Following the death of Queen Elizabeth II, her first son, 73-year-old Charles, ascended the throne to become King Charles III. The new king had been the Prince of Wales — the title reserved for future British kings-in-waiting — for the longest time in the monarchy’s history.
“There is no getting around it, he is not in his prime,” said CBS News royal contributor Julian Payne, who served as Prince Charles’ press secretary at the time. “Instead, we will see more than 50 years of experience on the global stage.”
Payne predicted that Charles would approach his role as king in the same way that his mother did as queen.
“He, like his mother, believes this is about duty and service,” Payne explained. “You do your job. When called upon, you provide a service to the nation. You don’t go looking for it, you don’t try to get it, but when it comes to you, you take on that role and do the best you can.”
In an interview with the Canadian public broadcaster, CBC, just days before King Charles’ official coronation ceremony at London’s ancient Westminster Abbey, Charles’ sister, Princess Anne, echoed that sentiment.
“You know what you’re going to get because he’s been practicing for a while, and I don’t think he’ll change,” Anne explained. “He is committed to… his own level of service, and that will remain true.”
First modern heir to the throne
Charles was the first modern heir to the British throne in many ways: he was sent to school rather than being tutored privately at the palace, and he went on to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree at Cambridge.
Charles then joined both the Royal Air Force and the Royal Navy, serving on several warships during the 1970s.
Charles, Princess Diana, and Camilla
Charles’ public life has been defined in many ways by the women he has shared it with. The boy-who-would-be-king had a duty from the start to find a wife and produce future heirs.
Lady Diana Spencer appeared to be the ideal partner at first. He was 32, she was 20, and their wedding was a global media sensation. They were the parents of two sons, Princes William and Harry.
But it soon became clear to the rest of the world that the royal couple was unhappy together. As more photos showed them looking away, the tabloids dubbed them “The Glums.”
In their highly public divorce drama, Prince Charles frequently unwittingly played the villain for a ravenous tabloid press.
When asked whether Charles’ long-time confidante Camilla Parker Bowles played a role in the breakdown of her marriage, Diana replied, “There were three of us in this marriage, so it was a bit crowded.”
When Princess Diana was killed in a car accident in Paris in 1997, Charles’ public image was so tainted that many questioned whether he could ever become king at all. It took years of being seen as the dedicated father to his two grieving sons for him to come out of the shadows.
He did, however, emerge and eventually married Camilla in 2005 in the first non-religious, civil ceremony for a British royal in England.
Early in 2022, Queen Elizabeth II stated that when Charles became king, it was her “sincere wish that, when that time comes, Camilla will be known as Queen Consort as she continues her own loyal service” to the monarchy.
In a statement, Charles said that he and Camilla were “deeply conscious of the honor represented by my mother’s wish.”
Invitations to the coronation on May 6, when both she and the king will be formally crowned, revealed that Camilla will drop the “consort” from her title after the event and be known simply as Queen Camilla thereafter.
A prince’s “bonkers” pursuits
Once his life partner and future heirs were determined, Prince Charles focused his efforts on the various charities and other causes he supported – not all of which were widely supported at the time.
“I suppose I have spent most of my life trying to propose and initiate things that very few people could see the point of, or, frankly, thought were plain bonkers,” he said in 2016. “Perhaps some of them are now beginning to recognize a spot of pioneering in all of this apparent madness?”
The remark was an arguably permissible humblebrag by a royal who had embraced concepts such as organic farming, nature conservation, and the urgency of confronting climate change before many others.
As Prince of Wales, Charles continued to be a passionate advocate for everything from environmental conservation to community empowerment through his charitable work.
“I find myself born into this particular position,” he told an interviewer once. “I’m determined to make the most of it, to do whatever I can to help, and, hopefully, to leave things a little bit better than I found them.”
Charles and the presidents
The corridors of power on the other side of the Atlantic are no stranger to King Charles. He’s been to Washington at least 20 times and has met every President of the United States since Jimmy Carter.
He will meet President Biden at the COP26 climate conference in Scotland in November 2021. Mr. Biden praised the then-prince for his environmental leadership, telling him, “We need you badly… and I’m not just saying that,” and crediting Charles with getting “the whole thing going.”
During former President Donald Trump’s state visit to the United Kingdom in 2019, Charles was supposed to meet with the American leader for about 15 minutes, but they ended up talking for an hour and a half.
Later, Trump admitted that Charles “did most of the talking,” but he described the royal as “a very good person” who was “really into climate change.”
“What moved me was his passion for future generations,” Trump said. “He wants to ensure that future generations have a good climate rather than a disaster, and I agree.”
During a three-day visit to the United States in 2015, Charles met then-President Barack Obama for the second time. Obama said in the Oval Office that the American people were “quite fond of the royal family,” and that they “like them much better than their own politicians.”
“I don’t believe that,” Charles replied.
