Princess Alice, Duchess of Gloucester, carried an extraordinary
\nburden for the final years of her husband\u2019s life \u2013 choosing never
\nto tell Prince Henry that their eldest son had died.<\/p>\n
The deeply personal decision followed the tragic death of Prince
\nWilliam of Gloucester in a plane crash in 1972, at a time when the
\nDuke of Gloucester\u2019s own health had deteriorated dramatically after
\nsuffering a series of strokes.<\/p>\n
Prince Henry, the third son of King George V and Queen Mary, had
\nalready experienced more than his fair share of personal tragedy.
\nHis elder brother, Edward VIII, abdicated the throne in 1936,
\nchanging the course of royal history, while his younger brother,
\nPrince George, Duke of Kent, was killed in an air crash during the
\nSecond World War.<\/p>\n
In later life, the Duke\u2019s health declined rapidly. In January
\n1965, while returning from the funeral of Sir Winston Churchill,
\nPrince Henry suffered a stroke that caused the car in which he and
\nPrincess Alice were travelling to crash. The Duke was thrown from
\nthe vehicle, while the Duchess sustained facial injuries.<\/p>\n
The stroke marked the beginning of years of poor health. Prince Just two years before the Duke\u2019s death, the family was struck by Prince William of Gloucester, aged just 30, was an accomplished Flying a Piper Cherokee Arrow alongside fellow pilot Vyrell Three local boys rushed to the wreckage in an attempt to rescue The tragedy shocked the Royal Family. Queen Elizabeth II Princess Alice was then faced with an impossible decision.<\/p>\n Fearing that the devastating news could further endanger her Messages of condolence poured in from around the world, Writing in her memoirs, The Memoirs of Princess Alice, She said: \u201cI was completely stunned and have never been Princess Alice later revealed that she never directly told Prince William was buried at the Royal Burial Ground at Just two years later, in 1974, Prince Henry died and was laid to <\/div>\n \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source royalcentral.co.uk \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Princess Alice, Duchess of Gloucester, carried an extraordinary burden for the final years of her husband\u2019s life \u2013 choosing never to tell Prince Henry that their eldest son had died. The deeply personal decision followed the tragic death of Prince William of Gloucester in a plane crash in 1972, at a time when the Duke […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2518820,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2518819","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-royalty"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/The-heartbreaking-secret-Princess-Alice-kept-from-her-husband-until.png","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2518819","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2518819"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2518819\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2518821,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2518819\/revisions\/2518821"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2518820"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2518819"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2518819"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2518819"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nHenry experienced further strokes, eventually becoming
\nwheelchair-bound and losing much of his ability to speak.<\/p>\n![\"Prince](\"https:\/\/royalcentral.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/Screenshot-2026-07-27-103456-1024x654.png\")
\n(public domain)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\nanother devastating loss.<\/p>\n
\npilot and President of the British Aviation Centre. On 28 August
\n1972, he was competing in the Goodyear International Air Trophy at
\nHalfpenny Green Airfield in Staffordshire when disaster struck.<\/p>\n
\nMitchell, Prince William\u2019s aircraft crashed shortly after take-off
\nafter striking a tree. Both men were killed.<\/p>\n
\nthose inside but were driven back by the intense flames.
\nFirefighters arrived within minutes, but the blaze was so fierce
\nthat it took around two hours to bring under control. The victims
\nwere later identified through dental records.<\/p>\n
\ncancelled planned engagements connected with the Munich Olympic
\nGames, while the Duke of Edinburgh returned early from Germany to
\nattend his nephew\u2019s funeral.<\/p>\n
\nhusband\u2019s fragile health, she chose not to tell Prince Henry that
\ntheir son had died.<\/p>\n
\nincluding one from Prime Minister Edward Heath, yet the Duchess
\ncontinued to shield her husband from the tragedy.<\/p>\n
\nDuchess of Gloucester<\/em>, first published in 1981, she reflected
\non the loss of her son.<\/p>\n
\nquite the same since, though I have tried to persuade myself that
\nit was better to have known and lost him than never to have had him
\nat all.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n
\nPrince Henry about Prince William\u2019s death, although she
\nacknowledged that he may have become aware of it through television
\ncoverage.<\/p>\n
\nFrogmore.<\/p>\n
\nrest alongside his son, bringing to a close one of the Royal
\nFamily\u2019s most poignant and little-known stories.<\/p>\n