Lady Susan Hussey chats to King Charles at Royal Ascot 6 months on from Buckingham Palace race row

Lady Susan Hussey, the former lady-in-waiting to the late Queen Elizabeth II, appears to be well and truly back in the fold after she was spotted chatting to the King at Royal Ascot.

Lady Susan, who was once referred to as Her late Majesty’s ‘head girl’ and was kept on in the Palace by King Charles following his mother’s death, beamed as she interacted with the monarch in the Royal Box on Ladies Day at the 2023 festival, months on from a race row last November.

Dressed in a blue floral frock and wearing a blue wide-brimmed hat, while accessorising with a three-layered pearl necklace, she put her hand to her chest and appeared to giggle.

The friendly exchange comes a month after the late Queen’s friend attended the Coronation at Westminster Abbey, suggesting she was back in the royal fold six months after domestic Ngozi Fulani, a black woman who runs domestic violence charity Sistah Space in Hackney, said she had asked her: ‘What part of Africa are you from?’ during a domestic violence reception at Buckingham Palace.

Responding to the allegations made by Ms Fulani on Twitter, Buckingham Palace said it took the situation ‘extremely seriously’, adding Lady Susan Hussey had offered a ‘profound apology’ for her words. 

However, after appearing at Westminster Abbey last month to attend King Charles’s Coronation, it seemed Lady Susan, while no longer employed by the Palace, had been welcomed back into royal circles.

Lady Susan, 83, was welcomed into The Firm in 1960, around the time Her late Majesty gave birth to her third child, Prince Andrew, when she was employed to help answer letters addressed to the Royal household.

She is the youngest daughter of the 12th Earl of Waldegrave and the widow of Marmaduke Hussey, former chairman of the BBC who passed away in 2006.

After assuming her role and becoming closer to the monarch, she soon became known as one of the late Queen’s ‘Head Girls’ as a lady-in-waiting. Before long, she was reportedly nicknamed the ‘Number One Head Girl’ as she continued to provide support to the Queen.

Lady Susan was present at King Charles’s Coronation at Westminster Abbey last month, signalling she was back in the royal fold following the race row 

Throughout her time as a close confidante of the royal family, Lady Susan grew close to King Charles. So close, in fact, that he asked her to be Godmother to his eldest son, Prince William.

By the 1980s she was an expert in the inner workings of the royal family and royal convention, and is thought to have been one of the key figures in showing Princess Diana the ropes when she married into The Firm. When Diana appeared in the notorious BBC Panorama interview with Martin Bashir in 1995, Marmaduke Hussey was BBC chairman.

Her closeness with members of the royal family including Diana led her to be portrayed briefly in series five of The Crown by actress Haydn Gwynne. Marmaduke Hussey, who is reported to have objected to the Bashir interview, is portrayed by Richard Cordery.

She is also reported to have played a similar role in helping the Duchess of Sussex acclimatise to life within the Royal Family.

Although her role within the Royal Family has largely gone under the radar, eagle-eyed fans will have spotted her presence alongside several senior members over the years, accompanying them while out and about, but also standing in for the Queen when she was unable to attend an event such as a funeral.

Lady Susan has been present at Remembrance Sunday proceedings at the Cenotaph in Whitehall, where she has appeared on the balcony alongside Sophie Wessex, the Princess of Wales and Vice Admiral Sir Tim Laurence, Princess Anne’s second husband.

She was also pictured alongside the King and Queen Consort at Royal Ascot this year, where the trio appeared glued to a race, with King Charles using binoculars to take a closer look.