Diana, Princess of Wales

Diana Frances Spencer was born on 1 July 1961 at Park House, Sandringham, Norfolk. She grew up between that house and, after 1975, Althorp, the Spencer family seat in Northamptonshire. She attended boarding schools in England and a finishing school in Switzerland, then worked in London as a kindergarten assistant. In 1981 she married Charles, Prince of Wales, at St Paul’s Cathedral. They had two sons, William (1982) and Harry (1984). The marriage was dissolved in 1996.

As Princess of Wales she kept a large public diary: children’s hospitals, the homeless, and, later, HIV/AIDS wards at a time when many public figures still refused to touch patients. After 1995 she also campaigned against landmines, walking through a cleared field in Angola in 1997 for the Halo Trust. She died in a car crash in Paris on 31 August 1997. Her funeral in London was watched by a large worldwide audience. This site’s Chinese New Year for 1961 is 15 February, so 1 July is Ox/Cancer.

No public-domain still of her face is on file. The Year of the Ox emblem stands in.