Prince Andrew: Scandal-hit royal to be stripped of his title and evicted from lodge

Andrew, the scandal-scarred younger brother of King Charles III, will be stripped of his title as prince, an extraordinary punishment — unheard-of in the annals of the modern British royal family — that caps his fall from grace over his ties to convicted sexual predator Jeffrey Epstein.

In a statement Thursday, local time, Buckingham Palace said it had begun a formal process to remove the “style, titles and honours of Prince Andrew.” The prince, it said, “will now be known as Andrew Mountbatten Windsor,” the family name of members of the House of Windsor. The palace also said Andrew, 65, would be evicted from his sprawling residence, Royal Lodge, and move to a private house.

The announcement, in a terse three-paragraph statement, came after Britain’s royal family was plunged into a widening crisis over new disclosures about the extent of Andrew’s links to Epstein and more damning details about his alleged sexual abuse of a young woman trafficked to him by Epstein.

Andrew has steadfastly denied that he raped the woman, Virginia Roberts Giuffre. But doubts about his account of his relationship with Epstein — as well as sordid details of his sexual misconduct in a newly published memoir by Giuffre — made his position in the royal family increasingly untenable.

Giuffre died by suicide in Australia in April; Epstein died, also by suicide, in 2019 while awaiting trial on federal sex-trafficking charges.

Giuffre’s family spoke out on Thursday, praising her “courage.”

“Today, an ordinary American girl from an ordinary American family, brought down a British prince with her truth and extraordinary courage,” they said in a statement.

Some British lawmakers had called on Parliament to take action against Andrew or to pass legislation that would make it easier for the King to do so. The Government has resisted getting involved, reflecting an ancient custom of the crown and Parliament staying out of each other’s business. But the drumbeat of disclosures was making it harder to avoid taking more definitive action against Andrew.

Last week, Andrew announced he would give up the use of his other most prominent title, the Duke of York. His status as a prince, the Palace said at the time, was based on his being the son of a monarch, Queen Elizabeth II.

On Thursday, palace officials said the King was sending “royal warrants” to the Lord Chancellor, requesting that he remove both the titles of Duke of York and Prince, as well as the honorific His Royal Highness, from the Peerage Roll, which sets out royal and aristocratic titles in Britain.

The palace said this would not require an act of Parliament, as some legal experts speculated last week. Charles, palace officials said, was pushing the boundaries of his royal prerogative because he did not want Parliament to spend time on this matter at the expense of other pressing national issues.

Not since King Edward VIII abdicated the throne in 1936 over his proposed marriage to a divorced American woman, Wallis Simpson, has the royal family experienced such an abrupt and visible downgrade of one its most senior members.

When Prince Harry and his American-born wife, Meghan, announced in 2020 that they would withdraw from official duties and move to the United States, he remained a prince, and the couple remained the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, titles bestowed on them by the Queen when they married.

Palace officials also said Andrew would move to a residence on the grounds of Sandringham, a royal residence in Norfolk, northeast of London, which is owned personally by Charles. The King, they said, would support Andrew through his private funds. Andrew’s former wife, Sarah Ferguson, who had lived with him at Royal Lodge, will receive no further support from the family, officials said.

“These censures are deemed necessary, notwithstanding the fact that he continues to deny the allegations against him,” the Palace said in the statement.

“Their majesties wish to make clear that their thoughts and utmost sympathies have been, and will remain with, the victims and survivors of any and all forms of abuse.”

For all the censure, officials said Andrew did not lose his place in the line of succession to the throne (he is eighth). But they noted that, just as in the case of Edward VIII, Britain would never allow an unsuitable person to become sovereign. Andrew’s daughters, Princess Beatrice and Princess Eugenie, will keep their titles.

Palace officials said the decision to act against Andrew had been made by Charles himself in response to what he viewed as serious lapses of judgment on his brother’s part.

They said the King was supported by other members of the family, including Prince William, his elder son and the heir to the throne.

Experts on the royal family said Charles was acting partly out of fear that the relentless scandal over Andrew was sapping public support for the monarchy.

In 2023, a poll of British social attitudes by the National Centre for Social Research found that 54 per cent of people surveyed said it was “very” or “quite important” for Britain to have a monarchy, compared with 86 per cent in 1983.

Andrew’s ties to Epstein have haunted him for more than a decade, costing him his job as a trade ambassador for Britain. But his problems deepened in 2019, after he gave a calamitous interview to the BBC.

In it, he denied having sex with Giuffre and insisted that he cut off contact with Epstein in 2010. British newspapers recently reported that Andrew sent a supportive email to Epstein a year later.

The fierce public backlash over the BBC interview led Andrew to withdraw from official duties in 2019. But his problems kept mounting. After a judge allowed a lawsuit filed by Giuffre against Andrew to go ahead in 2022, he lost his honorary military titles and use of the honorific His Royal Highness.

Andrew settled the suit with Giuffre later that year — without admitting wrongdoing — and his mother helped fund the undisclosed payment. But after the Queen died in September 2022, his position became more isolated. The surrender of his lease to the Royal Lodge became one of the last sticking points in sealing his estrangement.

When the palace stripped Andrew of the use of the title Duke of York this month, officials said he would no longer be invited to the family’s Christmas celebration, traditionally held at Sandringham.

Now, he will live in internal exile — bearing the title of a commoner, in a house on the grounds of the castle where the rest of his family gathers.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

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