Mrs Manley worked for Andrew for many years (Image: Getty)
Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor’s former private secretary, Dame Charlotte Manley, was given a major honour by King Charles at Windsor Castle today. She was made a Dame Commander of the Royal Victorian Order (DCVO), having been included on the monarch’s New Year’s Honours List for 2026.
Dame Commander is the second-highest rank in the Royal Victorian Order and gives her the right to use the title “Dame”. After she stepped down from her role working with Andrew in 2003, Ms Manley became the Chapter Clerk of St George’s Chapel, Windsor, and is being recognised for the work she has achieved there. Her retirement from the role was announced in October last year.
She recently revealed she would be willing to speak to the police about what she knows from her time working with Andrew.
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Charlotte Manley shows President Trump and the First Lady around St George’s Chapel (Image: Getty)
From 2001 to 2003, Dame Charlotte served as the private secretary and treasurer to the former Duke of York. She would regularly accompany Andrew on his many envoy trips abroad when he was the UK’s special representative for trade and investment.
During her time working with him, she was often listed in the Court Circular as joining him on trade envoy trips around the world, or meeting him at various airports or airfields upon his return.
Among these many trips was a visit to New York in 2001, shortly after Andrew took over the role, as well as trips to Bulgaria, Brazil, the Falkland Islands, Peru and Canada.
It also emerged that Manley signed a £75 cheque to Monique Giannelloni, a South African masseuse, from a Buckingham Palace bank account, who had been arranged to meet Andrew in his palace rooms by Ghislaine Maxwell. Maxwell, who is in prison for child sex trafficking as an accomplice of Jeffrey Epstein, told Giannelloni that she would introduce her to someone “more famous than God”.
When The Times visited her, Manley told them that she would “rather talk to police than the press”, but that she wouldn’t “have much to tell them”.
Charlotte also showed the Emperor and Empress of Japan around the chapel (Image: Getty)
Before Ms Manley joined royal service, she served in the Royal Navy as an officer from 1976 to 1996. During that time, she spent two years as an exchange officer with the United States Navy in Rhode Island and later joined the destroyer HMS Bristol as one of the first women at sea in the Royal Navy.
After being promoted to Commander in 1993, she joined the staff of the Second Sea Lord and Commander-in-Chief Naval Home Command.
Three years later, she was on a short-term contract in the Cabinet Office and became Assistant Private Secretary and Comptroller to Andrew, as well as Comptroller to Princess Alexandra. She left her role with Andrew in 2003 and became Chapter Clerk of St George’s Chapel in Windsor, a role she retired from earlier this year.
This is not the first time the King has recognised Ms Manley’s work, as she was previously appointed an OBE in 1996, LVO in 2003 and CVO (Commander of the Royal Victorian Order) in 2018.