The first sign that Margaret Thatcher was losing her vice-like grip on world affairs came shortly before the 1997 General Election which ended 18 years of Tory rule and brought Tony Blair to power. As Prime Minister she had famously survived on four hours sleep a night and the pace had never slowed after her fall from power seven years earlier. She was in huge demand on the international lecture circuit, travelling the globe to promote her free-market philosophy. Then, abruptly, at the end of 1996, her aides detected an uncharacteristic mental frailty in the Iron Lady. She began to repeat herself in discussions. But it was not just that her famed mental powers were dimming. Lady Thatcher was having difficulties with her hearing as well. Only her intimates were permitted to know that there was anything wrong with her. Lady Thatcher, on a park bench in London enjoying the sunshine in March last year with her carer Kate . One of the last pictures: Lady Thatcher in Battersea Park last year with her carers and police officer . 'She could no longer follow an argument from beginning to end,' said one close friend. 'She would lose the point halfway through. It was very confusing for her and unsettling for us. It was hard for everyone. The hearing loss exacerbated the problem. 'She was still functioning – and functioning well – but no longer at the extraordinary breakneck speed we were used to. It was difficult to know if she understood what was happening to her. If she did, she didn't tell us.' No one outside her inner circle knew . of her condition. Nor did anyone realise that, four years later, in . August 2001, Lady Thatcher had a serious stroke while on holiday with . her husband Denis; they were marking their golden wedding anniversary on . the Portuguese island of Madeira, where they had honeymooned. On her return to Britain doctors realised she had also suffered a series of small strokes in the months before the holiday. Lady Thatcher blithely insisted to friends that nothing was wrong. She had had the occasional stumble, she would admit, but nothing more. 'I don't think she could ever acknowledge the fact that she could be ill,' said one close friend. Great powers diminished: Lady Thatcher patting a playful dog . The Iron Lady was helped to her feet in Battersea Park, south London, by her carers . Around . that time she became patron of Alzheimer's Research UK, and it was not . until many months later, in early 2002, that the news of her failing . health was made public by her office. Then . came the death of her beloved Denis in 2003, after 52 years of . marriage. It was a shattering blow to someone in such a fragile mental . state. Grief stricken, she slipped into depression and her mind . deteriorated further. Her daughter Carol revealed in her memoir that her mother actually often forgot that her husband had died. 'I had to keep giving her the bad news over and over again. Every time it finally sank in that she'd lost her husband of more than 50 years she would look at me  sadly and ask softly, “Oh. Were we all there?”.' Carol also disclosed in that memoir the exact moment she realised there was a problem. Over lunch with friends in 2000 Lady Thatcher, in a discussion about the war in Bosnia, inexplicably confused the former Yugoslavia with the Falklands War, arguably one of her greatest triumphs. 'I almost fell off my chair,' said Carol. 'Watching her struggle with her words and her memory, I couldn't believe it. I had always thought of her as ageless, timeless and 100 per cent cast-iron damage-proof.' Bitter blow: Lady Thatcher was devastated by the death of her beloved husband Denis; the couple are pictured left on their wedding day in 1951, and right a few months before his death in 2003 . Support: Baroness Thatcher with her daughter Carol visiting the QE2 in Southampton in June 2008 . Family: The former Prime Minister in 2011 with her son Mark and his wife Sarah . By now her doctors were insisting that she stopped making public speeches because she was on ever-stronger medication and her memory lapses were becoming more pronounced and more frequent. She reluctantly agreed. For her staff, at least, there were some advantages to the slowdown in the schedule. Her fearsome temper tantrums became a thing of the past. The Iron Lady took on a new and more gentle persona. In 2005 she ignored the doctors to make a short stirring speech, with jokes, at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel in Knightsbridge at her 80th birthday party. The Queen and Prince Philip were present along with virtually all of the men who served in her Cabinets. After a faltering start, she was word perfect. It was the last public speech she was to make. In 2008 she was admitted to hospital for tests after she felt ill at a House of Lords dinner. It was the beginning of the end of her remarkable public life. Aide: Cynthia Crawford, left, stayed loyal to her old boss until the end of Lady Thatcher's life . Friends: The likes of Lord Powell, left, and Conor Burns, right, took turns visiting Lady Thatcher at the Ritz . Her absence from the wedding of Prince William in April 2011 was the most significant sign of the deterioration in her health. In fact, one of her last public appearances was her faltering photocall on the steps of her home after she returned from two weeks in hospital in November 2010. By now, Lady Thatcher, who once poignantly declared that 'home is where you go when you've nowhere else to go', rarely left her four-storey home in Belgravia. Her constant companions were her devoted carers, New Zealanders Kate and Janice, and her ever-faithful police protection officers. Trips out were increasingly rare. In January 2012 she did venture out, to a dinner party at the home of Jonathan Aitken, a former Tory Cabinet minister who once dated Carol. Tragically, she seemed to be unaware who was Prime Minister. 'She obviously didn't get who David Cameron was. I can't ever say I felt protective to her when she was in power, but I felt very lovingly protective towards her then,' he said. In that late period of her life she also had the occasional lunch at the Ritz, where staff always knew to serve chicken consomme and a main course of lemon sole; to ask her preference would have led to too much confusion. There was one further, poignant sighting of Lady Thatcher, on a park bench in London enjoying the sunshine in March last year with her carer Kate. Gone were her high heels, replaced by comfortable sandals and a walking stick – a testament to her frailty. Then, at Christmas, she went back to hospital for minor surgery to remove a growth from her bladder. When she came out she was even more uncertain on her feet, and a return home was out of the question. A police car outside The Ritz Hotel after Margaret Thatcher's death yesterday . Recuperation: Baroness Thatcher started the year convalescing at the Ritz in central London after undergoing minor surgery over Christmas . Tributes: Notes and bouquets were piling up outside the former prime minister's home in London following the news of her death . So she moved quietly into a suite at . the Ritz – one of her favourite places – and she was invited by its . owners the Barclay brothers to stay there for the foreseeable future. She never left. Her two . carers took it in turns to stay with her. There were photos of Denis, . her children and grandchildren on the mantlepiece in the suite. The same group of friends who took it in turns to see her in Belgravia were put on a rota at the Ritz. They included Alison Wakeham, the wife of John Wakeham who was one of the Tory ministers badly injured in the Brighton bomb; Lord Powell, who was her foreign policy adviser; Lord Forsyth, another former minister; Conor Burns, the MP for Bournemouth West; and Mark Worthington, who for more than two decades was her loyal private secretary. Cynthia Crawford, nicknamed Crawfie, who was her personal assistant in Downing Street, would stay for one or two weeks at a time. Each day she was dressed immaculately. Her trademark bouffant hair, elegantly coiffed, was now grey. By now it wasn't just the memory loss which afflicted her. She was struggling to speak because she found it increasingly difficult to form words. It was why only those closest to her were permitted to the Ritz to see her. Sir Bernard Ingham, her doughty press secretary at Downing Street, saw her a month ago. 'She looked immaculate and was keen to get involved in the conversation. Sometimes she started to speak and then the thought deserted her or she couldn't get the words out.' He then added sadly: 'It never occurred to me that it would be the last time that I would ever see her.' MAILONLINE & DAILY MAIL CAMPAIGN: HOW TO MAKE YOUR VOICE HEARD . If . you believe Lady Thatcher deserves a state funeral, and want the . Government to know, sign this online petition and submit it to us. We will pass it to the Prime Minister's office . at 10 Downing Street .
Suffered a series of strokes in 2001 but refused to admit she had fallen ill .
Devastated by death of husband Denis and often forgot he had died .
Moved into the Ritz a few months ago and was tended to by loving friends .
Cynthia Crawford, Conor Burns and Lord Powell paid visits among others .
The first sign that Margaret Thatcher was losing her vice-like grip on world affairs came shortly before the 1997 General Election which ended 18 years of Tory rule and brought Tony Blair to power. As Prime Minister she had famously survived on four hours sleep a night and the pace had never slowed after her fall from power seven years earlier. She was in huge demand on the international lecture circuit, travelling the globe to promote her free-market philosophy. Then, abruptly, at the end of 1996, her aides detected an uncharacteristic mental frailty in the Iron Lady. She began to repeat herself in discussions. But it was not just that her famed mental powers were dimming. Lady Thatcher was having difficulties with her hearing as well. Only her intimates were permitted to know that there was anything wrong with her. Lady Thatcher, on a park bench in London enjoying the sunshine in March last year with her carer Kate . One of the last pictures: Lady Thatcher in Battersea Park last year with her carers and police officer . 'She could no longer follow an argument from beginning to end,' said one close friend. 'She would lose the point halfway through. It was very confusing for her and unsettling for us. It was hard for everyone. The hearing loss exacerbated the problem. 'She was still functioning – and functioning well – but no longer at the extraordinary breakneck speed we were used to. It was difficult to know if she understood what was happening to her. If she did, she didn't tell us.' No one outside her inner circle knew . of her condition. Nor did anyone realise that, four years later, in . August 2001, Lady Thatcher had a serious stroke while on holiday with . her husband Denis; they were marking their golden wedding anniversary on . the Portuguese island of Madeira, where they had honeymooned. On her return to Britain doctors realised she had also suffered a series of small strokes in the months before the holiday. Lady Thatcher blithely insisted to friends that nothing was wrong. She had had the occasional stumble, she would admit, but nothing more. 'I don't think she could ever acknowledge the fact that she could be ill,' said one close friend. Great powers diminished: Lady Thatcher patting a playful dog . The Iron Lady was helped to her feet in Battersea Park, south London, by her carers . Around . that time she became patron of Alzheimer's Research UK, and it was not . until many months later, in early 2002, that the news of her failing . health was made public by her office. Then . came the death of her beloved Denis in 2003, after 52 years of . marriage. It was a shattering blow to someone in such a fragile mental . state. Grief stricken, she slipped into depression and her mind . deteriorated further. Her daughter Carol revealed in her memoir that her mother actually often forgot that her husband had died. 'I had to keep giving her the bad news over and over again. Every time it finally sank in that she'd lost her husband of more than 50 years she would look at me  sadly and ask softly, “Oh. Were we all there?”.' Carol also disclosed in that memoir the exact moment she realised there was a problem. Over lunch with friends in 2000 Lady Thatcher, in a discussion about the war in Bosnia, inexplicably confused the former Yugoslavia with the Falklands War, arguably one of her greatest triumphs. 'I almost fell off my chair,' said Carol. 'Watching her struggle with her words and her memory, I couldn't believe it. I had always thought of her as ageless, timeless and 100 per cent cast-iron damage-proof.' Bitter blow: Lady Thatcher was devastated by the death of her beloved husband Denis; the couple are pictured left on their wedding day in 1951, and right a few months before his death in 2003 . Support: Baroness Thatcher with her daughter Carol visiting the QE2 in Southampton in June 2008 . Family: The former Prime Minister in 2011 with her son Mark and his wife Sarah . By now her doctors were insisting that she stopped making public speeches because she was on ever-stronger medication and her memory lapses were becoming more pronounced and more frequent. She reluctantly agreed. For her staff, at least, there were some advantages to the slowdown in the schedule. Her fearsome temper tantrums became a thing of the past. The Iron Lady took on a new and more gentle persona. In 2005 she ignored the doctors to make a short stirring speech, with jokes, at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel in Knightsbridge at her 80th birthday party. The Queen and Prince Philip were present along with virtually all of the men who served in her Cabinets. After a faltering start, she was word perfect. It was the last public speech she was to make. In 2008 she was admitted to hospital for tests after she felt ill at a House of Lords dinner. It was the beginning of the end of her remarkable public life. Aide: Cynthia Crawford, left, stayed loyal to her old boss until the end of Lady Thatcher's life . Friends: The likes of Lord Powell, left, and Conor Burns, right, took turns visiting Lady Thatcher at the Ritz . Her absence from the wedding of Prince William in April 2011 was the most significant sign of the deterioration in her health. In fact, one of her last public appearances was her faltering photocall on the steps of her home after she returned from two weeks in hospital in November 2010. By now, Lady Thatcher, who once poignantly declared that 'home is where you go when you've nowhere else to go', rarely left her four-storey home in Belgravia. Her constant companions were her devoted carers, New Zealanders Kate and Janice, and her ever-faithful police protection officers. Trips out were increasingly rare. In January 2012 she did venture out, to a dinner party at the home of Jonathan Aitken, a former Tory Cabinet minister who once dated Carol. Tragically, she seemed to be unaware who was Prime Minister. 'She obviously didn't get who David Cameron was. I can't ever say I felt protective to her when she was in power, but I felt very lovingly protective towards her then,' he said. In that late period of her life she also had the occasional lunch at the Ritz, where staff always knew to serve chicken consomme and a main course of lemon sole; to ask her preference would have led to too much confusion. There was one further, poignant sighting of Lady Thatcher, on a park bench in London enjoying the sunshine in March last year with her carer Kate. Gone were her high heels, replaced by comfortable sandals and a walking stick – a testament to her frailty. Then, at Christmas, she went back to hospital for minor surgery to remove a growth from her bladder. When she came out she was even more uncertain on her feet, and a return home was out of the question. A police car outside The Ritz Hotel after Margaret Thatcher's death yesterday . Recuperation: Baroness Thatcher started the year convalescing at the Ritz in central London after undergoing minor surgery over Christmas . Tributes: Notes and bouquets were piling up outside the former prime minister's home in London following the news of her death . So she moved quietly into a suite at . the Ritz – one of her favourite places – and she was invited by its . owners the Barclay brothers to stay there for the foreseeable future. She never left. Her two . carers took it in turns to stay with her. There were photos of Denis, . her children and grandchildren on the mantlepiece in the suite. The same group of friends who took it in turns to see her in Belgravia were put on a rota at the Ritz. They included Alison Wakeham, the wife of John Wakeham who was one of the Tory ministers badly injured in the Brighton bomb; Lord Powell, who was her foreign policy adviser; Lord Forsyth, another former minister; Conor Burns, the MP for Bournemouth West; and Mark Worthington, who for more than two decades was her loyal private secretary. Cynthia Crawford, nicknamed Crawfie, who was her personal assistant in Downing Street, would stay for one or two weeks at a time. Each day she was dressed immaculately. Her trademark bouffant hair, elegantly coiffed, was now grey. By now it wasn't just the memory loss which afflicted her. She was struggling to speak because she found it increasingly difficult to form words. It was why only those closest to her were permitted to the Ritz to see her. Sir Bernard Ingham, her doughty press secretary at Downing Street, saw her a month ago. 'She looked immaculate and was keen to get involved in the conversation. Sometimes she started to speak and then the thought deserted her or she couldn't get the words out.' He then added sadly: 'It never occurred to me that it would be the last time that I would ever see her.' MAILONLINE & DAILY MAIL CAMPAIGN: HOW TO MAKE YOUR VOICE HEARD . If . you believe Lady Thatcher deserves a state funeral, and want the . Government to know, sign this online petition and submit it to us. We will pass it to the Prime Minister's office . at 10 Downing Street .
suffered a series of small strokes in the months had had the occasional stumble, she would admit, forgot that her husband had died. 'I had to keep Thatcher was devastated by the death of her beloved husband Denis; the couple are pictured Lord Powell, left, and Conor Burns, right, took moved quietly into a suite at . the Ritz – one of secretary. Cynthia Crawford, nicknamed Crawfie,