Queen molested by man on train as a schoolgirl
The Queen revealed she retaliated with a vengeance when she was attacked by a man on a train as a teenager, according to a new book by a royal correspondent.
Source: The Royal Family
The Queen once told former British PM Boris Johnson she was attacked by a man on a train as a teenager, an upcoming royal book reveals.
She told Johnson, who was then mayor London, that she had used her shoe to hit a man who tried to touch her on a train, according to the book, titled Power And The Palace.
The author, former Times royal correspondent Valentine Low, spoke to Johnson’s former communications director Guto Harri, who recalled Johnson telling him about the meeting at Clarence House in about 2008.
In an extract published in the Sunday Times, Harri revealed a conversation between the then Duchess of Cornwall and Johnson, about an assault that occurred when she was a schoolgirl.
“She was on a train going to Paddington – she was about 16, 17 – and some guy was moving his hand further and further,” he said.
Harri said Johnson asked what she did next.
“I did what my mother taught me to. I took off my shoe and whacked him in the nuts with the heel,” the Queen said.
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“She was self-possessed enough when they arrived at Paddington to jump off the train, find a guy in uniform and say, ‘That man just attacked me’, and he was arrested.”
The Queen, now 78, has long campaigned against domestic violence and sexual abuse and has dedicated her royal charity work to supporting victims of sexual assault.
A royal insider told The Daily Mail that the Queen, who married the then Prince of Wales in 2005 — was open about the alleged assault to those closest to her because she believed it was good if “her own experience helps other women”.
But she otherwise felt the incident “simply happened a very long time ago” and had “always taken the view that other women’s stories are much more important than her own”.
Power And The Palace is released on September 11.
Harry’s British visit
It comes amid reports the King and his estranged son Prince Harry are poised to meet for the first time in almost two years.
The Duke of Sussex, 40, will be in London next week for a charity event that coincides with the third anniversary of Queen Elizabeth II’s death.
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The news has sparked hopes that Harry will take the opportunity to reconcile with his 76-year-old father.
The Daily Mirror reports that recent discussions between Buckingham Palace officials and Harry’s team had raised hopes of a private meeting.
“Nobody is pretending the wider family issues have been resolved, but this is about beginning with Charles and Harry,” a US source said.
“For the first time in a long time, there’s a genuine sense that reconciliation is within reach.
“Prince Harry’s team and the palace have opened a line of communication, and there is every hope that father and son will see one another in September.
“After months apart, and with the King continuing his treatment, the feeling is that the time is right to take that step.”
The source said the encounter was likely to be “a simple face-to-face conversation between a father and a son”, rather than “a grand gesture or set-piece meeting”.
However, the Mirror said a reconciliation between Harry and his brother Prince William appeared unlikely. Another source told the Mirror the idea of the Prince of Wales, 43, reuniting with his younger brother had been “rejected out of hand”.
Harry’s wife Meghan Markle is expected to remain in California with the couple’s children, Archie, six, and Lilibet, four.
In May, Harry said he would “love a reconciliation”, explaining that he did not know “how much longer my father has”.
Despite that appeal, contact between the pair has remained limited.
In July, Harry and Meghan’s communications chief Meredith Maines met the King’s press secretary, Tobyn Andreae, at the Royal Over-Seas League in London – a short walk from Clarence House, the King’s London home.
Insiders described the meeting as the strongest sign yet of determination to ease the family feud.
-with AAP
