Why Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip Didn’t Go to Charles and Camilla’s Wedding Ceremony

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Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip at the opening of the new 350 million headquarters of the Bank of Scotland, Edinburgh in September 2005; Prince Charles and Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall leave the civil ceremony at The Guildhall, Windsor on April 9, 2005. PHOTO: DANNY LAWSON – PA IMAGES/PA IMAGES VIA GETTY, GEORGES DE KEERLE/GETTY

King Charles and Queen Camilla celebrated their wedding on April 9, 2005 with two ceremonies — but Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip did not attend both festivities.

More than 35 years after their initial meeting and subsequent marriages to other individuals, future King Charles and Camilla Parker Bowles legally tied the knot in a civil ceremony at Windsor Guildhall. The town hall is a stone’s throw from Windsor Castle, but the groom’s parents were not among the 28 guests at the intimate ceremony, which Prince William and Prince Harry attended.

As sovereign, Queen Elizabeth was head of the Church of England and decided it was not appropriate for her to be at the wedding of two people who divorced their previous partners. Charles was married to Princess Diana from 1981 to 1996, while Camilla was married to Andrew Parker Bowles (with whom she shares son Tom and daughter Laura) from 1973 to 1995.

Prince Charles and Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall leave the civil ceremony where they were legally married at The Guildhall, Windsor on April 9, 2005.

Though the civil ceremony at Windsor was without the pomp of larger royal weddings — Charles wore a morning suit in lieu of military uniform, while Camilla layered a white coat over a coordinating silk chiffon dress plus Phillip Treacy hat, and the newlyweds did not share a public kiss — The Guardian reported that up to 20,000 people came out to see them.

Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip’s absence from the Windsor Guildhall wedding was recreated in the sixth and final season of The Crown, which debuted in two parts on Netflix in late 2023. The last episode imagined that the Queen and Duke of Edinburgh intermittently watched the news coverage of the nuptials live on TV as they prepared to head to the Service of Prayer and Dedication at St. George’s Chapel in Windsor Castle later that day, as the Queen obsessed about the speech she’d make at the wedding reception.

Charles and Camilla’s religious wedding blessing recreated in The Crown, season 6.

As seen on screen, Charles and Camilla — who took the title Duchess of Cornwall upon her marriage to the then-Prince of Wales but did not use the Princess of Wales styling she was also entitled to out of deference to Diana, who died following a car crash in Paris in 1997 — had their marriage blessed in church before a larger congregation.