She might have the title, but she's no lady.
The tabloid fixture and British TV reality show contestant Lady Colin Campbell is making wild claims about Queen Elizabeth II's sex life with Prince Philip in her new book, The Queen's Marriage, which have outraged royalists and palace insiders alike.
The royal couple, both in their nineties, have been married for seventy years. The longest marriage of any British monarch actually started as a teenage crush. Princess Elizabeth was only 13 years old when she met 18-year-old Philip, who was then a British naval cadet. Their budding romance was kept secret for years until the Palace officially announced their engagement when Elizabeth turned 21.
The Queen has made very few public remarks about her marriage. In 1997, at a luncheon celebrating the couple's golden anniversary, she praised Philip, calling him, "quite simply ... my strength and stay all these years."
Insiders insist Campbell couldn't possibly know anything about the Queen's marriage. My palace source told me, "Those who know anything personal about the Queen don't talk, and those who talk, don't know anything. It's in outrageously bad taste."
Campbell has long been a thorn in the royal family's side having written numerous books on the Windsors, including one where she revealed Princess Diana suffered from bulimia.
Among the book's claims that have infuriated palace insiders: the Queen has a "healthy" sex drive, Prince Philip is a "raunchy" flirt, and Princess Margaret once made up rumors that Philip had had an affair to upset her sister—and subsequently touched off a bout of depression for the monarch.
Campbell, who was married to the Duke of Argyll's son, Lord Colin Campbell, writes that royal couple were a hot topic among the servants after having a wild wedding night in 1947.
The author has said she used a "variety of sources," which has been dismissed as nonsense by supporters of the royal family.
Ex-royal butler Paul Burrell, who wrote two tell-all books on Diana, which drew the ire of both Prince William and Prince Harry, told The Mirror: "Anyone can make up these claims. You can only be a true, reliable witness to history if you are there. Lady Colin Campbell was none of those things. She is writing about our Head of State, our Head of Church, and someone who she does not know. She is writing about someone who she is not familiar with."
When asked about the new book by the British newspaper The Sun, the Queen's former press secretary, Dickie Arbiter, said: "I will not dignify anything Lady Colin Campbell writes or says with a comment."
But Campbell is unapologetic and adamant: "[The royal couple] know I am honest and they've known about this book for a while."
"I'm sure the Queen finds this ridiculous and embarrassing," said my source. "But she has always had faith in her subjects's ability to discern grotesque fabrication from the truth about her life."
And for more on the long-reigning monarch, Here's How the Queen Really Feels About Meghan Markle.
Diane Clehane is a New York-based journalist and author of Imagining Diana and Diana: The Secrets of Her Style.
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