Prince Harry did an event for Heads Together a few weekends ago, and he ended up talking about his own grief over his mother’s death in 1997. Harry was making a point that people going through a hard time, people grieving or facing depression or anxiety or anything else should take the first step and talk about what they’re going through. Harry said he didn’t discuss about his mother’s death until he was 28 years old, nearly 16 years after her passing. So that made some British reporters curious: just why didn’t Harry feel comfortable enough to openly grieve his mother? Richard Kay (one of Diana’s favorite reporters) at the Daily Mail had some idea: Harry feels more comfortable talking about Diana nowadays because he doesn’t appreciate the way his mother’s legacy has been airbrushed out of the royal family. And there’s more to it too – you can read the full piece here.
Buckingham Palace wonders why Harry is speaking now about Diana: “It was his reflections on his mother that were being talked about in Buckingham Palace corridors this week. Long-time courtiers were left wondering about the significance of the remarks and why, almost 19 years after Diana was killed in that high-speed car accident, Harry should now feel the time was right to ‘open up’ about her. Some, perhaps cynically, were suggesting that he may have a ‘guilt complex’ over the manner of Diana’s airbrushing from royal history.”
William & Harry didn’t discuss Diana for fear of upsetting Charles & Camilla: A source tells Kay: “For a long time, they worried, and those around them worried, too, that whatever they said about their mother could be misinterpreted as somehow being critical of the Prince of Wales. The whole Diana subject was tricky, and their sensitivity about saying anything was noticeable. They were often upset when their mother’s name cropped up, especially when books about her came out, but there was this reluctance to say or do much.”
As a teenager, Harry would get really upset when anyone mentioned Diana: “He used to throw a fit if anyone mentioned his mother’s name. At school, they could manage it up to a point by restricting access to television, and, of course, at home with Charles at Highgrove there were never any newspapers around.”
Why Harry is speaking now: A source says: “He realises that with his military career over, the only thing left for him is what his mother did — charitable causes. As to why he should be bringing up his mother’s name, I suspect it is because he has a bit of a guilt complex about how she has been remembered. Like his mother, he has an emotional intelligence, is tactile, too, and, like her, connects easily with people. He is not afraid to show his humanity. Shining a light onto forgotten children around the world seems a very natural thing for him to do.”
Harry wants to do more to recognize Diana: “Unlike William, whose future is predetermined, Harry’s is not, and this is why he is taking the lead in ensuring that after all these years his mother is finally properly recognised. By the time of the 20th anniversary of her death in August 2017, he wants a new memorial in place. I understand that what he has in mind is something permanent and significantly different from any existing monument, and likely to be in London.”
I think it’s an excellent idea for Harry to take the lead in memorializing Diana in some new way for the 20th anniversary next year. I also think there are a lot of things at play for why Harry is speaking about his mother now, rather than when he was in his early 20s. I remember reading that Charles set about “Windsorizing” William and Harry after Diana’s death, that Charles wanted William and Harry to be more cut off from the Spencer family in general. I also think Charles made Harry and William live in a relative Diana-free bubble in those first years following her death, perhaps because that was the easiest and least complicated way for Charles to handle his sons’ grief. But as they grew up, William and Harry dealt with their mother’s memory in different ways, and they took different lessons away from her story. I dare say that I think Harry has handled it better?
Photos courtesy of WENN, Fame/Flynet.
Having to suppress his grief like that puts all the boneheaded things he did as a teenager into prospective. Because in some of those cases, he didn’t look like an average idiot teenage boy…there was something angry about him.
I agree. I couldn’t imagine having to swallow my grief about losing my mother. How can anyone live in a mom-free bubble?! Mom bubbles are the most important/best bubbles.
I hope the stuff about Charles is not true. That seems rather shitty. His job as a parent was to help his sons process their grief not find the easiest way for him to deal with their grief 😳
This may be an unpopular opinion, but I don’t really think that keeping the boys away from Charles Spencer was such a bad thing. I never got the impression that Diana’s brother truly cared for her in the ways that mattered. He also seemed to want to make money off her memory…
I agree Charles Spencer/the current Earl Spencer is really not a very savory character. He’s on wife number three and has 7 kids with 3 different mothers. He treated his first 2 wives like crap and has had many fiancees and girlfriends in between. The latest wife Karen is the ex of Mark Gordon who is a major Hollywood TV producer (Greys Anatomy, Criminal Minds, Quantico to name a few). For being close to the Spencer family I think Diana’s two sisters are more stable characters and it seems William and Harry are closer to them than to their uncle Charles.
An interesting tidbit is that Earl Spencer’s youngest daughter is named Charlotte Diana–she is older than Princess Charlotte. I think if William was close to Earl Spencer he would not have used the almost-same name for his daughter.
I agree about Charles Spencer. Although I don’t think they actually had to be ‘kept away’. All the books I’ve read say that well before her death, Diana and her brother were not speaking and before that they weren’t buddies who had a falling out. There was just very little contact.
For me, when I saw that Charles Spencer had a daughter 2 years before william and her name was Charlotte Diana, I knew they really never saw each other. If you are contact with a person regularly you don’t name you child the exact thing they just named theirs.
Ha ha @ Angel–Jinx! We had the same thought about “Charlotte Diana”
@Tourmaline Great minds and all that:)
Re: her family. I can see why he kept them from her family, she was never that close to her brother who seemed more interested in money than anything else. Thou i do think that the brothers did spent time with her sisters and their families, althou i could be wrong.
one of his maternal cousins is Charlotte’s godmother, I think.
Yep Laura Fellowes is a godmother of Charlotte, she is the daughter of Diana’s sister Jane
There were many reports that Charles did get them grief counseling. Someone as emotional and touchy about his own feelings as Charles wouldn’t have denied them that. I think Harry is referring to talking about her publicly, outside of a counseling office.
Yeah notasugarhere I agree and as far as Charles Spencer is concerned, he’s a two-faced ignoramus.
When I wrote earlier on CB I hoped Spencer kept his promise with regard to maintenance re- Diana memorial, I was referring to the island memorial where they say she’s buried though some believe she was cremated and her cremains buried beside her father at the church. In any event, Charles Spencer loved making money from the Diana memorial summer tours at Althorp but let the island memorial go to sh-t. Actions speak louder than words.
But we have to remember that Charles was raised in a completely different, “stiff upper lip” sort of way. He was raised with very old world thinking. I’m sure he did the best he knew how to in helping his boys. At least one hopes.
I wonder if he’s tired of hearing Kate compared to Diana….Yeah, maybe I’m being overly snarky.
Hearing his lazy sister in law compared to his mother HAS to annoy him. It upsets me, and I’m not related to her.
Aren’t we all? Especially when the comparison is like night and day.
I applaud Harry. When I visited London about three years ago, it did seem like Princess Diana was airbrushed out of history. There were no photos, post cards, images, etc. anywhere I looked in touristy London, including Buckingham Palace, which is open to tourists during the summer. In the gift shop I searched in vain for images of Diana. I asked a guard why Diana wasn’t represented and got the answer, “She’s not a royal and she doesn’t live in the palace.” I was stunned and have never forgotten this reply. Good for Prince Harry if he can put her back in her rightful place in English and royal history. She was much-loved and did so many good things for the world. Please, Harry, make all this happen. It’s up to you.
I took a tour of Kensignton Palace and you could see Diana in an embroidered pillow (along with other Royals who resided/reside in the palace), some weird wall paper with her image, and a big photo portrait. That’s it. Oh, and masks in Portobello.
The fountain in her memory is also… not great. She deserved better.
Maybe he simply could not find the words? My mother died when I was eleven and I just could not put into words the effect that had on me. I was 25 before I really could open up about her loss and even now with big life events I still miss her and wonder if she would be proud of me and the life I have built. Grief is complex and there is no “right” way to deal with it, everyone truly is different in how they handle it.
“Maybe he simply could not find the words?”
That’s what I was thinking too. It takes some people a long time to open up about their grief. They’re such public figures — it must be weird to be expected to share your grief with the world. I assume they must have discussed it with girlfriends and other friends in public, but talking to the press is an entirely different matter. Even with figures like the Kennedys where the actual moments of death were so public, you never really saw their family members talking about their grief in public.
This. He’s mature enough to have thought out how he’d approach it, he probably knows Charles and Camilla feel pretty secure right now, his brother’s started the next generation of Windsors. It’s a time for reflection. I think being under less pressure that he might be king one day, is liberating. I hope he finds happiness.
I think Charles is a callous, egotistical, self-indulgent man who treated Diana horribly and who seemed only to benefit from Diana’s death (in that it made his life much easier). I don’t doubt that he didn’t help his sons in their grief. Maybe the airbrushing began right after her funeral. I do know Charles dated Camilla BEFORE he married Diana, but was such a dithering idiot, Camilla ended up marrying someone else. We know the rest. I do hope that this aspect of Charles’ character/personality is remembered by history. What a pr-ck.
I never saw any air-brushing during or right after her funeral. Diana got the funeral she did because of Charles. Charles had to convince the Queen to give her the funeral she deserved. A lot of people talk about Tony Blair, but Charles did play an important role in giving her a good funeral. The royal family didn’t talk about Diana, but I felt the press talked about her all the time, at least in the first 5 years.
The weird air-brushing I see now seems to be in relation to Kate — everybody seems to want to say that Kate is either doing the same amount of work as Diana or that Kate and William are offering a modern-day approach to parenting that started with them. And I don’t know how much of that has to do with William trying to use his mother’s name to prop him and Kate up for their lack of work ethic.
Diana got that funeral because it would have been the end of the monarchy if she hadnt. The public was in no mood for the queens constipated nonsense about protocol. Charles may have been faster to read that mood although it has always been said that his advisors and some government officials had to convince him too. Also, dont forget what a PR coup that was for him. That man didnt care that she spent years suffering with suicidal ideation, he didnt suddenly grow a heart after the divorce, thats for sure.
Charles gets a lot of stick but people have forgotten how big a part he played in her funeral and the various memorials. He knew the people loved her and accepted it.
As for the air brushing – thats sort of a recent thing and relates to William using his mother to promote himself and, in particular, his wife. He’s using his mother’s memory to punish his father, the RF and the press.
“Diana got that funeral because it would have been the end of the monarchy if she hadnt. The public was in no mood for the queens constipated nonsense about protocol. Charles may have been faster to read that mood although it has always been said that his advisors and some government officials had to convince him too. Also, dont forget what a PR coup that was for him. That man didnt care that she spent years suffering with suicidal ideation, he didnt suddenly grow a heart after the divorce, thats for sure.”
I’ll never know what was going through his mind as I don’t personally know him, but I do think it’s false to say that airbrushing took place during the actual funeral. Whatever his motivations, he didn’t erase her from her own funeral.
I actually think William is more damaging to her memory than Charles is — he uses his mom’s memory whenever he wants to get out of work. He wants his wife compared to Diana even though she can’t put in the work and time to evoke a genuine comparison. He even has the press laud his approach to parenting over Diana’s. The worst I can say about Charles in the aftermath of her death is that he has simply gone on with his life (because, well, what other choice is there?), but his PR where Diana is concerned doesn’t seem manipulative like William’s. The reason Diana appears to be a less valiant figure now is because Kate keeps getting compared to her, making it seem as though Diana was sitting around doing nothing while she was alive. Both Diana and Charles were work-horses, and it seems as though William hopes that we forget that so that we don’t notice how lazy he and his wife are. Ultimately, William and Harry are her legacy, not Charles, and William isn’t doing anything worthwhile to show the impact she had (apparently on everyone else, but him).
William resents the family politics again because of his front row seat to his mothers life and it plays out in how far he goes to retain control over his life. They want him to cut more ribbons, he gives them the middle finger and spends time with the people he considers real family. He clearly intends to reinvent the role during his reign and that scares the Windsors and their hangers ons sh*tless. Harry processes it differently and thats fine.
As for Charles, he couldnt have written Diana out of her own funeral if he tried. In fact, had he tried the backlash would have issued directly from parliament. The MPs knew what their constituents expected to see and if only for political expediency, would have ensured it. Not even Philip would have dared!!
No, they got busy with sullying Dianas name shortly after. There are tons of books and articles that can be linked directly to his sources. It was well known that part of rehabilitating Camilla would require painting her as a soul mate (DESPITE the fact that she was never his only mistress.). That would however mean that he and the Queen were villains to drag a 19 year old girl into the mess to begin with. So they created a narrative of an attentive prince married to a dangerously crazy narcassistic manipulating castrating shrew. Lets also not pretend like they didnt push the miscegenation angle, what with Diana dating mutliple non-white muslim men. They even found a way to tack on “whore” into the description, because apparently when the prince husband sleeps with multiple married women thats only because he needs solace from the attic wife out of Jane Eyre but when after years of living with this, the twenty something year old wife finds someone who actually treats her like a person, she is a whore.
Sorry, now I’m ranting. What I set out to say was that there is more than adequate evidence that Charles took her death as an opportunity to rehabilitate himself at her expense. Her children understand that more as they grow older and they are letting the world see it.
People were saying weird things about Diana before she died (granted, she wasn’t helping matters much by doing the tell-all interview or kissing Dodi in the ocean). I don’t think criticism started solely with her death. Even Andrew Morton, her biographer, was criticizing her in the press.
Do I think Charles would sacrifice his own image for a wife he had severe conflicts with? No. But I don’t think criticism started during or after her death. She was deified around the time of her death, but was heavily criticized right before it. Biographies years later have come out to place criticisms on all of them (Tina Brown called both of them spoiled and self-absorbed and reserved most of her criticism for Camilla), but I see that as a symptom of Diana being a huge money-making industry and interesting subject for journalists (Kate and William being dullsville doesn’t help), more than anything else. Diana was an intriguing and very charismatic person, and the extreme interest in her life reflects that.
Naya, you clearly do not understand what royals do, if you think all they can accomplish is cutting ribbons. If William has such a problem with the Windsors, he can live off the Middletons instead of the taxpayers. He can go work for that other family firm instead of the one paid for by the people.
The general public does not care about a petulant 34-something manchild who whines constantly about his privileged life while sucking millions off the taxpayers every year.
William’s f-you attitude about his role insures that either the monarchy will end with Charles or William and his line will be thrown out.
You are conveniently leaving out Diana’s unstable temperament (not Charles fiction there but reality) and her multiple affairs with married men. Those things don’t fit into the Saint Diana fiction. I admired her work and her work ethic, but I recognize she was a human being warts and all.
Yes. Charles was on a plane immediately upon hearing to go to Paris. He asked to have time alone with her. He was distraught. It was said he yelled at the Queen about this – first time ever apparently he stood up forcefully to her. I’ll not presume more but that was all reported in the press with photos, except no photos of him with her in hospital obvs. Charles knew what he did to Diana and at least bears remorse for that. Or did. Today I don’t know but would think it hovers over him a bit in his heart and soul.
I think Harry handled this better than William for a few reasons. He went to actual real war – shooting things up help work out anger and trauma. He was the younger and so, more protected. Also Diana by that point was speaking to William as a partner which was a bad thing to do to William as he was still a child. William was very concerned about Harry and his last conversation with his Mother was about his thinking she should speak to Harry about the vacation issues or something, so Harry would understand and that Harry needed to hear this from her. It took *William* reminding his Mother to parent Harry properly. This was the last day of her life if memory serves, by telephone conversation. Because she was on a boat with Dodi and the boys had just vacationed with them there. That’s why her casket with the envelope marked To Mummy from Harry nearly broke me in half. I remember that a lot.
William was not treated well and it’s because he was eldest, he was also the next King after Charles and probably taught to stuff his emotions down. Harry was allowed to express himself and *everyone* including William always was concerned for Harry’s well being, William even at cost of his own.
Sorry for long comment. I just remember this vividly for personal reasons. Bond I had with deceased sister and this is tied together so details are bit vivid. Hope I got all correct but pretty sure I did.
Boo,
I only take issue with your comment that it was Harry in the army “shooting things up” that helped him work out his anger. I’m from a military background (although didn’t serve myself) and can tell you that killing isn’t therapeutic. It’s more likely that Harry witnessed other people’s grief and confusion, and as a good military leader, sought to help people with their own emotions, and was thereby better able to connect to his own.
Harry protected? Harry has been thrown to the wolves for both his father’s and his brother’s PR for 15 years. William picking out the costume, William leading Harry into the drug scene at Highgrove, William driving while intoxicated covered up, William’s reckless driving airbrushed from the news, CCTV of William’s stairwell sexcapades erased, William killing two different species of endangered birds. All of that covered up to keep Golden Child golden while attacking the spare.
William has always been protected by the Windsors and the press. Harry had to deal with what was going on because he *wasn’t* protected, so has matured much more than his brother.
William was away at boarding school during the majority of the War of the Waleses, not shoving tissues under her door nightly. Given how much she lied about other things, I’m not going to trust Diana’s statements about how much or how little William was told. William has Diana’s temperament, has been coddled beyond belief by the Windsors, and has never tamped down his emotions or behavior to please anyone.
I went about my life as usual on the day of Diana’s funeral as did all my friends. I was concerned for the boys and how difficult it was going to be for them to face the world’s media on such as horrible day, but that is it. I got fed up with be being bullied by those who demanded I be devastated. I didn’t like her and I wasn’t that impressed by her. I am impressed by the women I know who raise their kids, work full time and still gave an amazing amount of time to help others, or give money to charity that they have to budget carefully to afford. It is sad when anyone dies young, especially when they have children, but for me that is as far as it goes.
@notasugarhere, well then I think Harry should be King. Even Diana said Harry would make a better king.
Everyone grieves in their own way and everyone responds to death in their own way. I think it is unfair to pit William against Harry in a “who handled their mother’s death better” contest. They have always been very different people, and we’re at very different points in their lives when Diana died. Harry himself says he has few memories of his mother. William, on the other hand, likely has many memories, and not all of them happy.
Yes, agree. I think William and Harry have a dynamic that is sort of parent/child too, because Diana died when Harry was so young. She wasn’t a great Mom. A lot of what she did was stupid, without care or due consideration, and geared to soak up her personal spotlight. She didn’t work with the Royal family, she was inside but working against them. No judgment, it’s complicated and I don’t know them but that was never going to result in well adjusted children. Sadly for William and Harry. Altho Harry seems to have the better opportunities to heal than William. I think William will never get over this as it can’t really be gotten over. His mother was used and tossed aside by his father and family. A family he’s expected to represent. No wonder he balks at official duties. It’s passive aggressive but also speaks to a lot of pain for William I think.
I think William was more aware of what went down during his mothers lifetime and after her death. He naturally resents those aholes and thats made clear in how he leans so heavily on the Middletons to fulfill the role of family. Harry was younger and not really as close to his mother so its taken longer to process. Its a terrible situation to be in, to watch the family members, staffers and mistress that made your mothers life hell try to tarnish her legacy when she isnt here to defend it. What do you do? Issue a public warning? Make private threats? Remove yourself from their toxic bs and hope they are still alive when you are in charge of the palace?
Harry was extremely close to his mother. What are you saying? Diana leaned on William when she shouldn’t have involved him in her marriage/divorce with Charles. That doesn’t mean she didn’t have a great relationship with Harry. It’s clear he adored her and she adored him. William’s attitude comes from the fact he & Diana fought before her death and never reconciled. That’s the guilt he carries to this day.
I know the royals get a lot of grief, but this isn’t a black and white situation.
Everyone processes grief differently and that, put together with the reality of how visible they are, the weight of expectations that they never really get a break from, all the scandal and drama that happened before the crash-all of that at once would create a tough atmosphere to grieve in. Charles may have simply tried to shield then the best and only way he knew how.
I don’t live in the UK so I don’t I know how much truth there is to the stories about Will and Kate being lazy spendthrifts etc, but I sometimes wonder if the reason they really haven’t been pressed to do more is because someone didn’t want to put them same pressures on them that Charles and Diana had at the beginning of their marriage, so they have a chance to be normal as possible for a while. But I could be dead wrong about that.
I think they should just take Harry at his word and not have inappropriate speculative stories about personal grief in the newspapers, royal or not royal.
That’s an intrusive line that shouldn’t be crossed. Report what he says, by all means. But nobody should have the motivations or family dynamics of grief and bereavement dissected in public. If someone says that’s how they feel/how they reacted about the death of their mother than that’s how they feel/how they reacted. FULL BLOODY STOP.
I agree.
Those courtiers are so nasty. “guilt complex”? He lost his mum at 13 years old and had to carry on lest the public accuse him of being a cry baby.
William and Harry should have been in therapy to help them cope with private grief while leading public lives.
Yep. Courtiers for leaking and journalists for printing.
There are plenty of serious and properly reportable issues with the BRF. I’m all for those making the papers. I don’t mind the fashion gossip or the nosing into their love lives.
But discussing family dynamics in the wake of a bereavement? I just don’t think it’s acceptable. For example, Charles may have done all the right things to help his kids cope with the loss of their mother. Equally possibly, he messed it all up. But whichever way round it was, I think reaction to bereavement shouldn’t be gossip fodder. And anything said by the various parties should simply be respected and taken at face value.
I’ve always gotten the impression that Harry was perhaps left a bit – how do I say – directionless after her death? William was always going to be king, and his whole life has been set on that course. Harry hasn’t had that. Diana was probably the strongest constant he had in his life. William has his grandmother and father to follow. Maybe Harry wants to be known for following Diana?
That photo of Harry smiling at Charles is adorable. What a cutie.
I recently read the book “Game of Crowns,” and while not a particularly insightful book, the author does say that Charles had put into place a plan (a while before Diana died) to bring Camilla into the fold public opinion-wise. Diana’s death created a greater obstacle for him in that, but obviously it was accomplished. I’ve always wondered how that affected the boys. I just don’t know how I (as a middle aged adult) could process all that without hostility, much less teen and pre teen boys. Ugh.
He was a boy when his mother died. Why should he have been expected to grieve publicly of all things. Everybody processes grief and loss in their own way.
Diana did many wonderful things. She was the first public person to hug and kiss aids patients, when every one else was shunning and fearing them and the news media was practically criminalizing them. She was fearless with her causes, she would have got land mines banned if she had not been killed. Harry has a lot to be proud of with his mom, they are big footsteps to follow.
Wonderful, but careless things. At the time she was hugging and kissing AID patients, nobody yet knew how it was spread. Literally. We didn’t see her doing that to people with leprosy though did we? Right.
Land mines…. again… she had very very very young kids at home! who needed their mother! and one was to be King! That was irresponsible. Sorry, there were a lot of ways she could have done things to help and those are two of the most egregious I always remember. I was a fan and huge supporter of her and didn’t like the Royal Family for a long time. But now i’m older and have had some more life experiences, I can see how manipulative and abusive Diana was in her own way. I’m not saying it’s not understandable given how she was treated. But I think history will reflect she didn’t handle things well but then, she didn’t really have anyone to advise her to help. She was stuck. But she made scary decisions to get unstuck and ugh…for the kids sake I wish it all had been very different.
Nah, the CDC knew by 1983 all the major ways of AIDS transmission. They knew you couldn’t transmit it by casual contact, food, water, or air or touching the same surfaces (think toilet seat).
Many people back then were still afraid of contact with AIDS victims because they falsely believed they could contract it by touch, etc, but obviously Princess Diana was not one of them. There was nothing dangerous about her hugging or kissing an AIDS patient on the cheek.
Imagine how great it would be for someone who was shunned and vilified for having a disease to have a wonderful, high profile person like Princess Diana talk to them, hug them, and treat them like a person. I will always respect her for that.
I worked in the medical field, and I remember well all the hype going on about aids during that time. It actually was known that you couldn’t catch aids through casual contact like hugging and a peck on the cheek. But the media just kept on with the fear mongering, it was appalling what those poor people had to go through.
I’m sure she wouldn’t have done what she did if she had known otherwise, she was a mother after all.
Harry has always seemed to take more after his mother than his father. William has always seemed to take more after Charles. It’s possible that, as the youngest, Harry was closer to his mother and felt her loss in a different way than anyone else. I don’t blame him for not speaking up about it until now – Diana’s legacy was a sh-tshow for awhile, and people seem to remember her more now for her compassion, kindness and charitable causes vs. the gossip and scandal related to her tumultuous marriage and dating life.
The comparisons of Kate to Diana are laughable. Kate can flaunt The Ring all she wants, but Harry seems to exemplify Diana’s connection to people and dedication to making a difference. Kate’s very apparent lack of work ethic and frankly, her lack of genuine personality puts her far, far below Diana.
Haven’t you noticed to this day, NO ONE has been as popular as Diana was in the royal family?
Diana already knew about Camilla so why did she go along with the marriage ? Why is Camilla the only woman that gets such hate he had plenty of others I think the reason her majesty didn`t intervene is because Phillip is a cheater too and she looks the other way like women of her time do. William doesn’t resent his family enough not to live off them so he needs to get therapy or take his family off the throne simple time to be a big boy
She didn’t know until she was walking down the aisle at her wedding and spotted Camilla. Then on her honeymoon she found Charles had cufflinks gifted to him from Camilla. Then he treated her poorly on their honeymoon at some point and Camilla came up. Finally, the last straw, he didn’t show up after Harry was born. Charles never came to the hospital. That was when Diana was done and hurt so badly she wanted out. BUT the history of royal family was divorce was not allowed and she wasn’t allowed out. She was told and expected to put up with it -and Charles was horrible to her about it and so was Camilla – and she couldn’t. She loved him, she’d been set up, used, lied to, then treated poorly and ignored on top of it all. I’m amazed she only acted out as she did. Others would have done far far worse.
She knew about Camilla AND Kanga long before the wedding. They weren’t a secret in their set. It was said many women were wary of dating Charles in a serious way because of the ever present Camilla AND Kanga. And that’s before any issues of not wanting to join the royal spotlight – see comment from Lady Jane Wellesley regarding possibility of marrying her then BF Charles.
Camilla AND Kanga were invited to the wedding and Diana definitely knew about them. Both of them.
It’s also said she was very reluctant to marry him and wanted to pull out, BUT her family insisted she go through with it – ‘too late Dutch, your face is already on the tea towels’ one of her siblings told her after she voiced her intention of pulling out of the engagement.
For her own reasons, Diana fixated on Camilla whilst turning a blind eye to Kanga. Everything she accused Camilla was equally applicable to Kanga. Camilla AND Kanga never let Charles-Diana settle down to a married life. They both helped with the search for a suitable, compliant bride for Charles. They both inspected and approved his final choice.
Diana went as far as befriending Kanga and supporting her business ventures despite the ongoing flagrant affair Kanga was having with Charles.
Charles/Camilla/Kanga love triangle started in the early 70s and finished in the late 80s. Yet because Diana was obsessed with Camilla, she vilified her whilst ignoring the other equally entrenched mistress.
Finally, Charles attended Harry’s birth. Diana famously told the media that Charles was disappointed that Harry wasn’t a girl AND that he had red hair.
That statement taken at face value makes Charles appear to be a cold person, but for months Diana had been teasing a female birth. Plus her relationship with Charles wasn’t the best by the time of the birth so she twisted his words regarding the red hair to seem terrible. Charles adored baby Harry. Plus people choose to forget or don’t remember that Queen Mary had red hair. The Queen Mother made a joke about Harry’s eyes and ears at the christening photo session, but by then Diana was in a better mood. She could have easily twistee tjose words into something ugly as she was wont to do when she was in a mood. And let’s not forget how viciously vindictive Diana could be when she was in a mood. To extent that she would tell outright fibs to make her perceived enemy seem evil.
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She even wore Kanga’s unflattering clothing line to help her promote it.
Diana lied just to lie. In the PBS documentary about her and the press, the press recounted some of her tricks and lies. Princess Michael went to a dinner party and told people the new baby’s hair was red and it got into the papers. Diana was furious. She went out on engagements a few days later and kept telling people in the crowd that the baby’s hair was fair not red. She lied just to lie, to make those telling the truth look bad.
Given this, I take her stories about William the Confident with loads of salt. He was away at boarding school the majority of the time, not shoving tissues under her door nightly.
ConfidAnt not ConfidEnt!
LAK and notasugarhere, thanks so much. I obviously don’t have clear facts on all this. Doesn’t surprise me when I think of my main source… lol OMG this stuff just keeps rising from the depths like zombies.
Thanks to both of you, and others, for corrections and more backstory. Wow. I mean, wow.
Also I hope Harry finds someone lovely and fun and athletic to marry if he wants to marry. I’d be fine if he bucked protocol and partnered with a woman without the ceremony, had kids, etc. I’d just really like these kids to have some unmanipulated happy for once.
It’s hard for me to understand why anyone would question his waiting so long to speak about it. So weird that people would ask “why now?” I think it’s so cool that he’s doing such great work and I can’t wait to see what is in store for him. I’m so happy he’s finally able to deal with his grief now.
First off, Congratulations to Harry for stepping up for his Mum. I doubt his Dad – the Meddling Prince – would ever have thought to do this. The picture of Harry, William, Charles and Camilla highlights for me that Her Majesty has had a great deal of influence on what goes on – First, that Diana was brought in to breed height and looks – old Chuck is a short guy – and then for the next round the Middleton clan were OK’d, I think because of the hair. Charles had the hair implants, William is beyond hope. Lets hope George benefits – I think that after her Majesty shuffles off this mortal coil, Charles and William will have a very tough time keeping the UK’s loyalty to the Royal Family. Their only hope may be Charlotte and George. When was the last time the US had a bald President?
Harry has grown up. He’s learned how to use his position for good and he’s become media savvy – for example his fake twitter attack of FLOTUS with the queen next to him to give attention to the Invictus games. No one has that as a teen and the palace would not have allowed such utterings. Charles OUGHT to feel remorse, his regret strikes me as too little, too late. That divorce was horrendous, he was a spoiled cheating cad. What good is a decent funeral – oh does it help the firm’s PR? Does anyone else remember William consoling his mom about losing her HRH title and all that goes with it? “Don’t worry mummy, I will give it back to you when I am king.” I think both sons battle with this issue but the firm has a far heavier hand on controlling William. The firm’s minions will plant a zillion stories on being work shy so that he becomes one of them and he lets nannies do all the raising. How about when the queen wouldn’t allow Will to crouch with his son on the balcony, that video said a lot in just a moment.
She was not being mean it was time for him to stand for his country but he can`t be normal that ruins the whole point of the monarchy . Kate and William try to hard to distinguish them self from the royal family but they are workshy witch only makes them look bad
At that particular moment on the balcony, William was expected to stand at attention. George wasn’t in distress; crouching down to hang out with his son was cute but unnecessarily disrespectful. Showing respect for the military is part of WIlliam’s job. Doing it in front of his son is probably a good (and painless) way to prepare George for his future.
That HRH business is not true, yet demonstrates starkly what a manipulative fibber Diana was. She voluntarily gave up her HRH and when a few weeks later realised what the loss of status actually meant, she had a hissyfit, ran to the media and cried about how the horrid royals had taken her HRH. Threw in William to boost her case. All that was an effort to force the royals to give it back. They refused. And her fake version of events is the one the public remembers.
If you think she was forced to give up her HRH, i’ll point to Fergie. She was forced to divorce Andrew due to all the scandal she had caused yet her HRH was never on the table in the divorce discussions. Her divorce came through several months before Diana and her post-divorce title was HRH Sarah, Duchess of York. She lost the definitive ‘THE’ infront of the title ie HRH The Duchess of York.
She held her new title until AFTER Diana’s media title shenanigans because Diana had realised that without an HRH, her status was lower than the disgraced Fergie. The Queen was so irritated by Diana’s shenanigans that she added a caveat in the letters patent that govern who holds HRH status to effect that anyone who divorced the royals automatically lost the HRH status. And as a result, Fergie ended up losing her HRH. It was never formally removed or requested. The change in the letters quietly removed it, but there was never a formal process to remove it.
Yet, as in all things Diana, her fibs live on.
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“The firm’s minions”? William’s track record for a decade shows how lazy he is. Evidence from his military colleagues at all points proved he wasn’t showing up and pulling his weight. The Court Circular shows how lazy W&K are, while the majority of Harry’s work isn’t put in there because of William PR.
All the others managed to work more during-and-after pregnancy, and raise happy, engaged children quietly in the country while doing royal engagements. W&K with their three nannies spinning the idea that working parents are evil? Take several seats.
William has Diana’s temperament. Diana’s and Uncle David’s. He is sly, manipulative, and he’ll spin any story any way to get what he wants.
Agree with this. I’m reading a blog called Love, Lola. She does an excellent job writing about royals worldwide. I had no idea how lazy Will & Kate had been until reading her entries.
Graymatters, thanks for clarifications on things. I appreciate it.
LAK and notasugarhere, excellent stuff. These people are difficult to parse. The detailed memories matter.