Prince
Andrew to Be Stripped of His Royal Title
The
extraordinary move caps his fall from grace over his ties to the convicted
sexual predator Jeffrey Epstein.
Mark
Landler
By Mark
Landler
Reporting
from London
Oct. 30,
2025
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/30/world/europe/uk-prince-andrew-title.html
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 the convicted sexual predator Jeffrey Epstein.
In a
statement on Thursday, Buckingham Palace said it had begun a formal process to
remove the “style, titles and honors 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 that 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 Mr. Epstein and more damning details about his alleged
sexual abuse of a young woman trafficked to him by Mr. Epstein.
Andrew
has steadfastly denied that he raped the woman, Virginia Roberts Giuffre. But
doubts about his account of his relationship with Mr. Epstein — as well as
sordid details of his sexual misconduct in a newly published memoir by Ms.
Giuffre — made his position in the royal family increasingly untenable.
Ms.
Giuffre died by suicide in Australia last April; Mr. Epstein died, also by
suicide, in 2019 while awaiting trial on federal sex-trafficking charges.
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 that 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 Center for Social
Research found that 54 percent of people surveyed said it was “very” or “quite
important” for Britain to have a monarchy, compared with 86 percent in 1983.
Andrew’s
ties to Mr. 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 Ms.
Giuffre and insisted that he cut off contact with Mr. Epstein in 2010. British
newspapers recently reported that Andrew sent a supportive email to Mr. 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 Ms. 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 Ms. 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.
Mark
Landler is the London bureau chief of The Times, covering the United Kingdom,
as well as American foreign policy in Europe, Asia and the Middle East. He has
been a journalist for more than three decades.
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