Inside Diana’s ‘lonely’ last Christmas without Wills & Harry, by Paul Burrell & how her bath ended with a fireman visit
PRINCESS Diana’s last Christmas was sadly a “very quiet and lonely one”, according to her former butler and confidante Paul Burrell – but it wasn’t without drama.
Following her divorce from Charles in August 1996, the late Princess of Wales spent Christmas that year apart from Prince William and Prince Harry, who were celebrating with their father.
Paul, who joined the royal household in 1987 and worked for Diana until her death in 1997, claimed Christmas was typically not a happy time for her.
He told Fabulous: “Despite moments of joy, her birthday and Christmas Day were often her loneliest days of the year.
“Diana’s final Christmas was a very quiet and lonely one. Her Christmas Day was usually spent alone, as she gave up her boys.
“She always said, ‘well, they need to be with their cousins and the royal family, because they’re royal princes’.
“They went to Sandringham to spend it with their relations, rather than her. So she sacrificed them. Her day was a very quiet one.”
According to Paul, Diana planned to spend Christmas Day alone at her home – Apartments 8 and 9 at Kensington Palace – having a relaxing bath.
He said: “In 1996, her very last Christmas, she said: ‘Go home, unwrap some presents, spend the day with your family, and I’ll see you in the morning on Boxing Day.’
“No sooner had I got home and started unwrapping presents with my children than my direct line rang.
“It was the Princess, and she said: ‘I think you’d better come back.’
“I asked: ‘What’s the problem?’
“She replied: “Can’t you hear? All the alarms are going off, all these sirens are going off and I can’t stop them. Help!’”
Diana had had an unfortunate mishap with some mood-setting candles, the smoke of which had set off all the fire alarms in the palace, which she affectionately called KP.
Recalling the day, Paul said: “So I rushed back to Kensington Palace and turned off the alarms.
“She explained: ‘I thought, as I’m by myself, I’d treat myself to a nice soak in the bath and I lit lots of candles in the bathroom.
“‘But the smoke from the candles set off the fire alarms.’
“She added: ‘Thank goodness you’ve rescued me.’”
However, the festive saga didn’t end there.
Paul said he informed Diana that “all the fire alarms here are linked to the fire stations, and they’re on their way.”
He continued: “So four fire engines came roaring up the drive of Kensington Palace to the front door of Apartment 8 and 9, each carrying six firemen.
“She stood there in her dressing gown having been in the bath before that and she’s giggling away and she said: ‘Well, isn’t this a perfect Christmas morning? What could any girl want more than this?’
“All these firemen on my doorstep on Christmas morning.”
Paul said that her the drama had filled her lonely day with “lots of fun”.
He added: “She spent time chatting with all the firemen after they realised the palace wasn’t on fire, they all went back to their stations.
“That was her last Christmas at Kensington Palace.”
Diana’s last Christmas gifts
Paul said that when it came to presents for Diana, it was particularly tricky to get it right.
For her last Christmas, he revealed how he bought her a pair of Chanel earrings, which were “quite expensive.”
However, he had to be very careful to avoid the iconic entwined double C Chanel earrings, due to Diana possibly associating them to Charles and Camilla.
He added: “The real thing, and she loved them. I had to be careful not to get the intertwined C ones, which would have been a huge faux pas.”
Charles' entwined C cuff links
ACCORDING to royal experts, the popular 'entwined C' Chanel design first started to become a problem for Diana during her honeymoon with the then-Prince Charles in 1981.
Despite Charles’ best efforts to convince his wife that his relationship with Camilla was long over, a pair of cuff links his ex-girlfriend had given him continued to haunt Diana.
Royal journalist and author Penny Junor said: “Charles did not show huge emotional intelligence, if I’m brutally honest.
“He had some cuff links that Camilla had given him with two C’s entwined…he wore those on the honeymoon.”
When the couple’s relationship was rocked by claims suggesting Charles had cheated on Diana with Camilla years later, the late Princess asked her dear friend and butler Paul Burrell to get rid of any reminders of their relationship.
Paul claimed: “She made me pick off all the C’s off her Chanel shoes and the Chanel handbags because she couldn’t bear to see two C’s entwined.”
There are many traditions around present giving in the royal family, one of which left Diana “mortified” according to royal biographer Andrew Morton.
Andrew Morton, who wrote the bestseller Diana: Her True Story, claimed that Diana’s foray into the unusual world of royal festive customs began during her first Christmas at Sandringham in 1981.
It was just five months after she famously tied the knot with her husband Charles and by the time Christmas Day itself arrived, the Princess was pregnant with her first child Prince William.
Diana’s royal Christmas hatred
Despite suffering from severe morning sickness, Diana still took the time to “to buy her new family members thoughtful and expensive gifts,” Vanity Fair reported.
However, despite her careful planning to ensure heartfelt and personal gifts were selected, Diana soon found herself utterly “mortified” after discovering that this was not normal procedure for a royal Christmas.
Instead, contrary to what we might expect, it turns out that the Royal Family, who traditionally give their presents on Christmas Eve, prefer to give each other tongue-in-cheek ‘gag’ presents instead.
Everything you need to know about Princess Diana's final years
After years of separation, Prince Charles and Princess Diana divorced in 1996.
In 1997, Princess Diana spent her summer in the south of France and Italy. During August, she visited Sarajevo, Bosnia, to highlight the fight against landmines.
By the end of the month, the Princess of Wales and Dodi Al-Fayed travelled to Paris together.
It was revealed that Princess Diana stayed longer than planned in Paris due to a row over her land mine campaign.
Travelling in a black Mercedes Benz, Princess Diana was involved in a car crash in the Pont de l’Alma tunnel on August 31, 1997.
The Princess of Wales died at the age of 36.
Her funeral was held on September 6, 1997. As her coffin made the journey from Kensington Palace to Westminister Abbey, Prince William and Prince Harry walked behind their late mother.
Princess Diana’s mother, Frances Shand Kydd, and sisters, Jane Fellowes and Sarah McCorquodale, also attended the funeral.
The Princess of Wales was buried at her childhood home – Althorp House
If it wasn’t for her tragic death, Princess Diana would have been 62 today.
It’s a tradition that still stands today – typically, there are no diamonds under the royals’ Christmas trees.
Kate once, when he was single, gave Harry a Grow Your Own girlfriend kit, while Princess Anne once gifted her older brother Charles a leather toilet seat.
But Diana was unbeknown to this and was left blushing by the unusual tradition when she gifted her sister-in-law Princess Anne But in return, Diana was rewarded with a toilet roll holder.
Princess Diana told Andrew: “It was highly fraught. I know I gave, but I can’t remember being a receiver.
“Isn’t that awful? I do all the presents, and Charles signs the cards.
“[It was] terrifying and so disappointing.
“No boisterous behaviour, lots of tension, silly behaviour, silly jokes that outsiders would find odd, but insiders understood.”