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Friday 10 February 2017

Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh

Prince Philip was born on a kitchen table in Mon Repos on the Greek island of Corfu on June 10, 1921.

Mon Repos, the birthplace of Philip. By Marc Ryckaert (MJJR) 

He was born into the Greek and Danish royal families as Philippos Schleswig- Holstein.

Philippos was the only son and fifth and final child of Prince Andrew of Greece and Denmark and Princess Alice of Battenberg.

He is Queen Victoria's great-great-grandson.

In December 1922, following unrest after Greece’s defeat in the Greco-Turkish War, Philippos' family was exiled, and fled the country aboard HMS Calypso. The royal baby was carried aboard in a cot made from a fruit box.

Because he left the country as a baby, Philip does not have a strong grasp of Greek.

After being educated in France, Germany, and Gordonstoun in Scotland, he joined the Royal Navy in 1939, aged 18.

Philippos was on active service in the Royal Navy throughout the Second World War. At the end of the war he was on the destroyer HMS Whelp in the Pacific, and was in Tokyo Bay for the Japanese surrender on September 2, 1945.


After he changed his nationality, Philippos took the name of Philip Mountbatten in March 1947.

On November 20, 1947 Philip married Princess Elizabeth, the heiress presumptive to King George VI, having received the title of the Duke of Edinburgh the previous day.

Prince Philip was not allowed to invite his three sisters to his wedding to Princess Elizabeth, because they were all married to German noblemen, and this would have been considered inappropriate in postwar Britain.

Coronation portrait of Queen Elizabeth II with the Duke of Edinburgh, June 1953

The Queen and Prince Philip had four children: Charles III, Anne, Princess Royal, Prince Andrew, Duke of York and Prince Edward, Earl of Wessex.

In 1956, Prince Philip founded the Duke of Edinburgh's Award Scheme to encourage creative achievement among young people aged 14-24.

The Duke of Edinburgh once had a beard. He took it off with an electric razor 24 hours before he arrived on the royal yacht at Gibraltar on February 7, 1957. The Queen was disappointed not to see his facial hair, she'd told her husband by radio-telephone that she thought it "rather fun" and was looking forward to seeing it.

The Duke of Edinburgh was made a Prince of the United Kingdom in 1957.

Photograph by Allan Warren, 1992

He was the first member of the Royal Family to be interviewed on television, in May 1961.

On July 8, 1966, Prince Philip was picked to play polo for England in an international tournament in Argentina between October 29 and November 13. He became the first member of the Royal Family ever to represent his country at sport.  

Prince Philip's "sick and tired of making excuses" speech on February 9, 1967 caused controversy among business leaders. He told exporters in London that wherever he went abroad, he was asked about late deliveries, poor after-sales service, strikes and Britain’s financial position.

He retired from royal duties in 2017 after completing 22,219 solo engagements since 1952.

Sleeping Beauty's Prince Phillip was named after Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh.

There's a cult in the small island nation of Vanuatu, called the Prince Philip Movement, that believes that Prince Philip is a divine being. He once sent a signed picture of himself to them and they sent him a pig killing club.

He had a deep passion for carriage driving, which Philip shared with his granddaughter, Lady Louise.

Prince Philip was the longest-serving consort to a reigning British monarch at 69 years 62 days and the oldest-ever male member of the British royal family.

HRH The Duke of Edinburgh By Northern Ireland Office - Wikipedia

Prince Phillip passed away peacefully on the morning of April 9, 2021 at Windsor Castle aged 99.

Source Daily Mail

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