The Duke Of Edinburgh The Duke d{ Edinburgh, who was married to the Queen while she was still Princess Elizabeth, quickly won a high place in the affections of the British people. His sincerity, his sense of occasion, his liking for ordinary people, his devotion to Britain, and his humour are the chief qualities on which his popularity is founded. They were strikingly revealed, in speech and in action, soon after his marriage most notably so in a presiden- tial address to the British Association which scientists described as " a most dis- cerning survey," and, in the realm of action, by his easy assurance during the early days of the royal tour of Canada when the unexpected warmth of greetings might have proved well nigh over- whelming. Prince Philip shares with the Queen descent from two ancestors, Frederick 11 of Denmark in the sixteenth century and Queen Victoria, their great-great-grand- mother, in the nineteenth century. In everything but the accident of birth Prince Philip, at the time of his engagement, was typical of the great body of young English officers who had fought in the second world war. The only son of Prince Andrew of Greece, he was a Dane of the princely house of Oldenburg which had sent to England two Queens-Anne, the wife of James I, and Alexandra, the wife of Edward VII-and was the grandson of Queen Alexandra's brother who had been invited to the throne of Greece in 1863. AN ADMIRAL'S GRANDSON His mother, Princess Alice, was the daughter of that great admiral who became Marquess of Milford Haven during the first world war but will always be best remembered as Prince Louis of Battenberg, the First Sea Lord who built and trained the British fleet to meet the navy of the Hohenzollerns. Just as Prince Louis left his niative Germany for England expressly to seek a seagoing career in the service of his grandmother, Queen Victoria, so, in 1930, his grandson, Prince Philip of Greece, came to school in England to gratify the same ambition. He was then nine years old and from that time forward regarded himself in fact, though not in law, as an Englishman. English was his natural language-he spoke with no trace of accent-and equally Einglish were the processes of his rnind. All who had met Prince Philip and per- ceived his eager enthusiasm for the career of his choice were aware that he had no compunction whatever in surrendering his original princely rank. It was abundantly clear that his natural ambition was far more to become a fighting admiral than either an hereditary prince or a prince con- sort, and that the only sentiment which could have induced him to accept the prospect of this latter status, well knowing that it entailed the early relinquishment of his naval career, was his love for his bride. In becoming the King's son-in-law he was not marrying for ambition, but at the price of a considerable renunciation, and it has been truly said that all his life he will carry an invisible telescope point- ing towards the sea. Prince Philip was born at Corfu on June 10, 1921. His father, Prince Andrew of Greece, was involved in the political up- heavals that followed the first world war and went to live in exile in France shortly after the birth of his only son. At the age The Queen with the Duke of Edinburgh. His Royal Highness is wearing the uniform of an Admiral of the Fleet, a rank to which he was raised by her Majesty -as well as to Field-Marsbal and Marsbal of the R.A.F.-earlier this year. of seven Prince Philip was sent by his father to be educated in England under the care of his grandmother, the Dowager Marchioness of Milford Haven, advised by his uncle, Lord Louis Mountbatten, then a rising young officer in the Navy destined to become Commander-in-Chief in the Far East and the last Viceroy of India, and now Earl Mountbatten of Burma. The young prince went first, in 1930, to a preparatory school at Cheam, and three years later to a school at Salem, in Germany, of which the head master was the famous educational reformer, Kurt Hahn. In those early days of the Nazi rdgime the liberal-minded Kurt Hahn soon fell foul of Hitler and decided to migrate to Gordonstoun on the north-east coast of Scotland, where he became a naturalized British subject. Prince Philip remained at Gordonstoun for six years and had abundant opportunity to indulge his inherited love of the sea, for an import- ant part of Mr. Hahn's system was to turn his pupils loose in small boats along the wild Scottish coasts. The prince's qualities of leadership also found ample scope; he became captain of cricket and hockey, and was eventually head of the school. At the age of 18 Prince Philip passed into the Royal Naval College, Dattmouth, and in the same year, 1939, with his feet set on the lower rungs of his chosen career, he first met Princess Elizabeth. He took to the sailor's life with marked apti- tude, winning the King's Dirk and the Eardley-Howard-Crocket prize as best all- round cadet of his term. In 1940 Prince Philip went to sea as a midshipman in the battleship Ramillies with the Mediterranean Fleet. Later he served in the cruisers Kent and Shrop- shire, and in January, 1941, he joined the battleship Valiant, in which he served at the Battle of Cape Matapan and was men- tioned in dispatches for his good work in charge of the searchlight control. He was promoted in the ordinary course to acting sub-lieutenant and after a period of train- ing was appointed, in January, 1942, to H.M.S. Wallace, a flotilla leader on the Home Station. Six months later, at the age of 21, he was promoted lieutenant and reappointed to H.M.S. Wallace as her second lieutenant. In the following October he succeeded as first lieutenant at the request of the captain and thus became, it is believed, the youngest officer in the Royal Navy to hold the post of executive officer of a ship of the size of H.M.S. Wallace. EXCEPTIONAL PROMISE In February, 1944, Prince Philip was appointed first lieutenant in the new destroyer H.M.S. Whelp, which joined the Pacific Fleet, and in her he was present at the Japanese surrender in Tokyo Bay on September 2, 1945. On her return home he joined H.M.S. Glendower, the training establishment at Pwllheli, and later H.M.S. Royal Arthur, the training establishment for petty officers at Corsham, in Wiltshire. Such appointments in the training service are regarded in the Navy as recognition of exceptional promise in a young officer. On February 28, 1947, Prince Philip of Greece became a naturalized British sub- ject, assuming the name and style of Lieutenant Philip Mountbatten, R.N. It was then nearly 20 years since he had first come to England as a child and he had seen eight years of service, most of them active war-time service, with the Royal Navy. He had remained a Greek subject not through any desire of his own but rather because he lived in a less easy- going climate of international law than did his grandfather, Prince Louis of Battenberg, who had become naturalized by the mere fact of receiving a commission in the Royal Navy of Queen Victoria's day. Technical difficulties had prevented Prince Philip's naturalization in war-time. It was as Lieutenant Philip Mount- batten, R.N., while still continuing his instructional duties at Corsham, that he became engaged to Princess Elizabeth in July, 1947. The announcement of the engagement, with the King's approval, was received with great popular enthu- siasm. On the eve of the wedding, the King bestowed on Lieutenant Philip Mountbatten the style of His Royal High- ness, raised him to the peerage as Duke of Edinburgh, Earl of Merioneth, and Lord Greenwich, and directed his enrol- ment in the Order of the Garter, of which his bride was already a member. By virtue of the first of these honours Philip Mountbatten became once more a prince. The marriage of Princess Elizabeth to the Duke of Edinburgh was solemnized on November 20; 1947, amnid great popular rejoicing. After his marriage the Duke of Edin- burgh was given an appointment in the Operations Division of the Naval Staff at the Admiralty. The first great State func- tion which Princess Elizabeth and the Duke of Edinburgh discharged together was their visit to Paris as guests of the French Government at Whitsun, 1948. The Duke of Edinburgh, clinging with tenacity to his naval career, then entered on a six months' course of advanced in- struction at Greenwich and took up his quarters in the naval barracks there. On November 14, 1948, the first child of the royal marriage, Prince Charles, was born at Buckingham Palace. But for the King's illness, which was made known almost im- mediately after the baby's birth, the Duke of Edinburgh might have gone back to the Navy almost at once. Instead he stayed in England for nearly a year, sharing with the Duke of Gloucester many duties as an understudy for the King, and not until October, 1949, was he able to join the Mediterranean Fleet. He returned to naval duty as first lieu- tenant of H.M.S. Chequers, leader of the Destroyer Flotilla, Mediterranean Fleet, and remained in this post till July, 1950. He then took command of the frigate Magpie, based on Malta, and on July 16, 1950, was promoted lieutenant-com- mander. In the months that followed he worked and played characteristically hard; the Magpie's crew became celebrated in Malta for their athletic prowess, just as her commander became known for the skill of his polo. His command of the Magpie ended in July, 1951, and in his address to the ship's company he said that the period of his command had been " the happiest days of my sailor life." During his service at Malta the Duke of Edinburgh was twice joined by Princess Elizabeth. In November, 1950, they paid an unofficial visit to Greece as guests of the Duke's cousin, King Paul, and Queen Frederika, and spent Christmas of that year together at Malta. On February 11, 1951, Princess Elizabeth, " with other naval wives and children," watched the departure of his Majesty's frigate Magpie and other ships for a spring cruise, and in the afternoon the Princess entertained at tea 22 wives of Magpie ratings and their children. The next day, February 12, she returned by air to London. A month later Princess Elizabeth again joined her husband in Malta and in April presented the new King's Colour to the Mediterranean Station, one of the most impressive naval occasions in the island's history since the war. Then, on April 10, the Duke of Edinburgh accompanied the Princess on a fortnight's private holiday in Italy which included visits to Rome, the Vatican, and Florence. The Duke returned to Clarence House a few days after the Princess-staying in Rome to play in some polo matches-and took part with the King and Queen and other members of the Royal Family in the ceremonies that marked the opening of the Festival of Britain that year. He returned to his command in Malta early in May and remained until he relinquished command of the Magpie in the following July. A REMARKABLE SPEECH One royal engagement of exceptional significance that the Duke of Edinburgh fulfilled during his service in Malta was the opening of Gibraltar's new Legislative Council. For this he was specially com- missioned in the name of the King and in his address said that it was not only a great honour to represent his Majesty but that, as a naval officer, it was a great personal pleasure to pay tribute to a colony for which the Navy had such great affection. Soon after his return home in July, 1951, the Duke of Edinburgh presided at the meeting of the British Association in Edinburgh. It was an occasion that evoked many allusions to the pioneer work, 100 years earlier, of the Prince Consort as a royal patron of science and underlined the felicity of the choice of the Duke of Edinburgh, the prince consort of a future reign, to occupy the presidential chair. Prince Albert's Great Exhibition of 1851 marked, as his descendant said, the beginning of a great stimulus to techni- cal education and research which was felt for at least 50 years of rapid scientific progress. The contribution of British scientists to universal human knowledge since 1851 was then the major theme of the series of exhibits assembled under the Dome of Discovery on the South Bank of the Thames, and Prince Philip made it very appropriately the subject of his dis- course. At the close of his address Prince Philip turned to the deepest and darkest problem of all: the ineluctable truth that science is naked power and, as such, of equal capacity for good or evil. He reminded his audience that " we can either set the world free from drudgery, fear, hunger, and pestilence, or obliterate life itself." Soon after the Duke of Edinburgh became a member of the Royal Family he had accepted the presidency of the National Playing Fields Association. It provided a congenial sphere of activity for so highly athletic a young man who was keen to enlarge other people's opportuni- ties of outdoor exercise. It gave him, moreover, a ready-made reason for visit- ing without formality any part of the country he might wish to see, since there are playing fields everywhere and there is always some business going on into which the president might inquire. It has brought him into contact with all kinds of people and bodies, for the provision of playing fields touches the work of a great number of institutions in central and local government, it concerns architects and town planners, schoolmasters, organizers of youth activities, charitable societies, the committees and members of clubs playing all kinds of games, gardeners, horticulturists, and, of course, financiers. The Duke has said more than once, " I will gladly go anywhere to open a playing field." CANADIAN TOUR On October 8, 1951, Princess Elizabeth and the Duke of Edinburgh set out on their tour of Canada, which had been postponed for a week or two on account of the King's renewed illness necessitating an operation. The Duke's share in the triumph of this royal tour of Canada and the visit to Washington was immediate and unforgettable, and he had a great personal success with his single public speech of the tour-an address to 1,700 members of the Toronto Board of Trade, which was also broadcast. The more extended Commonwealth tour, which was to have taken the Princess and the Duke of Edinburgh to Australia and New Zealand, was cut short in its early stage by the sudden and unexpected death of the King on February 6, 1952. Since Queen Elizabeth came to the throne the Duke of Edinburgh has taken a still larger share in the fulfilment of royal engagements and duties. He has been chairman of the Royal Commission set up by the Queen to make preparations for the Coronation. In September last year the Queen issued a warrant to declare and ordain that the Duke of Edinburgh " shall henceforth upon all occasions and in all Meetings except where otherwise provided by Act of Parliament have, hold and enjoy Place, Pre-eminence and Pre- cedence next to Her Majesty." Early this year the Queen approved the promotion of the Duke of Edinburgh to Admiral of the Fleet and his appointment as Field- Marshal and Marshal of the Royal Air Force, thus giving him the highest rank in all three Services. The qualities that have endeared Prince Philip to the British people were happily and concisely stated when he was pre- sented to Cambridge University for the honorary degree of Doctor of Law last November. " We receive the Duke of Edinburgh," declared the Orator, " not merely with the homage due to a prince but with the affection called forth by a most welcome guest. From an early age he has known the rigours of active ser- vice and now devotes his vigour and enthusiasm to the common good and especially to the physical well-being of youth and to the pursuit of new paths in science and technology." THE DUKE OF EDINBURGH SAILOR AND SPORTSMAN, TUE CHAMPION OF YOUTH