Princess Eugenie and husband Jack Brooksbank are marking their sixth wedding anniversary today.
This year marks their ‘iron’ anniversary, and Metro spoke to leading royal expert Duncan Larcombe about how the couple have changed in the last six years.
Since tying the knot, they’ve welcomed two sons – August and Ernest – and as two working adults, they split their time between Portugal and the UK.
Throughout their six years of marriage, however, much of it has been ‘overshadowed’ by her father Prince Andrew’s tumultuous association with Jeffrey Epstein.
Duncan told Metro: ‘Jack has had to be a support to her throughout that period.’
Six years of marriage is often referred to as the ‘iron’ anniversary, and it seems that Eugenie and Jack’s union has been truly moulded through fire.
Prince Andrew was first drawn into the Epstein drama in 2015, when he was named in a US civil case filed against Epstein.
In 2019 – a year after Eugenie’s marriage – Prince Andrew did his infamous BBC Newsnight interview.
‘It’s been a difficult time for Eugenie and her sister Beatrice, because they’ve had to see their father dragged through the mud,’ Duncan added.
‘It has been one of the worst sort of royal scandals for years, if not ever. I think it’s probably drawn Jack and Eugenie closer together.
‘Eugenie really has had to lean on Jack for support throughout that period.’
Jack and Eugenie, who share two children, have been increasingly present in high profile royal events in the last six years since the departure of Prince Harry and Meghan – and Prince Andrew’s withdrawal from public life.
‘Eugenie has become a sort of staple character of big royal events. The Queen’s Jubilee and obviously then the Queen’s funeral, then King Charles’ Coronation. She’s certainly visible at these big royal events.
‘But at the same time, she’s a private person and I as a mother and wife, she seems keen to keep that the way it is.’
Duncan added that there have been ‘increasing’ calls for Eugenie and her sister Beatrice to carry out more official engagements due to the ‘strain’ the royal diary is under.
But that’s not likely to happen, he said.
‘I think Eugenie and Jack are going to try and bring up their children away from the limelight,’ he observed.
‘And I think the best way of doing that is for them to continue in the way they are – just living their life and not being part of official royal engagements too often.’
Last week, Princess Eugenie’s sister Princess Beatrice, 36, and husband Edoardo Mapelli Mozzi, 40, announced they are expecting a second baby.
The King was informed and both families are ‘delighted’, the Palace said on Tuesday.
The happy news comes during one of the royal family’s most personally challenging years, with the King, the Princess of Wales and Beatrice’s mother Sarah, Duchess of York all being diagnosed with cancer.
Sarah was treated for malignant melanoma skin cancer in January, just months after undergoing a mastectomy for breast cancer, but Beatrice said in May the duchess had been given the ‘all clear’.
Beatrice is the eldest daughter of the Duke of York and his ex-wife Sarah, and the new baby will be the Yorks’ fourth grandchild.
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