Princess Diana
by REBECCA SPARROW
Today is the 15th anniversary of Princess Diana’s death after a horrific car accident in France in 1997.
I remember exactly where I was when I was told that Princess Diana had died.
I was behind the wheel of my white Barina, pulling into my parents’ driveway, a CD blaring, when my father motioned for me to wind down the window.
I rolled my eyes.
He’s going to complain about me parking him in, I thought.
‘There’s been an accident’, he said. ‘With Princess Di.’
Words then floated from his mouth. I heard something about Dodi being dead. Paris. A car. Seatbelts. Diana was alive but badly injured. That’s what we thought.
I tumbled inside the house, past my mum who squeezed my arm and whispered to no-one in particular, “I hope nothing has happened to her beautiful face.’ (Fifteen years earlier my mum had slipped away from her secretarial desk in the city and stood in the crowds to catch a glimpse of Princess Di on her first Australian tour. She was tall, so much taller than you think, my mum had reported back to me that afternoon, as I lay on my bed, face in my hands, desperate for details. And her skin is exquisite. LIke peaches and cream).
Together we sat, my mum and dad and me, silently in front of our family TV as afternoon faded into evening. Waiting. Watching montage after montage. Waiting. For what would happen next. .
Diana was dead.
And I wept. As though I knew her. I felt a little like I did.
Is that stupid? Probably. But I cried for days and days and days. Yes, I’m one of ‘those’ people. Crying for a woman I never met.
It’s a little hard to believe that it’s fifteen years since Diana died.
She wasn’t perfect. I know that. Nobody is. But I simply adored her nonetheless. ‘
She comforted and soothed the desperate. She hugged and cuddled and giggled with the HIV positive. She campaigned against Land Mines, for the homeless, for the marginalised. And she lavished her boys with the type of open love and affection we had never really seen from a British Royal before.
It’s a little hard to believe that it’s fifteen years since she died.
I still miss her. I do.
This is the never before seen image.
Where were you when Princess Diana died?
Comments
158 Comments so far
Princess Diana died 5 days after my 5th birthday. It’s the first memory I have of my father crying. After explaining what had happened to me, I responded with, “Oh Daddy I’m so sorry. That lady did so much for our town”. I lived in Grafton, Northern NSW. Ha ha! I’ll make such a good journalist!
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I was 10 years old, and landed in London when it happened. It only got through to the news the next morning.
We were all asleep in my aunty’s house when my 7 year old brother came into all out rooms (as he woke up early to watch tv) to tell us all the Princess had died.
We had no clue what he was on about and told him to bugger off. An hour later we were all up for breakfast, and there it was on the TV.
When the funeral was on I remember us staying in a seaside town hotel, and we stayed in all day to watch it. My parents said they remember how different the WHOLE country was while we were there.
so for the whole month we were on holiday’s, this strange gloom hung around….I will never forget that time.
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It was my 10th birthday… still remember it like it was yesterday.
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Loved the gallery. She was so beautiful
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I was 7 years old, and was playing a game of netball with some friends. Mum told me and I remember feeling sad, although I wasn’t sure why. Amazed15 years have passed. I have since watched the funeral a couple of years ago and cried many tears.
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I was 7, and we were on holiday in the south of France. The next day, some French people came up to us and were saying “Elle est mort, elle est mort, je suis desole!” (she is dead, I am sorry!) as they thought we were english.
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I still remember her in my prayers – that’s something we can do for her..
If you think of her, she will know.
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I remember standing with my disinterested housemates in our house and trying to explain that we were witnessing something that would become a significant moment in history but I was, apparently, on my own in that opinion on that day with those people.
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Isn’t it amazing how we remember exactly where were? I was watching TV with my husband at my parent’s house. My world has sure changed in 15 years.
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Can we also remember that its been 15 years since mother.Theresa died too? Their funerals were on at the same time.
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I was in my bedroom, doing year 10 homework, after my best friend’s 16th birthday party. The top 40 countdown was interrupted with the news of her death. The next day I had work experience as a journalist at the local tv station and we did a lot of reporting about when she came to Albury – talking to council members and people who had met her in the early 80s. I couldn’t see the relevance of that re
Porting – why did it matter that Princess Diana came to and why are we reporting on it 15 years after she arrived? But now I do see the relevance – she touched so many, and there was a lasting impact on those she met,
I went to Kensignton Palace and her memorial in July. As you saw Bec, I took lots of photos. The visit was so moving, and I genuinely felt sad sitting beside the memorial fountain. Here are my thoughts of the visit. http://carlyfindlay.blogspot.com.au/2012/07/travel-tales-kensington-gardens.html
My friend took me past Mohammed Al Fayed’s mansion – it is so huge. He said that when Diana and Dodi died there were tributes that we’re hung on the fence.
I think back on the reporting at the time of her death and realised that that event may have been the start of 24 hour world wide news in Australia.
Lovely post Bec
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Sorry for my typos – iPad won’t let me edit. It’s reporting amd were, not we’re.
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I was the same age as her. I know exactly where I was standing when my sister phoned with the news of the accident. I told her it was another media beat up and that she’ll be back at the gym on Monday! Oops.
I can still hear my three year old saying that he wished she’d never died. How sweet. Oh, he then went on to point out that I hadn’t moved from in front of the TV for a week. I think the kids were scavenging food from the rubbish bins by the time the funeral was over.
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I was at Carlton v Collingwood at Princes Park. The ABC radio commentators stopped commentating: they didn’t know what to do or say. Our beloved footy became just a game. The commentators – footy blokes – were angry her death hadn’t been announced at the game. I told the people around me- you could see people talking quietly but urgently – and then everyone started to leave. No second glance at the footy- it was time to deal with bigger things.
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Hungover in bed on holiday in Greece.
I am born and bred in England and I could never feel anything for the woman, she lived a life so far removed from my experience. She lived and she died as we all will do.
I still feel nothing for the royals and never will.
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I loved her too…and wish she was still here. I was in outback Queensland on my way to Birdsville. Remember it clearly
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I was on the computer playing solitaire instead of studying for a year 12 exam when my grandfather came in and told me. “That can’t be right,” I thought, and went to take a look for myself. He was right. So sad.
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It was the day before my 8th birthday. It was a rainy day and I was in my dad’s shed with him and we had this tiny little black and white tv on in the background. I can’t believe I remember it, but it must have made an impact on me. I could grasp the sadness of it even at age 8.
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I was 26 when she died and I only really remember hearing it on the news and being shocked. I had grown up watching her; the shy girl, the lavish, princess wedding, every cover of every mag for years, eating disorder stories. ..and she was hounded! But the thing I remember most poignantly was THAT interview she did. Terribly sad, yet she was always so dignified whilst she must have been quietly dying inside. So tragic.
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I was at work at a nursing home (I worked there while I was studying my nursing degree). Some of the staff came out crying saying Diana had died, everyone was in genuine shock. A number of residents were also so upset. It is strange, some people have a way of making such an impact on your life, that their passing feels so personal and evokes such a strong emotional reaction, even though we do not know them personally. Great post Bec.
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I was 5 months pregnant with my son, and home with my 2 other small children aged 3 and 2. My husband was out working and rang me to say he heard on the radio there had been an accident. I sat and switched on the tv immediately and didnt move for hours.
I remember before it was announced that Diana had died, my sister in law called in and sat with me. I remember I was knitting a scarf (never knitted since) and I just kept knitting and knitting this ridiculously long ‘thing’.
I still cant believe she is gone. It was unfathomable that this Princess who seemed to be almost from a different planet to everyone else was actually ‘human’ and could actually die that way. So stupid I know.
I wonder if it was the age I was (mid 20s) and the fact i had grown through those childhood, into teen years with so much media saturation of her life that I felt a quite unrealistic attachment to her?
It made an impact on me and I made a moral choice that day to never buy 2 of the most common weekly womens magazines in Australia ever again. I remember being in my house and looking at an old issue with pictures of her and Dodi in it and feeling disgust that I bought into it. The hounding of her was relentless and I thought ‘enough’.
I’ve saved some money. I havent broken that promise.
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I was in California for a friend’s wedding. We had been out during the day at the beach and came in and heard it on the tv. It was so surreal, unbelievable really. We all sat glued to the television after that for days watching the crowds play out in London. Such a loss. I wonder what she would have been like today.
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I was visiting a friend in country northern NSW & we were on a day trip with her family including a very precocious little step-sister & her step-brother who was physically disabled & also partly autistic. The van had stopped & was overheated. We were stuck in the middle of nowhere with no mobile coverage & a distressed boy who just wanted to go home. It was such an uncomfortable situation because her father is verbally abusive & he was just starting to come up to the boil to go off. So when the news of Diana’s death came over the radio, I was the only one who seemed to care. I didn’t show how I felt at all.
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I was in bed feeding my 2 month old baby boy when my mum called me. My over-riding memory is the images of those poor little boys, William and Harry, having lost their mum. I’m a mother of two boys. Film showing them running into her arms just breaks my heart. That ‘baby’ I was feeding is now my beautiful 15 year old son. The night of her funeral my (now ex) husband and I were due to have a night out for the first time since the baby had been born. I couldn’t do it…we stayed home and I sat and cried and watched the funeral.
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It’s amazing how we remember such things.
I was 15 and was at the footy at the MCG and remember it coming on the big screen.
I also remember-
Sept 11 was awake watching the American today program around 5am. Didn’t hit me until hearing it on the way to uni and I cried all the way.
Steve Irwan- my students coming into afternoon homeroom telling me
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I was watching the football when it flashed on the screen that Diana and Dodi had died. I felt utter disbelief and sadness. A friend of mine was in Paris when she died and in London when the funeral was on. She was on holiday and said the feeling everywhere was just so sad. I often look at Wills and Kate and think how happy she would have been to see how lovely they are together and I am sure she would chuckle over Harry’s antics.
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Considering I was only nine, I still remember it as vividly as if it were yesterday. It was a friend’s 10th birthday party and we were bowling. On the TV screens above the lanes was the news, pronouncing Princess Di was dead. When I got home I told my dad to put the news on. He ignorantly tried to tell me that the headlines just meant her title as “Princess” was “dead”… Ahh, people who think they’re right…!
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Oh Bec – I think you of a kindred spirit even more now than I did before!
As a primary school student I had cuttings Clag-glued into scrapbooks full of Lady Di pictures, and my prized possession for some time was a letter from Buckingham Palace regretfully informing me that the Princess wouldn’t be able to come to my house on her tour of Australia but to thank me for my kind wishes!
I too cried for days and I think her funeral was the longest piece of non-stop television I have ever watched. My husband still remains dumbfounded!
I still have the scrapbooks somewhere …..
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I was only 4, and I only remember seeing the photographs of the car wreck on the TV. My mother was devastated. I cannot believe the world lost such a gentle, kind, compassionate, strong woman, who we desperately need in the world today. She is truly an inspiration to myself and I am sure, many. She has inspired me to dedicate my life to helping those less fortunate and always looking for the goodness in everyone. My God bless her soul and her family on this notable day. X
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I was in gorgeous Dublin with my now husband and a few mates. After a big drunken night we all came back to our hotel and put the tv on in one of the rooms. The news was on every channel, saying Dodi had died and Diana had a broken leg. Straight away, my husband said”she’s died”. Of course, we woke the next morning to the news she had died. I thought she was a beautiful, kind person, a great mother and was always dignified. I lived in the uk at the time, and the outrageous displays of grief were ott. Yes, it was an awful thing to happen, but maybe I’m just not one of those people who can cry for days over someone I never knew. But seeing her two sons at her funeral will always be one of the saddest things I’ve ever seen.
I love that I live in Australia, where the press doesn’t hound people in the public eye. The british press made her life a misery. For months before she died, the tabloids ran stories trashing her and basically calling her a slut abd an embarrasment to the royal family. And lets not forget that a large number of the british people bought these papers.
The day she died, the very same newspapers pronounced she was a saint. I do sound a tad cynical, and I apologise! It makes me sad that not much has changed – we still have celebrities and their kids followed by papparrazi, and judge people we don’t know by what’s said about them in magazines and tabloids. And it looks like Diana’s son Harry is is the current target for vitriol by the uk press, just cos he’s a bit cheeky. Come and live here, Harry! We’ll look after you!
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My boyfriend (at the time) and I arrived at his parents’ house and his mum told us Princess Di had been in an accident. I wondered if she’d been seriously hurt, and hoped of course that she hadn’t, so when the news followed swiftly through that she’d died, I was thoroughly shocked. I remember watching the funeral at home and feeling quite upset, even though I’d never really had a particular affinity for Princess Di. That someone so young and so famous had died seemed unbelievable, which is pretty irrational really, since youth and fame don’t make a person immune.
The funeral was so moving and I felt incredibly sorry for her boys, but Charles Spencer’s eulogy was so beauiful, loving and inspiring I almost cheered with the crowd.
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I was at my home in Glen Osmond in Adelaide watching the AFL – Crows play Essendon on the TV and a news flash happened during the game. We couldn’t believe it for a while!!! It was a memorable moment, especially for my mum who is English. We actually met Princess Dianna in 1987 when my family went to England and my mum and sister shook her hand outside Buckingham Palace.
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I was at the Sydney Football Stadium watching my boyfriend at the time playing RL. We’d heard about the accident and the “she’s fine”, “she’s seriously injured” reports at home before we left but at the Stadium they actually announced over the loud speaker that she had passed away. The whole stadium collectively gasped “oh no”, myself included and you could feel the atomospere of the crowd become very somber. I never cried over it, but it’s also something that I won’t ever forget.
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I was living in London. My dad used to visit me on Sunday mornings. He rang at 7am – much earlier than usual – and told me the news. I couldn’t believe it. Diana had been all over the press that week with the whole Dodi thing, she was also involved in an anti landmine campaign. I still had newspapers in the house with pictures of her in the safety gear. The press had slated her every day that week and then switched immediately to 100% Saint Diana mode.
The press hype was unbelievable and over the top. I think they have a lot to answer for with regards to the damage done to the Royal Family at the time.
I just wish she’d been wearing a seatbelt.
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…she wasn’t?!?
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No. The only one in the car who survived was her bodyguard & he was also the only one who was wearing a seatbelt.
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I was 13 and in year 8. I was reading a book in my room and my little brother came in and said, “Hey Anna Princess Diana is dead.” I didn’t believe him and told him to stop playing games and leave me alone. Not long after my mother confirmed that it was true and I couldn’t believe it.
To be honest if I heard the news now, as an adult, i think I would feel very shaken up; wondering how her sons were coping and thinkinghow tragic it was for someone who had done so much to die so younng. However, at 13, I was still very selfish and found it hard to put myself in someone else’s shoes. I was quite unaffected and didn’t think too much about it. I remember wondering why my mother was so upset because she didn’t even know Diana and complaining that the funeral was on every TV station because that meant nothing else was on. Now I can’t believe I thought like this! It’s funny how our perspective changes with time.
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I remember i was ironing, a rarity. It was a Sunday I think, the TV was on and I saw the 1st news reports before we knew she’d actually passed away. I prayed. I rang a friend, we spoke of her, we hoped against hope… but as we spoke they announced that she was dead. Shocked, we hung up and the week that followed was so sad, so quiet. Her funeral cortege and her boys, those sights will always stay with me. At her age, Diana was only a few years older than I, and I saw her as a big sister figure; a gorgeous, glamorous and yet persecuted woman. A picture of grace under fire. I will always love her for that.
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I was attending the Brisbane Writers Festival as a keen Honours student. I remember a panel about women’s writing/feminism where everyone was all analytical and cynical, but that’s when she was thought only injured. My head was spinning with arguments about the press/the royals/women in the public eye by the time I heard she’d died.
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I was 10, and I heard it on the news. I remember my mum collecting clippings on the accident and all the magazine tributes that were printed – she still has them.
We watched the funeral at our house with some family friends, and I remember looking at the princes walking behind the coffin and thinking how devastated I would be if it was my mum.
My older sister was in London, and she actually went along to the funeral and left flowers at Diana’s home. A very sad day.
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Wow! Has it really been 15 years?? I was 14 and in the car with my dad, who was pulling up outside my best friends house to drop me there for a sleep over. My friend came out wearing one of those funny glasses and nose things..you know? And she said “Diana’s dead”, and I was all “Nah, she’s just been in an acccident, DODI is dead”, and was all “Dude, check out the tv” (All whilst still having the glasses on. I couldn’t believe it! I too was really sad, and I will never forget the sound of the crowd during her procession down to the palace, utterly heartbreaking.
Still can’t believe it’s been 15 years..
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I remember that day so well. I was back packing for a year and was in Turkey. I arrived into a Turkish hostel to find everyone crowded around a telly. Someone told me what had happened. I watched the funeral on the roof terrace of another Hostel is Kas, under a blanket because it was so sunny we couldn’t see the telly. Such a tragic loss.
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I just remember the shock and the absolute sea of flowers that were left outside the gates to her home and her two young boys walking solemnly behind her coffin with their father and uncles and Elton John playing “candles in the wind” at her funeral.
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I was in a new age shop in Blackheath and it was like time stood still and everything was all hazy after that. ‘No it can’t be true’ I thought, she was my friend, we’d been through so much together. She can’t be dead! How could someone so alive be dead? I cried for days, and I lit candles for her for years. I can’t believe I forgot….
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I don’t remember exactly (I was 14) but I do recall being in Paris in 2007 and realising I was at the spot where she died (well, above the tunnel anyway) and thinking again how desparately sad it all was.
Those black and white photos of her are so beautiful. And it really is breathtaking how young the boys were. Tragic.
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I was six and didn’t know who Princess Di was. My mum and I were at a country crafts boutique/cottage in rural Qld. I remember needing to go to the toilet but there were no public bathrooms close to the cottage so the ladies who were busy at work making pottery kindly let my mum and I in to their workshop to use the facilities. As soon as we walked in, my mum just stopped when we saw the news on their tiny tv, and all the ladies told us about what had happened. I obviously didn’t understand what was going on but I knew that mum was really sad and I still remember exactly what that cottage looked like.
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I still have a vivid memory of that moment. It is one of those momentous events that make you starkly aware of your own mortality.
I was locked in an intense ‘study group’ in a small room at uni all morning (back in the days when hours could go by without any interruption from the outside world – we didn’t all have smart phones, laptops…hell, I didn’t even carry a mobile phone! Anyway…).
I jumped straight it my car afterwards and drove home (no radio – or working doors for that matter – in the old Nissan Pintara!) without a clue. I remember walking into the lounge room at my parents’ home and everyone was just staring blankly at the television in silence.
A family staring catatonically at the telly may not sound unusual, but this was a sunny, Sunday in Brissy and my family don’t do anything quietly (or sit still, together for any length of time). Something was up. A shiver ran down my spine. An unthinking person might have reacted to the atmosphere in the room with the remark, “woah, who died?”.
My most vivid memories of my late father are the ones where his macho stoicism momentarily left him and I saw him for the sensitive soul that he really was. I remember he just looked up at me with such a sad, yet gentle and, somehow, comforting expression. He could tell immediately that I had no idea what was going on, so he just nodded towards the television and calmly explained what had happened.
I still weep when I see photos or footage of William and Harry at the funeral. At the time I remember thinking how heartbreakingly cruel it was for children that young to lose a parent.
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I was still living in my hometown of Whyalla, SA. My boyfriend (now husband) and I were driving to my Mum’s house when we heard it on the radio that Princess Di had been in a car accident but she was OK only had broken bones… When we got to Mum’s we turned on the TV and it was confirmed, Dianna had died. I remember watching the funeral and crying my eyes out, she was just so beautiful and her two boys were now Motherless. So sad, I too still miss her xx
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I was up a ladder, cleaning the tops of the kitchen cupboards for my mum. We had the radio on, it sounded like a joke. It was about a fortnight before my first OS trip to the uk, alone. I was 18.
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I was 12 years old and i remember i was watching video hits and the breaking news went across the bottom of the screen. I ran outside to tell my mum who was gardening and she dropped everything to come inside.
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I was seven years old, watching TV with my parents one afternoon when I heard the news. My first question was, “who will be the next Princess of Wales?”…. I guess I didn’t realise at that age that someone like Diana could never ever be replaced.
Cannot believe it’s been fifteen years!
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I was just finishing up at an Intimo lingerie party (selling bras and knickers to supplement my income – Lordie, the things we do!) when I heard the news. I was in complete denial, refusing to believe it. The funeral was heart-breaking – my friends and I watched it together, eating cake and just crying our eyes out. I remember other friends telling us how silly we were to cry for a woman we didn’t know but the thing is, even though she didn’t know us, we knew so much about her and the bits we knew, we loved and were absolutely worth crying over. Does that make sense?
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Makes TOTAL sense – see directly below!
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Beautiful piece Bec.
I was in year 12. In the locker room.
I cried.
And so did lots of others. Then one of the girls in our year turned around out of nowhere and said “Why are you fools crying, you didn’t know her, she was nothing to you!”
But she was wrong. Ok, maybe we didn’t know her, but she wasn’t nothing to us. She was something. She stood for something. She was a beautiful person, especially on the inside, and even though I didn’t know her, this always shone through.
Rest peacefully gorgeous Diana.
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