Princess Diana was so stunned when then-Prince Charles asked her to marry him that she initially burst out laughing — convinced the future king had to be joking.
Diana was just 19 years old when Charles, then 32, proposed at Windsor in February 1981 following an unusually brief courtship.
The young nursery assistant had reportedly spent relatively little time alone with Charles before suddenly finding herself facing one of the biggest questions imaginable: Would she marry the heir to the British throne?
And according to Diana’s own later account, she was completely unprepared for what was coming.
Charles had called her beforehand and told her, “I’ve got something very important to ask you.”
Diana later recalled staying up through the night with girlfriends, wondering what he might say and how she should respond.
She arrived at Windsor around 5 p.m. the following day, where Charles told her he had missed her while he was away skiing in Klosters, Switzerland.
But Diana admitted their relationship had hardly been overflowing with romance.
She said Charles had never been particularly physically affectionate with her, leaving the inexperienced teenager unsure what a serious relationship was even supposed to look like.
Then came the question.
“Will you marry me?” Charles asked.
Diana laughed.
“This is a joke,” she reportedly replied.
But Charles wasn’t joking.
Diana eventually answered, “Yeah, okay,” as the reality of what was happening began to sink in.
Charles then reminded her that marrying him meant something far bigger than simply becoming his wife.
“You do realize that one day you will be Queen?” he told her.
Diana later said she immediately had an uneasy feeling about what lay ahead, recalling an inner voice warning her that she would face a difficult role.
She repeatedly told Charles she loved him.
His response would become one of the most infamous lines in royal history.
“Whatever love means.”
Charles later repeated the phrase during the couple’s televised engagement interview, helping fuel years of speculation about just how deeply in love he really was.
Diana admitted the words eventually haunted her, although she did not initially recognize them as a warning sign.
At the time, she said she actually believed Charles’ response was wonderful.
After the proposal, Charles reportedly rushed upstairs to telephone his mother, Queen Elizabeth II.
Diana, meanwhile, returned to her apartment and told her girlfriends she was engaged.
The reaction was immediate.
She recalled her friends screaming with excitement before they climbed into a car and drove around London celebrating their enormous secret.
Her parents were also thrilled.
But her younger brother, Charles Spencer, apparently had no idea just how serious Diana’s relationship had become.
When Diana announced she was engaged, the then-16-year-old reportedly responded with a stunned question: “Who to?”
Looking back years later, Diana admitted her youth and inexperience heavily influenced how she viewed Charles.
She believed he was deeply in love with her and said she had little romantic experience to compare their relationship against.
Diana later described their romance as something that developed gradually rather than through a dramatic whirlwind of passion.
After the engagement, she selected what would become one of the most recognizable pieces of jewelry in the world — a large sapphire surrounded by diamonds.
The ring was chosen from a collection presented to her and later became closely associated with Diana’s glamorous public image. It is now worn by Catherine, Princess of Wales.
Diana and Charles married in a spectacular ceremony at St. Paul’s Cathedral on July 29, 1981, watched by hundreds of millions of people around the world.
But behind the fairy-tale images, serious problems eventually emerged.
Their marriage deteriorated amid accusations of infidelity, loneliness and bitter disagreements, and the couple formally divorced in 1996.
Diana died the following year at age 36 after a devastating car crash in Paris.
Decades later, her extraordinary story about Charles’ proposal offers another glimpse into just how uncertain the future princess was before entering a royal marriage that would change her life forever.
