Earl Spencer posts tribute to his late mother and wishes her a happy 'heavenly' birthday – and shares photo of Princess Diana at her christening
Earl Spencer has paid an emotional tribute to his late mother on what would have been her 88th birthday.
Spencer, 59, who lives on the family estate Althorp in Northamptonshire, shared on Instagram yesterday a selection of newspaper cuttings about his mother, Frances Shand Kydd, who died in 2004.
The memory box full of photos also includes an article announcing the birth of the late Princess Diana, Charles' younger sister.
One of the photos, captioned 'Lord and Lady Althorp's third daughter baptized', showed the Prince of Wales' mother, 42, and the Duke of Sussex, 39, as newborns.
Diana is wrapped in a white blanket as her parents look down on her proudly.
Earl Spencer (pictured) shared a selection of photos yesterday to mark his late mother's 88th birthday
Princess Diana is photographed on the day of her baptism with her mother and father in the memory box (photo above left)
Earl Spencer, who still lives at the family home of Althorp in Northamptonshire, shared the photo of his late sister, who died in a car crash in Paris in 1997 aged 36.
Charles captioned the post: “It is with love and gratitude that I remember my mother on what would have been her 88th birthday.”
Hundreds flocked to the comments section to support Charles and wish his mother a happy 'heavenly birthday'.
Frances Shand Kydd married the 8th Earl of Spencer in 1954 at the age of 18 before divorcing in 1969.
In 1968, Frances lost a custody battle over Diana, Charles and their sisters Jane and Sarah and tried to regain custody of Johnnie Spencer in 1971, but lost again.
Diana's mother went to live with her new husband in Scotland after losing her first custody battle for her children, in which she was referred to as 'the bolter'.
Diana and her mother had a rocky relationship and did not speak to each other before she died in 1997.
In his Instagram stories, Earl Spencer also posted a photo of himself with his older sister Lady Elizabeth Sarah Lavinia McCorquodale
It comes after the announcement that Princess Diana's brother will open up about the 'trauma' of being sent to boarding school at the age of eight in his long-awaited memoir – which has been cited by several media outlets as something to watch in 2024 .
Earl Spencer will talk about the 'culture of cruelty' he experienced at Maidwell Hall, a preparatory school in Northampton, and provide 'important insights into an outdated boarding school system' in A Very Private School, out in March.
The guard has put it on a list of 'non-fiction to watch out for' this year – alongside titles such as Salman Rushdie's Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder – to add to the 'now many literary indictments of boarding school'.
It is also listed as one of the 'best' picks for this year The independentand presented as an expected memoir of the BBC.
The Financial times recommended it in their article on what to read in 2024.
According to Gallery Books – an imprint of publisher Simon & Schuster – Charles presents 'a candid reckoning with his past and a reclamation of his youth'.
A message to them Instagram added in October: 'A Very Private School provides a lucid, first-hand account of a culture of cruelty at the school Charles Spencer attended in his youth and offers important insights into an outdated boarding school system.'
Charles left for boarding school at the age of eight and had six months of sleepless nights before attending Maidwell Hall, where pupils deemed stupid or lazy were spanked on their bare bottoms with a stick in a “really unpleasant” manner.
Princess Diana's brother will open up about the 'trauma' of being sent to boarding school at the age of eight in his long-awaited memoir, which has been cited by several media outlets as something to watch in 2024
“I said I wanted to go to a state school because it was preferable to thirteen weeks blocks away in a rather cold and unpleasant place,” he told TES magazine.
“To be completely honest, I think teachers, given my background, had absolutely no expectations of me,” he said.
'They thought I would be fine in life anyway. I was lucky enough to float through it.”
But the school's former principal John Paul has previously suggested that Earl Spencer may have exaggerated how bad his time there was.
“He has been in constant contact with the school since then, so I don't think he could have been that unhappy,” Mr Paul said in 1992.
And it seems that Charles's experiences at Maidwell Hall would stay with him decades later.
“Fifty years ago tonight I spent my first night without my family,” he wrote in a post X in 2022.
'I was eight and was sent to boarding school. It was part of a family tradition. September 12, 1972 has stuck with me ever since.
'I have seven children. None of them were forced to go to boarding school.”
Instead of going to public school, Charles attended Eton College, where his sister Diana married Prince Charles at the age of 20.
He was subsequently offered a place at Magdalen College, Oxford to study modern history, but admitted that he spent very little time on his studies.