Meghan Markle and Prince Harry quit royal life five years ago, leaving their duty behind and relocating to sunny California instead. While the decision was considered by the couple as the best move for them to take, it left behind a series of fractured relationships between Harry, 40, and some of his relatives.
These fractured relationships have been impacted even more so over the last five years, with Harry and Meghan, 43, making a number of controversial decisions, starting with their bombshell 2021 interview with Oprah Winfrey. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex then went on to release their Netflix docuseries Harry and Meghan in 2022, followed by Harry’s memoir Spare in 2023.
While these decisions resulted in some rocky relationships between Harry and his family, it is believed that the duke was always in touch with his father King Charles, until recently.
In an interview with the BBC earlier this month after losing his UK court appeal following his downgraded security rights in the UK, Harry said the 76-year-old monarch “won’t speak” to him.
This was believed to be as a result of the security case.
While it is believed that the King is not currently in contact with Harry and Meghan – claims which Buckingham Palace has not responded to – Meghan once made a very surprising comment about her father-in-law, suggesting that the relationship was once very special to her.
In their 2022 docuseries, Meghan described the King as “very charming” when talking about how he walked her down the aisle at her 2018 wedding to Prince Harry, when the King was the Prince of Wales.
She explained: “Harry’s dad is very charming. And I said to him, like, ‘I’ve lost my dad in this.’ So him, as my father-in-law, was really important to me.
“So I asked him to walk me down the aisle and he said yes. The whole thing was surreal. It was at that moment I could see H.”
While Harry last saw his father in February 2024, when the King revealed he had cancer, it is believed Meghan has not been in the same room as the monarch since the late Queen’s funeral in 2022.
This was believed to be Meghan’s last visit to the UK.