YOUR recent HAS contributors in favour of Princess Diana have got my fullest support.

The Princess is in a line of consorts betrayed or slighted by their flippant husbands' infidelities - Katherine of Aragon, Henry VIII's dutiful first wife, was shabbily divorced in favour of further partners, and Alexandra of Denmark, wife of King Edward VIII, had to endure that king's blatant flirtations with others.

It was left to Diana to "blow the whistle" in her broadcast, in which a shining, mature spirit shone out from somebody regarded as unworldly and expendable. Diana advanced the cause of devalued females everywhere.

The Bishop of London, Dr Richard Chartres, wishes public attention to move elsewhere. But the Church of England was born in the shame of Henry VIII's first divorce. Today, nobody still knows whether the Church of England, when it married Charles and Diana, was aware of any existing liaison with another woman.

We need to know about this, otherwise the Church will continue to remain under the doubt of making an empty farce out of one its most solemn ceremonies.

E Turnbull, Newcastle.