I would like to thank the following people who helped with the research and preparation of this book:
Darley Anderson, Mark Beynon, Kate Dunn, Andrea Messent, Juanita Hall, Jessica Bale, Kerry Green, Mary Darby, Peter Carington (6th Baron Carrington), David Owen (Lord Owen of the City of Plymouth), Jeffrey Archer (Lord Archer of Weston-super-Mare), Edwina Currie, Sir Bernard Ingham, David Steel (Lord Steel of Aikwood), Tim Bell (Lord Bell of Belgravia), Ronald Allison CVO, Michael Dobbs, Denis Healey (Lord Healey of Riddlesden), Dr Daniel Conway, Geoffrey Howe (Lord Howe of Aberavon), Nigel Lawson (Lord Lawson of Blaby), Maggie Smart and Angie Nuttall.
I should also mention friends and family who have been supportive throughout this process: Mary-Jane Evans, Deborah Wearn, Kate Shepherd, Jackie Moore, John Baldry, Patricia Turnbull, Rachel Himbury, Angela Holden, Kim Palmer and Kay Palmer.
The following archives and libraries also proved invaluable, foremost being the documents stored in the online archive at the Margaret Thatcher Foundation. Other sources include the British Library, the London Library and the Chichester Library. This book has also benefited from the release of new documents, particularly from the National Archives in 2013.
Most factual writers pluck fragments, large and small, from their predecessors’ work. In writing this book I also found the works of the following authors extremely useful, in particular, the many excellent biographers of Queen Elizabeth II and royal writers, including the late Ben Pimlott, Sarah Bradford, Sally Bedell Smith, Piers Brendon, A.N. Wilson and Andrew Marr, as well as the biographers of Margaret Thatcher, including Penny Junor, John Campbell, Jonathan Aitken, Robin Harris, Charles Moore and Claire Berlinski.
Of great use were the two books written by Carol Thatcher, A Swim-on Part in the Goldfish Bowl and Below the Parapet. There were several incredibly useful articles in Vanity Fair, in particular ‘The Blooming of Margaret Thatcher’ by Gail Sheehy (June, 1989) and ‘The Invincible Mrs Thatcher’ by Charles Moore (December, 2011). Andrew Neil’s autobiography, Full Disclosure, was excellent in illuminating the facts of Michael Shea’s press leak which opened the shutters on the relationship between monarch and prime minister.
The research done by journalists Mark Hollingsworth and Paul Halloran into Mark Thatcher is also revealing, as was an article about Prince Andrew entitled ‘The Trouble with Andrew’, by Edward Klein in Vanity Fair (August, 2011), and the various investigations carried out by the Mail on Sunday.
Around the time of Mrs Thatcher’s death and funeral in April 2013, I found many newspaper articles and press reports useful. In particular, the coverage by the Daily Telegraph, Sunday Telegraph, Daily Mail, Mail on Sunday, Daily Mirror, Sun, The Times, Sunday Times and Independent.
Also of use was the Channel 4 documentary on The House of Windsor (December, 2007) presented by Dr David Starkey, and the four part BBC documentary series The Downing Street Years (September, 1993), based on the prime minister’s own memoirs.