retrieved but the couple still received a police escort, which Lord Douro believed to be the standard procedure at the wedding of a general's daughter, his bride not having revealed the plot to him at the time. The wedding had been precipitated by his posting to Italy and later that year she learnt that he was returning home and arranged to join the same convoy of boats heading to Britain. As luck would have it, they were on neighbouring boats and at six o’clock each day he would position himself on the bow of his ship and she on the stern of hers, and they would communicate messages of endearment in the darkness with a torch using Morse code, much to the amusement of those on board who could decipher the messages. After the war Lord Douro continued his military service, attaining the rank of brigadier, and Lady Douro lived with him in Cyprus in the 1950s and Madrid from 1964 to 1967. He retired from the army in 1967 and they moved to Stratfield Saye. In 1972 Lord Douro's father died and he and his wife became Duke and Duchess of Wellington. At home the Duchess tended personally to the gardens and was amused to be mistaken frequently for a gardener when their home was open to the public. The Duchess died at the family home, Apsley House, in London on 1 November 2010, aged 88. She lived to see the births of several of her great-grandchildren, including twins Lady Mae and Arthur, Viscount Wellesley, third in the direct line of succession to the dukedom. Titles and honours Diana McConnel became Marchioness of Douro upon marriage and took the female equivalents of all her husband's inherited titles after his father's death. In Britain she was Duchess of Wellington, Marchioness of Douro, Marchioness of Wellington, Countess of Mornington, Countess of Wellesley, Viscountess Wellesley, and Baroness Douro, variously in the Peerages of the United Kingdom and Ireland. Due to her husband's ancestor, the first Duke of Wellington, was such a celebrated general rewarded by many of Europe's crowned heads, the Duchess of Wellington was also Princess of Waterloo in the Netherlands and Duchess of Vitória in Portugal. She was Duchess of Ciudad Rodrigo in Spain from 1968 when her father-in-law ceded the title to his son (something common enough with Spanish titles, although unheard of in Britain). Her husband in turn