This Female Royal ‘Has Always Been The Achiever’ And It’s Not Kate Middleton Nor Meghan Markle
A female royal has gained King Charles' "trust" amid Kate Middleton and Meghan Markle's absence.
The slimmer British monarchy has very few active working members amid King Charles and Middleton's cancer battles four years after Prince Harry and Markle quit their royal duties. However, a female member of the family has reportedly worked her way up in the ranks of the firm. The royal member has also been dubbed Queen Elizabeth's "favorite" royal, and she's no other than -- Prince Edward's wife, Sophie, 59.
"[The Duchess of Edinburgh] is down to earth, which is pivotal, but without attracting adverse publicity," Richard Fitzwilliams, a British PR consultant and royal commentator, told the Daily Mail's FEMAIL.
"It is Sophie who has been the achiever. In recent years she has visited Kosovo, South Sudan, Iraq and Ukraine as well as the Democratic Republic of the Congo and other African countries meeting victims of gender-based sexual violence. Sophie is active on the ground in this area, as shown in her visit to Sierra Leone in 2020, which is an excellent example of what working members of the royal family can achieve."
Fitzwilliams also described the Duchess of Edinburgh as "cheerful, dedicated and attentive.'" He added that the Countess of Wessex was very different from "self-obsessed" Markle, as the former would prefer to "get on with it."
"Sophie was famously a confidante of the late Queen, and King Charles knows he can trust her implicitly," Fitzwilliams continued. "Her temperament is very different to Meghan's. The latter, though not without talent, is self-obsessed and reportedly temperamental. "
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He also made a comparison between Prince Harry's wife and aunt-in-law. According to the royal commentator, Sophie is associated with dozens of patronages. Additionally, the Edinburghs do not seek attention.
"Sophie is attached to nearly 70 organisations. Meghan only had a few patronages, Harry had a few more, [and] they chose to give them up to make a new life elsewhere," he continued.
"Sophie and Edward do not seek publicity or praise. Like Princess Anne, they get on with it, are trusted, do a lot of good and not just for themselves, as the Sussexes do often appear to do."
Gyles Brandreth, a British broadcaster, TV presenter, writer and former Parliament of the United Kingdom member, appeared on the "Palace Confidential" podcast in 2022. He claimed that the late Queen Elizabeth offered Markle a mentor in the person of Sophie, so she would be successful in her marriage and new role, but the former actress reportedly declined.
"I think she suggested to her that Sophie Wessex, who certainly was a favourite with her, and had been through it because she had married into the royal family, and married Prince Edward, might help her, be a sort of mentor," Brandreth said.
"I don't think Meghan was interested in that. She felt she had Harry, she didn't need to be offered a mentor... The Queen was very keen at first."
Among Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip's four children -- King Charles, Princess Anne, Prince Andrew, and Prince Edward -- only the Duke of Edinburgh is not a divorcee. The Duke and Duchess of Edinburgh celebrated their 25th wedding anniversary last month. Jennie Bond, a former royal correspondent for the BBC, believed among the secrets to their successful marriage were the years they spent together before they married. Both were also reportedly "mature enough to know that they were right for one another" when they decided to tie the knot.
"Perhaps part of the secret of their successful marriage is that they spent five years in a relationship before tying the knot. And that was pretty unusual at the time," Jennie told OK!. "Sophie had seen at first hand the trauma of the Diana years, the breakdown of Charles and Diana's marriage, the Yorks' divorce and Anne's divorce and second marriage."
