The royal family and Kennedy dynasty have been intimately connected for decades. Princess Diana had a lot in common with John F. Kennedy Jr. and Carolyn Bessette. The royal family and Kennedy dynasty have been intimately connected for decades.
In The Kennedys and the Windsors: The Story of Two Dynasties, One Born, One Made by Caroline Hallemann, a February 1997 note sent from Princess Diana to JFK Jr. reveals she worried about the tabloid treatment of the young couple, per an excerpt published in Vanity Fair.
“I hope the media are leaving both you and Carolyn alone. I know how difficult it is, but believe it or not, the worst paparazzi are here in Europe!” the royal wrote in 1997, Hallemann’s book claims, with the word “hope” underlined.
Princess Diana and JFK Jr. first met to discuss her appearing on the cover of George magazine in 1995 at the Carlyle Hotel in New York. While she politely declined, JFK Jr. pitched her for an interview on several occasions thereafter. Her letter showed that, while she wasn’t closing the door on the opportunity, the timing wasn’t right.
Princess Diana, along with JFK Jr. and Bessette, faced tabloid scrutiny in the 1990s and were chased by the paparazzi constantly. Before and after her divorce from then-Prince Charles, she was an object of fascination among the media. The Kennedys, meanwhile, faced tabloid scrutiny during their courtship and marriage.
The royal died in August 1997 due to injuries sustained by a car crash in Paris following a high-speed chase when her car was pursued by paparazzi. Her car’s driver and her partner, Dodi Fayed, died instantly. Diana’s bodyguard Trevor Rees-Jones was the only survivor, though he was seriously injured.
Princess Diana was pronounced dead hours later at the Pitié-Salpêtrière Hospital. She was 36.
Less than two years later, JFK Jr. and Carolyn died in July 1999 in a plane crash off the coast of Martha’s Vineyard. The couple, along with Carolyn’s sister Lauren, were flying from New Jersey to Massachusetts that evening. The plan was to drop off Lauren in Martha’s Vineyard before the couple headed to Cape Cod for Rory Kennedy’s wedding.
Their bodies were recovered days later from the ocean floor. It was determined that they died upon impact.
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Diana’s private secretary Patrick Jephson believed “she saw in him a fellow victim, if you can put it that way, of life in the public eye and difficulty of knowing who to trust,” according to Hallemann’s book.
“And I think that that did create a connection between them. I wouldn’t call it a bond, but an affinity, a recognition of each other’s unusual hardships and difficulties.”
The Kennedys and the Windsors: The Story of Two Dynasties, One Born, One Made comes out on June 2. It is available for preorder wherever books are sold
