Queen Mary's Father Dies at 84 in Tasmania

COPENHAGEN, Denmark — John Dalgleish Donaldson, the father of Denmark's Australian-born Queen Mary, died Sunday in Hobart, Tasmania, at the age of 84, the Royal House of Denmark announced.

The statement from the royal household confirmed that Donaldson passed away in his longtime home city after several years of declining health. Queen Mary, who ascended the throne in January 2024 alongside her husband, King Frederik X, had visited her father at the end of March during an official state visit to Australia. The six-day trip from March 14 to 19 marked the couple's first to the country since Frederik's proclamation as king following the abdication of his mother, Queen Margrethe II.

Born in Scotland on September 5, 1941, Donaldson moved to Australia as a young man and built a distinguished career as a professor of applied mathematics. He settled in Tasmania with his first wife, Henrietta Clark Donaldson, and their daughter, Mary Elizabeth Donaldson, was born in Hobart on February 5, 1972. Henrietta died in 1997, and Donaldson remarried Susan Moody in 2001.

Queen Mary's path to the Danish monarchy began in Sydney during the 2000 Summer Olympics, where she met then-Crown Prince...