Nazis, affair babies, and a marriage doomed to end on a Tudor chopping block. Not all royal
couples get to have their happily ever after… at least not without a few public outcries.
While the actual wedding of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle,
the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, may have been picture perfect, it wasn't without drama.
Let's start way back at the beginning. When Harry introduced Meghan onto the royal scene,
there was a hefty amount of backlash. She was an American divorcée, an already problematic
combination for the royal family. But she was also mixed race, and the media frenzy and
backlash — which was mostly rooted in blatant racism — was immense and all-encompassing.
As far as the actual wedding itself, a ton of drama and controversy surrounded Meghan's
extended family members and their involvement on the day. Her father,
Thomas Markle, famously fumbled the wedding plans as he staged paparazzi photos. Thomas
ultimately claimed that he would not attend the wedding due to a then-recent heart attack,
The Washington Post notes, but the public damage to the couple was already done.
King Charles III's 2005 wedding to Camilla Parker Bowles, now Queen Consort Camilla, was a long time
coming. He and Camilla had been in each other's lives — platonically and romantically — since the
1970s, and while many Britons didn't love the idea of their union, the couple finally tied
the knot. Of course, in expected royal flair, the day didn't come and go without some controversy.
First and foremost, Charles and Camilla didn't have a grand ceremony in Westminster Abbey the
likes that we've seen for other royal couples. Instead, they had a civil ceremony at Windsor and
a blessing from the Archbishop of Canterbury at St. George's Chapel. Furthermore, Queen
Elizabeth II made it clear that she would not be attending the second wedding of her eldest son,
insisting that her role as head of the Church of England had to come first. Of course, it wasn't
the best look for the day, especially given Camilla's sordid history with the royal family.
To make matters worse, the public was firmly against Charles and Camilla's union. Penny
Junor wrote in "The Firm: The Troubled Life of the House of Windsor" that she received
emails from Britons ahead of the wedding, expressing their disgust at the union.
Prince Albert and Princess Charlene of Monaco's seemingly "happy" day
and the lead up to it was fraught with controversy. As noted by Now To Love,
many had their suspicions about the royal couple before they tied the knot thanks to
their two-decade age gap, but that was far down the list of troubles they faced. As it turns out,
Albert had a child — the result of an affair — who was conceived while he was in
a relationship with Charlene. Albert already had two other children from prior affairs,
so while the news wasn't entirely unexpected, it likely shook the bride off her feet.
Then came the day in question. Charlene was seen wiping tears
from her face during the ceremony. She shut down any naysayers, however,
by saying that her tears were the result of being overwhelmed. She told The Times:
Falling in love with Peter Townsend as a young woman,
Princess Margaret found herself at an incredibly difficult crossroads — she could not marry the
then-divorced Townsend due to her status as a royal, and she ultimately put the crown
above her own happiness. Margaret went on to marry Antony Armstrong-Jones — known as
Lord Snowdon — and yet her second attempt at love was not entirely fruitful either.
As noted by People, Margaret and Armstrong-Jones met at a party in
the late 1950s, and kept the truth about their romantic relationship under wraps practically
up until their February 1960 engagement. Just three months later, they got married,
but the whirlwind surrounding their wedding and early marriage was not
cloaked in positivity. Christoper Warwick, Princess Margaret's biographer, told People:
But, like many royal couples who would follow them, Margaret and Armstrong-Jones pulled the
plug on their marriage, bringing an element of shame to the royals and
the crown's image as a whole. Former BBC royal correspondent Jennie Bond explained:
"She did tarnish the reputation of the royal family, by her lifestyle,
by her broken marriages, by bringing divorce into the fold."
At the height of her success, actor Grace Kelly was synonymous with style, grace, and that old
Hollywood glam — the only way she could top her reputation was by becoming a princess, so
that's what she did. As noted by the Independent, Kelly packed 80 suitcases and started her life as
a royal in 1956 after marrying Monaco's Prince Rainier III. Having met the prince while filming
"To Catch A Thief" in the French Riviera, Kelly admitted that her previous relationships hadn't
been fruitful — maybe a prince would change all that. She said of her romantic life:
While the wedding should have marked the start of a new chapter for Kelly,
celebrity biographer Wendy Leigh attested that life in Monaco — and with the prince — was not
at all what the actor had envisioned. Rainier, it's said, had "taken at least three mistresses"
in the months that followed the wedding, leaving Kelly "humiliated." According to Leigh:
Kelly tragically died at the age of 52 after sustaining a car crash,
the conspiracy of which is still alive to this day.
It was Queen Elizabeth II's uncle, King Edward VIII, who was the direct heir to the British
throne and originally took the crown in 1936 — with a great amount of hesitation. As it happened,
Edward was in love with Wallis Simpson, an American two-time divorcée, but the confines
of his role did not permit the two to marry. Determined to spend his life with Simpson,
Edward abdicated the throne the same year that he took it, causing a tailspin of
royal drama and the eventual crowning of Elizabeth's father, King George VI. Not
only did this coupling completely throw the monarchy off its prescribed path,
but it clearly displayed to the British people that Edward's own desires would come first.
Edward was prepared to give up the throne for the love of his life, telling the prime minister and
his mother, Queen Mary, of his intentions. His family unsurprisingly told him that
pursuing such a relationship and marriage was a fruitless venture, but Edward maintained that
he could not stay on the throne without Wallis in his life. The couple got married in 1937,
tying the knot in a very intimate ceremony. None of the royal family members, however, were in
attendance. The course of the modern monarchy was forever changed by Edward's singular decision.
The Netherlands' Queen Beatrix first met Prince Claus at a dinner party
before later crossing paths at a royal wedding in 1964. A ski trip followed,
as did a blooming romance between the two. Sounds innocent, right? Wrong.
As it turned out, Claus had been a member of the Hitler Youth and was a soldier for Germany during
World War II, as noted by The Guardian. Given that it was the 1960s and the memories of the
war were still fresh for many Europeans, Beatrix and Claus' romance was met with vitriol as soon
as it began. The Dutch people were adamant that their future queen not marry a former member of
the German army — a petition in protest of the marriage garnered 300,000 signatures.
When Beatrix and Claus got married in Amsterdam in 1966, a smoke bomb was thrown at the royal coach.
This is the controversial royal wedding that started the controversial royal wedding trend,
and we're talking about none other than King Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn. For this story,
we have to go all the way back to 1509, when Henry was happily doing his thing as monarch,
and observing Catholicism while doing so. He was already married to Catherine of Aragon,
but, as luck would have it, Henry fell for his mistress, Anne, and decided that he wanted to
divorce Catherine. Unfortunately, divorce is not allowed within the Catholic religion,
but Henry was set on marrying Anne. So what did he do? He started his own religion,
of course. Thus, the Church of England was born, and Henry married Anne.
Royal Central notes that this entire episode spanned a five
year period of "religious revolution and ... international controversy." And, of course,
the drama between Henry and Anne wasn't over. Suspicious of Anne's fidelity to him, Henry had
her beheaded in classic medieval fashion. He was married another four times throughout his life.