At the reception at Windsor Castle, Prince Charles\u2019s mother, Queen Elizabeth II<\/a>, in front of 800 guests, offered a toast to the newlyweds. \u201cThey have overcome Becher\u2019s Brook and The Chair and all kinds of other terrible obstacles. They have come through and I\u2019m very proud and wish them well. My son is home and dry with the woman he loves.\u201d<\/p>\n Not surprisingly, the Queen, a lover of horses and horse racing, used racing references as she welcomed Camilla into the family: Becher\u2019s Brook and The Chair are fences at the Aintree Racecourse, where the Grand National takes place.<\/p>\n It was in the summer of 1971, when Prince Charles<\/a>, then 22, first met Camilla Rosemary Shand, who was 24. A legend has been fostered that the couple were introduced at a polo match at Smith\u2019s Lawn in Windsor, but, according to Jonathan Dimbleby\u2019s authorised biography, The Prince of Wales <\/em>(1994), the introduction was in fact made by a mutual friend, Lucia Santa Cruz, daughter of the Chilean ambassador to the United Kingdom, whom Charles had met when he was a student at Cambridge.<\/p>\n It was reportedly an \u201cinstant attraction\u201d between Charles and Camilla. During an 18-month period their friendship blossomed into a love affair. They shared a lot in common, including an appreciation for the comedy of The Goon Show<\/em>, a BBC radio series devised by Spike Milligan. Charles also liked that Camilla was very much at home in \u201cthe country with horses and hunting.\u201d<\/p>\n Camilla had been involved in an on-and-off relationship with Andrew Parker Bowles, an officer in the Royal Horse Guard, that began when she was 17. But Andrew was said to have a roving eye and was involved with several women at the same time. In 1970 he dated Charles\u2019s younger sister, Princess Anne<\/a>, as they shared a common interest in horses, but marriage between the pair was out of the question as Andrew was Roman Catholic.<\/p>\n Charles pursued Camilla with \u201celaborately worded love notes\u201d and late-night telephone chats. He thought about proposing marriage in November 1972 but was hesitant about taking the next step, according to Dimbleby.<\/p>\n Charles, who played his cards close to his chest, realised that he was \u201ctoo uncertain of his feelings\u201d to ask Camilla to marry him. Their last weekend together was spent at the Hampsire estate Broadlands in mid-December 1972. His great-uncle, Lord Mountbatten<\/a>, was the only family member in whom Charles had confided about Camilla.<\/p>\n Charles knew that his parents would not approve of the relationship. This view was supported by his godmother, Patricia, 2nd Countess Mountbatten of Burma, who later told biographer Gyles Brandreth that the marriage \u201cwouldn\u2019t have been possible, not then. Camilla had a \u2018history\u2019 \u2013 and you didn\u2019t want a past that hung about.\u201d Charles wrote to Lord Mountbatten lamenting that this was \u201cthe last time I shall see her for eight months\u201d, after he and Camilla parted after their final weekend together.<\/p>\n As a part of his naval service career, Charles joined the HMS Minerva<\/em> in mid-January 1973 for a seven-month voyage in the Caribbean. He was in the West Indies when he received the news that Camilla had become engaged to Andrew Parker Bowles on 15 March. He wrote to his great-uncle of his disappointment that \u201csuch a blissful, peaceful and mutually happy relationship\u201d would come to an end.<\/p>\n Charles\u2019s grandmother, Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother, and Princess Anne attended Camilla and Andrew\u2019s wedding at Guards\u2019 Chapel, Wellington Barracks on 4 July 1973. Charles sent his regrets as he was still serving on the Minerva<\/em>. Arrangements could have been made to fly back to London for the wedding, but it would probably have been difficult for Charles to watch Camilla walk down the aisle and marry Andrew.<\/p>\n As Camilla settled into her new life as Mrs Parker Bowles, raising their two children, Tom and Laura, in the country, her friendship with Charles remained platonic for some time. The years that followed, which Charles would later refer to as his \u201cfootloose\u201d years, were a time when he was linked with numerous women, most notably Davina Sheffield, Amanda Knatchbull, Anna Wallace and Lady Sarah Spencer \u2013 Diana\u2019s sister. Many believed that Davina Sheffield had a real chance to marry Charles, but this was scuppered when a former boyfriend spoke to the press about their relationship.<\/p> Charles was in Iceland when he learned that Lord Mountbatten had been assassinated by the IRA<\/a> in August 1979. It was with Camilla Parker Bowles that he sought consolation for his grief. Indeed, Camilla was the only person to whom he could talk about anything. She was his best friend, his soul mate, and, and after the death of his great-uncle, lover. This second affair \u2013 which royal biographer Penny Junor believes started the year previous, in early 1978<\/a>, shortly after the birth of Camilla\u2019s second child, Laura \u2013 lasted until Charles\u2019s engagement to Diana<\/a> in 1981.<\/p>\n In 1980, the duchy of Cornwall (Charles, as the eldest son of the sovereign, is the Duke of Cornwall), purchased Highgrove House, near Tetbury in Gloucestershire, as a country home for the Prince of Wales. The estate was only 11 miles away from Bolehyde Manor, Camilla and Andrew\u2019s home in Wiltshire. The purchase of the estate was an investment in his future, as Charles wanted nothing more than a \u201cnormal family life,\u201d according to Lady Mountbatten.<\/p>\n Charles first took notice of Lady Diana Spencer<\/a> in 1977 \u2013 he thought her \u201cjolly\u201d when he visited Althorp, the Spencer estate, in 1977, when he was dating her older sister, Lady Sarah.\u00a0This relationship came to an end in early 1978: Lady Sarah and Charles were skiing at the Swiss resort Klosters when Sarah decided to have lunch with two British journalists.<\/p>\n There she talked about her drinking and her battles with anorexia, but perhaps most damaging of the \u201ckamikaze remarks\u201d, as the journalist Tina Brown described her interviews, was her discussion of the Prince of Wales.\u00a0\u201cHe is a fabulous person but I am not in love with him,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd I wouldn\u2019t marry anyone I didn\u2019t love, whether he were a dustman or the King of England.\u201d<\/p>\n Shortly before one of the interviews was published in Woman\u2019s Own<\/em>, Lady Sarah told Charles she had spoken to the press. Charles\u2019s response was cold and right to the point: \u201cYou\u2019ve just done something extremely stupid.\u201d Lady Sarah did not realise it at the time, but she had inadvertently made it possible for Charles to pursue her younger sister, Diana.<\/p>\n Later that year, both Lady Sarah (who was by now Charles\u2019s ex-girlfriend) and Lady Diana received invitations to Charles\u2019s 30th birthday party at Buckingham Palace<\/a>. The Parker Bowles were also guests at the party.<\/p>\n In the summer of 1980, Philip de Pass, a friend of Diana\u2019s, invited her to a house party that his parents were hosting at their home, New Grove, near Petworth. He added that the Prince of Wales was the guest of honour.<\/p>\n It was at de Pass\u2019s house party where Charles first saw Diana Spencer as a potential girlfriend<\/a>. Sitting next to each on a bale of hay at a post-polo barbeque, Diana broached the topic of Lord Mountbatten\u2019s funeral and told Charles that \u201cit was the most tragic thing I\u2019ve ever seen. My heart bled for you when I watched, I thought, \u2018It\u2019s wrong, you\u2019re lonely \u2013 you should be with somebody to look after you\u2019\u201d.<\/p>\n It was Diana\u2019s innocence and her sympathetic nature that first caught Charles\u2019s attention. They saw each other, on and off, for the next few months. In the first week of August 1980, Charles invited her to join his party on the royal yacht, Britannia<\/em>, for the sailboat races at Cowes on the Isle of Wight.\u00a0One month later, Diana was invited to Balmoral, where she stayed with her sister, Jane (Lady Jane Fellowes) who was married to the queen\u2019s assistant private secretary, Robert Fellowes, as they had a grace-and-favour home on the Balmoral estate. This invitation came from the Queen at Charles\u2019s request.\u00a0Diana later recalled: \u201cI was frightened because I had never stayed at Balmoral, and I wanted to get it right.\u201d<\/p>\n Others at Balmoral included the Parker Bowles and other friends of the Prince of Wales. Charles sought out Camilla\u2019s advice as he weighed the pros and cons of a marriage with Diana. On paper, Diana had all the right attributes<\/a>: daughter of an earl with royal connections, and she did not have \u2018a past\u2019 \u2013 i.e. there were no worries about former boyfriends flogging their stories to the tabloids.<\/p>\n Yet, Charles had his doubts but as the media frenzy grew, his father, Prince Philip<\/a>, took matters into his own hands. He sent his son a letter advising him that it was time to make a decision: propose to Diana or let her go. Charles wanted to do the right thing for \u201cthis Country and for my family\u201d. He proposed to Diana<\/a> at Windsor Castle on 6 February 1981. She accepted without hesitation, although she had already suspected that Camilla Parker Bowles was more than Charles\u2019s best friend.<\/p>\n One of Camilla\u2019s friends told biographer Gyles Brandreth that Camilla \u201chad encouraged Charles to marry Diana,\u201d yet Diana was suspicious of Camilla\u2019s guidance. But Charles, according to Dimbleby, tried to reassure Diana that Camilla had once been an intimate friend but now, as he was going to marry her, \u201cthere was, and there would be, no other woman in his life\u201d. Both Charles and Camilla accepted that their affair had come to an end, yet they remained close friends as Camilla remained a touchstone and confidant.\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n![\""Charles,\"](\""https:\/\/images.immediate.co.uk\/production\/volatile\/sites\/7\/2019\/10\/GettyImages-52611097-9a23343.jpg?quality=90&resize=311%2C413"\" "\\"\"Charles,\\"\/")
<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div>\u201cInstant attraction\u201d<\/h3>\n
![\""Andrew\"](\""https:\/\/images.immediate.co.uk\/production\/volatile\/sites\/7\/2019\/10\/GettyImages-489213471-89e8f9f.jpg?quality=90&resize=279%2C413"\" "\\"\"Andrew\\"")
<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div>Camilla and Andrew Parker Bowles<\/h3>\n
![\""The\"](\""https:\/\/images.immediate.co.uk\/production\/volatile\/sites\/7\/2019\/10\/GettyImages-3260826-bca3b1e.jpg?quality=90&resize=555%2C413"\" "\\"\"The\\"\/")
<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div>A second affair<\/h3>\n
![\""Charles\"](\""https:\/\/images.immediate.co.uk\/production\/volatile\/sites\/7\/2019\/10\/GettyImages-613460626-e39bbee.jpg?quality=90&resize=278%2C413"\" "\\"\"Prince\\"")
<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div>How did Prince Charles and Diana meet? Why did he marry Diana?<\/h3>\n
![\""Prince\"](\""https:\/\/images.immediate.co.uk\/production\/volatile\/sites\/7\/2019\/10\/GettyImages-3285877-a1d6100.jpg?quality=90&resize=525%2C413"\" "\\"\"Prince\\"\/")
<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div>![\""Prince\"](\""https:\/\/images.immediate.co.uk\/production\/volatile\/sites\/7\/2019\/10\/GettyImages-84180834-03be574.jpg?quality=90&resize=284%2C413"\" "\\"\"Prince\\"")
<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div>![\""Lady\"](\""https:\/\/images.immediate.co.uk\/production\/volatile\/sites\/7\/2019\/10\/GettyImages-73389802-fff7275.jpg?quality=90&resize=256%2C413"\" "\\"\"Lady\\"")
<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div>![\""Lady\"](\""https:\/\/images.immediate.co.uk\/production\/volatile\/sites\/7\/2019\/10\/GettyImages-2352014-d7cc05c.jpg?quality=90&resize=275%2C413"\" "\\"\"Lady\\"")
<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div>Wedding of the century<\/h3>\n