Revealed: ‘Senior advisor’ who brokered links between Prince Andrew and ‘Chinese spy’ is a semi professional golfer and ex Scots Guard who has had a relationship with Royal Family for more than 25 years

The ‘senior adviser’ who brokered the relationship between the Duke of York and an alleged Chinese ‘spy’ is a semi-professional golfer who has had a relationship with the royal family for more than 25 years.

Dominic Hampshire, 56, is a former Scots Guard who rose to the rank of captain and spent the last three years of his decade in the army as equerry to the Duke of Kent.

Mr Hampshire has said his role was to ‘manage the professional life’ of the Duke of Kent, with official documents showing he accompanied His Royal Highness – a cousin of Queen Elizabeth II – on royal engagements to countries in the late 1990s such as France, Canada and South Africa.

A married father-of-two from Chalfont St Peter, Bucks, Mr Hampshire, was described in court documents released on Thursday as Prince Andrew’s ‘advisor’ in dealing with a Chinese official who has been banned from entering Britain over claims that he is a secret agent gathering intelligence on behalf of the Chinese Communist Party [CCP].

But he has long been acting as a ‘fixer’ for members of the royal family and other ‘high net worth individuals’.

After leaving the armed forces, Mr Hampshire, who was born in Edinburgh but moved to Africa as a child before joining Cheltenham College, helped set up a travel company, Latitude International. In 2003 he joined the company as director, specializing in the best holiday hospitality.

It allowed people with deep pockets to ensure they didn’t “have to check into hotels, check out and worry about paying,” he said in a podcast in 2021.

Mr Hampshire added, referring to his previous experiences with the Duke of Kent: ‘I knew I had a product that worked for our Royal Family and it didn’t exist anywhere else.’

Prince Andrew and alleged Chinese spy are banned from entering Britain

Mr Hampshire long acted as a ‘fixer’ for members of the royal family and other ‘high net worth individuals’

The trips often involved lavish golfing holidays and Mr Hampshire, who even described himself as a “professional golfer” with corporate board positions, bonded with Prince Andrew over their shared love of the sport.

He is secretary of the Quad-Centenary Club, which was formed to raise money for London’s Royal Blackheath Golf Club, of which Andrew was chairman. He was also ‘tournament director’ of the Duke of York’s under-18s golf tournament, The Young Champions Trophy, which was axed following revelations about his relationship with pedophile Jeffrey Epstein.

It appears that Mr Hampshire also helped the Duke with other business arrangements.

In February 2019, Mr Hampshire founded the company ‘York Investments Global Ltd’, but it immediately closed the following year. In November 2019, Andrew’s Newsnight interview about the car crash had aired, in which he attempted to justify his much-criticized relationship with Epstein.

In June 2020, Mr Hampshire stood behind an unlimited company, Lincelles, named after the Battle of Lincelles in 1793, in which Britain was commanded by the then Duke of York, Prince Frederick. The company was reportedly a trust fund for Andrew’s daughters, Beatrice and Eugenie.

The duke controlled the trust, together with his ‘friend and private banker’ Harry Keogh. In 2018, Mr Keogh left his position at Coutts, the royal bank, amid allegations he made unwanted advances towards female colleagues. At the time the allegations became public, a friend of Keogh told the Wall Street Journal that he denied the allegations. Another controller was Charles Douglas, a lawyer and partner at the London firm CDS Mayfair, who is said to work “closely with private banks, private equity and offshore funds advising high-net-worth individuals and their business entities, nationally and internationally.”

Lincelles was dissolved in 2022.

A neighbor of Mr Hampshire said he had no idea of ​​his life in royal circles, and instead believed he was a wealthy “city worker”, given his membership of a prestigious golf club.

Mr Hampshire had a relationship with the royal family dating back more than 25 years

“If you had mentioned Prince Andrew and the neighbor, I had no idea you could knock me down with a feather.”

Another said he was often picked up from his property in cars, while a third said they had spoken to him at a dinner party several years ago, but he was coy about his royal connections.

“I understood he was a stable master, but I don’t even know what a stable master is,” she said.

“I can definitely tell you that at the dinner I went to, he didn’t mention Prince Andrew once.

“So I think he’s probably very discreet.”

The court documents revealed that Mr Hampshire wrote a letter to the alleged Chinese spy about the Duke of York in March 2020. He said: ‘I also hope that it is clear to you where you stand with my director and also with his family.

‘You should never underestimate the power of that relationship. Outside of his closest internal confidantes, you’re sitting at the very top of a tree that a lot of people would like to be in.”

There is no evidence that Mr Hampshire or the Duke suspected the Chinese businessman, known for legal reasons as H6, was a spy.

Mr Hampshire, who has admitted he was forced to join the army because he didn’t work hard at school, told the 2021 podcast that his mother always said he was “very lucky to have been born with charisma.” But charisma alone is not enough.’

Now the former soldier may be ruining an element of naivete in his dealings with the Chinese ‘spy’.