Edward the new Duke of Edinburgh

[SnottyLottie]

www.telegraph.co.uk/royal-family/2023/03/10/king-charles-prince-edward-royal-family-title-duke-edinburgh/

In order to honour Edward’s 59th birthday

By the 1980s (which is the earliest the we accept she might have found out about these cousins) QEII had 4 children, 6 grandchildren, 18 nieces and nephews, and 30 cousins. She was also quite busy as Head of State. Judging her for not being a hands on carer for all members of her extremely large family seems a bit unreasonable to me.

Exactly. And I wish I could word it better but this is what I think.

There are families out there where perhaps just one member of that family is seriously wealthy, sold a company maybe, or maybe famous, or a celebrity. It tends to happen that that person looks after, (even on a minor level) those that are in his family and not in a privileged position. It's a normal thing to do...
We are always hearing about footballers/celebs buying their Mum a house, or setting someone in their family up, helping them, starting them off in something... I'm rambling here I know.

And here we are... one of the richest and most well known families ever... and they don't look at extended family, they just ignore them or write them off as dead when they're not.?

I find it weird and not good. Sorry for the ramble. I can't word it right.

@YetMoreNewBeginnings Except with the royal family a quick google can show you what children were born to who and when.

I am not judging her for not being a hands on carer! That is just dramatic talk from you

I would expect more from the royal family as a whole.

@Serenster So you are saying it is fine for the Queen to only care about her children and her job. And she did not even do that well.

There is zero reason why they could not have visited. They simply ignored those two women.

Exactly! I almost feel I knew more about these sisters than the Queen did!

I knew about them a long time ago.

"But Charles does not give a sh*t about his own son and grandchildren....."
I think that's a bit harsh @OutOfChocolate. And I am no fan of Prince Charles.

I watched H&M's wedding on tv and I thought PC walking M up the aisle was a lovely gesture.

I am reminded of that Shakespeare quotation "....to have a thankless child."

Many people have issues with their families but playing it out in public is detrimental to both sides.
It makes reconciliation so difficult.

Sorry, at what point in time was the Queen supposed to be using google to find out about the existence of previously unknown to her cousins?

But what reason did they have to visit? Would you rush to visit if you discovered you had cousins you’d never met? I bet loads of people never visit distant family members they hadn’t previously knew existed - yet if that family is the Royal family, it’s somehow scandalous.

Would a PR exercise visit really have been better?

Her mother knew. Not previously unknown. And what is wrong with her asking an aide, one she can trust, to look into the family. The public knew about them! And I come back to saying... surely surely you ask about your cousins, your first cousins. Are they that switched off and isolated and not in the same world as everyone else, to just concentrate on immediate family.

Sad if so.

You think first cousins are distant family members!!

So in the 1980s the Queen was supposed to google her family tree in case of missing cousins?

That’s just silly talk.

The woman had more reason than most to expect she knew everything about her family given how many times her tree will have been done by all sorts of experts.

Their welfare?

The fact NO-ONE visited them ever?

Human empathy?

Not a PR exercise. A very private visit. Not that hard.

They are if you’ve never clapped eyes on them.

Well then how do you know there wasn’t a private visit? If it was genuinely private, you wouldn’t know about it, would you?

So are you all really so distant from your family that you do not even know if you have first cousins? The only people that matter are parents and children. Nuclear family and to hell with any other relatives.

And first cousins are NOT distant family members.

And the Royal Family do involve extended family. They have for a start an annual Christmas lunch for extended family with over 200 people attending. So please do not pretend they ignore extended family.

Or they are if you pretend they do not exist as they are disabled.

I have 5 first cousins. Two of them are a lot older than me, they were adults when I was born. The other three are 5-10 years older and grew up 300 miles from where I grew up. I don't "know" my cousins. I have one as a FB friend, not the other 4. The oldest two I could walk past in the street and not recognise. I don't have their phone numbers or addresses. These people are complete strangers to me.

My dad's dad was one of 10, just like the Queen Mother. Dad didn't know all of his first cousins when he was growing up as there were so many of them, spread all over the place, and of a wide age range. In fact, we have just recently discovered that my grandad's youngest sister is still alive and in a care home at the age of 102. We all thought she'd died about 20 years ago.

God alive... the british public knew about them. I would be ashamed that the public knew this, but I couldn't be arsed to look into it. Her Mother knew they were alive in 1982. The story broke in 1987.

And what is wrong with her asking an aide, one she can trust, to look into the family.

But in order to do that, you have to have a suspicion that all is not correct.

Families have SO many secrets. I look at family histories regularly and it's so common to turn up extra siblings who died young and have simply been erased from family discussion, black sheep whose names are never mentioned and complete lies about parentage etc.

Bearing in mind that only hospital staff attending their funerals, I doubt it.

I knew of this a long time ago, there has never been a hint of anyone visiting.

@KnittingNeedles so if your first cousins were put in an institution after birth you would not care?

I understand people not being in contact with first cousins as an adult. People move around the country, move abroad, change phone numbers, etc.
I do not buy that they did not know these two women were in an institution. They did know and did not care. They were as good as dead to them.

As I said the Royal Family do have large get togethers for extended family.

So are you all really so distant from your family that you do not even know if you have first cousins? The only people that matter are parents and children. Nuclear family and to hell with any other relatives.

What absolute bollocks. I have cousins to whom I’m very close; one of their daughters is getting married this year and has included my niece in the wedding party, even though it’s an otherwise childless wedding. Hardly “to hell with any other relatives”.

I do, however, have other cousins I’ve never met. Do I wish them any ill? Not at all. But if something awful happened to one of them, I think it would be pretty patronising to steam in as if a visit from me would make it all better.

You keep on making things up to suit your narrative all you like. The truth is, if you heard Mildred Bloggs from three doors down had cousins she’d never met and she didn’t visit them in hospital, you wouldn’t be outraged or even surprised. You’re only outraged because of the particular family involved.

I very well might do if I had 30 cousins! 😀