitable organizations saw her travel abroad frequently. However, in her older years, she has handed down most of these international visits to younger working royals.

But this doesn't mean the princess royal is set to slow down any time soon. According to Vanity Fair, she carried out more than 500 engagements in 2019. In 2017, The Times reported she had carried out 455 engagements that same year, above and beyond any other working royal. Anne admitted to jam-packing her itinerary and said that her idea of retirement is not necessarily as traditional as people may think.

"I don't think retirement is quite the same (for me)," Anne said.

"Most people would say we're very lucky not to be in that situation because you wouldn't want to just stop. It is, to a large extent, the choice of the organizations you're involved with and whether they feel you're still relevant."

Another of Anne's interests that she had nurtured since childhood was horseriding, a love she shared with her mother, Elizabeth, who was also a keen horserider. Anne practiced riding diligently up to adulthood when she began to ride competitively. Her passion and talent led her to be crowned European Eventing Champion in 1971 at the tender age of 21. Securing a place in the British eventing team culminated in Anne heading to the 1976 Montreal Olympics.

However, her appearance at the Games did not go as planned, as she fell off her horse halfway through the course and suffered a concussion. While she eventually got back on and continued riding, she would later say that she had no memory of doing so.

According to her trainer Alison Oliver, Anne's love for horses stemmed from the fact that her parents did not treat her differently just because she was a princess. She told the 2002 Channel 4 documentary "The Real Princess Anne" that Anne liked the fact horses responded to her like any other rider. Oliver said:

"The horses didn't treat her any differently than it would anybody else and reacted to her as a rider and as a person, not as a princess."

She added:

"Her ambition just grew and grew and she wanted to do well – well, I mean it was not enough just to do it well, she had to really win."

According to the documentary, Anne's love for horses was "close to an obsession" as it had been for her mother. She also told Vanity Fair, "I thought if I was going to do anything outside of the royal family, horses were likely to be the best way of doing it. But then you have to find the right horse at the right time."

Meanwhile, Anne's romantic life did not always come up roses. She wed early at the age of 23 to Captain Mark Phillips and was the first out of her three siblings to tie the knot. According to Tatler, the two met in Mexico City while attending an event for horse riding enthusiasts. Their Westminster Cathedral wedding was a highly publicized television spectacle that drew an audience of 500 million, as well as crowds of hundreds lining the streets outside.

Although they were rarely spotted out together, the strain of their relationship was highly publicized with reports of the both of them having affairs with other people (Anne dated her brother's wife Camilla, Queen Consort of the United Kingdom's then-husband, Andrew Parker-Bowles). Their divorce was finalized in April 1992. The princess and Phillips share two children together: Peter Phillips and Zara Tindall.

Following the breakup of her first marriage, Anne was lucky to find love a second time with Vice Admiral Sir Timothy Laurence. While the pair were married at Crathie Kirk in Scotland on Dec. 12, 1992, the path to happily ever after could have easily been derailed at the start. For one, they could not marry at home as the Church of England, unlike the Church of Scotland, does not permit second marriages for divorced people. While Anne was not the first royal to ever get divorced, she did eventually become the first member of the British monarchy to remarry since Princess Victoria Melita of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, the granddaughter of Queen Victoria, in 1905. Also, during their courtship, while Anne was still married, private letters between the two were leaked and published by The Sun. The couple does not have any biological children together

Something many people may not know about Anne is that she was almost kidnapped. According to Smithsonian Magazine, there was an attempted kidnapping of the princess on Mar. 20, 1974. The attack happened just a few months after she married her first husband.

In the incident, Anne was returning with Phillips to Buckingham Palace after attending an event that night. With them were her lady-in-waiting and bodyguard. 

Anne explained years later in an interview with Michael Parkinson, "this car overtook us and stopped." Her bodyguard exited the car to see what was going on and was shot in the shoulder by a bearded, red-headed man. 

The man, later identified as Ian Ball, a mentally ill, unemployed 26-year-old, then approached Anne's car. "He opened the door, and we had a sort of 'discussion' about where or where not we were going to go," Anne recounted to Parkinson. However, she told him it would "be much better if he just went away and we'd all forget about it."

While more men, including police and a former boxer, who were in the area at the time, tried to intervene and stop the man, the ensuing fracas led to three others being shot, including Anne's chauffeur.

Ball attempted to flee the scene but was stopped by police. It was then revealed that he intended to ransom the princess for about $4 million. While the incident was traumatic, it is clear that it could have ended far worse had Anne not stood her ground and resisted as much as she did.

"I suppose the answer is I decided that I wasn't going to get out if that particular situation arose," she added to Parkinson.

"However, there was only one man. If there had been more than one then it might have been a different story."

There have been a number of changes in the royal family and their duties in the past few years as the family faced various challenges and tragic passings. Through them all, many have noticed just how Anne's independent spirit appears similar to that of her nephew, Harry.

After Prince Harry and Meghan Markle announced their royal departure in March 2020, many pieces were left out of place as the family worked at figuring out how to move forward. While most members of the family preferred to keep mum on the entire affair, Anne voiced her thoughts in the documentary, Anne: The Princess Royal At 70. In expressing her sympathy for the hardships the couple was going through, she said:

"The pressure that is applied to the younger members of the family is always worse because that's what the media is interested in, and that's sometimes hard to deal with. But there was no social media in my day, so it probably has made it more difficult."

The pressures of being a young royal were something Anne took seriously, according to royal aide Robert Hardman, who said in the same documentary:

"That was certainly part of the thinking in her decision not to give her own children titles … they're (Peter and Zara) both very forthgoing on how grateful they are that they've been able to have as normal a life you can when your grandmother is the monarch."

In a similar fashion, Harry and Meghan also eschewed royal titles for their children Archie and Lilibet.

With her big heart, staunch loyalty to family and duty, it's no wonder at all that Anne has been praised for "representing the very best of royalty."

What do you think about Princess Anne's life? Which parts were you aware of, and which were you surprised to learn about? Let us know, and be sure to pass this along to friends and family, too.