Former ‘It Girl’ Tara Palmer-Tomkinson, UK socialite and friend of royalty, dies aged 45

Tara Palmer-Tomkinson, the socialite, TV presenter and friend of the royal family, has been found dead at her London flat.

The former “It Girl”, a god-daughter of Prince Charles, had recently revealed she was being treated for a brain tumour, a non-malignant growth in her pituitary gland.

Scotland Yard said the ambulance service called officers at 1.40pm on Wednesday to an address in south-west London. It said: “A woman, aged in her 40s, was pronounced dead at the scene. At this early stage police are not treating the death as suspicious. Inquiries into the circumstances are ongoing. The coroner has been informed.” Next of kin were also told.

The 45-year-old was the daughter of the former Olympic skier and landowner Charles Palmer-Tomkinson and his wife, Patricia, who are friends of Prince Charles. Her older sister, Santa Montefiore, an author, is married to the historian and novelist Simon Sebag Montefiore.

Palmer-Tomkinson became famous in the 1990s, as a glamorous skiing companion and sometime nanny to princes Harry and William. She sometimes joined Charles and his sons on their annual skiing holiday to Klosters, her presence inevitably sparking unfounded rumours of an unlikely romance with the divorced heir to the throne, 23 years her senior.

The Prince of Wales and Duchess of Cornwall said they were “deeply saddened and our thoughts are so much with the family”.

Of her tumour, Palmer-Tomkinson told the Daily Mail in November: “I got terribly frightened. I started thinking, I’m going to die.” The tumour, which was discovered following blood tests after she felt ill in the summer of 2015, had been successfully reduced by the treatment, she told the newspaper.