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she bemoaned that, because she, via Richard Kay, published an allegation that she was forced by the Queen and Prince Charles to do it. At the end of June, through Richard Kay again, she did her last attempt to get her title back, when she proclaimed that the Palace then insisted that she should keep her title as the future king’s mother. But this was not the truth at all (Bradford 307). After Diana’s funeral, Prince Charles, William and Harry and also Diana’s butlers Paul Burrel and Colin Tebbutt set off the royal train journey from London to Northamptonshire, because they were invited to dinner at Althorp. During this journey someone from the roy- al family suggested returning this title to Diana. Her brother Charles Spencer refused it, because he considered it to be an insignificant gesture (Bradford 385).
22 3 DIANA’S ADULTHOOD 3.1 Diana’s New Start “’The third stage’ of her life was the period between the divorce and the death” 16
(one of Diana’s friends qtd. in Bradford 337). After the divorce, the Princess was reserved a permanent right to live in Kensington Pa- lace and she remained a member of the Royal Family. The custody of her sons was shared by both parents equally(www.princess-diana.com., Bradford). In the book Diana: The Portrait by Rosalind Coward Diana’s situation is fully compre- hended by William Rees-Mogg: “Diana tried to arrange her own independent life. As a single woman she could enjoy much bigger social freedom, as a famous personality she took advantage of her empathy for practical purposes, and she was still an excellent mother.Everything began to fit together perfectly.” 17 (Brad- ford 337) In this period Diana travelled all over the world and devoted herself to charity, to ill people, especially the ones suffering from AIDS and she fought against the land-mines. According to Richard Kay “that was the time when she became that great personality she was” 18
(Bradford 337). Meanwhile, she lived also her personal life, although it was not easy, because she was still haunted by sensation-seeking paparazzi (see appendix A7). Like Charles, also Diana went through several love affairs. Some of them already during her marriage to Charles after she had learnt of his relationship to Camilla and felt lonely. “I want to find somebody who would requite my affection” 19
(Diana qtd. in Hrom, 23rd Sep- tember 1997).
16
17 ,,
Diana se snažila zařídit si vlastní samostatný život. Jako svobodná žena se mohla těšit z mnohem větší společenské volnosti, jako známá osobnost využívala svého soucitu pro praktické účely, a nadále byla vyni- kající matkou. Všechno do sebe začínalo hezky zapadat.“ 18 ,,Tehdy se stala tou velkou osobností, kterou byla.“ 19 ,,Chci najít někoho, kdo by opětoval mé city.“ (translated by the author)
23 But, as one of Diana’s friends judged her situation, “Diana’s love life was a long run of misfortune. The men exploited her. She put too much in liaison” 20 (Bartholomew qtd. in Hrom, 23rd September 1997). Unfortunately, among her men there were also some mar- ried ones, for example Oliver Hoare and Will Carling, which caused her troubles. In 1985 the rumour said that she was in love with her bodyguard Barry Manakee. Later he died in a motorcycle crash that was said to have been planned. James Gilbey’s passionate phone calls with Diana were also disclosed. The Pakistani cardio-surgeon Hasnat Khan’s parents did not agree with his relationship to Diana (Hrom, 23rd September 1997). 3.2 Dodi (Emad) Al Fayed “Dodi is the love of my life. I will never let him go” 21 (Diana to her friend, qtd. in Hrom). Emad El-Din Mohamed Abdel Moneim Fayed, better known as Dodi Al- Fayed, was the son of the Egyptian billionaire Mohamed Al-Fayed ,owner of British department store Harrods, Fulham Football Club and the Hôtel Ritz Paris. His mother was Samira Kashoggi, sister of the notorious weapons dealer, Adnan Khashoggi.Born in Alexandria, Egypt, Fayed was a student at Collège Saint Marc before attending the Institut Le Rosey in Switzerland. His occupation was often given as film producer; he helped make Breaking Glass (1980) and Chariots of Fire (1981), as well as the movie F/X and its sequel. He also served as the Executive Creative Consultant for the television series.Dodi was an executive producer for the 1991 movie Hook starring Robin Williams and Dustin Hoffman. In addition he was the executive producer of the 1995 film adaptation of The Scarlet Letter.(wikipedia) Diana met Dodi already about ten years earlier while he was playing polo against her husband’s team, but did not pay much attention to him (Stern 8). The fact that Diana accepted Fayed’s father invitation to spend holiday with her sons near St.Tropez surprised her friends. But that time, in July 1997, when TV Channel 5 was interested in the adaptation of Camilla Parker’s biography, Diana got nervous. Moreover, Prince Charles, via Michael Fawcett, was preparing the ball in Highgrove on the ocassion of Camilla’s fiftieth birthday. (Bradford 359). So, her decision to accept this invitation could be seen as 20
,,Dianin milostný život byl dlouhou šňůrou neštěstí. Muži ji využívali. Dávala do vztahu příliš mnoho.“ 21 ,,Dodi je láskou mého života. Nikdy mu nedovolím odejít.” (translated by the author)
24 a revenge. Diana, Dodi and her sons were having a great time on his yacht Jonikal, which Dodi had bought just because of Diana (Bradford 362). Diana provoked the photographers and on 18 th July, just on the day of Camilla’s celebration in Highgrove, the tabloids were full of photos of Diana in her swimsuit, exactly as she had apparently intended (Bradford 360-361). Diana was deeply touched by the relationship that emerged betweeen her sons and Dodi (Verdier Odile, and Philippe 132-133). On the other hand, in the book The Death of Princess is mentioned an article for tabloid News of the World, in which William showed his antipathy to the Egyptian multimillionaire and a playboy who was not, according to William, a suitable partner for his mother and William was prepared to discuss this topic with Diana just after her arrival from Paris. And so happened that this article was published on Sunday of 31 st August, when both Diana and Dodi were no longer alive (Dobrovolný 108-109). Would Dodi have become Diana’s husband, had not they died in a car crash? Not all sources agree. Adam Cohen in his article Diana’s Unlikely Suitor does not consider him to be a suitable husband for her, because this “unreconstructed playboy” known for his rom- ances with such women as Brooke Shields and Tawny Kitaen is not used to reading books and what’s more,his character is not unimpeachable: “Dodi Al Fayed, the rakish Egyptian-born heir to the billion-dollar Har- rods fortune, seemed an unlikely consort for Britain’s fairy princess... His past was littered with women he had romanced and rejected, as well as with creditors still hoping to be paid for meals consumed and lodging used long ago”(www.time.com). As far as reading books is concerned, it should not have been the main problem here as among Diana’s favourite ways of spending her leisure time was to bury herself in “the romantic world of novels by Barbara Cartland, where strong men court virgin brides and love prevails over everything” 22 (Bradford 41), so she probably was not a kind of discri- minating reader. More problematic would be the situation that a writer for London’s Daily Mail sees and warns that ”Diana by marrying into the clan of Al Fayeds would be trading in one prison, the life-style of the royal family, for something worse, an Arab one” (www.time.com). 22
nevěstám a láska vítězí nade vším.” (translated by the author)
25 The matter of religion might have become slightly problematic. There appeared some speculation that, after meeting Dodi, Diana wanted to become a Muslim. But the majority of experts on Diana’s life do not consider this presumable, because a step like this would not be popular with the British (Dobrovolný 105). 3.3 Diana’s Death “That evening she was so happy as I have never seen her before” 23 (Richard Kay qtd. in Bradford 368). On 20
th July Diana returned to London where she met Hasnat Khan to clarify their situation as far as their relationship was concerned. They really loved each other, but he was aware of the fact that as Diana’s husband he would not be able to reach a high rank in his occupation and to make his wife financially secure. Two days later Diana left for Gianni Versace’s funeral in Milan, where she comforted her friend Elton John (Bradford 362, Stern 90,Hrom). On 26 th July she met Dodi in Paris and on 31 st July they were aboard Jonikal again and set out for voyage round Corsica and Sardinia (Bradford 363). From 8 th
to 11 th August Diana managed to lead the campaign against the land mines in Bosnia with Bill Deeds. It was her last trip as “Charity Queen” and “Queen of Hearts” (www.princess- diana.com). When she returned to Dodi, they were still disturbed by paparazzi. But in some cases they were Diana and Dodi themselves who informed them.(Bradford 364-365) During the trip to Monte Carlo they visited the jewellery Repossi, where they chose a ring from the set called “Tell Me Yes”. According to Mohamed Fayed, Dodi gave Diana this engagement ring after. From that time, the whole flotilla of boats with paparazzi was chasing them, some of them even in helicopters. They were still trying to get aboard, which perturbed Diana and especially Dodi, who was not used to such a situation (Bradford 366). When they got to Paris, paparazzi on their motorcycles had already been waiting for them, shouting, so Dodi decided not to visit the Chez Benoit restaurant, where they had already booked the table. Instead they had their dinner at the Ritz hotel. Nevertheless, the paparazzi had been waiting there as well (Bradford 368). 23 ,,V ten večer byla tak šťastná, jak jsem ji ještě nikdy neviděl.”(translated by the author)
26 They wanted to spend the night in the flat in Rue Arsene Houssaye, so, after dinner Dodi,in his effort to confuse the paparazzi, arranged “evading tactics with the hotel staff” (see appendix A1): ...a chauffeur drove his limousine from the main entrance, turned round after a few kilometres and returned back to the hotel. And yes, the photographers followed on their motorbikes. Yet they soon realised that something was afoot, and remained on the hotel forecourt. At 19 minutes past midnight Diana and Dodi were ready to go. They chose the back exit which led out on to the narrow street Rue Cambon (www.princess- diana.com).
Dodi manifestly wished Henri Paul, “the second security man at the hotel”, for a driver, although his regular chauffeur was Philippe Dourneau (www.princess-diana.com, Bradford 369). ”Dodi trusted him” (www.coverups.com/diana), but as the Ritz staff members suggest, “it was Paul who persuaded Dodi to let him drive and do what he thought he did best: to shield the couple from the paparazzi”(www.coverups.com/diana). But there is also some unnamed witnesses’ evidence, who, according to France-Soir daily, claimed that it was Henri Paul who forced the original driver out in the last moment (Dobrovolny 86). Dodi’s bodyguard Trevor Rees-Jones sat in the front seat, Diana behind him and Dodi next to her:
He wanted to outdrive the paparazzi under all conditions...He drove faster and faster. Henri Paul took the fast road at the harbour of the river Seine, raced then into the tunnel under the Place de Alma. The speed limit is 80 kilometres, he drove a full 180. Shortly after the entrance to the tunnel he completely lost the control of the heavy car. The car skidded, lurched from side to side and finally crashed at high speed into the 13 th
0:25. The driver was dead at the scene (www.princess-diana.com).
And so was Dodi. Diana was still breathing when Dr. Frédéric Maillez,who was by chance driving on the opposite traffic lane, saw the car accident and stopped his car: “I went to the wreckage to see what was going on inside,” says Maillez, who tended to the seriously injured princess after the crash.”I can tell you her face was still beautiful. She didn’t have any injuries, main injury on her face. She was unconscious. She didn’t speak at all” (www.cbsnews.com).
27 The last Dr. Maillez’s sentence does not correspond with the information that appeared in Le Parisien daily. According to this newspaper, dying Diana still repeated her last words “Leave me alone” and “Oh, my God”(Dobrovolný 82). Dr. Maillez laid an oxygen mask over the unconscious Princess’s mouth and tried to free her air passages. After arrival of the ambulance, Dr. Jan-Marc Martino took care of her. But the car had to be first cut open using metal shears, so it took almost an hour to get victims out of the wreck.(Bradford 372, www.princess-diana.com) During the way to the hospital La Pitié-Salpetriére the ambulance had to stop because of Diana’s condition. She went through two heart attacks, her blood pressure dropped dangerously. Daniel Eyraud, member of the vascular surgery team, explained:”Her blood pressure was very low, but her heart was still beating.”( In Gregory, Martyn Diana: The Last Days, 74 In: Bradford 373). At half past one in the morning Diana came into the La Pitié-Salpetriére hospital: … emergency operation. The surgeons opened her ribcage and discovered a torn vein. Massive inner bleeding! They managed to close the vein. But suddenly her heart stopped. The medics tried to bring the Princess back to life using heart massage. The fight lasted until shortly before four o’clock in the morning. Then the doctors had to agree that they had lost the fight (www.princess-diana.com). 3.4 Diana’s Funeral After Prince Charles and Diana’s sisters reached Paris, they found Diana in her death to be calm and serene. “She had a black dress on and the shoes from Lady Jay, her hair freshly neated with a hair dryer and in her hand the rosary that Mother Theresa had donated her.”(Bradford 377)In the interview with the author on 3 rd March 2004 Colin Tebbut who accompanied them together with Paul Burrell remembered that Diana’s sister, Lady Sarah McCorquodal had intended to organize just a modest private funeral in Althorp. But then while accompaning Diana’s coffin on A40 they saw thousands of people along the road clapping their hands and Sarah shouted:”This will not be a quiet funeral!”(Bradford 377) Meanwhile, Diana’s body is expected at home: In the afternoon of 31 st August 1997 a BA146 from the Royal Squadron brought Diana’s corpse back to Great Britain: ”The aircraft lands at Nor- folk airport. Prime minister Tony Blair is among those who are waiting.
28 The coffin is draped with the royal flag. At midnight the coffin lays in state in the Royal Chapel in St. James’ Palace” (www.princess- diana.com). And the Diana’s funeral really was not a modest one. It became “the best exhibition of the solemn royal ceremony”(Bradford 381) It was precisely organized from the very beginning to the end by the Palace. The whole arrangement proceeded from the preliminary proposi- tion of the official funeral for Queen Mother. According to the police’s advice, the route of the funeral had to be lenghtened because of the amount of the onlooking people (Bradford 381). At 6.00 p.m. on Friday, 5 th September, the Queen Elizabeth spoke to the nation live from the Chinese Dining Room at Buckingham Palace (see appendix A2).This funeral speech is maybe the most personal one the Queen gave. It was written by Diana’s brother-in-law, Sir Robert Fellowes. Downing Street just added the formulation “what I say to you now as a grandmother” (Bradford 381). On Saturday of 6th August 1997 more than one million people came to London to say go- odbye to their adored Princess Diana: When at 9.08 the bells of Westminster Abbey chimed, Diana’s coffin on the horse-drawned carriage left the gates of Kensington Palace. The cof- fin was covered with the royal standard and up there were three bouquets:white tulips from William, the bunch of lilies from Charles Spencer and the most touchy bouquet of Diana‘s favourite white roses with a simple label entitled by Harry’s twelve-year handwriting “to mummy“ 24
The burial service (see appendix A3) was held in Westminster Abbey where about two thousand people gathered. Not only the statesmen and celebrities, but many of them con- nected with Diana’s charitable activity. As Richard Kay noticed, Diana’s life was so im- mensely divided that these people did not know each other (Bradford 382). 24 ,,Když se v 9.08 rozezvučely zvony Westminsterského opatství, vyjela z bran Kensingtonského paláce Dianina rakev na voze taženém koňmi. Zahalili ji do královské standarty a nahoru položili tři kytice: bílé tulipány od Williama, květenství lilií od Charlese Spencera a ze všeho nejdojemnější pugét Dianiných oblí- bených bílých růží s prostým lístkem, na nějž Harry nadepsal svou dvanáctiletou rukou „mamin- ce“.“(translated by the author) But maybe the most moving was Charles Spencer‘s funeral oration (see appendix A4), where he accused the journalists of ‘having blood on their hands‘, and the song “Goodbye
29 England’s rose“ by Elton John that was in fact new arrangement of the original requiem “Candle in the Wind“ written for Norma Jean (Marilyn Monroe) whom Diana had admi- red and who died at the same age as Diana did.
30 4 MYTH OR REALITY? 4.1 Searching for the Culprit In the book Diana, In Pursuit of Love by Andrew Morton Prince Charles quite accurately summed up the situation when he said:“Everyone will blame myself for it, won’t they?“ 25
Because people did not want to reconcile with Diana’s death, quite logically, since her death many questions have been asked. Some of them apparently pointless, some of them fundamental ones. There were also discrepancies, which became the breeding ground for distrust, suspicion and conspiracy theories. To start from technical issues, there were some inaccuracies as far as the type of the win- dows of the car and its speed are concerned. The speed of the Mercedes entering the tunnel was too high. But it is quite surprising, how the sources differ: 180 kmph(www.princess-diana.com) 118-155 kmph(Bradford 370) 100 kmph(www.princess-diana.com) 196 kmph(Dobrovolny 82) 160-180 kmph(Hrom) 121 mph(www.londonnet.co.uk) 60-80 mph(www.coverups.com/diana)
Instead of Mercedes 600, the second-hand one S-280 without smoke-tinted windows was chosen, although some of press photographers used just smoke-tinted windows as an excuse, because to take photos through this type of glass is practically impossible (Dobrovolny 81). This information is in tune with the Internet source:”the windows of Mercedes were heavily tinted”(www.coverups.com/diana).
25
„Všichni to budou vyčítat mně, že ano?“ (translated by the author)
31 While the Diana book is not in tune with paparazzi: “Now came the fatal decision not to turn right to Champs Élysées, the most direct way to the flat, they would have to stop at the lights at seve- ral crossroads and so enabled paparazzi to catch up with them and take photos of the couple through nontinted windows.” 26 (Bradford 370) Also the seat belts were dicussed: “What saved Trevor Rees-Jones’s life except of the air- bag, is the fact that he, as the only one, was wearing seat belts.According to some opi- nions, those ones could safe also Princess Diana’s life” 27 (Richard Cuerden, professor of Birmingham University qtd. in Dobrovolný 84). In Diana book there is the information that none of them had fastened the seat belts (Brad- ford 370) and in Hrom magazine that Trevor Rees-Jones was miracuously saved thanks to airbag at the front seat and the fastened seat belts (Hrom, 23 rd September 1997). Recently, on TV channels and on internet pages results from French investigators have been published, even the interview with Rees-Jones. Here are some of them: “LONDON (CNN) – The bodyguard who survived the crash that killed Princess Diana and two others strapped on his seat belt moments before the accident, French investigators said....A study of pictures taken by photographers during the course of the night showed that Trevor Rees- Jones did not wear seat belts when the Mercedes left the Paris Ritz hotel on the night in question. But later pictures showed Rees-Jones wearing the belts shortly before the August 31 crash, which also killed Diana’s companion Dodi Fayed and the driver of the car. Police believe the last- minute action saved his life. None of the other occupants of the car were wearing seat belts.”(www.cnn.com) But quite different is the “Operation Paget’s view: None of the seat belts were being worn at the time of the impact, includ- ing that of Trevor Rees-Jones. From the nature of marks found on his seat belt, it is considered unlikely that he was even in the process of at- tempting to put it on at all at time of the crash.”( Operation Paget Report qtd. in en.wikipedia.org).
26
museli by totiž zastavit na několika světelných křižovatkách, čímž by paparazziům vzadu umožnili, aby je dojeli a fotografovali dvojici přes netónovaná skla.”(translated by the author) 27 ,,Trevora Rees-Jonese zachránila kromě airbagu skutečnost, že jako jediný měl zapnuté bezpečnostní pásy. Ty podle některých názorů mohly zachránit život i Dianě.“(translated by the author)
32 Finally also Trevor Rees-Jones via his book:“I think I’ve been told that I wasn’t wearing a seatbelt. I assume that’s been misreported, that the airbag must have saved me on the ini- tial impact, but then my face and chest hit the dashboard when the car was pushed around.”(Trevor Rees-Jones Tells ‘The Bodyguard’s Story’ qtd. in http://en.wikipedia.org) Armouring of the car was also discussed, because the opinions on this matter differ.On the basis of compurer reconstruction, professor Cuerden is persuaded, on the contrary of the declaration of the Ritz, that Mercedes was not armoured (Dobrovolny 84). But in the ar- ticle Diana was fighting for her life..it says that the irony is that the armoured bonnet, which should have saved travellers in the car, became a prison instead, where Diana was kept more than an hour (Hrom, Sept 23rd). Finally, on the Internet pages there appeared a report about the examining of the car: 48 Hours took a similar model Mercedes and the analysis contained in the French report to Murray MacKay, one of Europe’s most prominent vehicle-safety experts. MacKay says French investigators examined eve- ry component of the crashed Mercedes, particularly the brakes, to deter- mine if either a mechanical failure or deadly tampering caused the acci- dent. “I think they did a very thorough job,” says MacKay. “There was nothing wrong with the car at all … the driver was drunk. He was going excessively fast and couldn’t cope.” (www.cbsnews.com,8.4.2008)
It is obvious that just before the car crash there must have been present another car, which the Mercedes were overtaking. In the book The Death of Princess it was not clear yet, what type of car was present there in the tunnel just before the car crash:”According to the last police report , Paul did not manage the high speed while trying to overtake a slowly driv- ing Peugeot 205.”(Dobrovolny 86) While in Diana is already mentioned Fiat Uno:”...Paul was overtaking the white Fiat Uno, driving much more slowly in the right taffic lane”(Bradford 370). And also in The Final Report from 26 th October 1998 is mentioned this type of car: “The investigators also discovered the remains of an indicator cover. The analysis of this, just like that of the traces of paint on the Mercedes re- vealed that the car in question was a white Fiat built between 1983 and 1987. Eyewitnesses had also mentioned this vehicle. Although 3000 Uno drivers were laboriously scrutinized the car to this day has still not been found. The driver was primarily sought as a witness, but he would also have to explain his reasons for leaving the scene of an acci- dent.”(www.princess-diana.com)
33 In CBS News’ edition of 48 Hours Investigates in April 2004 there was broadcast a one- hour report on Princess Diana that addresses the circumstances surrounding her death al- most seven years ago. Identity of Fiat Uno was discussed, too: “Was this the same Fiat Uno that was sideswiped by the Mercedes in the tunnel the night Diana died?“
“It was our investigators, not the French police, who found the Fiat Uno. It was found in a garage in Paris and traced to paparazzi named James Andanson,” says John McNamara, Al Fayed’s former security chief, on the Al Fayed documentary.Al Fayed and McNamara are convinced that some of the paparazzi, and possibly the driver of the white Fiat Uno, were MI-6 agents whose mission was to stop the announcement of the forthcoming engagement.“(www.cbsnews.com) But maybe the most arguable question remains the presence of 41 years old Henri Paul as a driver. A former officer, owner of the pilot licence, in whose blood there was found from 1.74 to 1.87 grams of alcohol per litre. One of the investigators later gave an account of Henri’s drunkenness:”he was so drunk, that it must be taken our hat off to him, that he was actually able to hit the right tunnel, because he had to see several ones” 28 (Dobrovolný 82). In the article Diana:Secret Documents Revealed we can find some information that appeared during the investigation of this case: One claim that Al Fayed has made is that Paul wasn’t drunk at all that night – but that the French switched the blood samples either by accident or on purpose.. 48 Hours provided the forensic data from the French dossier to Dr. Robert Forrest, one of England’s leading forensic toxicologists, to see if he could find any evidence of a mistake or a cover-up: “This is the first time I have seen these data and it has been absolutely- fascinating,”saysForrest The dossier documents that multiple tests were conducted on blood, hair and tissue. Paul’s body was also photographed and identified by an ankle tag, #2147 – the same number listed on the samples.
28 “Byl tak opilý, že je před ním třeba smeknout, že se vůbec trefil do správného tunelu, protože jich musel vidět několik.“(translated by the author)
“There is nothing in the trail of evidence, which suggests there is any- thing funny about the way in which the samples have been taken,” says
34 Forrest, who adds he didn’t see any sign of a conspiracy.
Not only do the tests indicate three times the legal limit of alcohol in Paul’s system at the time of the accident, Forrest says, they also indicate an alarming amount of various prescription drugs: “Let me put it this way. If I knew that I was going to be driven by someone in that conditi- on, I would not get into the car with them. No way.” (http://www.cbsnews.com) Such amount of alcohol means, that he must have drunk either eight ‘snorters’ of hard al- cohol or one and a half liter of wine (Dobrovolný 82). According to safety camera record, Paul did not look like a drunker, although this record could have been rearranged. And what’s more, Dodi’s personal bodyguard Trevor Rees-Jones, who had dinner commonly with Paul, would not let him drive a car, if he was in such a state (Dobrovolný 84-86). And the opinions about Paul’s state differ again: One of the last things that Trevor Rees-Jones, the bodyguard who survi- ved the tunnel crash, remembers, is that he, too, considered Paul to be perfectly sober and fit to drive. Paul was qualified to drive the Mercedes 280-S. He had been to Germany on two occasions, taking the Daimler Benz special driving courses, which he passed with flying colors.
Friends, co-workers, and relatives universally disputed the media at- tempts to portray Paul as a sullen, depressed alcoholic: Further, Paul had gone for his annual physical exam, to qualify for renewal of his pilot's li- cense 48 hours before the crash. He not only passed the physical exam. According to the Doctor who administered the exam, there were no signs of any damage to Paul's liver, a usual sure-fire sign of alcoholism. The French autopsy report also confirmed that Paul's liver was healthy at the time of his death. (nourishingobscurity.blogspot.com, 8.4.2008)
Anyway, even if Paul was sober, in spite of the medical tests, the speed of the car was too high. So, why Dodi’d bodyguard did not order him to slow down? If he did it, just Dodi alone could upset his order, which could explain the fact, that Rees-Jones fastened his se- atbelts. For bodyguards usually are not used to do it, in case that something wrong happe- ned (Dobrovolný 86).
In Blesk magazine from 16 th June 2005 was published, which says “according to British Daily Express the investigators found out, that a week before this tragical accident in cor- version almost four million crowns were credited to Paul’s account....and that at the end of the year 2004, the former agent of British security service MI6 admitted, that Henri Paul in fact was a member of the security service, too”( The Death of Lady Di).
35 The question remains whether Paul was really given some money and whether he had any- thing in common with the security service: But the French dossier still raises questions, especially about Paul, the driver who was also chief of security for Mohamed Al Fayed’s Ritz Ho- tel. We found documents that reveal a number of significant bank depo- sits in French francs made by Paul, beginning nine months before the crash. French investigators were unable to pinpoint the exact source of the mysterious money, but the dossier reveals that they searched Paul’s home and office, interviewed his friends and associates, and analyzed his phone records. They found no evidence of a conspiracy – even though there was a theory that Paul was a security services informant (www.cbsnews.com, 8.4.2008).
Another arguable question is the fault of paparazzi: After their arrival, the police supposed that the photographers chasing the car became the direct cause of the tragical accident; they arrested seven of them and finally accused them of manslaughter and of failure to render assistance. They confiscated their cameras, but after processing film be- came apparent, that paparazzi had not taken any of the photographs befo- re the arrival at the place where the accident happened 29 ( Bradford 373). But on 8th April 2008, there was printed a photograph on the internet pages http://nourishingobscurity.blogspot.com, which demonstrates that the driver was dazzled (see appendix A5). On The Times internet pages there is released the evidence of the arrested paparazzi in the article Paparazzi questioned after the death of Diana, Princess of Wales. (see appendix A6). 29
gické nehody. Sedm z nich zatkli a posléze je obvinili z neúmyslného zabití a neposkytnutí pomoci. Zkon- fiskovali mužům fotoaparáty, ale po vyvolání filmů vyšlo najevo, že paparazziové nepořídili žádnou z foto- grafií před příjezdem na místo, kde došlo k havárii.” (translated by the author) 4.2 Cospiracy Theories Princess Diana’s letter, where she accused Charles of his intention to kill her, has become the basis of many conspiracy theories. Diana wrote it several weeks before her death.
36 On the basis of this information Mohamed Al Fayed, Dodi’s father, is persuaded that his son and Princess Diana were murdered by MI6 on the orders of the Duke of Edinburgh, Diana’s former father in law, Prince Philip. In this connection, also Prince Charles was named and was questioned by the Metropolitan Police in 2005 (www.timesonline.co.uk, en.wikipedia.org). And what’s more, Mohamed Al Fayed claims, that Diana was killed being pregnant and he considers this fact to be one of the main reasons for her murder, because the royal family would allegedly not admit to accept a Muslim as the future King’s stepbrother or stepsister. He even gave evidence in court that he is the only one who knows this information, because it was Diana herself who familiarized him with this shortly before her death (www.timesonline.co.uk, www.novinky.cz). The tabloid article The last secret of Lady Diana informed about Diana’s pregnancy, too. It said that on the official paper entitled “Assistence Publique-Hopitaux de Paris” by profes- sor Pierre Coriat, who took part in Diana’s operation, adressed to the British Home Secre- tary Jean-Pierre Chevénement was confirmed that according to the blood tests of Diana Frances Spencer and also her postmortem examination is clear that she was in the ninth or tenth week of pregnancy (Blesk,16.2.1998). But not only Mohamed Al Fayed is the source of the conspiracy theories. There has also appeared the statement by the former secret MI6 agent Richard Tomlison who gave evidence that he had seen the plans that described intentional causing of the crash in tunnel. Those were plans according to former Yugoslavian president Slobodan Milosevic should have been murdered in the one of tunnels in Geneva in 1992(www.novinky.cz).”The way MI6 is alleged to have planned to kill him in 1992, was the same way as Princess Diana died in 1997”(www.fantompowa.net). This theory could have emerged in connection with Diana’s activity as far as the abolition of land mines is concerned. But there are still some theories that seemed to be quite ab- surd:
The first Diana conspiracy site appeared on the Internet in Australia only hours after her death on August 31 st , 1997. Since then an estimated 36,000 Diana conspiracy websites have been set up – breathtaking by anyone’s standards. Hypotheses range from pure James Bond (‘it was all an MI6 plot to protect the monarchy’) to farce (‘it was fiendish murder plot thought up by the world’s florists to sell lots of flowers’). And most popular of all, Diana, Princess of Wales, isn’t dead after all – that terrible
37 car crash in Paris was an elaborate hoax to enable the Princess and her boyfriend, Dodi Fayed, to fake their own deaths so that they could live in blissful isolation for the rest of their lives (New Headway, Upper- Intermediate, Student’s Book, Oxford 2005). In the article “12 things we’ve learnt from the Diana inquest” published in The Times on March 19
th , 2008 there are answered some of the questions (see appendix A7). And finally in the article “Diana death ‘conspiracy’ thrown out by coroner” by Alan Hamilton in The Times from April 1 st ,2008 is affirmed: The decade-long conspiracy theory that Diana, Princess of Wales, and Dodi Fayed were murdered by MI6 on the orders of the Duke of Edinburgh was finally and comprehensively dismissed yesterday. In a landmark day in the six-month inquests, the coroner told the jury that there was no evidence to support claims by Mohamed Al Fayed that the couple were killed in an Establishment plot. Summing up after hearing more than 250 witnesses, Lord Justice Scott Baker said that the Harrods owner’s claims were so manifestly without foundation that even his lawyer was no longer pursuing them. The hearings had heard not a shred of evidence to support them, he added. The coroner ruled that it was not open to the jury to find that the deaths were the result of an unlawful killing by the Duke of Edinburgh or anyone else in a staged accident. Their options for verdicts were unlawful killing by the gross negligence of Henri Paul, the driver, the negligent driving of pursuing vehicles, a combination of both, accidental death, or an open verdict (www.timesonline.co.uk) 4.3 Myth or Reality? If anybody dies, there is always the tendency to present him or her to his or her best advantage. But still there was something about Diana that the reporter of Sunday Times, Christina Lamb, in the book by Brian Mac Arthur Requiem: Diana, Princess of Wales called ‘aura’. She accompanied Diana during their journey in Angola with the Red Cross organization, where they were attending the patients who were suffering from very serious injuries because of land mines: But Diana never turned her head away. Actualy, she was surrounded by something that I had seen about Nelson Mandela before – a kind of aura, thanks to one people wanted to be with her. She had entirely sincere gift, the ability coming from heart: she managed to bring the will to the people who, from our point of view, were left just a few reasons for living
30 (Bradford 341-342).
38 Sometimes there were some doubts and speculations about Diana’s behaviour in public, especially when the media were present. Now here is the tangible evidence of her sincere attitude and empathy.”What this lady was performing, was not determined just for cameras” says Christina Lamb and remembers the situation, when, while attending another hospital and at the time when all the photographers had already left for their air- conditioned hotel rooms, she was watching Diana who did not notice at all if somebody connected with newspaper was present. Diana was sitting by the small girl who had suffered serious injury of digestive tract.”She was sitting by her the lifetime. When Diana finally left, this small girl suffering from acute pain, asked me if that beautiful lady had been an angel”(Bradford 343). Maybe the reason for Diana’s empathy and sympathetic feeling was her experience when she, just six years old, took care of her three-year-old brother at the time when their mother was forced to leave them and the children stayed by their father. Andrew Morton describes one of the saddest Diana’s experiences: Diana Spencer sat quietly at the bottom of the cold stone stairs at her Norfolk home, clutching the wrought-iron banisters while all around her there was a determined bustle. She could hear her father loading suitcases into the boot of a car, then Frances, her mother, crunching across the gravel forecourt, the clunk of the car door being shut and the sound of a car engine starting up and then slowly fading as her mother drove through the gates of Park House and out of her life. Diana was six years old (Diana: Her True Story 9). According to the fact that Diana was able to revive her feelings after twenty-five years this experience really could influence the whole her life, the same as her feeling of a ‘spare child’:”I was supposed to be a boy” (Diana qtd. in Morton 9) she formulated her parents’ 30
“Ale Diana nikdy neodvrátila hlavu. Vlastně ji obklopovalo něco, co jsem před tím viděla jen u Nelsona Mandely – jakási aura, díky níž s ní lidé chlěli být. Měla naprosto přirozený dar, schopnost pramenící od srdce: dokázala přinášet naději lidem, kterým z našeho pohledu zbývalo jen málo důvodů k žití.“(translated by the author)
dissapointment. But also she held herself responsible for her mother’s leaving them. An- drew Morton explains:“Diana certainly caught the pitch of the family’s frustration, and, believing that she was ‘a nuisance,‘ she accepted a corresponding load of guilt and failure for disappointing her parents and family, feeling she has now learned to accept and reco- gnize“ (Diana: Her True Story 10).
39 In Diana: Her True Story Morton also remembers Diana’s sad experience that she had to go through quite often at that time: Every night as she lay in her bed, surrounded by her cuddly toys, she could hear her brother sobbing, crying for his mother. Sometimes she went to him, sometimes her fear of the dark overcame her maternal in- stincts and she stayed in her room listening as Charles wailed:‘I want my mummy, I want my mummy.‘Then she too would bury her head in the pillow and weep.‘I just couldn’t bear it,‘ she recalls.‘I could never pluck up enough courage to get out of bed. I remember it to this day‘(Diana qtd. in Morton 19).
The behaviour of her parents has contributed to Diana’s behaviour to a large extent. Maybe that is why she was also supercilious, crafty and deceitful. There must have been reason for her nickname “Duchess”. It was her mother’s husband, Peter Shand Kydd who christianed Diana this nickname for the first time. It was for her sometimes patronizing attitude (Bradford 36). Later her brother Charles confirmed that Diana as a child had propensity for lying (Bradford 28). During her adulthood this characteristics emerged in the situation when she insisted that she had nothing in common with Morton’s book. In this case she even betrayed her brother in law, Sir Robert Fellowes’s, trust, which disappointed him and his wife, Diana’s sister Jane, because as a consequence of it he exposed himself to ridicule in front of his colleagues and superiors (Bradford 231). Both parents were so traumatized by a sense of guilt that they were used to spoil their chil- dren and they did not guide them at all. It was especially Diana who has managed to take advantage of it and has learned to manipulate with people (Bradford 33). In the book by Mary Clarke Little girl lost: The Troubled Childhood of Princess Diana by the Woman who Raised Her the author, who took care of small Diana and her younger bro- ther describes the situation when Diana refused to visit Prince Andrew and Edward in San- dringham:“She asserted that she had a headache and by summoning up an unbending will, that was characteristic of her, she braved all father’s attempts to persuade her“ 31
(Bradford 35). Similar incidents happened also later, when she treated her husband the same way (Bradford 35). While in Diana we can learn how friendly and close relationship with Charles’s main personal secretary Edward Adeane as well as with the others Diana had (Bradford 93), Nicholas Davies described relationship between Diana and Charles’s employees in a com- pletely different way. According to Davies she was able to get rid of the Charles’s most
40 efficient people (Davis 98-113). The interesting thing is that all these people stayed de- voted to her (Bradford 304). And to introduce more Diana’s character features, Davies describes the situation where Diana used vulgar invectives that she cried at Charles from a balcony using a scurrilous language. The reason was his hunting that Diana hated. Charles’s parents were just waiting for him and he wished Diana to follow him. But she, already pregnant, desperately wanted him to stay with her (Diana.A Princess and Her Troubled Marriage 90-95). This information does not correspond with Diana’s state- ment:”I remember that I did not want to do anything my own way. Everything was terrify- ing me. So I did it like Charles did” 32 (Bradford 93). More likely seems her father’s reac- tion that Diana always does everything her way (Davies 113). According to the “balcony scene” and some of Prince Charles’s close employees’ state- ment Diana seems to have been an unbalanced person. On the other hand, as far as her re- lationship to her sons and the way she guided them, as well as her foresight and ability to prepare William for the role of King are considered, she looks like an unbelievably bright and reasonable woman. Diana’s former employee, Meredith Ethering-Smith, in the interview with the author in the book Diana is admiring Diana’s circumspection and is pointing out that it does not happen too often so that accidentaly taken William’s Photo- graphs appeared somewhere. This is because his friends do not betray him, just
31 “Tvrdila, že ji bolí hlava, a s vynaložením velice silné vůle, která pro ni byla charakteristická, vzdorovala všem otcovým pokusům přemluvit ji.” (translated by the author) 32
“Vzpomínám si, že jsem nechtěla dělat vůbec nic podle svého. Všechno mě hrozně děsilo. Tak jsem to dělala jako Charles.“ (translated by author)
according to Diana’s opinion:”I think their friends will guard them as well. They will grow up together and guard each other” 33 (Diana qtd. in Bradford 347).
41
33
“Myslím, že je přátelé budou taky chránit. Budou spolu vyrůstat a navzájem se ochraňovat.“ (transtated by the author)
42 CONCLUSION Without any doubt, Diana was a controversial and unbalanced figure. Only though we ad- mit that from her twenty she was under such a pressure that hardly anybody can imagine her situation, nothing can be changed about this fact. On the other hand, her post enabled her to choose from different possibilities. Fortunately, she, thanks to her strong empathy and sympathy for those in need, was able to guide her activities the right way, there, where her help was needed the most. Also, the way she prepared her son for his future King’s role and how she ‘humanized’ the Royal Family in front of public is the undenia- ble contribution, for the Royal Family as well. And when we add the fact that thanks to media people considered her almost a member of their families with her pros and cons, no wonder all these are satisfactory reasons for worshipping her as an icon. Unfortunately, because of her husband’s character, Diana’s worshipping became counter-productive. The question whether her worse character traits emerged not being treated badly, still remains unanswered. According to the available sources, Diana’s problems with bulimia ended, when she felt comfortably in her relationship with Dodi. This thesis has also followed in- vestigations relevant to clarification of the cause of Diana’s death and also some conspira- cy theories. Although, there are many questionable affairs and unnamed witnesses as well as lies connected with this case, the car crash was officially judged as a banal one. Not all sources are reliable. Sarah Bradford with its many references and Nicholas Davies have been worthwhile for my exploration into Diana’s life for their extensiveness and ob- jectivity, Marek Dobrovolný has come with some interesting details and facts connected with Diana’s death, Daniel Stern, a journalist, describes Diana’s life and especially some details about her death in a simple but truthful way. Also Andrew Morton’s books seem to try introduce Diana’s life as objectively as possible, nevertheles, he will be still criticized for not being objective enough, because his books (Diana: Her True Story and Diana: Her New Life) are written on the basis of the interview with Diana’s close friends and after her death he himself admitted his cooperation with Diana. Of course, in all these mentioned books are several differencies. But in most cases these ones happened because of different year of publishing the books and so some new information emerged meanwhile. In the Acknowledgments of the book Diana: Her True Story Andrew Morton explains that the ‘eternal problem‘ that royal writers have to face is ‘that of authenticity’:
43 How to convince the world of the truth of your account and the veracity of your sources when so many interviews are conducted on a confidential basis. The opposite problem afflicts those chosen by Buckingham Palace to write authorized stories of royal lives. While they have access to offi- cial archives, influential friends and members of the royal Household there is always, in the public mind, the lingering suspicion that even though they are being served the truth it is not necessarily the whole tru- th.(vii)
But this explaining can not apologize the uncomparably untrustworthy book by Odile and Philippe Verdier, which is more like the novel of very low standard and some of the facts there are completely confusing. At the very beginning of this thesis there are mentioned the survey results from 1992, which are connected with the monarchy. Ten years later, in 2002, survey results prepared for Sunday Times, which differ from the previous ones, appeared on internet pages (see appendix A8).
44 BIBLIOGRAPHY
[1] Bradford, Sarah. Diana. Praha [Prague]: BB/art, 2007. [2] Davies, Nicholas. Diana: Princezna a její manželské maléry. [Diana: A Princess and Her Troubled Marriage]. Praha [Prague]: Premiéra, 1992. [3] Dobrovolný, Marek. Smrt princezny a krále. [The Death of Princess and King]. Pra- ha [Prague]: Duel, 1997. [4] Morton, Andrew. Diana: Diana: Her True Story. London: Michael O´Mara, 1992. [5] Morton, Andrew. Diana: Její nový život. [Diana: Her New Life]. London: Michael O´Mara, 1994. [6] Stern, Daniel. Proč zemřela Diana. [Why Diana Died]. Praha [Prague]: Knihcent- rum, 1997. [7] Verdier, Odile,and Philippe. Diana a Dodi: Osudová setkání. [Lady Di et Dodi – Destins croisés]. Plzeň [Pilsen]: Nava, 1998. [8] Hrom “Dianini muži” [”Diana’s Men”] Sep. 1997: 12-13 [9] Blesk. “Poslední tajemství lady Diany” [“Lady Diana’s Last Mystery”] Feb. 1998: 1 [10] Blesk. “Smrt Lady Di” [“Lady Di’s Death”] Jun. 2005: 16 [11] Soars, Liz, and John.New Headway, Upper-Intermediate/Student´s Book. “The World’s Top Conspiracy Theories”. Oxford: 2005:39 [12] Chua – Eoan, Howard.: “ The Saddest Fairy Tale.” Ten Years On: Why Diana Mat- tered. Oct 2007 < http://www.time.com/time/daily/special/diana/ > [13] “ Diana: Secret Documents Revealed“. Mar 2008
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