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As Prince Edward, the Duke of Edinburgh, turns 60 today, I want to share a story about his sporting enthusiasm—and his character and personality—that has never been told before. It involves my husband, Stephen G. Smith, who wrote a feature for The New Yorker magazine in 1991 about the venerable and complicated racquet sport known as court tennis in the United States and real tennis in Britain.  Stephen’s account of the match they played was meant to be the surprise ending of the article, but it was cut in the editing. He still thinks it shouldn’t have been cut, and I agree. So after I give you my take on Edward’s place in the royal family as he hits his milestone birthday, I’ll turn this post over to my husband as a guest contributor.

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Prince Edward and his 59-year-old wife Sophie, the Duchess of Edinburgh, have become crucial figures in the royal family. Edward’s older brother, King Charles III, has been out of action for more than a month since he began treatment following his cancer diagnosis. And Catherine, the Princess of Wales, wife of Edward’s nephew Prince William, has suspended her royal duties until after Easter while recuperating from abdominal surgery in mid-January. She and William just released the first official photograph of her since her operation.

Edward is 14th in line to the British throne, but he and Sophie have been hard-working senior royals for more than two decades. They married in June 1999 after dating for six years. From the early days of their courtship, Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip took a shine to Sophie and admired her for being sensible and down-to-earth. Like Kate Middleton, she came from a solid middle-class family. Her father, Christopher Rhys-Jones, was a tire salesman and her mother, Mary, was a charity worker.

The monarch didn’t mind Sophie staying in the royal apartments at Buckingham Palace while she and the prince were dating. When the royal family took summer cruises aboard the royal yacht Britannia in 1995 and 1997, Sophie was invited along with Edward. They married in June 1999 at St. George’s Chapel in Windsor Castle.

At first they tried to work outside the royal orbit, Sophie with her own public relations company, and Edward in television production. But these efforts foundered, and in 2002 they took on royal duties full-time in support of the Queen and to pursue their own philanthropic interests. Much of their work went unheralded, but after Prince Harry and Meghan Markle gave up their royal duties in 2020 and moved to California to pursue money-making ventures, Edward and Sophie took on a greater role, and their causes attracted more attention. A year ago, on his 59th birthday, Charles III named Edward the Duke of Edinburgh, their father’s title that Philip wanted to pass to his youngest son.

Although his older brother, Prince Andrew, was frequently called the Queen’s favorite child, those who know the royal family best say that she was closest to Edward. The Queen and Philip often visited Edward and Sophie at Bagshot Park, their home near Windsor Castle, Sophie rode on horseback with the Queen at Windsor, and Prince Philip taught their daughter Louise how to drive horse-drawn carriages. On Edward’s 50th birthday, his parents came to lunch at Bagshot, and Philip at age 92 jumped on a trampoline with Louise and her younger brother James.

To mark Edward’s 60th, Sophie released a statement praising him for his work behind the scenes on behalf of his philanthropies. “Whatever he is doing he gives 150 per cent of himself,” she said. “He is the best of fathers, the most loving of husbands and still is my best friend.”

Over the past couple of years, I have spent time with Edward at two occasions in Washington, D.C. The first was in November 2022 when he invested Oliver St. Clair Franklin, the Honorary Consul of Philadelphia, as an Honorary Commander of the Order of the British Empire. Edward has known Oliver for years, and the award highlighted Oliver’s many services to Anglo-American relations.  

Four months later, in April 2023, shortly after becoming the Duke of Edinburgh, Edward was back in the United States for a dinner hosted by the British Ambassador, Dame Karen Pierce. He spoke passionately about the Duke of Edinburgh’s International Award that he is expanding into the Washington area. As Prince Philip cut back his duties before retiring in 2017 at age 96, Edward took over his father’s role leading the program.

At the ambassador’s dinner, Edward described the scope of the initiative. Founded by Prince Philip in 1956, the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award recognizes teenagers and young adults for tackling challenging courses in community service and physical endurance. The award has helped millions of young people in 144 countries achieve their goals and contribute to their communities through voluntary service. When he was a teenager, Edward earned a gold award—the highest level after bronze and silver—and over the years he has presided over gold award ceremonies around the world. He was relaxed and engaging, and he spoke fluently and easily without notes. With the coronation of his older brother only weeks away, he joked that he was glad to be away from the “adrenaline and fear” surrounding the rehearsals for the big day.

What he did not mention was that in 2018 as the patron of the Tennis and Rackets Association, he raised over £2 million for the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award by playing on 52 real tennis courts around the world.  He spent 45 weeks playing 151 sets with 438 players, starting at Cambridge University, where he first took up the game as an undergraduate, and ending at the Royal Tennis Court, Hampton Court, where he had played many times over the years. “The Tennis Challenge exceeded everyone’s expectations,” he said at the end of his remarkable mission.

Such an odyssey would have been difficult to envision in the spring of 1991 when 27-year-old Prince Edward came to Manhattan to watch the World Championship at the Racquet & Tennis Club on Park Avenue.

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