Freddie Mercury's deathbed words to lifelong friend Mary Austin revealed

4 September 2026, 14:08

Mary Austin wasn't flattered by her one-time fiancé's final words to her.

Freddie Mercury's lifelong friend and one-time fiancée has been speaking about her time spent with the Queen frontman as she publishes a book of his lyrics and letters.

Mary Austin, who inherited much of Freddie's estate after his tragic death in 1992, didn't open several trunks of his belongings for 30 years after his passing.

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She has turned the recently recovered writings and photographs into the newly released Freddie Mercury: A Life in Lyrics, and has also given rare interviews about their relationship.

And speaking to The Guardian, Austin has now revealed the last thing he ever said to her.

"I was holding his hand. He was on morphine and in and out of consciousness, and he falls back to sleep," she said.

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"And I stand there for quite a while and he finally comes round again and he just said, 'My old faithful'. So I felt a bit like a dog. I wasn't flattered."

Asked if Freddie ever told her he loved her, she replied: "No. No, he was not a man who … He bought things."

Of whether in turn she considered him the love of her life, she replied: "I think I can say, in retrospect, so far, yes, he is the love of my life."

Mary and Freddie met in 1969, just five years after he moved to England, when she was 19 and he 24.

They started a relationship and moved in together and even got engaged in 1973, but parted a few years later after he came out to her as bisexual.

They nevertheless remained lifelong friends, and when he died Freddie left her half her estate, including his Garden Lodge home in Kensington.