Ronnie Russell gets appreciation from the Queen for saving the life of her daughter Princess Anne.
The Princess was attacked in 1974 by a man named Ian Ball- his mission was to kidnap Anne but got saved from the incident.
Ronnie recalled to the Mirror how the police visited him at his home after the incident.
“They were looking round my home and saying, ‘Oh this is a nice house’. They asked if I had a mortgage and I said, ‘Yes, yes. Why?’ They said, ‘Well we are really telling you this a bit early, but the Queen is going to pay off your mortgage as a gift for what you have done.’ I thought it was wonderful,” Ronnie explained. “I was actually close to repossession at the time. They were going to repossess my home. So I dug myself out of that one!”
He was also awarded the George Medal for bravery by the monarch, who said : “The medal is from the Queen, but I want to thank you as Anne’s mother.”
The gold medal is now up for sale due to ill health and to provide for his future. It is expected to raise between £15,000 and £20,000 at auction next month.
“It was something I said I would never, ever do,” he said. “What I would like is whoever does eventually buy the medal, I would hope they might invite me somewhere to tell them about what happened on the night.”
Former heavyweight boxer Ronnie Russell, 72, was driving home to Kent at the time of the late-night incident. Ian Ball had blocked Princess Anne’s car on The Mall in central London, and had fired shots, injuring four people.
“It was moving very fast,” he said, recalling seeing the kidnapper trying to pull Anne from her car, while her then-husband Captain Mark Phillips was pulling her back. Of the Princess, he added: “She was very, very together, telling him, ‘Just go away and don’t be such a silly man.’ He stood there glaring at me with the gun and I hit him. I hit him as hard as I could, and he was flat on the floor face down.”
