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EDEN CONFIDENTIAL: Lady Sally Aspinall, aunt of Prince Harry's ex Cressida Bonas, dies aged 80
She raised gorillas by hand, shared her bed with lion cubs, bottle-fed cheetahs and walked tigers through the rarefied streets of London 's Belgravia – all with the same aristocratic style and spirit she'd displayed as a 1960s model.
But the extraordinary life of the beautiful, twice-widowed Lady Sally Aspinall, daughter of Le Mans-winning 5th Earl Howe, and great-aunt of the most glamorous of Prince Harry 's old flames, Cressida Bonas, ended this week at the age of 80.
Her youngest son believes she yearned to be reunited with the two men she married.
The first was Formula 1 driver Piers Courage, killed competing in the 1970 Dutch Grand Prix; the second, casino king and inimitable wildlife park founder John Aspinall, who succumbed to cancer in 2000.
'I think a part of her died with Piers,' reflects Bassa Aspinall, 53, Sally's only child by 'Aspers' as Aspinall was known to friends including fugitive peer the 7th Lord Lucan.
The sense of loss, Bassa adds, was redoubled when his father died. 'It was an amazing love story. She'd kept him alive for six or seven years. Half his face was missing from the cancer. It was morphine and bandage changes four or five times a day.'
Their romance had begun as Sally slowly emerged from the trauma of losing Piers, by whom she had two sons, Jason and Amos, without whom, she said, she 'could easily have gone under'.
'To complement my father, you had to be a very special human being. He loved strength in women,' Bassa adds, pointing out that his mother was blessed with abundant courage.
'It's all very well to be loving and caring, but it's another thing to fit into that world,' he says, referring to his father's parks at Howletts and Port Lympne, where wildlife enjoyed previously unimaginable freedom.
'If he said she was safe, she would trust him entirely. He brought laughter and purpose back into her life.'
It wasn't just in Belgravia, where tigers were taken for nocturnal walks close to the couple's London address, that heads were turned, but also at Wellesley House, Bassa's prep school, where, he recalls, his mother arrived for sports day 'with two Siberian tiger cubs in the back seat'.
But in 1995 she suffered further tragedy. Jason Courage, her elder son by Piers, was riding his motorbike in central London when he was hit by a car making an illegal turn. He was left paralysed from the neck down.
By then, Aspinall was afflicted by cancer. Sally didn't falter; she never did. 'She was very stoic,' says Bassa.
Her resilience was tested again after Aspinall's death, when she found that much of her life was controlled by those who did not have her wellbeing at heart. Her health began to fail.
But in 2019 she moved to South Africa, where Bassa had settled with his wife, Donne. 'She was the daughter that my mother never had – they had an incredible bond,' he tells me, adding that it was Donne, Sally's carer in her final years, who sensed that she was slipping away and alerted Jason and Amos in England.
Both flew to Cape Town to say goodbye. 'She died very peacefully – idyllically,' says Bassa, who, together with Donne and their children – sons Redwald and Odin, and daughters Takara and Elysia – was by her side.
Imrie 'glad' her son isn't a girl
The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel star Celia Imrie says she's grateful that her only child was a boy so they don't compete for parts.
Angus Imrie, 30, played 'Creepy Jake' in the hit comedy Fleabag and Prince Edward in the fourth series of The Crown.
'I'm glad he's not a girl, only because we would be fighting for the same roles and that causes tension if there's two female actors in the family,' says Imrie, 72, who was presented with an Icon Award at this year's Raindance Film Festival in London.
'I'm glad Angus is a whole generation younger and is in his own lane. I'm terribly proud of him,' she adds.
Presenter: I was meant to be on doomed flight
As a presenter of TV show A Place in The Sun for seven years, air travel was part of the job for Scarlette Douglas.
But the star tells me she 'hates flying' for a heartbreaking reason. 'I lost a really good friend of mine in the Air France crash from Brazil to France,' she says at the Taste of London Food Festival opening party in Regent's Park.
'The scary thing was I was supposed to be on that flight. She had booked it.'
Flight 447 from Rio de Janeiro to Paris crashed into the Atlantic in 2009, killing 228 people.
Scarlette, 38, couldn't take the flight because of a job she had in Hollywood.
'Forever my best boy': Lara pays tribute to adored pet
Lara Stone has been left devastated by the death of her beloved dog, Bert, who was once at the heart of her family life with comedian David Walliams.
The Dutch model, 41, posted a photograph of the border terrier online, writing: 'Love you forever, miss you for always, forever and ever my best boy you'll be.'
When Lara split from David in 2015 after five years of marriage, she left their £3.25million north London home with their son Alfred, now 12, and Bert.
The former couple went on to share custody of both. David later adopted a second border terrier, Ernie, and often referred to the pair as 'my boys'.
Lara has since remarried and has a second son, Bob, one, with property developer husband David Grievson.
Monty is Pamela's world
Baywatch babe Pamela Anderson has an unlikely hero – Monty Don.
The actress, 57, says the green-fingered Gardeners' World presenter, known for his rumpled navy-blue shirt and colourful scarf, inspired her passion for gardening.
'I love Monty Don, his videos and books,' she says. 'He writes so beautifully and poetically when it comes to gardens.'
Wait until Pammy meets Alan Titchmarsh.
The celebrity gardener claims that when he collected his MBE from Queen Elizabeth in 2000, she told him: 'You give a lot of ladies a lot of pleasure.'
Fire guts home of model's sister
Jade Parfitt called off this year's Bath Fashion Festival with just weeks to go after a major backer dropped out.
Now, the top model is coming to terms with a disaster closer to home.
This week her younger sister Amy's house in Totnes, Devon, was devastated by a fire which spread into two neighbouring homes.
'Thanking our lucky stars that no people were injured, but they have a very long road ahead,' says Jade, 47, who encouraged her online followers to donate to her sister's family via the GoFundMe website, with the appeal immediately raising almost £20,000.
'We are so grateful that people are donating their hard-earned cash and sending lovely messages,' Jade added.
Meghan Markle had planned to become a British citizen after she married Prince Harry, but abandoned the process long before obtaining a passport.
Another foreigner who married into the Royal Family has more staying power, however.
Swedish financier Timothy Vesterberg, who wed Princess Alexandra's granddaughter Flora Ogilvy in 2020, received his British citizenship this week.
'I'm very proud of my newly British-Swedish husband,' says art consultant Flora, 30.
She added: 'I was very moved by how thoughtful the ceremony was.'
