Prince Andrew’s personal Royal Standard flag is removed from the roof of the Royal Lodge

Prince Andrew’s Royal standard flag has been removed from the roof of The Royal Lodge, his palatial home in Windsor Great Park after his car crash interview over the Jeffrey Epstein scandal. 

The Duke of York has been under pressure as a result of his friendship with US paedophile financier Jeffery Epstien. 

The 59-year-old Royal attempted to deflect criticism of this friendship in a sit-down interview with Emily Maitliss inside Buckingham Palace. 

Each of the Queen’s four children has their own Standard, with Prince Andrew’s featuring a blue anchor to represent his time in the Royal Navy

In a photograph taken on Friday – when Prince Andrew was in residence and out riding with The Queen – the Standard was not flying in its usual place with even the flag pole missing

Prince Andrew, circled left, was photographed earlier this week riding with the Queen, circled right, in the grounds of Windsor Castle

Since the interview, Prince Andrew has been forced to step back from public life and many organisations have reviewed their relationship with him. 

Today it has emerged that Prince Andrew’s personal Royal Standard has been removed from the Royal Lodge at Windsor Great Park.  

Each of the Queen’s four children have their own personalised versions of the standard which they are allowed to fly over their homes and Prince Charles has his version ceremoniously hoisted on the roof whenever he is at his London home Clarence House.

Prince Andrew has flown the Duke of York Royal Standard from the flagpole above the 30-room The Royal Lodge for years whenever he has been in residence.

Visitors to Windsor today noticed the missing Royal Standard, which is complete with a small blue anchor to represent his position as Vice Admiral in the Royal Navy, was significantly absent on the roof of the house he shares with Sarah, Duchess of York and their two daughters Beatrice and Eugenie.

Photographs taken this Friday when Prince Andrew was at home after being photographed nearby in the Great Park horse riding with The Queen show that not only was his distinctive Standard no longer in place on top of The Great Lodge, but the flag pole which held it had been completely removed too.

Prince Andrew’s flag has what is known as a ‘three-point label’, which refers to the three white marks at the top of the flag. The middle point is charged with a blue anchor in recognition of his career in the Royal Navy.

His two children have their own bedrooms at Royal Lodge and stay frequently at weekends, even though Eugenie also has an apartment at Kensington Palace and Beatrice has an apartment at St James’s Palace. 

The Duke of York has faced a torrid time since his car crash interview with Emily Maitlis on BBC Newsnight.  

The Duke of York’s Royal Standard, pictured, features a blue anchor to note his navy service

Prince Andrew, pictured, has been under fire since he appeared on BBC Newsnight 

He has reportedly resigned from his role with his flagship business project Pitch@Palace after days of speculation about his future with the initiative he founded.

Andrew appears to have bowed to pressure and stepped down a day after one sponsor said his plans to continue leading Pitch were “not tenable”.

High-profile business sponsors KPMG, Standard Chartered and Inmarsat, a British satellite telecommunications company, have all said they would not renew their financial support for Pitch while Barclays, a partner of the project, ended its association on Friday.

The Daily Telegraph reported sources as saying Andrew was no longer leading Pitch, which would continue without any royal involvement.

Prince Andrew is expected to have the ‘riot act’ read to him by Prince Charles when he returns to the UK following a tour with his wife Camilla of New Zealand and the Pacific Islands. 

The 70-year-old heir to the throne was angered by his brother’s bungled Newsnight interview and a decision to invite his ex-wife Sarah, Duchess of York, to Buckingham Palace. 

Prince Charles, pictured on his final day of a tour of New Zealand, left, was angered by Prince Andrew’s decision to speak to Newsnight, which he believes overshadowed his official tour

Royal author Phil Dampier said: ‘I’m sure when Charles returns from New Zealand he will sit Andrew down and read him the riot act’.

While Tom Bower, author of the explosive biography of Charles, the ‘Rebel Prince’, told MailOnline: ‘There’s no love lost between Charles and Andrew and I’m certain they will meet.

‘Charles will be furious that his trip to New Zealand has been completely overshadowed. The one thing Charles is determined to do is inherit the crown and he won’t let anyone get in the way’.

Lisa Bloom, 58, a lawyer who is representing several of Jeffrey Epstein’s victims, has urged the Duke of York to co-operate with US investigation into his late friend’s conduct. 

Lisa Bloom (pictured), who represents five of Epstein’s alleged victims, has said the Prince co-operate in full with the authorities in the US and ‘permit his staff to do the same’

She said, in an interview with The Times: ‘The way we look at it is, if Prince Andrew saw something, and surely he did, because everybody who spent time with Jeffrey Epstein says there were girls coming in and out all the time […] had he shown the basic human decency to report his friend, other women could have been spared being sexually abused. 

‘This could have been stopped and instead, because there were so many enablers around Jeffrey Epstein, and apparently Prince Andrew was one of them, this just went on and on.’   

It comes after Prince Andrew’s suggestion that sex is a ‘positive act’ for a man, so therefore difficult to forget, was said to have left Charles’ daughter-in-law Meghan Markle ‘troubled’.

A source, described as ‘close to The Duchess of Sussex’ spoke to The Daily Telegraph criticising Prince Andrew’s BBC Newsnight interview and describing Meghan’s reaction to seeing it.

After a week of catastrophic headlines for Prince Andrew, in which his charities have abandoned him, Meghan’s camp hit out at the Duke.

‘The interview left everyone watching it wanting to curl under a table. It just got worse and worse and worse,’ a source close to the Duchess of Sussex’s team said.

Beleaguered Andrew also faces the prospect of Virginia Giuffre – an alleged Jeffrey Epstein victim who claims she had under-age sex with the duke, which he strenuously denies – being interviewed on BBC’s Panorama programme early in December.

The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra (RPO) was among a number of organisations which announced on Friday they would no longer be involved with Andrew, following the controversy around his friendship with convicted sex offender Epstein. 

The day after the Duke of York’s offices at Buckingham Palace were cleared out as the Jeffrey Epstein scandal engulfed the monarchy, it can be revealed that Prince Andrew has removed his personal Royal Standard flag from the roof of The Royal Lodge, his palatial home in Windsor Great Park.

Perhaps the most recognisable symbol of the monarchy, the Royal Standard flag flutters above any Royal palace where the Queen is in residence. 

Buckingham Palace said they do not wish to comment on the missing Royal Standard.