Prince George Starts at Eton: A History of Royal Education

This week, Prince George arrived for his first day at Eton College in a jacket and tie, alongside his parents, Prince William and Catherine. Eton’s headmaster, Simon Henderson, welcomed him inside, and George changed into the school’s traditional black tailcoat, waistcoat and stiff white collar. For most of the monarchy’s history, an heir to the throne never sat in an ordinary classroom at all: lessons happened in the nursery, taught by a governess or tutor answerable only to the parents. The distance between that private schoolroom and George walking into a building full of nine hundred boys who are not royal at all took three generations to close, and each family along the way made a genuinely different choice about how a future monarch should learn.

Centuries of private tutors, and Victoria’s own strict curriculum

Queen Victoria was educated entirely at home under her governess, Louise Lehzen, a Hanoverian who joined the household when Victoria was five and became fiercely protective of her against the political scheming around the young princess. The curriculum was broad for its era: French, German and Italian alongside history, literature, music and needlework. When Victoria had children of her own, she and Prince Albert treated their education as a serious project in its own right, exchanging detailed letters and memoranda on teaching methods and hiring specialists for each subject. It set a pattern that lasted generations: royal children learned at home, from adults chosen specifically for them, with no other pupils in the room.

The rigour did not guarantee results. Victoria and Albert’s own heir, the future Edward VII, struggled under the intensive programme of private tuition his father designed, and his parents worried openly that he lacked the seriousness a future king would need. Bertie, as the family called him, simply learned better from people than from books, and it was only once he escaped the strict schoolroom regime as a young man that he began to flourish, sociable and popular in exactly the way his formal education had never managed to draw out.

Crawfie, and the princesses who never went to school

That pattern held right through to Queen Elizabeth II’s own childhood. She and her sister Princess Margaret were educated entirely by their governess, Marion Crawford, known affectionately as “Crawfie,” who joined the household in 1933 and stayed for sixteen years. Neither girl ever did a school run, sat an exam or shared a classroom with anyone outside the family. Lessons happened at home, shaped around the constraints of royal life and, later, the war. Crawford’s version of events eventually caused a genuine rift: after leaving royal service she wrote a memoir, The Little Princesses, and although she had tentative approval to publish it anonymously, the family froze her out entirely once it appeared under her own name. It remains one of the more human footnotes in royal education: the last governess in the line, effectively erased for having told her own story.

Philip’s tough Scottish school, and the son who hated it

The real shift toward formal schooling came through Prince Philip, not the Windsors themselves. Philip had thrived at Gordonstoun in Scotland, a school built around a demanding regime of outdoor challenge and physical endurance, founded by the German-Jewish educator Kurt Hahn after he fled Nazi persecution in the 1930s. When Philip’s own son Charles came of age, he was sent to the same school, first through Cheam and then to Gordonstoun itself at thirteen. It did not go the way Philip had hoped. Charles’s parents later admitted to his authorised biographer that the Gordonstoun experiment had fallen short, describing their son as “a square peg in a round hole,” and Charles was still describing his unhappiness there well into his sixties. His younger brother Andrew, by contrast, seemed to thrive under exactly the same regime.

Diana breaks the Gordonstoun run

By the time Charles had children of his own, Princess Diana pushed hard for a different path, and got it. Rather than following Charles, Andrew and their younger brother Edward into Gordonstoun’s Spartan tradition, William and Harry were sent to Ludgrove preparatory school and then to Eton College, just across the river from Windsor Castle. It was a deliberate break with three generations of family precedent, choosing a school built around academic breadth and city-adjacent normality over wilderness endurance, and it stuck: Eton has been the family’s school of choice for royal boys ever since.

University, the army, or neither at all

What happened after school diverged even further. Princess Anne, the first woman in the family to attend an actual school rather than be taught at home, went to Benenden and never went on to university at all. Prince Edward read history at Jesus College, Cambridge, and then tried a different path entirely: he joined the Royal Marines on leaving university, only to withdraw from the demanding commando training course a few months in, a rare example of a royal changing course publicly partway through. William took a gap year and then studied art history at the University of St Andrews in Scotland, where he met a fellow art history student named Kate Middleton, who had also deferred her own place by a year. Harry took the opposite route entirely: a gap year that included time in Africa and Australia, followed not by a degree but by officer training at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst and a full military career.

Beatrice and Eugenie’s own school run

Princess Beatrice and Princess Eugenie followed a path closer to their cousins’ generation than their father’s. Both started at Coworth Park and St George’s School near Windsor, before Eugenie boarded at Marlborough College in Wiltshire for five years. Both went on to graduate from university with the same class of degree: Beatrice with a 2:1 in history and the history of ideas from Goldsmiths, University of London, and Eugenie with a 2:1 in English literature, history of art and politics from Newcastle. Eugenie has also been publicly candid about scoliosis surgery she underwent at twelve, later choosing a wedding dress with a low back specifically to show the scar, calling it a way of standing up for other young people who go through the same operation.

The next generation follows a familiar path

Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis started at a Norfolk nursery before moving to Thomas’s Battersea and then to Lambrook, a Berkshire prep school with its own golf course and swimming pool. This week George followed his father and uncle to Eton, keeping the family’s newer tradition alive even as the wider institution of the monarchy keeps changing around it.

Three centuries of royal education tell a fairly clear story about the family’s changing idea of itself: from a household that educated its children entirely apart from everyone else, to one that now sends them to school, and occasionally to war or university, alongside people who will never be royal at all. Browse more of our Royal Figures stories for the personalities and relationships behind the institution.

Frequently asked questions

Did Queen Elizabeth II go to school?

No. Along with her sister Princess Margaret, she was educated entirely at home by a governess, Marion Crawford, from 1933 until 1949, and never attended a formal school.

Why did Prince Charles hate Gordonstoun?

Charles found the school’s demanding, outdoor-focused regime a poor fit for his more sensitive temperament. His parents privately acknowledged to his biographer that the experiment had fallen short, and Charles continued to speak about his unhappiness there decades later, in contrast to his brother Andrew, who thrived at the same school.

Why did William and Harry go to Eton instead of Gordonstoun?

Princess Diana pushed for a different educational path than the Gordonstoun tradition followed by Charles, Andrew and Edward, choosing Ludgrove and then Eton College instead, a decision that has shaped the family’s school choice for royal boys ever since.

Where did Prince William and Kate Middleton meet?

At the University of St Andrews in Scotland, where both studied art history after taking a gap year. They graduated together in 2005.

Did Prince Harry go to university?

No. After a gap year that included time in Africa and Australia, Harry chose officer training at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst over a university degree, going on to a full military career.

What school does Prince George attend?

George started at Eton College this week, following the path of his father, Prince William, and his uncle, Prince Harry, after several years at Lambrook preparatory school in Berkshire. He arrived with his parents and was greeted by Eton’s headmaster, Simon Henderson, before changing into the school’s traditional black tailcoat and waistcoat.

Did Princess Anne go to university?

No. Anne was the first woman in the royal family to attend a school, Benenden, rather than being educated at home, but she did not go on to university afterwards.

Did Prince Edward join the military?

Yes, briefly. After graduating from Cambridge, Edward joined the Royal Marines but withdrew from its commando training course after about a third of the twelve-month programme, before later pursuing a career in television production.

Details of royal education are drawn from royal biographies, school records and widely published royal history and reporting; described as of 2026.