Princess Margaret's Daughter Sarah Was The Queen's Confidante
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Princess Margaret was well-known as the wild child royal, but her life as a mother is less public.
After her televised royal wedding to Antony Armstrong-Jones, she gave birth to two children, David and Sarah.
Princess Margaret's children went on to have careers in the arts and each has two children of their own.
The original wild child of the royals—Princess Margaret, played by Helena Bonham Carter in seasons three and four of The Crown—had two children with ex-husband Antony Armstrong-Jones, David and Sarah.
Margaret’s children, who are King Charles’ only maternal first cousins, appear in the Netflix show (which the royal fam watches, btw), but the two don’t play major roles in The Crown season four.
This week, Margaret’s son David Armstrong-Jones, the 2nd Earl of Snowdon, and her daughter, Lady Sarah Chatto, are just two of the more than 2,000 guests gathered to honor Queen Elizabeth’s 70-year-reign, according to The Mirror and NPR.
Despite Margaret and Elizabeth’s strong bond, the two sisters were also very different. Unlike her corgi-loving sister Queen Elizabeth II, who was just 22 when she gave birth to Prince Charles, motherhood wasn't in the cards for Princess Margaret until she was 31.
Princess Margaret died back in 2002 at just 71 years old, but people have a lot of questions about her life and, specifically, about the children she left behind.
Before Princess Margaret became a mother, she married Antony Armstrong-Jones.
Princess Margaret, who later became Countess of Snowdon upon marriage, was born on August 21, 1930. The youngest daughter of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth, she was the only sibling of the late Queen.
Margaret lived a comfortable childhood with her parents and sister, until 1936 when her life was upended. Her father’s brother, King Edward VIII, abdicated the throne and threw her father into the spotlight. Suddenly, her dad was king and her sister the presumptive next queen.
During her twenties, Margaret had an illicit (and tumultuous) romance with Group Captain Peter Townsend of the Royal Air Force. Naturally, Queen Elizabeth wasn't thrilled, mainly because Peter was divorced. After the Queen posted Peter to a position in Brussels, he fell in love with another woman and married her instead of Margaret. (Sigh.)
Princess Margaret and Antony Armstrong-Jones' decades-long love story began while she was on the rebound, for lack of a better word. The princess kept her relationship with the photographer, who had taken portraits of the royal family, on the DL until they were ready to become Westminster Abbey official.
Within 24 hours of hearing of Peter’s engagement, Margaret accepted a proposal of her own: to wed Antony. "I received a letter from Peter in the morning and that evening I decided to marry Tony," she told the BBC. "I didn't really want to marry at all. Why did I? Because he asked me! Really, though, he was such a nice person in those days. In a way, he introduced me to a new world."
The Queen named Antony the Earl of Snowdon when he wed Margaret on May 6, 1960, at Westminster Abbey in a picturesque ceremony. It was the first royal wedding to be broadcast on television, paving the way for the media frenzy to surround weddings over the coming decades (hello, William and Kate...and Meghan and Harry). More than 20 million people watched Margaret marry, per the BBC.
David Armstrong-Jones, now 2nd Earl of Snowdon, was born a year after Princess Margaret's wedding.
The still-semi-newlyweds welcomed their first child, David, on November 3, 1961. When he was born, David was fifth in the line of succession to the British throne, but now he is the 24th. (All those royal babies!)
As an adult, David opened a shop in Dorking where he built and designed furniture for a few years, before opening his own company, David Linley Furniture Limited. Now, it’s known as Linley, and the brand has designed for high-profile clients like Elton John and Valentino, according to Town & Country.
He credits his creativity to his father.
“I inherited my love of design from my father, the Earl of Snowdon, who was always fascinated by pushing the boundaries of an object–working out how to make it touch the ground in two places rather than three,” he told the Telegraph. “I was pretty bad at making things as a child but he was an excellent teacher.”
But don't call him a designer. “I’m a maker, not a designer,” he told Vanity Fair in 2017. He also lends his creative talents to Christie's auction house as honorary chairman.
FYI: Princess Margaret has always been supportive of his work.
"I remember my mother came to my first shop," he told Vanity Fair. "And I went downstairs, and there was my mother sitting on the floor, screwing a screw into the back of a mirror. She was greatly enthusiastic."
Princess Margaret’s only son married Serena Armstrong-Jones, who is the Countess of Snowdon, in 1993. However, the couple divorced in 2020 after 26 years of marriage, according to Town & Country. David and Serena had two children together: Lady Margarita Armstrong-Jones and Charles Armstrong-Jones.
When Antony Armstrong-Jones died in 2017, David became the 2nd Earl of Snowdon.
David walked behind Queen Elizabeth’s coffin during its procession from Buckingham Palace to Westminster Hall and attended the monarch’s state funeral, per T&C.
Lady Sarah Chatto is Margaret's youngest child and only daughter.
The only daughter of Princess Margaret, Lady Sarah Chatto was born on May 1, 1964. Both Sarah and her brother grew up in Kensington Palace. Princess Margaret's daughter was as high as seventh in line to the throne, but she's now 27th in the line of succession. She also followed in her father’s artistic footsteps, becoming a well-respected painter and vice president of the Royal Ballet.
Sarah was a bridesmaid at the wedding of Prince Charles and Lady Diana, as well as at her cousin, Princess Anne’s, wedding to Captain Mark Phillips in 1973.
She also traveled with her mother and brother on official business to China and Hong Kong in 1987, according to Theo Aronson’s 2013 biography of Princess Margaret.
Sarah married actor Daniel Chatto in 1994, and the couple has two children together: Samuel and Arthur.
While Lady Sarah has kept a relatively low profile (for a royal), she was considered one of the Queen’s confidantes, according to Who.com. She is also Prince Harry and Lady Louise Windsor’s godmother...so she's pretty legit.
Lady Sarah is super private but finds her own ways to honor her mother. She is known for wearing Margaret's statement pearl earrings to royal events.
Sarah also wears Princess Margaret’s floral diamond brooch during important occasions, such as the Queen and Prince Philip’s 50th wedding anniversary in 1997, and her mother’s funeral in 2002, according to Express.
Lady Sarah wore the jewels to the Queen’s funeral on Sept. 19, as well.
Princess Margaret involved her children in her world.
David has said that his mother "first invented the word 'antiquing,'" and she would often take him and his sister on trips to antique shops.
Princess Margaret also wanted her children to appreciate art—in her own way. David told Vanity Fair in 2017 that his mother once took him to the National Gallery to view a single Vermeer painting. When he asked his mother about all of the other pieces of artwork, she told him, "If you want to see those, you can go on your own."
To her credit, Margaret also made sure her children knew what her work life was like and took them to meetings and visits often.
"I loved being around my mother," David said in a 2018 Alain Elkann interview. "In the house were very interesting people from all walks of life, there was creativity and music. She played the piano by ear, and at Christmas she held the Sacred and Profane buffet and people would play."
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