Charles celebrating Prince of Wales investiture 'quietly'

The Prince of Wales was "celebrating quietly" to mark the 50th anniversary of investiture, the Duchess of Cornwall has said.

Camilla's comments came as she visited Swansea with Charles to mark another five-decade milestone - Swansea being bestowed city status in 1969.

The honour was announced the week Charles was invested as the Prince of Wales - July 1 1969 - during a ceremony staged at Caernarfon Castle.

The couple met community stalwarts, dignitaries, Swansea charity bosses, schoolchildren and locals who remembered when Charles visited the city 50 years ago.

Quizzed about how her husband would be marking his milestone, the duchess said: "Another anniversary I know - celebrating quietly."

The Swansea celebrations were staged in Victoria Park, close to the Patti Pavilion, a local landmark, where the couple went on a brief walkabout meeting local schoolchildren, youngsters from uniformed groups and members of the public when they first arrived.

Teacher Laura Williams, 40, who had brought her eight-month-old son Lenny to meet the prince said: "Charles said 'I'm trying to get a smile out of him, that's all I want'. I said he did smile - for your wife."

Commenting on Swansea getting city status, she said: "It was fantastic, it really put Swansea on the map.

"The city had been damaged by bombing during the war so it was a positive step."

Charles chatted to Alison Thomas, 74, and Kay Richards, 78, who remembered his trip to Swansea 50 years ago and the celebrations that followed.

Ms Thomas said: "We told him we remembered holding street parties when Swansea got city status and he said we must have been very young or as old as he was."

Later, Charles travelled to the nearby Morriston Tabernacle Chapel, a place he visited during his tour of Wales in 1969 following his investiture as Prince of Wales.

At the time the congregation had staged a national hymn-singing festival to celebrate the event, something the prince remembered well.

He said: "I don't know about some of you but I find it very hard to know where those 50 years have gone and whether any of you were here at the time. One or two of you may have been."

Charles added: "One of the things that I will never forget from 50 years ago was the sheer volume of sound from the size of the choir when I came then."

Every summer Charles and Camilla regularly tour Wales, visiting communities across the country and meeting organisations and charities.

The visit came after a freedom of information request by WalesOnline revealed the cost to design, create and install signs renaming the Second Severn Crossing the Prince of Wales Bridge - £216,513.

The change of name was a controversial move that was criticised at the time with Plaid Cymru's then-leader Leanne Wood tweeting: "Is this a late April fool joke?"

A petition against the decision was launched on Change.org attracting more than 38,000 signatures.

But then-Welsh Secretary Alun Cairns described it as a "fitting tribute" to Charles' "decades of continued, dedicated service to our nation".