Lady Pamela Hicks has Died

Sad news today; The fascinating Lady Pamela Hicks has passed away at the age of 97! The younger daughter of Lord Mountbatten was the first cousin of the Duke of Edinburgh and served as the late Queen’s bridesmaid and lady-in-waiting before marrying an influential interior designer!

The younger daughter of Lord Louis Mountbatten, a great-grandson of Queen Victoria, and the Hon. Edwina Ashley, she was born, quite suddenly, in Barcelona, with King Alfonso XIII of Spain (a cousin by marriage of her father) becoming her godfather. Pamela Mountbatten was the first cousin of the Duke of Edinburgh and a niece of Queen Louise of Sweden, growing up in England, with a stay with Mrs. Cornelius Vanderbilt III at her residence in New York City during the Second World War.

Pamela accompanied her parents to India when they were appointed the last Viceroy and Vicereine of India, later writing her experiences in India Remembered: A Personal Account of the Mountbattens During the Transfer of Power. Lord Louis was created Earl Mountbatten of Burma and thus Miss Pamela became a Lady.

After serving as her bridesmaid in 1947, Lady Pamela was appointed as a Lady-in-waiting to her cousin-in-law, Princess Elisabeth, for a tour in 1952. While in Kenya, the Royal party received news that the Princess’s father, King George VI, had died in London, and that the Princess was now Queen Elisabeth II. Lady Pamela recounts how when embracing the Princess, she realized that she was now Queen, and curtsied to her new sovereign. She later accompanied the Queen and Duke of Edinburgh on the 6-month post-Coronation Commonwealth Tour, and was the Corps Commandant of the Girls’ Nautical Training Corps from 1952 to 1959.

In 1960, Lady Pamela married noted interior decorator and designer David Nightingale Hicks at Romsey Abbey, near the family seat of Broadlands. Lady Mountbatten passed away during their honeymoon, and Lord Mountbatten was assassinated by the IRA in 1979, during a family holiday in Ireland. The couple had three children, Edwina, Ashley, and India and remained happily married, residing at Britwell House and then The Grove, until his death in 1998.

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In 2012, Lady Pamela published her memoirs ‘Daughter of Empire: Life as a Mountbatten’ chronicling her childhood, her time in India, and her time as lady-in-waiting to the Queen. She was a frequent figure on her daughter’s Instagram Account and will be much missed.

Our condolences to the Hicks Family!

The King has said:

The Royal Family mourn a woman whose warmth, wit and perspicacity always made such an impression, and who will be so dearly missed by all those who knew and loved her.’