A royal author has revealed the bizarre nickname that Prince William’s friends gave Kate Middleton and her family while the Prince and Princess of Wales were courting.
With the family surrounded by formal titles it’s unsurprising that the royals have a number of pet names for one another.
The late Queen Elizabeth II was affectionately referred to as Lillibet by members of the family. While Prince George calls his grandfather – King Charles III – ‘Grandpa Wales’.
King Charles and Queen Camilla are known to refer to each other as ‘Fred and Gladys’ the nicknames reportedly came from the BBC radio comedy series The Goon Show.
One of the more strange nicknames was coined not by any members of the family but by some of Prince William’s closest friends who got to know Kate while the couple were dating.
Writing in her royal bestseller The Making Of A Royal Romance – which explored Kate and William’s relationship from its beginnings to their wedding – Katie Nicholl revealed an odd nickname William’s friends gave the Middletons.
‘William’s friends jokingly refer to the close-knit family as the “the OM Middleton” meaning the “On Masse Middletons” because they are always together,’ Nicholls wrote.
Most recently at Wimbledon the Middletons proved they were still as close as ever when the family were spotted together at the tennis tournament on multiple occasions.
Kate Middleton and Prince William announcing their engagement in 2010. Wills friends had an unusual nickname for Kate which they coined while the couple were dating
Kate and her mother, Carole Middleton, shopping together. William’s friends jokingly refer to the close knit family as the ‘the OM Middleton’ meaning the ‘On Masse Middletons’ because they are always together
Carole with her husband Michael Middleton in 2010 following the announcement of their daughter’s engagement
Nicholl used the example of when the Middletons fled to Mystique to escape the paparazzi as an example of the nickname.
The press frenzy occured in July 2009 when The News Of The World printed a shocking photo of Kate’s uncle – Gary Goldsmith – seemingly preparing to snort cocaine on their front page.
Nicholls said: ‘”I called Will a f***er!” was the headline above a grainy black and white picture of Kate’s uncle Gary Goldsmith preparing to snort a line of cocaine through a 100 euro note, his oversized gut spilling onto a kitchen worktop.’
Gary had unwittingly invited two journalists from the paper into his £5million villa in Ibiza where he also shared stories about Kate and Wills time at his home – dubiously named La Maison de Bang Bang – including a tale of how William broke his ornamental pyramids.
Unsurprisingly, the world’s media decided to camp on the family’s doorstep keen to snap a photo of the embarrassed family.
‘The family needed privacy, and the only place to get away from media storm and the paparazzi camped on the doorstep of their home was Mystique,’ Nicholls said.
So the Middletons left en masse and travelled to the Caribbean island to stay at a family friend’s house.
While William and his friends might have joked about the close-knit family, it is greatest strength.
Kate’s sister Pippa and brother James (right) at Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s wedding in 2018
Kate and William together while they were dating. It is around this time that the ‘OM Middletons’ nickname was coined
Kate’s uncle Gary Goldsmith caused the Middleton family to flee to Mystique after he spurred on an accidental media frenzy
Royal insider Katie Nicholl revealed the odd nickname William’s friends gave the Middletons
Most recently their close family unit was on display after Kate revealed her cancer diagnosis in March last year.
Kate’s parents, Carole and Michael, along with her brother James and sister Pippa supported her recovery at her home in Windsor, which is near their own homes.
In an interview in May, James, 38, candidly discussed the struggles faced during Kate’s illness.
James revealed there was an enormous strain placed on his family when his sister, 43, announced she had been diagnosed with cancer in March 2024, and was undergoing treatment.
He told The Times: ‘For her and her family, it was a challenging time, and I know for us and our bigger family it was a challenging time.’
The entrepreneur, who now operates dog food business James & Ella, explained how the process taught him to offer unconditional support wherever possible.
‘Being there for someone is such an important part, and it doesn’t necessarily have to be on your terms, and it shouldn’t be on your terms.
‘It should be on their terms; unconditional: “I’m not doing it for something in return. I’m doing it because I love you,”‘ he continued.
Katie Nicholl’s royal biography The Making Of A Royal Romance which explored Kate and William’s relationship from its beginnings to their wedding
Carole and Micheal at Wimbledon in 2021. Kate’s parents, Carole and Michael, along with her brother James and sister Pippa supported Kate’s recovery at her home in Windsor, which is near their own homes, after her cancer diagnosis
Carole playing cards with her grandchildren. The grandmother featured in the Princess of Wales’ video announcing she had finished chemotherapy
‘And that’s the simplest way of really demonstrating love. You can do it in all these various fancy ways, but actually, it is just generally being there.’
Last September, the Princess of Wales revealed she had finished her course of preventative chemotherapy. To accompany the happy announcement, Kate shared an intimate video featuring her family.
It also featured clips of her parents playing cards with the couple and their three children, suggesting that the extended family had also played an important role in helping the Wales through their difficult time.
Both Kate and William are famously close to the rest of the Middleton family, and so it may come as little surprise to many royal watchers to see Michael and Carole in the moving video.
Over the imagery of Prince William and Kate, as well as their three children and the Middletons, the mother-of-three says the experience has reminded her and her husband, Prince William, to ‘reflect and be grateful for the simple yet important things in life, which so many of us often take for granted. Of simply loving and being loved’.
Carole and Michael have long been known for their hands-on parenting approach and often host their grandchildren for sleepovers.
Kate’s parents have been ‘brilliant’, according to friends, at stepping in and helping out, always willing to drop everything at a moment’s notice.
They were a key part of Prince George’s life from the get go, with William and Kate immediately decamping to Bucklebury a day after leaving the Lindo Wing and Proud grandfather Michael overseeing the future King’s first photoshoot in the garden a month later.
