“I knew that without the escort she would die.” To say it is Ken Wharfe, today 77 years old, former bodyguard of the princess Dianainterviewed by the British broadcaster Channel 5 in the documentary “Diana: The Princess and the Bodyguard”. A story that brings to the center a knot that has never been completely resolved: Lady Diana’s security in the last years of her life. Wharfe entered the service of the royal family in 1986. Initially his role was to look after the little princes William e Harrywho were four and two years old respectively at the time. “Within a year,” he says, his relationship with Diana became so solid that he carried it to become his personal bodyguard, taking over from Graham Smith, who was forced to leave the role due to terminal cancer.
In the most delicate years of Charles and Diana’s marriage, Wharfe remained a constant presence. When the Princes of Wales officially announced their separation in 1992, he was still at her side, witness to her daily difficulties and fears. However, 1993 marked a turning point: a period of tension and conflict that led Diana to give up escorting and, shortly afterwards, to publicly announce her retirement from official life during a speech at the Headway charity.
According to Wharfe, behind that decision there was above all a strong need for freedom. A desire that often collided with safety rules. He recounts an episode that occurred in March 1993, during a holiday in Lech, Austria, one of the princess’s favorite ski resorts: “It was an early morning, around half past six,” he recalls. “I was woken up by the night security guard, who in an embarrassed tone told me that Diana had just returned to the hotel. To my great amazement, I realized that she had jumped off the first floor balcony, which was about six meters high.”
Another episode, equally emblematic, occurred in Kensington High Street. Diana decided to get out of the car and go shopping alone, without protection. The next day Wharfe resigned: “It was a difficult decision,” he explains. “I felt sorry because I liked the work I did with her.” But, he adds, at that point he knew he could no longer guarantee his safety. “Almost overnight Diana found herself without a protection officer. It was a fatal mistake,” she says today without hesitation. Hence his judgment on the night of August 31, 1997, when the princess died in a car accident in the Alma tunnel in Paris. “When I found out I was completely amazed,” he says. “I have analyzed the security failures of that night many timesand, which were numerous. It was very difficult for me to accept the failure of the security team. He died tragically when he really shouldn’t have.” According to Wharfe, some steps could have changed the course of events: “If the driver had left the hotel escorted by the police and the paparazzi had been identified before departure, Diana would not have died that night“.
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