The upcoming season of The Crown has put Prince Charles and Princess Diana's relationship back into the public eye.
Season five will show the breakdown in the marriage between the two. Thus far, the series has heavily alluded to Camilla Parker Bowles' involvement in that. But now a former protection officer for Charles and Diana is coming forward and saying that Diana was the first one to step out on her marriage.
Allan Peters tells the Daily Mail that Charles didn't reconnect with Camilla until after discovering Diana was having an affair of her own. Allegedly, that affair was with fellow protection officer Barry Mannakee.
Peters says he was the one to tell Charles about the affair. "The popular perception is that the Prince of Wales was straying all the way through his marriage — and that is definitely, unequivocally, not the case," he told the Daily Mail.
"The first person that strayed was the Princess. He went back to see Mrs Parker Bowles after he learned about her affair with Mannakee."
"I started to notice her behaviour was unusual whenever we were anywhere near Mannakee, so I decided to talk to her about it," Peters said of discovering the affair.
"For the first 20 minutes, she categorically denied it. But then she told me exactly what was going on: she was having some sort of relationship with Mannakee."
"The Prince of Wales approached me and said: 'Why is the Princess behaving in the way she is? What on earth is the matter?'" Peters recalled.
"So I said: 'You've got to talk to her.' And he said: 'Well, I've tried all that, and the only thing that seems to be upsetting her is that Barry Mannakee is going back to uniform. And, if she's that upset, Barry can stay.'"
"At that stage, I was forced to say: 'Well, Sir, if he stays, then I'm afraid I'll have to leave.' And, I think, at that point the penny dropped. He was utterly shocked and was clearly very upset," Peters shared.
"Nobody is the villain. In my view, everyone is the victim. [Charles] was under a lot of pressure to get married and she, too, was the victim of this whole process."
Many are pointing out that this narrative wouldn't be coming out if it wasn't in some way beneficial to the royals. Some royal fans think that this story falls into the continued effort to smear Princess Diana and her memory.
It also pokes at the credibility of The Crown, which the royals are clearly not fans of. Just earlier this week, they were said to be offended that the show was filmed at the BBC's offices. Allegedly, the royals are debating cutting their ties with the BBC because of the move, which they feel cosigns the narratives presented on the show.
