Peter Phillips—King Charles III’s nephew—has broken up with his long-term girlfriend Lindsay Wallace, three years after divorcing his ex-wife, in the latest in a line of royal splits, according to reports.
Princess Anne’s son was married to Autumn Kelly between 2008 and 2021 and the couple had two daughters together.
Following the collapse of the marriage he struck up a serious relationship with Wallace, which even saw Phillips introduce her to his grandmother, Queen Elizabeth II, before the monarch died.
British tabloid The Sun now reports the relationship has come to an end, leaving some commentators discussing the difficulties of romance in the royal family, a subject that has also been raised at length by Prince Harry.
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Daily Mail columnist Richard Kay, a friend of the late Princess Diana, wrote: “Some will see it as another example of a mid-life relationship that has sadly run its course. Others will doubtless caustically note it offers further proof that far from guaranteeing domestic happiness, membership of the Royal Family is positively an impediment.
“For Peter Phillips, however, yesterday’s news that he has split from his long-term girlfriend Lindsay Wallace—after the agony of his broken first marriage—there is the additional burden of knowing that of all Queen Elizabeth’s grandchildren, he has been the unluckiest in love.”
Kay contuinued, “The news that she had been introduced to his grandmother during a shooting party at Windsor and had accompanied him to the christening of his sister Zara Tindall’s son, Lucas, at the royals’ private chapel in Windsor Great Park, suggested she was not just a permanent fixture in his life, but well on the way to becoming the second Mrs Phillips.”
Phillips may be one of the lesser known royals to many, particularly because Anne ensured that her children would not get royal titles, believing them to be a burden.
However, despite not being a prince, he is very much in the royal family’s inner circle, recently being trusted to speak about Charles’ cancer during an interview in Australia and walking between warring brothers Prince William and Prince Harry at Prince Philip’s funeral in April 2021.
His mother, Anne, knows perfectly well what it is like for a marriage to end, having divorced her first husband Mark Phillips, Peter’s father, in 1992.
And she was not the only royal of her generation, with Charles and Prince Andrew also divorcing, while Prince Edward was the only child of Elizabeth’s not to see a marriage crumble.
Prince Harry has spoken at length about the pressures royal life can place on a relationship, including through a witness statement from his lawsuit against Mirror Group Newspapers in London.
“I always felt as if the tabloids wanted me to be single,” he wrote, “as I was much more interesting to them and sold more newspapers.
“Whenever I got into a relationship, they were very keen to report the details, but would then, very quickly, seek to try and break it up by putting as much strain on
it and creating as much distrust as humanly possible, as I shall go into in more detail later in this statement.
“This twisted objective is still pursued to this day, even though I’m now married. Whenever I have been in a relationship, I have always tried to be the best partner that I possibly could, but every woman has her limit.
“Unfortunately, they are not just in a relationship with me, but with the entire tabloid press as the third party.
“At no point did I have a girlfriend or a relationship with anyone without the tabloids getting involved and ultimately trying to ruin it using whatever unlawful means at their disposal.”
For Phillips’, the media attention has not been anywhere near as intense as it is for Harry and indeed William, but his own romantic struggles may well still pose questions about the difficulties of royal life.
Jack Royston is Newsweek‘s chief royal correspondent based in London. You can find him on X, formerly Twitter, at @jack_royston and read his stories on Newsweek’s The Royals Facebook page.
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