Welsh-born Princess Lilian of Sweden has died at her home in Stockholm. She was 97.
Lilian met Sweden’s Prince Bertil in 1943 but the prince’s obligations to the throne and Lilian’s status as a divorced commoner prevented them from making their love public.
It would take more than 30 years before they could marry. The couple’s sacrifices and lifelong dedication to one another gripped the hearts of Swedes.
Prince Bertil died in the couple’s residence, Villa Solbacken in Stockholm, in 1997. The couple never had any children.
Born Lilian Davies in Swansea in 1915, she moved to London as a 16-year-old to embark on a career as a model and an actress. She met British actor Ivan Craig, who she married in 1940.
After the Second World War broke out, Craig was drafted into the British army while Lilian stayed behind in London, working at a factory making radio sets for the British merchant fleet and serving at a hospital for wounded soldiers.
At the time, Prince Bertil was stationed at the Swedish Embassy in London as a naval attache.
The couple first laid eyes on each other in the nightclub Les Ambassadeurs shortly before Lilian’s 28th birthday in 1943 and their romance blossomed.
Lilian was still married at the time but the situation resolved itself since Craig, too, had met someone else during his years abroad in the army, and the couple divorced on amicable terms.
The prince and Lilian lived together in a common-law marriage for decades until in 1976, 33 years after they first met, the new king finally gave them the approval they had been waiting for and that year, Lilian became princess of Sweden.