From the Independent:
“The Queen’s
‘hidden’ cousins: Who were Nerissa and Katherine Bowes-Lyon and why were they
kept away from the royal family?”
The fourth
season of The Crown gives fans of the royal family a detailed look at some of
the most significant moments in their public and private lives. The new series
begins as the 1970s are drawing to a close and takes viewers through to 1990, a
period during which the royal family were involved in a number of major
scandals, including the illicit relationship between Prince Charles and
Camilla. However, the breakdown of the Prince of Wales’ marriage was not the
most shocking incident the family had to deal with, as in 1987, it was
discovered that Queen Elizabeth II had two “hidden” cousins: Katherine and
Nerissa Bowes-Lyon. But, who were they and why were they kept apart from the
royal family? Here is everything you need to know.
Who were
Katherine and Nerissa Bowes-Lyon? Katherine, born in 1926, and Nerissa,
born in 1919, were the daughters of John Herbert Bowes-Lyon – the brother of
the Queen Mother – and his wife, Fenella. The ties to the royal family
mean they were first cousins of Queen Elizabeth II. The sisters were
born with severe learning difficulties and, following the death of their father
in 1930, they were admitted to a mental health institution, the Royal Earlswood
Hospital in Redhill, London, in 1941. Their cousins Idonea, Etheldreda
and Rosemary – the daughters of Fenella’s sister, Harriet – also had a similar disability,
and were admitted to the state-funded hospital on the same day. Katherine
and Nerissa had been listed in the 1963 edition of Burke's Peerage – a
reference book to the nation’s aristocracy – as having died in 1940, when in
fact they were both still alive. The condition was thought to have been
hereditary and descended from their common maternal grandfather, Charles Trefusis,
21st baron Clifton. Nerissa died aged 66 in 1986 and was buried in a
grave marked only with a name tag and serial number. Katherine stayed in the
hospital until 1997, when it closed amid abuse claims, and then lived in
another home in Surrey. She later died aged 87 in 2014.
How are they
portrayed in The Crown? Viewers are introduced to the sisters in episode
seven of the fourth series. The episode begins with images of the Queen
arriving at the Royal Variety Performance being shown on a TV in a hospital, as
Katherine and Nerissa stare at the screen, before standing for the national
anthem. The women, then in their sixties, proudly salute to the monarch,
stopping only to take pills handed to them by a nurse. Their connection
to the royal family comes to light in the episode when Princess Margaret,
played by Helena Bonham Carter, learns of the sisters’ existence from a
therapist, who asks the royal if she is aware of any relations struggling with
mental health issues. Upon hearing of their struggles, Margaret is later
shown confronting the Queen Mother about her knowledge of the sisters. “Locked
up and neglected. They’re your nieces — daughters of your favourite brother,”
she says. “It’s wicked and it’s cold-hearted and it’s cruel and it’s
entirely in keeping with the ruthlessness which I myself have experienced in
this family.”
Why were
they kept away from the royal family? While many members of the royal
family knew about Katherine and Nerissa, the majority believed they had died,
including Queen Elizabeth II. However, it later transpired that their deaths
had been falsified. But, why? At the time, there were fears that the
sister’s condition could threaten the social standing of the royal family due
the stigma surrounding learning difficulties. In The Crown, the Queen
Mother, played by Marion Bailey, tries to defend the decision to fake their
deaths, telling Margaret that her brother’s children paid a “terrible price” as
she went from being the wife of the Duke of York to Queen Elizabeth The Queen
Mother. “At the same time my family, the Bowes-Lyons, went from being
minor Scottish aristocrats to having a direct bloodline to the crown, resulting
in the children of my brother paying a terrible price,” she says. “Their
illness, their imbecility — their professionally diagnosed idiocy and
imbecility — would make people question the integrity of the bloodline. Can you
imagine the headlines if it were to get out? “The idea that one family
alone has the automatic birth right to the crown is already so hard to justify,
the gene pool of that family better have 100 per cent purity. There have been
enough examples on the Windsor side alone to worry people…if you add the
Bowes-Lyon illnesses to that, the danger is it becomes untenable.”
When did the
public learn about Katherine and Nerissa? The sisters’ story came to light
in 1987, shortly after Nerissa’s death, when journalists discovered she was
buried in a grave marked only by a plastic name tag and serial number. The
hospital confirmed that Katherin and Nerissa were linked to the royal family
following a report that appeared in The Sun. At the time, Buckingham
palace said the Queen was aware of the report but added: “We have no comment
about it at all. It is a matter for the Bowes-Lyon family.” Lady
Elizabeth Anson, a niece of the two sisters, also issued a statement to the BBC
on behalf of the Bowes-Lyon family saying that “there was no attempt at a
cover-up” and that many family members had visited the sisters. The
story reared its head again in 2011 when a Channel 4 documentary, titled The
Queen’s Hidden Cousins, was made about the five Bowes-Lyon girls. The program
meant a new generation of people were outraged by the scandal, as the
documentary suggested the cousins had been treated callously by the royal
family. After the documentary aired, a source close to Buckingham Palace
branded the claims as “utter lies”. “The Queen is very, very upset at
the thought that this programme is being made which is just not true,” the
source said. “Both Katherine and Nerissa were visited very regularly by their
family but neither could speak, and throughout their lives had the thinking age
of four years old.”
Did the
royal family ever visit the sisters? The Channel 4 documentary claimed that
Katherine and Nerissa had very few companions, and there is no evidence to
suggest any of the royals ever visited. Speaking in the program, Dot
Penfold, a former ward sister at the hospital where the sister’s stayed, spoke
of her sadness that they were not visited for years. “The impression I
had was that they’d been forgotten,” she recalled. The Independent has
contacted Buckingham Palace for comment.
^ Sadly,
throughout most of history – including well into the 20th Century –
people of all walks of life (from ordinary to Royalty) have hidden their
disabled relatives away and forgotten about them in the hope that no one would
find out their secret and see them as “defective” too. The Kennedys did the
same to Rosemary Kennedy (Sister of JFK, Bobby and Ted) who was forced (by her
Father, Joseph) to have a lobotomy in 1941 and when that failed she was institutionalized.
It was only after Joseph Kennedy had a stroke in 1961 that the Kennedy Siblings
learned of her whereabouts and not until Joseph’s death in 1969 that those
still living (ie. Eunice, Jean and Ted) started visiting her. She died in 2005.
Hiding someone disabled or even refusing to acknowledge their existence is a
dark stain that will forever overshadow any good a person could do in their
lifetime. I hope the British Royal Family, the Kennedy Family and everyone else
learns from these horrific abuses placed on their disabled relatives and works
hard to not make the same evil mistakes as their own relatives did who
abandoned their disabled children. ^
https://www.yahoo.com/lifestyle/queen-hidden-cousins-were-nerissa-151407485.html
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