Why Malta remained a ‘happy place’ for Queen Elizabeth

The ‘dating song’ of the late Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, People Will Say We’re in Love, would be played the moment the couple walked into the Phoenicia Malta. Everything would stop and the music would change, recalled the band’s clarinetist.

This detail about the young princess’s time in Malta between 1949 and 1951 features in Robert Hardman’s latest of six books on the queen, Elizabeth II: In Private, In Public – The Inside Story, launched at the hotel where she frequently danced.

Malta – and the hotel – feature prominently, with the island mentioned more often than any country except the US and Canada, underlining its special place in the queen’s life.

That song was from the West End musical Oklahoma, which took post-war London by storm and was Queen Elizabeth’s favourite production, Hardman related. She saw it several times and it became the couple’s signature tune in Malta. Clarinettist Freddie Mizzi could vouch for that. He has since passed away but he told the author his band would start playing the tune as soon as they entered the hotel.

Back then, Prince Philip would get a telling off for letting the “Queen of tomorrow” stay out late, maybe after one dance too many at the Phoenicia, Hardman added.

The book's cover

Princess Anne

Much is known about the couple’s stay in Malta, but the author maintained there was always more to say.

“What has changed in the way the queen’s life has been captured is the way things were perceived,” he said.

For example, the fact that she missed her children’s first birthdays and Christmases to be in Malta would have been frowned upon today, but it was common practice to leave them behind with a guardian and the press was also more deferential.

“She would have been treated harshly by the media today,” said Hardman, a Daily Mail journalist who has interviewed all senior members of the British royal family.

Calculating the timeline, Hardman speculated Princess Anne was conceived in Malta. This was not something that would have been discussed back then but a picture of the princess in the Phoenicia Hotel’s visitors’ book shows her at a dance in November 1949 and her daughter was born in August of the following year. That “little nugget” may make it into his next book, he said.

Detour

During their Diamond wedding anniversary in 2007 – “the queen always gave more importance to these than birthdays, which everyone had, because you had to work at that” – a trip to Uganda was given a “curious detour” as it passed via Malta. It was very telling that the couple chose to spend a night here on their anniversary, said Hardman, adding it was a private stay.

Malta was also the last place she would travel to. By the 2015 Commonwealth summit in “dear old Malta”, she had already given up long-haul travel because of Prince Philip’s health.

What has changed in the way the queen’s life has been captured is the way things were perceived

“She decided to draw the line in Malta – her happy place… The weather was terrible that time, but she did not mind,” Hardman recounted. It was five months short of her 90th birthday and Prince Philip was getting on too.

“The last thing I remember seeing her do was go on a boat trip across Grand Harbour. That was the final overseas excursion of the most travelled monarch ever. She returned to the UK and never left the country again.”

Trump and I

Hardman acknowledged that much has already been written about the monarch but “whenever you start digging, new documents and research always come to light”, he said.

The fact that he wrote the book after her death meant more people were prepared to talk about her, he noted.

“People who have not spoken out decide to do so when she is no longer around. For some, it was probably a question of loyalty; they would not have thought it appropriate to talk about her while they worked for her.”

Different interviewees remembered different things, he said, so the story never went stale.

From his experience as a royal correspondent for The Daily Telegraph, Hardman believed that when it came to matters of the monarch, people who would not talk to journalists were also more willing to drop their guard.

Former US president George W. Bush happily joined a Zoom call on the queen during the COVID-19 pandemic. But an even bigger “surprise” came five months ago: Donald Trump invited the author at the last minute to meet him at his Florida golf club – “next Saturday!”.

The author during the interview.

Hardman flew to Florida on Boxing Day expecting breakfast but spent much of the weekend with Trump, gathering anecdotes about the queen between discussions of world affairs.

That meeting, which almost eclipses the queen herself, did not get off to a good start, with Trump telling him he was only there to play golf and the Englishman not impressing him by admitting he had never tried the sport. In a four-way conversation – often going off on a tangent – with his peace envoy, golf cubby and others, Hardman picked up nuggets for the book.

Plans to give Trump a copy were derailed by the shooting at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner in April. But Hardman recalled making a U-turn from the airport when the president, who “adored” the queen, agreed at the last minute to receive him in the Oval Office.

“I missed my flight, and the book had more security scans than I did,” he said, adding that Trump checked out how he was mentioned, looking up any references in the index and proceeded to review it on his Truth Social platform.

Hardman takes no credit for Trump’s interest, saying he was an ardent royalist and anglophile. But he compared the impulsive politician to British spin doctors who would give you “seven minutes and want to see the questions first”.

Digressing from the book’s contents, other politicians enter the conversation. Drawing on his insight into the royal family and the Malta connection, Hardman recalled that the opening shot of the first-ever and ever-so-popular behind-the-scenes documentary of the royal family, screened in 120 countries, showed then Prince Charles waterskiing on the island. Hardwood could not locate the place but “there were no buildings”, he said about the 1969 footage.

What he did know from a 2013 speech by today’s King Charles III was that he was taught to waterski by former prime minister Dom Mintoff. Hardman quoted him as saying Mintoff was wearing a bathing cap and earplugs and when the monarch, then a Cambridge student, fell into the water as they were skiing side by side “he just sailed off into the distance”.

Hardman was also looking forward to the opening of the Guardamangia residence, saying it was long overdue. During the 2015 Commonwealth summit he knocked on the villa’s door but was shooed away by an elderly resident who had likely grown tired of journalists.