A new royal book revealed the real reason Meghan Markle did not go to Balmoral with the rest of the royals to be with the late Queen Elizabeth on her deathbed.
Queen Elizabeth II, the UK’s longest-serving monarch, died on September 8 2022 at the age of 96, plunging the whole nation into mourning after reigning for 70 years.
Previous reports suggested that Meghan was asked to stay away by then-Prince Charles and let Prince Harry visit his grandmother alone, with the understanding that the same was also asked of Princess Kate.
But a new biography of King Charles’s accession to the throne sheds light on the moments during the day Elizabeth died and reveals that Kate had not been asked to stay at home but had chosen to do so instead.
And that her decision was used as an excuse and, out of sheer luck, helped calm Prince Harry down when he was informed Meghan was not welcome at Balmoral as the royals wanted to concentrate on their final goodbyes and not engage in petty infighting.
Charles III: New King, New Court. The Inside Story by Robert Hardman, claims that Kate decided to stay in England because felt she needed to support her three children as they began to attend a new school.
The book, segments of which have been serialised by the Mail, reads: “It was by luck rather than judgment, but it made it a lot easier to tell Harry that he was coming alone”.
Prince William appeared to be distant from his brother during this difficult time. Despite the Sussex couple being in the UK at the time, and Prince Harry allegedly texting Prince William about his travel plans, no direct contact was made.
In his memoir Spare, Harry wrote that he a call from his father warning him that the Queen’s health had “taken a turn”. He said: “I immediately texted Willy to ask whether he and Kate were flying up. If so, when? And how? No response. Meg and I looked at flight options.”
On this, Mr Hardman writes: “Clearly, Prince William did not regard this as the appropriate moment for the intensely difficult conversation he needed to have with his brother.”
The author adds that feelings about the Sussex interviews and various claims against them were still raw.
The book reads: “There could be little scope for dialogue until its contents were known. The sense of reckless betrayal following the Sussexes’ interview with Oprah Winfrey the year before, and its vague, unanswerable half-claims of institutional racism and hostility towards Meghan, still lingered.
“‘Some of the family were probably ready to give him a piece of their mind,’ says one of those in the midst of this fast-moving turn of events.”
But as the Sussexes decided to fly on their own to Balmoral, Harry received another call from Charles, this time informing him that he should come on his own.
According to Hardman, Buckingham Palace treated any conversation with the troublesome Sussex couple with trepidation.
As the then-Prince of Wales informed his younger son that Meghan was not welcome at Balmoral, he was apparently full of “dread”.
He writes: “We can easily imagine the dread with which the Prince of Wales approached that call. The Sussexes’ capacity for taking offence was well known and everyone was conscious that any conversation could end up in the public domain — as, indeed, this one did three months later.
Recounting the conversation in his bombshell memoir Spare, Harry’s fury was obvious. He called his father “nonsensical” and “disrespectful” and recalled: “I wasn’t having it. Don’t ever speak about my wife that way.”
The book claimed that it was this moment when the now-King told his son he simply didn’t want lots of people in the house and that Kate wasn’t coming either with Harry replying: “Then that’s all you needed to say.”
It comes as a historic memo, kept confidential until now, revealed the Queen’s final moments were painless as she “slipped away” in her sleep and “wasn’t aware of anything”.
The Queen’s most senior staff member Sir Edward Young has described the moment of her death in a poignant memo for posterity, which is now lodged in the Royal Archives.
It reads: “Dougie [Glass] in at 3.25. Very peaceful. In her sleep. Slipped away. Old age. Death has to be registered in Scotland. Agree 3.10pm. She wouldn’t have been aware of anything. No pain.”
