Sir Patrick Stewart has opened up about growing up in a violent home in a documentary which follows Queen Camilla’s work with domestic abuse campaigners and victims.
Mr Stewart, 84, revealed how from a young age he would have to ‘scream’ at his father to stop when he would hit his mother ‘again and again’.
He would listen to the frightening outbursts alongside his older brother and the pair became ‘experts’ at knowing when they would need to intervene and protect their mother.
The veteran actor – whose career has spanned seven decades – also spoke of ‘shame’ and ‘humiliation’ he experienced while witnessing the abuse which led him to seek therapy in later life.
He made the revelation in unseen clips from a ITV documentary following Queen Camilla‘s work with domestic violence campaigners and victims.
He also explained how he begged his mother to leave their father and even offered to buy her a house once he had become a successful actor.
But Mr Stewart said he came to the painful realization that that she would ‘never leave him (his father)’.
Mr Stewart explained how his ‘perfect’ life was flipped upside down when he was just six and his father returned from WWII.
He said: ‘The war ended in 1945 so I was by the time my father came home, I was six years old, and it was horrifying.
‘The shouting was so loud because he had a huge voice. I would scream at my father to stop when he hit my mother and hit her again and again.’
He added: My brother and I, we became experts at understanding where the shouting was going, what it was going to lead to, and we always knew the moment that the violence was going to begin.
‘So with that, we would push open the door and burst into the room, and my brother, Trevor, who was taller than me, would force himself between my father and my mother so that he couldn’t reach her and she would shout out, no, no, no, please. You don’t have to protect me.’
Mr Stewart previously said he took up boxing at school so he could stand up to his father and recalled him if he harmed his mother he would ‘come off worse.’
The award-winning actor spoke of the distress he felt as a young man in feeling ‘responsible’ for his mother’s suffering.
The family had lived in poverty in Mirfield, West Yorkshire, in the late 1940s.
Mr Stewart’s father, Alfred, was a decorated war hero and a Dunkirk veteran.
He believes Alfred suffered from PTSD as a result of the war, making him violent towards his loving mother, Gladys.
Mr Stewart revealed how domestic violence was something that people never spoke about and so he kept it a secret.
He said: ‘I kept it all to myself. It was locked inside me, and I felt shame, and I of course, also felt responsible.’
The 90 minute documentary ‘Her Majesty: Behind Closed Doors’ produced by Love Monday TV has received huge critical acclaim, leading industry insiders to think it will be shortlisted for a prestigious BAFTA award.
Queen Camilla decided in 2016 to draw attention to the problem of domestic abuse after meeting Diana Parkes, the mother of Joanna Simpson who was beaten to death by her abusive husband.
The Queen has been credited for her compassion in a subject that has remained taboo and campaigners say it will help to stop victims suffering in silence.
Mr Stewart thinks that the death of his mother in 1977 left his father ‘devastated.’
He said: ‘He (Alfred) missed her so much. It’s so complex and makes one grieve. It doesn’t go away.’
On her crusade, the Queen said: ‘It is going to take a long, long time because it has been going on forever.
It’s been going since time began. But I think if you look at the steps that we’ve taken since the bad old days, we have made a huge amount of progress, and I shall keep on trying until I am able to no more.’
Stewart’s full interview was released to mark ’16 days of action’, a campaign to raise awareness of domestic abuse in the run-up to Christmas starting on Monday.
