Sarah Ferguson told Jeffrey Epstein that “no woman has ever left the Royal family with her head”, according to newly released files.
The former Duchess of York wrote to the late financier via email in July 2010, telling him that she was being “hung out to dry”.
In May that year, she was caught in a tabloid sting appearing to agree cash for access to Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, then Prince Andrew. She had also undertaken a television interview with Oprah Winfrey in which she discussed her financial difficulties.
In an exchange with Epstein in July, she appeared to ask him: “Have you died on me? Don’t… Please you are my pillar.”
Epstein replied the next day to say: “I thought you needed a place for the second week?”
Ms Ferguson with Ghislaine Maxwell, the former partner of Epstein, at an event in New York in December 2003 Credit: Mark Mainz/Getty Images
Ms Ferguson responded: “Dear Jeffrey, yes I did need a second place for a week?
“And I thank you so much, but just as I predicted many, many months ago, the British press is ready to exterminate me, and it seems that PricewaterhouseCoopers and the palace system are not equipped to deal with all of this huge wave of negativity.
“Therefore I have to return to the UK, and be exterminated and face the thunderous music.
“I am now 1000 per cent being hung out to dry, just as I predicted you will see, the Press will have me exiled. I am totally on my own now.
“This is beyond scandalous and nobody can do anything. I cannot believe what this is all coming to.
“I have to return to face my judge and jury and be hung yet again.”
She added: “Just as I always said, no woman has ever left the Royal family with her head, and the [sic] cannot behead me, therefore they will discredit me. Totally to obliteration. I have no words.”
At the time, PricewaterhouseCoopers had been engaged to audit her finances.
Epstein is shown in the documents to have given Ms Ferguson significant financial help.
He provided £15,000 to help pay off her debts, including those owed to a former member of her staff. She later described the decision to accept the arrangement as a “gigantic error”.
Files also showed Ms Ferguson thanking Epstein profusely for his assistance in helping her with business contacts, and asking his advice.
She called him a “legend” and the “brother I have always wished for”, telling him in 2010: “Just marry me.”
The documents appear to show that she visited Epstein just five days after he was released from prison for sex offences, and took her adult daughters, Princess Beatrice and Princess Eugenie, with her.