Kate Middleton Has Been Admitted to Hospital to Deliver Royal Baby No. 3
Royal baby: Kate Middleton in 'early stages ' of labor, palace says
LONDON — The Duchess of Cambridge was admitted
to a London hospital Monday in the "early stages of labor,"
Kensington Palace said in a statement.
The former Kate Middleton, 36, and Prince
William, Duke of Cambridge, 35, arrived at the Lindo Wing at St Mary's
Hospital, in London's Paddington neighborhood, by car.
The baby, the royal couple's third, will be
grandmother Queen Elizabeth II's sixth great-grandchild, and become fifth in
line to the throne.
The child will join sister Princess Charlotte,
2, and Prince George, 4, in the growing Cambridge family, as the third
grandchild of Charles, Prince of Wales, and his late first wife, Princess
Diana.
As with her previous pregnancies, Will and Kate
did not know the sex of the baby beforehand, palace officials confirmed in a
briefing weeks before the birth.
Among the names favored by British bookmakers
for a girl: Alexandra, Alice, Elizabeth, Mary, Victoria; If a boy: Albert, Arthur,
Frederick, James, Philip.
The development comes just weeks before the
wedding of Harry and Markle at St. George's Chapel in Windsor on May 19.
William and Kate will mark their own seventh
wedding anniversary on April 29.
The news of a royal birth is traditionally
announced on a gilded easel placed outside Buckingham Palace. Large crowds
gathered outside in July 2013 to see the announcement of the arrival of William
and Kate's first child.
The couple announced his name, George Alexander
Louis, and that of their daughter, Charlotte Elizabeth Diana, a couple of days
after each was born.
Among bookmakers' favored names for the couple's
third child are Arthur, Albert and Frederick for a boy, and Mary, Alice and
Alexandra for a girl.
Shortly before older brother George was born,
British law changed to make birth order the determining factor in succession,
replacing gender — male primogeniture — as the default rule that developed over
10 centuries.
Aware that a 300-year-old set of laws then
governing the succession looked increasingly egregious and inexplicable in the
21st century, British lawmakers decided the time for "royal equality"
had finally arrived.
The newest little royal will displace Uncle
Prince Harry, 33, in the succession; he will move down to sixth in line, and
any children he has will follow him.
Kate's other babies had easy deliveries (she gave birth and left the hospital on the same day for Princess Charlotte), in contrast to crippling bouts of acute morning sickness that forced her to cancel engagements and stay in bed in the early stages of her pregnancies. She was so ill she had to miss George's first day of his new school; Will did the solo dropoff instead.
The Cambridges are now full-time royals based in
their sprawling 20-room Apartment 1A at Kensington Palace. George's school is
just across the Thames River; Charlotte started at a nursery school near the
palace in January.
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