On August 31, 22 years ago, an event shook the whole world: the Princess of Wales Diana Frances Spencer, known as Lady D, who had divorced Prince Charles the year before, in 1996, died in a terrible car accident in Paris. . Diana he was in the French capital with his new partner Dodi Al-Fayed, an Egyptian entrepreneur, when their Mercedes, driven by the chauffeur Henri Paul, crashed into the thirteenth pillar of a tunnel under the Pont de l'Alma.
In the crash, Dodi Al-Fayed and the driver Henri Paul are killed instantly. Trevor Rees-Jones, Dodi's bodyguard, sitting in the front seat and the only one wearing his seat belt, he is badly injured but will survive. Lady D, freed from the tangle of metal sheets, is still alive and after the first aid given by Dr. Maillez, by chance on the spot, she is transported by an ambulance to the Pitié-Salpêtrière hospital, where she arrives at around 2 am. Due to severe internal injuries, she is pronounced dead two hours later.
On this tragic event, judicially archived as an accident, strong doubts and many conspiracies have been consumed over the years. Still today, many suspicions are nourished on the sudden death of Lady D, who just a year earlier had stormily left her husband Charles, antagonizing the British royal family: there has also been repeated talk of the possibility that the mother of Prince William and Prince Harry could to have been victim of an assassination organized by the British secret services as with his figure and the divorce from Prince Charles (according to some revelations about the marriage, he would never have loved her) he would have endangered the stability of the British crown.
But his funeral proved otherwise. Diana Spencer was loved by the people and therefore despite the first choice of a private funeral, since the former princess was no longer aRoyal Highness, the sudden and unexpected reaction of the British people, disoriented and in tears for the loss of the beloved princess, prompted the royal house to accept the public funeral. On 6 September 1997, the day of her funeral, about 3 million people poured into the streets of London.
Diana's coffin was placed on a cannon carriage and from Kensington Palace, where she had spent the night, she crossed Hyde Park to St. James's, where Prince Charles, together with his sons William and Harry, their father Philip, the XNUMXth Earl Spencer, brother of Diana (born 1 July 1961 in Sandringham of an aristocratic family), and 500 representatives of the organizations sponsored by the princess joined the procession behind the coffin.
The thousands of people present at the funeral, weeping and crowding around the barriers, threw flowers at the passage of the coffin and all along the way. In front of Buckingham Palace, the entire royal family waited, dressed in mourning, for the passage of the coffin: in front of the coffin, Elizabeth bowed her head as a sign of respect. The funeral continued in Westminster Abbey: during the ceremony, Elton John sang Candle in the Wind, a modified version for the occasion of the famous song dedicated to the death of Marilyn Monroe.
Diana's brother delivered his speech, saying that “Diana was the very essence of compassion, duty, style, beauty. Throughout the world she was considered a symbol of humanity and altruism, champion of the rights of the oppressed. A quintessentially English girl, who transcended nationality; a woman of innate nobility, who transcended social classes, and who has proven in recent years that she needs no royal title to continue to generate her own particular kind of magic.”
The funeral was broadcast live on television around the world followed by over two billion people, making it one of the most watched televised events in history.
