When Sarah Ferguson got married in 1986 she was given a coat of arms with a Latin motto that translates as “out of adversity grows happiness”. She spent the next 40 years testing that theory to destruction. With her life derailed on what may be a permanent basis, she apparently spent a month at a $17,500-a-day wellness clinic in Switzerland, wallowing in self-pity, exhibiting no remorse and convinced that the world is out to get her. She is now said to have washed up, desperate and penniless, in the UAE, staying goodness knows where, at the expense of goodness knows who, having arrived on a flight paid for with goodness knows what. Close observers will recall that we have been here before.
Back in 1986, adversity seemed unlikely. While her childhood and character had been damaged when her mother ran off with an Argentinian polo player, she was nevertheless brought up in an affluent home, with ponies and skiing holidays and staff. She was also well connected, counting the young royals, including her future husband, as playmates. Her father, who worked as a polo manager for Prince Charles, once commanded the sovereign escort riding alongside Queen Elizabeth, who had to tell him to fall back. “It’s me they’ve come to see,” she told him, “not you.”
