The royal family is awash with speculation this week as the combined interest in the Princess of Wales’ health, Prince William’s absence from his godfather’s memorial, King Charles’ cancer and the death of Thomas Kingston overwhelms the Palace.
Kingston’s death has been described as “shocking” and “unexpected” by his own family and royal commentators alike. The 45-year-old was found dead at an address in the Cotswolds on Sunday evening, with ambulances attending the scene around 6pm. The question mark still hangs over his cause of death, which has not yet been confirmed and will instead be the subject of an inquest. However, police did confirm that there were no suspicious circumstances surrounding the royal’s death.
To many, Kingston would not have been immediately obvious as a key player in the royal family. He married Lady Gabriella Windsor, the 42-year-old non-working royal 56th in line to the throne, and has stayed relatively removed from frontline royal life.
But there is much more to Kingston than is widely known: the University of Bristol graduate had links to the royal family long before Lady Gabriella, having allegedly dated Pippa Middleton around the time of Kate and William’s wedding in 2011, as well as one of Prince William’s rumoured ex-girlfriends. And while he’s a financier by trade, Kingston also spent a period of time working in hostage negotiation and conflict resolution in Iraq during the war.
Here’s everything we know about the royal’s storied past.
Kingston moved in royal circles from an early age
As with most people who come to marry royals, Kingston was well-acquainted with friends-of-friends of the family long before he actually married into The Firm. Born in Evesham, Worcestershire to William Martin Kingston and Jill Mary Kingston (née Bache), he wasn’t exactly British nobility. Bache is the granddaughter of Sir William Joseph Pearman-Smith of Park Hall, the former Mayor of Walsall, and Kingston is a “self made man” who was educated at a secondary-modern state school, before going on to become a successful barrister specialising in planning law.
But it was in Gloucestershire where Kingston would find himself in the outer circle of the royals. At one point, he met fellow Bristol University graduate Natalie Hicks-Lobbecke and the pair are rumoured to have dated for a period of time. As it happens, Hicks-Lobbecke was also part of the Gloucestershire-based ‘Beaufort Polo Club set’ along with Prince William and Harry. She and William sparked dating rumours around July 2000, when Hicks-Lobbecke and the young Prince were photographed laughing with each other at a polo match, though both denied the relationship rumours at the time.
Then came Kingston’s second brush with near-royal romance in 2011, when he was said to be dating Pippa Middleton right around the time of Kate and William’s royal wedding. Far from the standard post-split animosity, he and Pippa have remained close friends. Both parties attended each others’ weddings — Kingston was at Middleton’s nuptials to James Matthews in 2017, and Middleton was in attendance at Kingston’s royal wedding to Lady Gabriella in 2019 — and have been photographed enjoying each others’ company many times over the years.
Hostage negotiator turned financier who ‘survived a suicide bombing’
Kingston left Bristol University with a degree in economic history, which he put to good use in his some 17 years of work as a chartered financial analyst, equity analyst and director of the capital firms. However, he took an interesting segue after graduation, where he worked within the diplomatic missions unit of the Foreign Office in Iraq.
In this role, Kingston was based in Baghdad, and gained experience in hostage negotiation and conflict resolution. According to The Times, he utilised his “relentless optimism” to help negotiate the release of hostages and adjudicate disputes between the Iraq’s warring ethnic, religious, and tribal leaders.
In 2004, he narrowly escaped a brush with death when a a suicide-bombing claimed the lives of 22 people at the only Anglican church in Iraq. Reverend Canon Andrew White, who was known as the “Vicar of Baghdad” thanks to his ten years presiding over the Anglican church in Iraq and also survived the bombing, said previously that Kingston was an “an exceptional young man” who “makes things happen.”
“Tom is one of the most remarkable people I have ever worked with and I would have him back at my side tomorrow, if he would come. Tom has a fierce determination to make things succeed and great insight into what makes humans tick, both good and bad. He uses those to see beyond the impossible and get through to the other side.”
Following on from his time at the Foreign Office, Kingston joined the Iraqi Institute of Peace as a project officer from 2003 to 2006. The Times reports that Kingston “developed a reputation as a talented young diplomat and a devout Christian” during his time there, and worked tirelessly to help Iraqi Christians rebuild their lives in the wake of Sadam Hussein’s reign of terror.
Kingston then veered back into the calmer world of finance, first working as an equity analyst for Schroders, the global asset management firm, then as the managing director of Voltan Capital Management until 2017.
His entry into the royal family
Kingston’s widow, Lady Gabriella, is the daughter of Queen Elizabeth’s first cousin, Prince Michael of Kent, and his wife Princess Michael of Kent. While this makes them relatively minor royals, Prince Michael’s first cousin-status also provided an indelible link to Queen Elizabeth, and so the Michaels were kept in the public eye — even when they wish they weren’t.
Known as “Princess Pushy”, Princess Michael has suffered her fair share of gaffes during her years in the royal family, including the infamous “racist” brooch incident. This occurred when Princess Michael met Meghan Markle for brunch, all the while outfitted with a “blackamoor” brooch that features the bust of a human with black skin. Princess Michael apologised, with a spokesperson saying she was “very sorry and distressed that it has caused offence".And Lady Gabriella was not devoid of scandal, either. In 2018, the year before Kingston wed into the family, Lady Gabriella’s ex-boyfriend, Aatish Taseer, penned a bombshell article for Vanity Fair that, among other things, claimed they had taken MDMA in royal residences and swam naked in the Queen’s pool in Buckingham Palace. The article also alleged further racially-insensitive actions from Princess Michael, worsening her public profile. He referred to an article published in the New York Post with the headline ‘Royal Bigot’. The story claimed that Princess Michael had told some noisy customers (and people of colour) at Da Silvano, an Italian restaurant in Greenwich Village, to go back to the colonies. She denied it, saying: “I would never have said that.”
But Kingston didn’t care. He was thrust into public life in 2019 when the news of his proposal to Lady Gabriella, which took place on the Isle of Sark, in the Channel Islands, where his family has a holiday home, made the news in 2018.
He wed Lady Gabriella in a ceremony at St George's Chapel in Windsor Castle in May 2019, and the pair looked a picture of wedded bliss. The Queen, Prince Philip and Prince Harry were all in attendance, despite Harry becoming a father to Prince Archie just weeks beforehand. Also in attendance were Pippa Middleton, Downton Abbey creator Julian Fellowes, Lady Frederick Windsor (aka Sophie Winkleman, Claudia Winkleman’s sister). The only notable absence was Prince William, who was busy with his role as President of the Football Association, presenting the trophy at the FA cup final. Post-nuptial celebrations were held in Frogmore Cottage, the same location as Harry and Meghan’s wedding reception.
In the years since their marriage, the Kingstons have appeared happy and well at numerous public functions. Their last public appearance was just earlier this month, at a a celebration of Shakespeare’s work at the Grosvenor House Park Lane Hotel in London. Close friends of the couple told the MailOnline they seemed perfectly happy. "They seemed happy and positive as ever,” the close friend said. "Ella was particularly chatty." Another friend said: "It's utterly shocking. None of us saw it coming. I cannot understand it."
