What was meant to be a heartfelt tribute for Princess Anne’s 75th birthday turned into an online talking point — and a quiet deletion.
The Princess Royal, who turns 75 on Friday, August 15, has previously admitted she prefers low-key birthdays, only making a fuss for milestones ending in a zero, not a five. Despite that, the Royal Family posted a celebratory list of “75 facts about Princess Anne” on social media this Wednesday.
It didn’t last long. Fans quickly spotted a glaring error in fact #14, which read: “Her Royal Highness also has two stepchildren from her second marriage to Sir Timothy Laurence, Tom and Amy Laurence.”
In reality, Princess Anne has two children — Zara Tindall and Peter Phillips — from her first marriage to Captain Mark Phillips. When she married retired Royal Navy officer Sir Timothy Laurence in December 1992, it was his first marriage, and he has never been publicly known to have children.
Social media users wasted no time sharing their reactions. One joked, “Either I’ve gone crazy or Sir Tim Laurence has secret children.” Another wrote, “Pretty sure this is an error… That would be the best hidden royal secret ever.”
Others suggested the blunder might be the work of artificial intelligence. “Could it be an AI mistake? Someone at BP made that list with ChatGPT but didn’t check it?” one commenter speculated. Another noted the curious coincidence: “Tom is the name of Camilla’s son, and T & A are Tim and Anne’s initials.”
Royal watchers concluded it was most likely a simple error, but one fan summed it up with a wry observation: “It would be embarrassing, but given the number of mistakes on their website in recent years, not surprising.”