Royal relative hits back at Nerissa and Katherine Bowes-Lyon storyline in The Crown

David Bowes-Lyon has dubbed the episode about the Queen’s first cousins ‘fiction pretending to be fact’
The Queen and Captain David Bowes-LyonStuart C. Wilson / Getty Images

While audiences have been voraciously watching Season 4 of The Crown, the level of excitement and scandal in the Netflix favourite has also attracted plenty of controversy. With its imagined scenes and historical inaccuracies, everyone from Earl Spencer (brother to the late Diana, Princess of Wales) to Helena Bonham Carter (who plays Princess Margaret in the series), has been proposing that the fictional nature of the drama needs to be made more explicit.

Now another royal insider has weighed in, with Royal Family relative Captain David Bowes-Lyon criticising how the story of the Queen’s first cousins, Nerissa and Katherine Bowes-Lyon, is represented in the show.

In episode seven of the new series, ‘The Hereditary Principle’ Princess Margaret learns that two maternal cousins, Nerissa and Katherine Bowes-Lyon, who had been recorded as deceased, are in fact alive. She discovers that the sisters, who suffered from developmental disabilities, have been secreted away in a mental hospital because, says the Queen Mother in the episode, ‘The hereditary principle already hangs by such a precarious thread… Throw in mental illness, and it’s over.’

In reality, it’s thought that the mis-recording of the deaths in Burke’s Peerage was simply a mistake made by the sisters’ mother, who was described by their cousin, Lord Clinton, as a ‘vague person’.

Now 73-year-old David Bowes-Lyon, whose father was a first cousin of the Queen Mother once removed, has criticised The Crown’s version of events, dubbing it ‘fiction pretending to be fact’. He told the Telegraph that the Royal Family were not pleased with the depiction, stating: ‘I wouldn’t say there is upset in the family, but I think people are frustrated and would like the record put straight.’

He also refuted the idea, as portrayed in the episode, that Princess Margaret was unaware of her cousins’ existence and shocked and appalled to learn of their situation. He went on: ‘She knew who they were in every respect, as you would any cousin. She knew exactly who they were and what had happened. It is completely wrong to say they were forgotten and certified as lunatics.’

Nerissa (1919–1986) and Katherine Bowes-Lyon (1926–2014) were two of the daughters of John Herbert Bowes-Lyon (the Queen Mother’s brother) and his wife Fenella. While their exact diagnosis remains unknown, both women were said to be significantly handicapped and nonverbal.

The sisters were placed in the Royal Earlswood Hospital in Redhill, Surrey in 1941. Established in 1847, Earlswood was the first hospital catering specifically to those with developmental disabilities. Nerissa and Katherine remained in institutional care for the rest of their lives, until their deaths at the ages of 66 and 87 respectively.

Contrary to The Crown’s portrayal of the sisters being secreted away and forgotten, David Bowes-Lyon stressed that they weren’t ‘abandoned’ and were visited ‘frequently’. He said that both Nerissa and Katherine developed dementia and were unable to recognise people. He added that his cousin, Lady Elizabeth Shakerley, who died last month, and his father, Major General James Bowes-Lyon, both related that the sisters were indeed visited.

Olivia Colman in The CrownOllie Upton / Netflix

More from Tatler