This week, Birgitte, Duchess of Gloucester, arrives in Bermuda to kickstart a royal tour on behalf of King Charles III and Queen Camilla. The unassuming royal, whose husband, Prince Richard, Duke of Gloucester, was a first cousin of Queen Elizabeth II, works tirelessly on behalf of the Royal Family, although you would be forgiven for not being familiar with her face.
For like many of her contemporaries among the senior generation of royals, the Duchess of Gloucester prefers to stay out of the spotlight and let her work speak for itself. It is a similar approach to the one taken by her husband, brother-in-law Prince Edward, Duke of Kent, and his late wife, Katharine, Duchess of Kent.
This most recent visit is in honour of one of the Duchess of Gloucester's military appointments: as Colonel-in-Chief of the Royal Bermuda Regiment. The regiment is celebrating its 60th anniversary, so the Duchess of Gloucester has made the visit to the British Overseas Territory for the occasion. Now aged 79, the Duchess of Gloucester maintains ties to more than 60 organisations across the arts, sport, health, welfare, education and the military.
Yet the Duchess of Gloucester had a very different start to life – over a thousand kilometres from Buckingham Palace. Growing up in the city of Odense, Denmark, the birthplace of Hans Christian Andersen, the young girl might never have guessed that she soon live out her own fairytale, spending her life among the British royal family and serving for over five decades as one of the Firm’s most dedicated (yet perhaps most unsung) working members. As she celebrates her birthday today, Tatler celebrates the remarkable story of Birgitte, the Duchess of Gloucester.
Born in 1946 to lawyer Asger Preben Wissing Henriksen and his wife, Vivian van Deurs, Birgitte Eva van Deurs Henriksen was no stranger to the ways of high society, studying at a Swiss finishing school and the Scandinavian Academy of International Fashion and Design in Copenhagen. After her parents divorced on 15 January 1966, she would go on to take her mother’s ancestral name, van Deurs.
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It was while completing a further education in Cambridge that Birgitte’s fairytale began. Prince Richard, the grandson of King George V and cousin of Queen Elizabeth II, was studying architecture at the university, while the future Duchess of Gloucester was undergoing a language course. Their paths crossed in 1966, and by February 1972, the couple were engaged. The New York Times ran with the headline: ‘Queen’s Cousin Will Wed a Secretary’, noting that Prince Richard’s parents, Prince Henry and Lady Alice Montagu, were ‘simply delighted’ by the news.
A year later, on 8 July 1973, the couple tied the knot at St Andrew’s Church in Barnwell, Northamptonshire. The bride’s Swiss organdie dress was designed by Norman Hartnell – the dressmaker to the Queen Mother and Queen Elizabeth, who had previously designed the bridal gown and bridesmaids' dresses for the wedding of Prince Henry and Lady Montagu, and who would go on to design the dress for Princess Beatrice’s wedding, almost half a century later. In a break from tradition, the new royal did not wear a tiara, instead adorning her veil with stephanotis flowers: aptly enough, the bloom translates from Greek as ‘crown’ and is said to symbolise marital bliss. After the ceremony, Birgitte was granted the style ‘Her Royal Highness Princess Richard of Gloucester’, and the couple lived in the family home at Barnwell Manor until moving to Kensington Palace in 1994.
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There was to be a tragic twist in the tale, however. Prince Richard never planned to assume the Dukedom of Gloucester, which was set to be inherited by his brother (and ‘dashing’ best man), Prince William. Indeed, the Prince and Princess Richard had their sights set on a professional career outside the duties and responsibilities of royalty, said Town and Country. Just six weeks after their wedding, however, Prince William died in a plane crash, leaving Richard the unexpected heir to his father’s title – a position to which he would accede just one year later. By 1974, at the age of just 27, the girl from Odense became the Duchess of Gloucester.
Unexpected as her rise to one of Britain’s most lauded noble titles might have been, Birgitte took to the role with grace and hard work. A patron for around 60 charities, the Duchess has served as honorary president of the Lawn Tennis Association (and is thus a fixture in the royal box at Wimbledon), worked with the National Asthma Campaign and the Children’s Society, and followed in the footsteps of Princess Diana as patron of the Royal Academy of Music.
‘Charity work in Great Britain is a tradition,’ the Duchess has said of her work. ‘I don’t think I have a friend who has not involved him or herself somehow or other. How far back this tradition goes, I am not sure- it is one of the major aspects which makes me very proud to be British.’
But Her Royal Highness’s charity work is not confined to the Green and Pleasant Land. Her first visit came in 1973, when she joined the Duke of Gloucester at King Olav V of Norway’s 70th birthday. From Tonga and Tunisia to Singapore and the Solomon Islands, the Duchess has joined her husband on a host of international visits. Indeed, the couple have a close relationship to the Tongan royal family, representing Queen Elizabeth at the funeral of King Tāufaʻāhau Tupou IV in September 2006 and the coronation of King George Tupou V in August 2008.
The Duchess is, however, no stranger to solo travels. Later in 2008, she met troops who had been deployed to Iraq, and in 2015, she travelled to Bermuda in her position as Colonel-in-Chief of the Royal Bermuda Regiment. The late Queen Elizabeth recognised the Duchess of Gloucester as a talented diplomat, giving her sponsorship of two naval ships – HMS Gloucester and HMS Sandown, and sending her to represent the crown in such diverse countries as Norway, New Zealand, and China.
Amid all this, the Duke and Duchess of Gloucester were raising a family. The couple welcomed a son – Alexander Windsor, the Earl of Ulster – in 1974, and later two daughters, Lady Davina Windsor and Lady Rose Gilman, in 1977 and 1980. The Gloucesters now also have six grandchildren, including Xan Windsor, Lord Culloden.
The monarchy has changed considerably over the past three years. As Prince of Wales, Charles had long made it known that he would pursue a more ‘stripped back’ approach to the Firm, with only working royals seeing official representation at the family's biggest public events. It is a testament to the Duchess of Gloucester’s dedication, then, that the King trusted her to remain as a representative of the Crown. Case in point? Birgitte was featured in the official Coronation portrait, side-by-side with the likes of Prince William, the Princess of Wales, and Princess Anne. She is a constant presence at Garter Day, Trooping the Colour, and Royal Ascot.
