Princess Diana Sent Ex-Prince Andrew Anonymous Valentine's Day Cards as a Teenager, New Book Claims

Janine HenniFri, June 19, 2026 at 4:57 PM UTC

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Lady Diana Spencer and Prince Andrew in a carriage during the Trooping The Colour ceremony, Buckingham Palace, London on June 13, 1981Credit: Central Press/Hulton Archive/Getty -

Princess Diana sent anonymous Valentine's Day cards to Prince Andrew as a teenager, according to a new book

Royals author Catherine Mayer makes the claim in Divide and Rule: Royal Women and Their Battles

Diana later introduced her childhood friend Sarah Ferguson to Prince Andrew, leading to their marriage in 1986

Did Princess Diana fancy one of King Charles' brothers when she was young?

Author Catherine Mayer makes the claim in the new book Divide and Rule: Royal Women and Their Battles, out June 23.

As seen in PEOPLE's exclusive excerpt of the text, Mayer writes that Princess Diana sent Valentine's to his younger brother, the former Prince Andrew, for a time as a young woman.

"If Diana failed to spot that Charles was incapable of giving her the love she craved, it cannot have helped that the love she craved was a fiction — a modern-day version of courtly love. Before she ever met her future husband, she developed a passion at a distance for one of his brothers," she writes. "The schoolfriend says that every year until Diana turned fifteen or sixteen, she sent Andrew a valentine card, anonymously of course."

Prince Andrew, Lady Diana Spencer and Prince Charles attend the Cartier International polo match on Smith's Lawn, Windsor on July 26, 1981.Credit: Jayne Fincher/Princess Diana Archive/Getty

Speaking to The Telegraph, Mayer says that the friend's claim surprised her.

"I was quite startled when I found that out. That was new news," she told the outlet in a piece published on June 16.

"Divide and Rule: Royal Women and Their Battles" by Catherine Mayer.Credit: HQ

Lady Diana Spencer's family had several connections to the royals, and she was born at Park House on the Sandringham Estate. Her grandmother Ruth Roche, Baroness Fermoy, was a lady-in-waiting to Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, and her brother-in-law Lord Robert Fellowes worked in the royal household, eventually rising to the role of Queen Elizabeth's private secretary.

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Diana's older sister Sarah briefly dated then-Prince Charles in the late 1970s and introduced the pair during a shoot at Althorp House, the Spencer family's ancestral home, in 1977. Sarah and Charles' fling didn't last long, and he began courting Diana in 1980, then a whirlwind engagement and marriage followed.

Princess Diana and Prince Charles stand on the balcony of Buckingham Palace after their wedding ceremony at St. Paul's Cathedral in London, England on July 29, 1981.Credit: Express Newspapers/Getty

Diana became the Princess of Wales when she married the future monarch, and she eventually set up her childhood friend and fourth cousin Sarah Ferguson with then-Prince Andrew.

"I said to her, 'Oh, Andrew's really good-looking.' And she said, 'Duh, Fergs!' " Ferguson told PEOPLE in 2021 about Diana connecting them.

Prince Charles, Princess Diana, Sarah Ferguson and Prince Andrew on a skiing holiday in Klosters, Switzerland in February 1987.Credit: Shutterstock

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Ferguson, nicknamed Fergie by friends and the press, married Andrew in 1986. Years later, she and Diana would both separate from their royal husbands in 1992 before getting divorced.

Princess Diana died following a car accident in Paris in 1997 at age 96, and King Charles stripped Andrew's princely title in October 2025 as his ties to Jeffrey Epstein came under renewed scrutiny. The former Duke of York has long denied any wrongdoing regarding his links to Epstein and his ex-wife Ferguson lost her Duchess of York title in the same sweep.

Divide & Rule follows the lives and times that shaped eight women in the British royal family, including Princess Diana, Kate Middleton, Meghan Markle, Queen Elizabeth and Queen Camilla.

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