Queen Camilla fought off groper with her shoe: Book

Queen Camilla once fought off a man who tried to grope her on a train by taking off her shoe and hitting him “in the nuts with the heel,” according to a new book.

The queen told former U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson that the man had attempted to take advantage of her when she was a schoolgirl, according to Power and the Palace by former royal correspondent Valentine Low.

An extract, serialized in U.K. broadsheet The Sunday Times, quoted Camilla telling Johnson: “I did what my mother taught me to. I took off my shoe and whacked him in the nuts with the heel.”

Why It Matters

In adult life, Queen Camilla has supported sexual assault victims, doing so for more than a decade. She has visited numerous sexual assault referral centers (SARCs) across the U.K.

What To Know

According to Low, Camilla described the encounter to Johnson during a meeting at Clarence House in 2008, when the Conservative Party politician was the mayor of London.

Low quoted Guto Harri, Johnson’s communication’s director at the time, who said after their conversation: “Boris was raving about her. They obviously got on like a house on fire. He was making guttural noises about how much he admired and liked her.”

He added that the pair had a “serious conversation” about an experience Camilla had “when she was a schoolgirl.”

“She was on a train going to Paddington,” Harri said, “she was about 16, 17 and some guy was moving his hand further and further.”

When Johnson asked what happened next, Camilla replied: “I did what my mother taught me to. I took off my shoe and whacked him in the nuts with the heel.”

“She was self-possessed enough when they arrived at Paddington to jump off the train, find a guy in uniform and say, ‘That man just attacked me,’ and he was arrested,” Harri added.

Harri told Low that Camilla’s ordeal as a teenager had fueled her commitment to helping sexual assault victims and that she gave her backing to Johnson’s own plans to open three new rape crisis centers in London to supplement one that already existed.

“I think she formally opened two out of three of them,” he said. “Nobody asked why the interest, why the commitment. But that’s what it went back to.”

Camilla has spent years advocating for sexual abuse survivors and personally wrote to Gisèle Pelicot, a Frenchwoman whose husband drugged her so that he and hundreds of strangers could rape her in a campaign of abuse that spanned more than a decade.

What People Are Saying

The Acting Your Age Campaign in the U.K. released a statement on Instagram: “The revelation in Valentine Low’s new book, about Queen Camilla, has again put violence against women & girls on the map. This is vital.”

A palace source told Newsweek in May: “She [Camilla] was tremendously affected by the Madame Pelicot case in France and that lady’s extraordinary dignity and courage as she put herself in the public eye because, as she rightly put it, why should she be made to feel like a victim or hide away in shame?”

What Happens Next

Power and the Palace is scheduled for release in the U.K. on September 11 with Headline Publishing Group.

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