We all know King Charles and Queen Camilla have had a long romantic history together. And of course, with such a long romance, there were bound to be twists and turns along the way. But one major twist? The time Camilla wrote to Charles while he was on deployment with the Navy to inform him that she was engaged to another man.
The now-King and Queen were dating when Charles went on tour, and they took a break from the relationship at that time. But while he was away, Camilla got engaged to husband-to-be Andrew Parker Bowles — which she told Charles in a letter. He, of course, was none too pleased.
“She wrote to Charles herself to tell him. It broke his heart,” royal author Penny Juror wrote in her book, The Duchess: The Untold Story (as reported by the Mirror). “He fired off anguished letters to his nearest and dearest. It seemed to him particularly ‘cruel,’ he wrote in one letter, that after ‘such a blissful, peaceful and mutually happy relationship’ fate had decreed that it should only last a mere six months.”
Camilla was married to Andrew between 1973 and 1995, and the two share children Tom, 49, and Laura, 46. Meanwhile, Charles went on to marry Princess Diana in 1981, with their divorce being finalised in 1996. As you well know, they welcomed Prince William, 42, and Prince Harry, 40, during their ill-fated marriage.
With that said, Charles later admitted on television that he had cheated on Diana with Camilla. According to TODAY, the two resumed their romance circa 1986. Camilla didn’t divorce from Andrew until 1995. It wasn’t until 1999 that Charles and Camilla became a public couple, and they eventually married in 2005, with Camilla taking on the title of Queen (and not Queen Consort) when her husband ascended the throne.
