Freddie Mercury's closest friend Mary Austin breaks silence on "secret lovechild" claims

11 August 2025, 11:31

Did Freddie Mercury have a secret daughter? His dear friend Mary Austin opens up.

It's inevitable that there are countless myths and mysteries surrounding a star as famous as Queen frontman Freddie Mercury.

That he kept the details of his romantic life relatively private and lived with his HIV diagnosis for four years before revealing it shortly before his death has led to even more speculation about what may have happened behind closed doors.

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And this year it was remarkably claimed that Freddie secretly fathered a daughter in 1976, around the peak of Queen's fame.

Journalist Lesley-Ann Jones has written the book Love, Freddie with a woman known only as "B", built not just around interviews with the supposed daughter, but also 17 handwritten diaries that Freddie is claimed to have given shortly before he died.

"We had a very close relationship from the moment I was born and throughout the final 15 years of his life,” a letter from B in the book reads. "He entrusted his collection of private notebooks to me, his only child and his next of kin."

In the letter, it is claimed that Freddie Mercury's closest friend, Mary Austin, knew the truth of him having a daughter.

Freddie Mercury - Living On My Own (Official Video Remastered)

“Mary Austin — the wonderful woman who was to all intents and purposes his wife until death parted them — knew absolutely everything about him, including all his undisclosed secrets," the note read.

But Austin has denied this claim and told The Times: "Freddie had a glorious openness, and I cannot imagine he would have wanted to, or been able to, keep such a joyful event a secret, either from me or other people closest to him.

"The truth is that I am simply not the guardian of such a secret. I’ve never known of any child, or of any diaries. If Freddie had indeed had a child without me knowing anything about it, that would be astonishing to me."

She added: "As this particular narrative has grown, I had to say something to prevent my silence being interpreted as confirmation — speaking now is not a decision I have taken lightly.

"I wanted to carefully consider everything being said so I could approach the topic responsibly, most of all for Freddie, who is not here to speak for himself."

Austin added that she was still living with Freddie when he is supposed to have started this diary, and that she never saw him doing so.

She also suggested that Mercury was too unwell to have passed over these 17 volumes to "B" just weeks before his passing, adding: "I have no knowledge of the diaries or them being ‘entrusted’ to a child. I was with him most days in the months before his death."

Both Lesley-Ann Jones and "B" have responded to Austin's comments.

Freddie Mercury - Made In Heaven (Official Video Remastered)

"I am devastated by Mary Austin's alleged response," B told the Daily Mail. "Here, she has not yet read the book, yet she apparently makes this statement. I don't understand why."

Jones added: "I am surprised by Mary Austin's response. As a journalist I approached her for interview countless times over many years, but she never once responded.

"In this book, however, there is only one voice: that of Freddie's daughter herself. The story is hers. The quotes are hers.

"Her source is the collection of 17 handwritten diaries that Freddie gave her three weeks before he died."