Relationships and marriages
In his youth, Charles was romantically linked to several women. His girlfriends included Georgiana Russell, the daughter of Sir John Russell, who was the British ambassador to Spain; Lady Jane Wellesley; Davina Sheffield; Lady Sarah Spencer; and Camilla Shand, who later became his second wife.
Charles's great-uncle Lord Mountbatten advised him to "sow his wild oats and have as many affairs as he can before settling down", but, for a wife, he "should choose a suitable, attractive, and sweet-charactered girl before she has met anyone else she might fall for ... It is disturbing for women to have experiences if they have to remain on a pedestal after marriage". Early in 1974, Mountbatten began corresponding with 25-year-old Charles about a potential marriage to his granddaughter, Amanda Knatchbull. Charles wrote to Amanda's mother, Lady Brabourne, who was also his godmother, expressing interest in her daughter. Lady Brabourne replied approvingly, but suggested that a courtship with a 16-year-old was premature.
Four years later, Mountbatten arranged for Amanda and himself to accompany Charles on his 1980 visit to India. Both fathers, however, objected: Prince Philip feared that his famous uncle would eclipse Charles, while Lord Brabourne warned that a joint visit would concentrate media attention on the cousins before they could decide whether to become a couple.
In August 1979, before Charles was due to depart alone for India, Mountbatten was assassinated by the Provisional Irish Republican Army. When Charles returned, he proposed to Amanda. But in addition to her grandfather, she had lost her paternal grandmother and younger brother in the bomb attack, and was now reluctant to join the royal family.
Charles first met Lady Diana Spencer in 1977, while he was visiting her home, Althorp. He was then the companion of her elder sister Sarah and did not consider Diana romantically until mid-1980. While Charles and Diana were sitting together on a bale of hay at a friend's barbecue in July, she mentioned that he had looked forlorn and in need of care at the funeral of Lord Mountbatten. Soon, according to Dimbleby, "without any apparent surge in feeling, he began to think seriously of her as a potential bride" and she accompanied him on visits to Balmoral Castle and Sandringham House.
Charles's cousin Norton Knatchbull and his wife told Charles that Diana appeared awestruck by his position and that he did not seem to be in love with her. Meanwhile, the couple's continuing courtship attracted intense attention from the press and paparazzi. When Charles's father told him that the media speculation would injure Diana's reputation if Charles did not come to a decision about marrying her soon, and realising that she was a suitable royal bride (according to Mountbatten's criteria), Charles construed his father's advice as a warning to proceed without further delay. He proposed to Diana in February 1981, with their engagement becoming official on 24 February; the wedding took place at St Paul's Cathedral on 29 July. Upon his marriage, Charles reduced his voluntary tax contribution from the profits of the Duchy of Cornwall from 50 per cent to 25 per cent. The couple lived at Kensington Palace and Highgrove House, near Tetbury, and had two children: William, in 1982, and Harry, in 1984. As of 2025, Charles has an estranged relationship with his son Harry, who relinquished his royal family obligations and moved to the United States in 2020.
Within five years, the marriage was in trouble due to the couple's incompatibility and near 13-year age difference. In 1986 Charles had fully resumed his affair with former girlfriend, Camilla Parker Bowles. In a video tape recorded by Peter Settelen in 1992, Diana admitted that, from 1985 to 1986, she had been "deeply in love with someone who worked in this environment." It was assumed that she was referring to Barry Mannakee, who had been transferred to the Diplomatic Protection Squad in 1986, after his managers determined his relationship with Diana had been inappropriate. Diana later commenced a relationship with Major James Hewitt, the family's former riding instructor.
Charles and Diana's evident discomfort in each other's company led to them being dubbed "The Glums" by the press. Diana exposed Charles's affair with Parker Bowles in a book by Andrew Morton, Diana: Her True Story. Audio tapes of her own extramarital flirtations also surfaced, as did persistent suggestions that Hewitt is Prince Harry's father, based on a physical similarity between Hewitt and Harry. However, Harry had already been born by the time Diana's affair with Hewitt began.
In December 1992, the British prime minister, John Major, announced the couple's legal separation in the House of Commons. Early the following year, the British press published transcripts of a passionate, bugged telephone conversation between Charles and Parker Bowles that had taken place in 1989, which was dubbed "Tampongate" and "Camillagate". Charles subsequently sought public understanding in a television film with Dimbleby, Charles: The Private Man, the Public Role, broadcast in June 1994. In an interview in the film, Charles confirmed his own extramarital affair with Parker Bowles, saying that he had rekindled their association in 1986, only after his marriage to Diana had "irretrievably broken down". This was followed by Diana's own admission of marital troubles in an interview with journalist Martin Bashir on the BBC current affairs programme Panorama, broadcast in November 1995. Referring to Charles's relationship with Parker Bowles, she said, "well, there were three of us in this marriage. So, it was a bit crowded." She also expressed doubt about her husband's suitability for kingship. Charles and Diana divorced on 28 August 1996, after being advised by the Queen in December 1995 to end the marriage. The couple shared custody of their children.
Diana died following a car crash in Paris on 31 August 1997. Charles flew to Paris with Diana's sisters to accompany her body back to Britain. In 2003, Diana's butler Paul Burrell published a note that he claimed had been written by Diana in 1995, in which there were allegations that Charles was "planning 'an accident' in [Diana's] car, brake failure and serious head injury", so that he could remarry. She had allegedly expressed similar concerns in October 1995 to Lord Mishcon, her solicitor, that "reliable sources" had told her "that she and Camilla would be put aside" for Charles to marry Tiggy Legge-Bourke. When questioned by the Metropolitan Police inquiry team as a part of Operation Paget, Charles told the authorities that he did not know about his former wife's note from 1995 and could not understand why she had those feelings. The allegations were later revealed to have been among the smears spread by Bashir to secure the interview with Diana for the BBC.
Because Charles and Parker Bowles were romantically involved periodically, both before and during their respective first marriages, their relationship received criticism from the public and the media. Following both of their divorces, Charles declared his relationship with Parker Bowles was "non-negotiable" and appointed Mark Bolland to enhance Parker Bowles's public profile.
In 1999 Charles and Parker Bowles made their first public appearance as a couple at the Ritz London Hotel and the following year, she met Queen Elizabeth II at the 60th birthday party of former King Constantine II of Greece, which was seen as an apparent seal of approval by the Queen on the relationship. In 2003, Parker Bowles moved into Charles's official residence, Clarence House and she accompanied Charles on almost all of his official events, including the annual Highland Games in Scotland. Former Archbishop of Canterbury, George Carey, told The Times that Charles and Parker Bowles should marry, "He is heir to the throne and he loves her. The natural thing is that they should get married." Their engagement was announced on 10 February 2005. The Queen's consent to the marriage – as required by the Royal Marriages Act 1772 – was recorded in a Privy Council meeting on 2 March. In Canada, the Department of Justice determined the consent of the Queen's Privy Council for Canada was not required, as the union would not produce any heirs to the Canadian throne.
Charles was the only member of the royal family to have a civil, rather than a church, wedding in England. British government documents from the 1950s and 1960s, published by the BBC, stated that such a marriage was illegal; these claims were dismissed by Charles's spokesman and explained by the sitting government to have been repealed by the Registration Service Act 1953.
The union was scheduled to take place in a civil ceremony at Windsor Castle, with a subsequent religious blessing at the castle's St George's Chapel. The wedding venue was changed to Windsor Guildhall after it was realised a civil marriage at Windsor Castle would oblige the venue to be available to anyone who wished to be married there. Four days before the event, it was postponed from the originally scheduled date of 8 April until the following day in order to allow Charles and some of the invited dignitaries to attend the funeral of Pope John Paul II.
Charles's parents did not attend the marriage ceremony; the Queen's reluctance to attend possibly arose from her position as Supreme Governor of the Church of England. However, his parents did attend the service of blessing and held a reception for the newlyweds at Windsor Castle. The blessing by Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams was televised.
Since their marriage in 2005, Charles has paid tribute to Camilla repeatedly in public letters, speeches and interviews, thanking her for "steadfast support" and referring to her as "my darling wife".
