Sarah Ferguson Was Ready to "Tell Stories" About the Royal Family That Weren’t "Very Pleasant" Amid Andrew Divorce, Per Her Mother
Susan Barrantes admitted that her daughter was prepared to fight back during her split from the former Prince Andrew.
Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor was stripped of his titles and honors amid the fallout from his Jeffrey Epstein scandal, but ex-wife Sarah Ferguson also lost her Duchess of York title this fall. Although Entitled author Andrew Lownie told Marie Claire that Ferguson is the "Houdini of the Royal Family," a comeback looks far off for the former duchess at the moment.
But Fergie weathered another scandal in 1992 when her formal separation from then-Prince Andrew was announced—and her mother told the press that Sarah was willing to reveal royal secrets if her custody demands weren't met.
In Entitled: The Rise and Fall of the House of York, Lownie shares an excerpt from an interview Ferguson's mother, Susan Barrantes, gave to Italian magazine Gente at the time of their separation. Along with telling the publication that her former son-in-law, Andrew, "hasn't got any character," she said that Ferguson was worried about Princess Beatrice and Princess Eugenie being taken away from her.
"Sarah will not accept easily to lose her children and if she does, she is prepared to tell stories that are not very pleasant about the English Crown," Barrantes told the media outlet.
Sarah Ferguson is pictured sledding with Eugenie (right) and Beatrice during a 1993 trip to Switzerland.
Lownie writes that "Fergie was determined to avoid the fate of her mother and sister Jane who had both lost custody of their children when their marriages broke up," adding that "her trump card" was that she "could always sell a kiss-and-tell memoir."
The historian and author continues that for Queen Elizabeth, "the threat was ever present, and the Royal Household knew it always would be."
In the Channel 5 documentary When Fergie Met the Monarchy, royal author Tom Quinn said that Sarah's custody concerns weren't far off the mark. He said that Sarah being "pushed away" from Beatrice and Eugenie "was put forward as a serious suggestion by the House of Windsor, by the Royal Family, largely because they feel they should always be in control, that they, or rather Andrew, would have custody of the children."
The former Duke and Duchess of York brought their daughters to the Royal Windsor Horse Show in May 1992, two months after their separation.
However, a joint custody arrangement was agreed to with Andrew, and a splashy tell-all didn't quite see the light of day. Sarah waited until after her divorce to publish her first memoir, My Story, in 1996, along with a followup, Finding Sarah, in 2011, but they focused more on her personal journey than revealing royal secrets.
Thirty years later, the potential of a new memoir still hangs in the air, but for now, Ferguson is focusing on finding a new home as she and Andrew spend their last Christmas at Royal Lodge.
