William Prince of Wales earned a Master of Arts degree in geography at the University of St Andrews where he met his future spouse, Catherine Middleton.
99 Facts About William, Prince of Wales
1.
2.
William Prince of Wales then trained at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst prior to serving with the Blues and Royals.
3.
William Prince of Wales served as a full-time pilot with the East Anglian Air Ambulance for two years, starting in July 2015.
4.
William Prince of Wales holds patronage with over 30 charitable and military organisations, including the Tusk Trust, Centrepoint, The Passage, Wales Air Ambulance and London's Air Ambulance Charity.
5.
William Prince of Wales undertakes projects through The Royal Foundation, with his charity work revolving around mental health, conservation, and emergency workers.
6.
William Prince of Wales was made Duke of Cambridge prior to his wedding to Catherine Middleton in April 2011.
7.
William Prince of Wales became Duke of Cornwall and Duke of Rothesay following his father's accession to the throne on 8 September 2022.
8.
Prince William was born at St Mary's Hospital, London, on 21 June 1982 as the first child of Charles, Prince of Wales, and his first wife, Diana, Princess of Wales, during the reign of his grandmother Queen Elizabeth II.
9.
William was the first child born to a prince and princess of Wales since Prince John was born to Prince George and Princess Mary in 1905.
10.
When he was nine months old, William Prince of Wales accompanied his parents on their 1983 tour of Australia and New Zealand, as his first trip overseas.
11.
William Prince of Wales carried out his first public engagement while accompanying his parents on a visit to Llandaff on Saint David's Day in 1991.
12.
William Prince of Wales was reportedly uncertain as to whether he should walk behind his mother's coffin during the funeral procession.
13.
William Prince of Wales was educated at private schools, starting at Jane Mynors' nursery school and the pre-preparatory Wetherby School, both in London.
14.
William Prince of Wales was admitted to Eton College, studying geography, biology, and history of art at A-Level.
15.
William Prince of Wales obtained an 'A' in geography, a 'C' in biology, and a 'B' in history of art.
16.
William Prince of Wales was captain of the swimming team and his house football team at Eton, taking up water polo.
17.
The royal family and the tabloid press agreed that William Prince of Wales would be allowed to study free from intrusion in exchange for regular updates about his life.
18.
William Prince of Wales is a boy: in the next few years, perhaps the most important and sometimes painful part of his life, he will grow up and become a man.
19.
On 3 June 1991, William Prince of Wales was admitted to Royal Berkshire Hospital after being accidentally hit on the forehead by a fellow pupil wielding a golf club.
20.
William Prince of Wales suffered a depressed fracture of the skull and was operated on at Great Ormond Street Hospital, resulting in a permanent scar.
21.
William Prince of Wales lived with other young volunteers, sharing in the common household chores.
22.
In 2001, William Prince of Wales enrolled at the University of St Andrews in Scotland.
23.
William Prince of Wales embarked on a degree course in Art History but later changed his main subject to Geography.
24.
William Prince of Wales wrote his dissertation on the coral reefs of Rodrigues in the Indian Ocean and graduated with an undergraduate Master of Arts degree with upper second class honours in 2005.
25.
William Prince of Wales was known as "Steve" by other students to avoid any journalists overhearing and realising his identity.
26.
At the age of 21, William Prince of Wales was appointed a Counsellor of State; he first served in that capacity when the Queen attended the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in 2003.
27.
In March 2011, William Prince of Wales visited Christchurch, New Zealand, shortly after the earthquake, and spoke at the memorial service at Hagley Park on behalf of his grandmother.
28.
William Prince of Wales travelled to Australia to visit areas affected by flooding in Queensland and Victoria.
29.
William Prince of Wales instead trained in the Royal Navy and Royal Air Force, obtaining his commission as a sub-lieutenant in the former and flying officer in the latter, both broadly equivalent to the army rank of lieutenant.
30.
William Prince of Wales was then seconded to train with the Royal Navy.
31.
William Prince of Wales then completed an accelerated Naval Officer training course at the Britannia Royal Naval College.
32.
In January 2009, William Prince of Wales transferred his commission to the RAF and was promoted to Flight Lieutenant.
33.
William Prince of Wales trained to become a helicopter pilot with the RAF's Search and Rescue Force.
34.
William Prince of Wales's first rescue mission as co-pilot of an RAF Sea King was a response to an emergency call from Liverpool Coastguard on 2 October 2010.
35.
William Prince of Wales was deployed to the Falkland Islands for a six-week tour with No 1564 Flight from February to March 2012.
36.
In June 2012, Prince William gained a qualification to be captain or pilot in command of a Sea King rather than a co-pilot.
37.
William Prince of Wales conducted 156 search and rescue operations, which resulted in 149 people being rescued.
38.
William Prince of Wales later became patron to the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight.
39.
On 13 July 2015, William Prince of Wales began working full-time as a pilot with the East Anglian Air Ambulance based at Cambridge Airport, which he felt was a natural progression from his previous search-and-rescue role.
40.
William Prince of Wales required a civil pilot's licence and further training before being permitted to begin his role.
41.
William Prince of Wales underwent part of his training at Norwich Airport.
42.
William Prince of Wales described working irregular shifts and dealing mostly with critical care cases.
43.
William Prince of Wales discussed the impact of witnessing intensive trauma and bereavement on his mental health and personal life.
44.
In 2001, William Prince of Wales met Catherine Middleton while they were students in residence at St Salvator's Hall at the University of St Andrews.
45.
William Prince of Wales reportedly caught William's attention at a charity fashion show on campus.
46.
Media attention became so intense that William Prince of Wales asked the press to keep their distance from Middleton.
47.
On 15 December 2006, Middleton and her family attended Prince William's Passing Out Parade at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst.
48.
Middleton and her family attended the Concert for Diana in July 2007 at Wembley Stadium, where she and Prince William sat two rows apart.
49.
Middleton was in attendance during the Order of the Garter procession ceremony at Windsor Castle in June 2008, where William Prince of Wales was made a Royal Knight of the Garter.
50.
William Prince of Wales was admitted on 22 July 2013 to the Lindo Wing of St Mary's Hospital, London, where Prince William had been delivered.
51.
William Prince of Wales was admitted on 2 May 2015 to the same hospital and gave birth to Princess Charlotte.
52.
Catherine's third pregnancy was announced on 4 September 2017; William Prince of Wales Louis was born on 23 April 2018.
53.
The couple toured Canada in summer 2011, attending Canada Day celebrations on Parliament Hill; William Prince of Wales delivered speeches at Quebec City Hall and Northwest Territories, the former entirely in French and the latter including phrases from the Na-Dene and Inuvialuktun languages.
54.
William Prince of Wales hosted his first investiture ceremony at Buckingham Palace in October 2013, an "extension of the Duke of Cambridge's public duties" after leaving the Royal Air Force.
55.
In February 2015, William Prince of Wales visited Japan, meeting then Emperor Akihito and Empress Michiko at the Imperial Palace and visiting survivors devastated by the 2011 tsunami.
56.
On 1 November 2020, it was reported that William Prince of Wales had tested positive for COVID-19 in April but decided not to alert the media to 'avoid alarming the nation'.
57.
William Prince of Wales assured that the royal family would accept each country's decision on republicanism with "pride and respect".
58.
In May 2022, William attended the State Opening of Parliament for the first time as a counsellor of state, where his father, then the Prince of Wales, delivered the Queen's Speech on behalf of William's grandmother.
59.
Queen Elizabeth II died on 8 September 2022, and William Prince of Wales's father succeeded as Charles III.
60.
William Prince of Wales visited the Senedd in November 2022, meeting Welsh first minister Mark Drakeford.
61.
In March 2023, William Prince of Wales undertook a solo visit to Poland during which he visited Rzeszow to meet Polish and British troops and Ukrainian refugees, and had talks with Polish president Andrzej Duda at the Presidential Palace in Warsaw.
62.
In May 2007, William Prince of Wales became patron of MREW and president of the Royal Marsden Hospital, the latter of which was a role previously held by his mother.
63.
William Prince of Wales succeeded Lord Attenborough in 2010 as the fifth president of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts.
64.
William Prince of Wales has spoken out for LGBT rights as part of his work against cyberbullying, stating the importance of being "proud of the person you are" and discussing the effects of online abuse and discrimination.
65.
William Prince of Wales was recognised at the British LGBT Awards in May 2017.
66.
In March 2020, William Prince of Wales appeared in a video for the National Emergencies Trust, launching a fundraising appeal to help charities during the pandemic.
67.
In February 2021, William Prince of Wales visited a vaccination centre in King's Lynn and later encouraged use of the vaccine, denouncing false information that could cause vaccine hesitancy.
68.
In September 2021, it was reported that William Prince of Wales had helped an Afghan officer who was a graduate of the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst and an assistant to the British troops be evacuated from the Kabul airport along with more than 10 members of his family amid the 2021 Taliban offensive.
69.
Prince William became a patron of the Tusk Trust in December 2005, a charity that works towards conserving wildlife and initiating community development across Africa.
70.
William Prince of Wales carried out his first official duty with the trust in launching a 5,000-mile bike ride across the African continent in 2008.
71.
Later, William Prince of Wales helped with launching the Tusk Conservation Awards, which have been presented to selected environmental activists annually since 2013.
72.
William Prince of Wales has occasionally commented on the effects of overpopulation on the wildlife of Africa, but his remarks have been criticised in the media for not taking resource consumption and population density into consideration.
73.
William Prince of Wales established the United for Wildlife Transport Taskforce in December 2014, with the goal of reducing global illegal wildlife trade.
74.
Later that month, William Prince of Wales took over the patronages of Fauna and Flora International and the British Trust for Ornithology, passed on from his grandparents.
75.
In early 2021, William Prince of Wales made a private donation to the Thin Green Line Foundation, which provides grants for the relatives of conservation park rangers that are killed every year while protecting wildlife.
76.
In July 2022, William Prince of Wales condemned the murder of South African park ranger Anton Mzimba and asked for the responsible parties to "be brought to justice".
77.
William Prince of Wales had previously called for harsher punishments and penalties for poachers and smugglers at the Illegal Wildlife Trade Conference in 2018.
78.
In 2014, Jane Goodall stated that William Prince of Wales had expressed the view that all ivory in the royal collection needed to be destroyed.
79.
Since 2009, William Prince of Wales has been patron of Child Bereavement UK, which provides support for children and families who have lost a loved one.
80.
William Prince of Wales later volunteered on the crisis helpline during the COVID-19 lockdowns to provide support via text message.
81.
In September 2005, William Prince of Wales granted his patronage to Centrepoint, a charity that assists the homeless.
82.
In December 2009, as part of a Centrepoint-organised event, the prince spent the night in a sleeping bag near the Blackfriars Bridge to raise awareness of the experiences of homeless youth.
83.
William Prince of Wales opened their new facility, Apprenticeship House, in November 2019 to mark their 50-year anniversary.
84.
William Prince of Wales has been patron of homelessness charity The Passage since 2019 after first visiting the centre in 1993 with his mother.
85.
In December 2020, William Prince of Wales volunteered at the charity to help prepare donation bags for homeless residents in emergency hotel accommodations and spoke with residents about their experiences.
86.
In June 2023, William Prince of Wales launched Homewards after two years of development.
87.
William Prince of Wales is a fan of football, and supports the English club Aston Villa.
88.
William Prince of Wales became president of England's Football Association in May 2006 and vice-royal patron of the Welsh Rugby Union in February 2007, supporting the Queen as patron.
89.
In May 2007, William Prince of Wales became patron of the English Schools' Swimming Association.
90.
In 2012, together with his wife Catherine and brother Prince Harry, William launched Coach Core.
91.
William Prince of Wales enthusiastically took part in a bandy event in Stockholm in January 2018.
92.
William Prince of Wales is generally believed to be popular across Britain and has been considered as one of the most popular members of the British royal family since his birth.
93.
William Prince of Wales has been particularly praised for his work in launching and running the Earthshot Prize along with David Attenborough.
94.
In 2005, William Prince of Wales spoke with ITV reporter Tom Bradby and concluded it was likely that their voicemails were being accessed.
95.
William Prince of Wales later sued News Group Newspapers, the publisher of News of the World and The Sun, which resulted in an out-of-court settlement in 2020.
96.
In 2005, after his then-girlfriend Catherine Middleton was chased by the paparazzi on her way to a job interview, William Prince of Wales consulted Middleton and her father and penned a legal letter to newspapers requesting that they respect her privacy.
97.
In November 2018 and during a visit to the BBC studios in central London, William Prince of Wales publicly criticised the social media firms' approach to handling "misinformation and conspiracy" and added, "Their self-image is so grounded in their positive power for good that they seem unable to engage in constructive discussion about the social problems they are creating".
98.
In June 2022, a three-minute video of William Prince of Wales confronting Terry Harris, a paparazzi photographer, was posted to Harris's YouTube channel.
99.
William Prince of Wales is a Royal Knight Companion of the Most Noble Order of the Garter, an Extra Knight of the Most Ancient and Most Noble Order of the Thistle, a member of the Privy Council of the United Kingdom, and a Personal Aide-de-Camp to the sovereign.