Andrew's arrival 'provokes Sandringham strike' as staff told they can reject working for disgraced royal
Staff on the Sandringham estate have reportedly been allowed to reject serving the former prince
Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor has provoked a strike among staff at Sandringham as masses of servants opt out of helping the ex-prince at his new home.
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After being ushered to Wood Farm Cottage on Monday, following his eviction from Windsor's Royal Lodge, workers on the Sandringham estate have reportedly been allowed to reject serving abuse-accused Andrew.
Andrew, who has consistently denied allegations of wrongdoing against him, has been moved into the "ramshackle" cottage while his permanent new home at Marsh Farm is prepared for his arrival.
A source told The Sun: “They’ve been told they don’t have to serve Andrew or work for him if they feel uncomfortable.
“There is already quite a list saying no thanks. There is understandably a lot of disquiet as he is now a total pariah.
“But there is also a worry that once he gets comfortable at Wood Farm while Marsh Farm is being finished, they will never get him out again.”
Read More: Ghislaine Maxwell admits infamous photo of Andrew with arm around Virginia Giuffre's waist is real
Read More: Andrew and Epstein ‘asked exotic dancer for a threesome at paedophile financier’s Florida home’
Removal trucks were seen departing Royal Lodge on Wednesday, with Andrew himself remaining out of sight.
A series of white vans and lorries departed the gates of the Windsor mansion in the direction of the Royal Family's private Sandringham Estate in Norfolk.
It is understood that Andrew's new home will not be ready for his arrival until the start of April, with Wood Farm Cottage being used as a stopgap.
The Cottage is where Andrew's late father, Prince Philip, spent much of his retirement.
Lawyers representing the alleged victim have urged King Charles to contact them following the allegations.
The woman is not British and was in her 20s at the time of the alleged incident.
This revelation, alongside renewed scrutiny upon Andrew following the release of the so-called "Epstein Files" on Friday, reportedly led King Charles to hasten his exit from his Windsor home.
The latest claims make the woman the second to allege she was trafficked by Epstein for sex with Andrew, after the late abuse accuser Virginia Giuffre.
Ms Giuffre, 41, died by suicide and was found at her farm in Neergabby, Western Australia, last April, where she had been living for the past few years.
Andrew has always vehemently denied any wrongdoing in relation to Epstein and denied having ever met Ms Giuffre.
He has not publicly responded to the second set of allegations.
A Thames Valley Police spokesperson has told LBC: "We are aware of reports about a woman said to have been taken to an address in Windsor in 2010 for sexual purposes.
"We are assessing the information in line with our established procedures. We take any reports of sexual crimes extremely seriously and encourage anyone with information to come forward.
"At this time, these allegations have not been reported to Thames Valley Police by either the lawyer or their client."
The woman's lawyer, Brad Edwards, said: "We’re talking about at least one woman who was sent by Jeffrey Epstein over to Prince Andrew.
"And she even had, after a night with Prince Andrew, a tour of Buckingham Palace."
Press photographers and TV crews gathered near the entrance to a driveway to Wood Farm Cottage, Sandringham, where Andrew is reported to be staying temporarily, on Wednesday.
The impending arrival of Andrew turned the usually quiet lane in the village of Wolferton, by St Peter's church, into a gridlocked road lined with parked cars, as a helicopter hovered overhead.
A woman who answered the door at a house in Wolferton, speaking anonymously, said she felt it was the wrong location for Andrew to move to and that he should be someone more “secluded”.
“I think if he has to come and live here, it should be somewhere that’s quite secluded,” she said.
“There are houses that belong to the King that he could go to that wouldn’t cause anybody any bother.
“The press are all down there. The villagers don’t like that.
“It’s a quiet village.”
She suggested a house that was “out in the woods that’s surrounded by trees and no other houses… would have been better”.
It comes as another royal source told the Mail Online: "The sight of him plastered on the front pages, out riding his horse or driving in his car past photographers in Windsor, amid the continued dripping poison of the Epstein files was just too much."
"He had to be removed from the public eye."
A friend told The Sun: “He had planned to cling on at Royal Lodge a little longer, but with the latest batch of Epstein files, it was made clear to him that it was time to go.
“Leaving was so humiliating for him that he chose to do it under the cover of darkness.
“He didn’t want to have a big emotional goodbye, even though Royal Lodge is a place where he had so many family memories.
“Theoretically, he could have stayed until Marsh Farm was ready, but the headlines were only getting worse. Also, the fact he’s been seen driving around Windsor laughing and looking like he hasn’t a care in the world hasn’t gone down well with the Royal Household.”
Andrew was stripped of his titles by the King last year after the posthumous publication of a book from Ms Giuffre, who alleged she was trafficked by Epstein and his former girlfriend Ghislaine Maxwell when she was 17.
The former prince paid millions of pounds to Ms Giuffre in 2022 to settle a civil court claim in the US without admitting liability.
Andrew and his ex-wife Sarah Ferguson appear frequently throughout the three million documents released by the US Department of Justice.
Being named in the files does not amount to a suggestion of wrongdoing.
Among the releases was an admission from Epstein's accomplice, Ghislaine Maxwell, in which she says the infamous photo of Andrew with his arm around his Giuffre is real.
The former Duke of York has long disputed the image's authenticity and claimed it may have been faked.
This claim was central to the defence he tried to put over in his disastrous Newsnight interview with Emily Maitlis, where he also claimed he doesn't sweat.
Ghislaine, who is currently serving a 20-year sentence in a Florida prison, says in the email she was "stating for the record as fact" that not only had she introduced Andrew to Giuffre but that the photograph was taken at her London home the same night.
Her admission, unearthed by the Daily Mail, comes as a blow to Andrew, who memorably claimed he was in Pizza Express in Woking, Surrey, with his daughter, the day he was alleged to have met 17-year-old Guiffre.