Prince Charles and Jimmy Savile.Photo: Tim Ockenden/PA Images via Getty
The close relationship betweenPrince Charlesand disgraced BBC presenter Jimmy Savile, who was publicly exposed as a pedophile following his 2011 death, is being examined due to a new Netflix documentary that uncovered letters between the pair.
The first of the letters, dated Jan. 14, 1987, was a handwritten note fromPrince Charles.
“Perhaps I am wrong, but you are the bloke who knows what’s going on,” the heir wrote. “What I really need is a list of suggestions from you. I so want to get to parts of the country that others don’t get to reach.”
Princess Diana, Prince Charles and Jimmy Savile.Hilaria McCarthy/Daily Express/Hulton Archive/Getty
Prince Charlesinquired in 1989 for suggestions on “useful morale-boosting visits etc to worthwhile groups, places, projects and so on that don’t get enough attention.”
“It reignited a discussion about how the royal family should respond to disasters,” the documentary’s director Rowan Deacon said, according toThe Times.“Jimmy Savile wrote this dossier, quite an in-depth document of advice, on how the Queen should behave and how members of the royal family should not be in competition with each other.”
Savile’s guidelines included hiring “a special person with considerable experience in such matters” and having “an ‘incident room’ with several independent phone lines, teletext, etc.”
Prince Charlessaid in a 1989 letter to Savile, “I attach a copy of my memo on disasters which incorporates your points and which I showed to my father. He showed it to HM [Her Majesty].”
Jimmy Savile and Prince Charles.Gareth Copley/PA Images via Getty
Prince Charlesalso asked Savile to meet with Fergie, as Prince Andrew’s now ex-wife is known, in a Dec. 1989 note.
“I wonder if you would ever be prepared to meet my sister-in-law — the Duchess of York?” he said. “Can’t help feeling that it would be extremely useful to her if you could. I feel she could do with some of your straightforward common sense!”
Savile’s victims came forward several times over the years, but police inquiries never came to fruition until after his death. According toThe Times, an anonymous letter was sent to police in 1998 stating that Savile “thinks he’s untouchable because of the people he mixes with.” That included a relationship with Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, who successfully lobbied for him to be knighted in 1990.
“The consequence of that was that it gave him a seal of approval in the eyes of the British public,” Deacon said. “It consolidated our trust in him. We’re not suggesting for one moment that Thatcher orPrince Charlesknew what he was really up to. Nonetheless, that seal of approval meant that the weight of his respect and trust was a planet compared to the tiny voices of these women that popped up every now and again.”
source: people.com
