Book Review: Diana, Closely Guarded Secret

By Ken Wharfe, with Robert Jobson

When Diana, Princess of Wales, was killed in an automobile accident in Paris in 1997, her loss was felt keenly all over the world. Just as they had on the night of her death, the media were in a frenzy, and the now infamous tunnel in central Paris was on the front page of every newspaper. Known as the people’s princess, for her ability to empathize with the downtrodden, her many charities, her great beauty and her innate sense of style, the Princess of Wales has remained an object of public fascination, and much has been written about her. Diana: Closely Guarded Secret is unique in the sense that it offers a very candid personal account of the last years of the princess’s life, and the book caused quite a stir when it was first published in 2002. A revised and expanded second edition was published this year, in time for the twentieth anniversary of the Princess’s death.

Diana: Closely Guarded Secret was written as a response to what Mr. Wharfe perceived as an attempt by certain parts of the establishment to smear Diana’s memory and drag her name through the mud after her death. Her bitter and drawn-out divorce from Charles, the Prince of Wales, and her determination to champion sensitive causes such as HIV/AIDS, as well as her outsized public profile, were causing discomfort in lofty circles. Mr. Wharfe’s book tells the story as he himself saw it, and leaves nothing out, Diana’s good sides as well as her bad ones are all in there, and it is up to the readers themselves to decide what the Princess of Wales was like, after having seen all sides of her complex and fascinating character.        

Inspector Ken Wharfe, who served as Diana’s personal protection officer from 1987 to 1993, came to know his charge well during the almost seven-year long period they spent together. A personal protection officer (PPO) from the Scotland Yard’s Royalty and Diplomatic Protection Department is no mere bodyguard like the muscled brutes who shove pop stars into their limousines or the heavily armed Secret Service agents who guard the president. Mr. Wharfe clearly has a great sense of pride when he tells of how every PPO is trained to protect their charges no matter what situation they may find themselves in. The tools of their trade consists mainly of information and communication, to be able to keep out of trouble and keep diplomats and royalty safe with a minimum of fuss. They must be able to blend in seamlessly wherever their charges go, therefore they wear tailored suits and smoking jackets, with their sidearm concealed in a special holster that doesn’t create an unseemly bulk. In other words, a PPO needs to have the concentration and martial prowess of a special forces operative as well as the suaveness of Roger Moore in The Spy Who Loved Me.  

Naturally, guarding one of the most recognizable and popular celebrities in the world was often a quite glamorous assignment, but Mr. Wharfe originally got the job after he had proved himself guarding the Waleses two young sons, Prince William and Prince Harry. The two young boys came to form an affectionate bond with their protection officer over the years that followed, and Mr. Wharfe was often involved in their pranks and bouts of spirited fisticuffs. Mr. Wharfe recalls how, when staying at Prince Charles’s summer retreat, Highgrove, they would knock on his door and one of them would proceed to ask in a mischievous voice if he wanted to fight. The next moment they would surge into his room and throw themselves at him, forcing him to protect his vital parts as the punches rained down upon him. Diana once asked him to take her sons with him to the Scotland Yard firing range and let them hone their marksmanship, an excursion that the two boys enjoyed mightily. They were both capable shots, but Harry in particular was a highly adept marksman, even at so young an age. He credits Diana with giving the boys a grounded upbringing and helping to raise them into two fine young fellows, who will be able to carry the monarchy into the twenty-first century.

During the first years as Diana’s PPO, the state of the Waleses marriage was not known to the public, but the palace staff knew that something was amiss. After having been married in a fairy tale wedding at St Paul’s Cathedral in 1981, the pair had started to drift apart in the years that followed. A contributing factor to this estrangement was the fact that Charles kept seeing his longtime mistress, Camilla Parker-Bowles, after he had been married to Diana. The Prince of Wales himself maintains that he only resumed his acquaintance with Camilla after his marriage with Diana had reached breaking point. Even though she regularly attacked her husband for his infidelity, Diana herself had a string of lovers during the course of her marriage. It was Mr. Wharfe’s job to make sure that his charge was kept safe at all times, his job was not to pass judgement, and he even stayed with Diana and one of her longtime lovers, a dashing army officer, in the countryside cottage where they would spend many weekends together. It is true that Charles and Camilla were sometimes less than fully discreet when choosing their rendezvous, but Mr. Wharfe points out that the Prince of Wales should not be seen as callous or heartless. He is a compassionate and thoughtful person, and his charity, the Prince’s Trust, has helped thousands of young people escape poverty and drug abuse over the years.        

Naturally, having to play the role of the dutiful wife while her marriage was crumbling wasn’t easy for Diana, and at times she was under considerable psychological strain, but Mr. Wharfe steadfastly denies those who would question the state of her mental health during this period. She did an incredible job copying with the demands of her station and raising her two young boys while maintaining her marriage during a difficult time. Anyone would have had trouble keeping up a public façade in such a difficult situation, he maintains.

That nature of Mr. Wharfe’s job meant that he witnessed many deeply personal moments in the princess’s life, and was a trusted voice during the difficult times she went through. Getting away from the stresses of her marriage and a feverish press-corps was essential to allow Diana to recharge and spend quality time with her boys. The task of arranging such getaways, and maintaining a low-key but effective security, fell on Mr. Wharfe’s shoulders. The Princess was particularly fond of Necker Island, the private retreat of billionaire businessman and entrepreneur Sir Richard Branson. She visited the island several times together with her friends and family, but its remote location was not a deterrent for the paparazzi. The moment they learned that she was staying at the island, they would rent a ramshackle collection of small boats and descend upon the island like a fleet of buccaneers. It seems incredulous that their entourage did not include a press officer, as the task of negotiating a truce with the paparazzi was sometimes carried out by Mr. Wharfe. The procedure was simple, in exchange for a few days of peace and quiet, a photoshoot would be arranged where the princess and her children would frolic on the beach, while the paparazzi were given ample opportunity to take their pictures. This worked surprisingly well on many occasions, but Mr. Wharfe had some explaining to do to his superiors when they returned home. Once, when they thought the paparazzi were getting a bit close to Necker Island, Prince William and Prince Harry used makeshift catapults to lob water balloons into the encroaching skiffs with great success, a feat that delighted all of them, including their mother, to no end.               

During the waning years of her marriage with Charles, Diana devoted herself to growing her profile as a philanthropist and goodwill ambassador. Her stature was great, but Mr. Wharfe argues that she may have been overly optimistic when she expected to carry on as before after her divorce, when she would no longer be married to the heir to the throne. Be that as it may, it is certainly true that the rest of “The Firm”, as the British monarchy is referred to, were not entirely pleased with Diana trying to establish a rival power base. The monarchy has since then been forced to modernize and adapt to the modern world, a change that Mr. Wharfe credits Diana with bringing about. This did not come easy, however, as her devotion to shining a light on those afflicted by HIV/AIDS, a feared diseased and a highly controversial topic at the time, wasn’t looked upon kindly by everyone in the Palace hierarchy.

It is clear that Mr. Wharfe considers himself and his former colleagues at the Scotland Yard to be the finest bodyguards in the world, and it is equally clear how little he thinks of the security detail that was responsible for Diana on the night of her death. Given the fact that he protected Diana for many years without her getting as much as a scratch, and the fact that her protection team on that fateful night in Paris had only been in charge of her security for a couple of weeks, I can understand his frustrations. Mr. Wharfe, like many others, believes that her death could have been avoided, and pulls no punches when he dissects the events of that fateful night. Tensions with the paparazzi were already running high before Diana and her boyfriend, Dodi Fayed, left the hotel, and the driver was far above the legal drinking limit when he got behind the wheel. He and Dodi then egged each other on and attempted to outrun the paparazzi, which was foolish and irresponsible, argues Mr. Wharf. The last thing he would wish, however, is that Diana is only remembered for the circumstances of her death and the marital turmoil that preceded it.  She may have been hard to deal with at times, but throughout her life the Princess of Wales reached out to the most vulnerable and downtrodden in society, making sure the direness of their plight was heard by all. Her determination to make the most out of each and every day inspired those around her, and her great sense of humor and mischief made sure that there was hardly a dull moment for those around her. Reading between the lines, that is how Mr. Wharfe would like his former charge to be remembered, not as a saintly character placed on a pedestal or an out of touch diva, but as someone whose empathy and down to earth manners truly embodied the epithet the people’s princess.