Tragedy for Prince William’s ‘old flame’ whose father died in a drunken fall: Royal had a forgotten romance with The Voice contestant Rose Farquhar

It was a ‘sweet and innocent’ romance that could well have changed the course of history if Prince William‘s ‘first love’ Rose Farquhar had gone on to be a royal bride. 

Rose certainly had all the right credentials – as the daughter of King Charles‘ longtime friend and legendary hunting figure Ian Farquhar, she moved in the same circles as the royals, lived near Highgrove and loved countryside pursuits. 

She enjoyed a summer of love with an 18-year-old Prince William after he left Eton, and while their romance didn’t last, their families remained close and the future King attended her wedding in 2022. 

He will no doubt have offered some words of support to his former girlfriend, after the tragic death earlier this year of her father, one of the King and Queen’s closest friends. 

The Old Etonian died in March aged 78 after he became trapped between a wall and his bed while drunk at his home near Chippenham, Wiltshire and Swindon coroner’s court was told on Wednesday.

Retired Army Captain Farquhar was an equerry to the late Queen Mother and moved in Royal circles as he regularly dined with the King and Queen Camilla at their Highgrove residence in Gloucestershire.

Their families shared a close bond, with his daughter Rose dating Prince William in the summer of 2000 after he finished his A-levels at Eton.

The singer-songwriter, now married and in her 40s, has been described as his ‘first love’ after the pair met at the Beaufort Polo Club in Gloucestershire.

Rose, the youngest daughter of Captain Farquhar, the former master of the Beaufort Hunt, has been described as Prince William’s first serious girlfriend.

The future King, 42, was 18 when he dated The Voice contestant and would take her on afternoon picnics, according to royal author Katie Nicholl.

And they were once left red-faced after being caught by a farmer in a field, according to Nicholl’s book The Making of a Royal Romance.

Prince William, who met his now-wife Catherine, Princess of Wales in 2003, knew Rose as a child.

She studied at Westonbirt School in Gloucestershire and was friends with Victoria Inskip, the sister of one of the royal’s best friends Tom.

‘When it came to girls, the notoriously shy prince was quite the romantic and uncharacteristically confident,’ Nicholl wrote.

‘He had abandoned his rather crass chat-up line, ‘I’m a prince, wanna pull?’ and instead spent the summer of the Millennium courting Rose with romantic afternoon strolls and picnics in the Gloucestershire countryside.

‘Rumour has it that on one occasion the couple were stealing a private moment in a field when they were rudely interrupted by a farmer who stumbled across the young lovers.’

Nicholl added: ‘It was a long hot summer and William spent a lot of time at Highgrove and Rose was always around.’

The pair shared the same interests and the same friends but only realised that summer they liked each other after Prince William made the first move.

‘It was a very sweet and innocent love affair and Rose still laughs about the time they got caught by a farmer in a field,’ Nicholl wrote.

Despite their romance faltering, Rose and Prince William have always stayed on good terms and have often seen each other at society weddings over the years due to their mutual friends.

In 2022, Prince William, who has three children with Princess of Wales, attended Rose’s wedding to George Gemmel – the stepson of Barbadian building tycoon Sir Charles Williams and an aspiring vet.

He slipped in discreetly through the back door of St Mary the Virgin church in Tetbury, Gloucestershire, to witness the ceremony.

After dating Prince William, Rose headed to New York where she studied acting at the Lee Strasberg Institute.

She appeared on The Voice in the UK in 2016, singing for Boy George and Will.iam.

Rose also participated in the reality show ‘How Do You Solve A Problem Like Maria?’ in 2006, which searched for an actress to play Maria Von Trapp on the West End’s production of The Sound of Music.

Following the programme, she went on to receive a BBC Fame Academy Award to study Musical Theatre and Acting in New York City.

Today, she works for the Duchess of Rutland’s Belvoir Castle in a business development role.

Still in society circles, she attended the wedding of Prince William and Kate in 2011, but also that of Prince Harry and Duchess Meghan in 2018.

Rose’s father Captain Farquhar, who loved horses and hunting, was discovered dead in March with his legs up in the air above his bedside table at his home.

A coroner ruled that the retired Army Captain, who loved horses and hunting, was probably trying to move off his bed.

An inquest heard that his blood alcohol level was 4.5 times over the drink drive limit when he died.

Captain Farquhar’s daughter, Victoria, revealed how he would ‘drink a litre of gin and a couple of bottles of wine in a day’.

He rose through the ranks of the military as part of the prestigious cavalry regiment the Queen’s Own Hussars, becoming a Captain.

Whilst in the Army he also served as equerry to the Queen’s Mother, attending public engagements with her. He previously lived on the King’s Highgrove estate where he rented a farmhouse.

In the last few years of his life Captain Farquhar struggled with his health, he was unsteady on his feet and had to use a walking stick as well as being unable to pull himself up when he had a fall.

On March 6, care worker Beth Gillingham visited him and heard no response as she called out his name when she entered his home.

Ms Gillingham went up to the bedroom and could not see the former huntsman until she looked down the side of the bed and saw him trapped between the wall and his bed.

The carer checked for a pulse but when she could not find one she called the police who attended the scene and pronounced Captain Farquhar dead just after 1pm.

An empty bottle of Gordon’s gin, two empty wine bottles and a half empty bottle of whisky were found in his home.

The pathologist recorded postural asphyxia, inversion of the body and alcohol toxicity as the cause of death, which was also adopted by the coroner.

At the inquest, a statement was read out from his daughter, Victoria, who described his love of horses but said that hunts are where his drinking problem began.

‘He went to Eton then joined the military and went to Sandhurst,’ she said.

‘He became the Queen Mother’s equerry, he said he was essentially the Queen Mother’s bodyguard.

‘He was a huge lover of horses and would go on hunts where there would be a dinner afterwards.

‘The amount of drinking was considered normal for the activity but as time went on we thought he had a drinking problem. He would drink a litre of gin and a couple of bottles of wine in a day.

‘He did try and stop and he would for a couple of weeks, doctors advised Ian that if he did not look after himself he would die.’

Victoria explained that her father began to suffer from falls in 2022 and the family contacted care agency Helping Hands who would visit for an hour or so a day to provide Captain Farquhar with support and companionship.

Stuart White formed a close bond with Old Etonian as his main carer and, in a statement, he told the inquest that he would talk about his past but that he missed being able to look after dogs and horses.

Area Coroner for Wiltshire Ian Singleton recorded a conclusion of death by misadventure saying that Captain Farquhar had probably moved off the bed in a ‘deliberate act’ but he had not intended to die.