A new royal prince has been born to The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge — that’s Prince William and Princess Kate to you and me. The 8-pound, 7-ounce baby was born at 11:01 am at St. Mary’s Hospital in London.
So naturally you’d assume that the man standing outside the hospital doors in the official-looking red outfit and feathered hat — holding a scroll and wearing a badge reading “Royalist Town Crier” and shouting “Oyez, Oyez” — is the Queen’s own servant, right? Jolly Old England and all that?
You would assume it, and you would be wrong. His name is Tony Appleton and he is, to put it bluntly, a royal phony. He likes to show up at royal births and shout at the top of his lungs as if he was an official emissary of the Royal Family. He isn’t. He’s just a guy who likes to get his photo in the Boston Globe (above) or US Magazine (below) or anywhere else he can show up.
Oh, he is a town crier of sorts. As we reported a few years back, he claims to be “President of the Guild of International Millennium Town Criers and [recipient of] the coveted ‘Town Crier of the Year’ awarded by the International Town Criers Authority.”
He works hard to make himself look royally approved. Check out the fancy badges on his outfit:
“Royalist town crier” — pretty sneaky, that. On the other one, with the crossed baby rattles, he just straight-up calls himself “Royal Town Crier,” but presumably he’s leaving himself wiggle room: he’s not THE royal town crier, but he did appear (uninvited) at the royal births of Prince George and Princess Charlotte (“may they both be happy and glorious”). And as we know, that’s enough for him.
Watch the Royal Town Crier announce Prince Harry’s engagement to #MeghanMarkle pic.twitter.com/UpZzSKjuWA
— Business Insider (@businessinsider) November 27, 2017
Appleton is moving beyond births, too. Last November he was on the scene at Kensington Palace after Prince Harry and Megan Markle got engaged.
Sure, people are onto him. The Guardian and even local American TV stations have called him out. But they’ll never stop the Town Crier of the Year.