Prince Harry Made Aide Wear 'Mildly Saucy' T-Shirt 'As a Forfeit'—Book

Prince Harry made an aide wear a T-shirt bearing a "mildly saucy image of a woman eating a hot dog" during a 2014 visit to a dangerous area in Brazil, according to a new biography.

The Duke of Sussex, 38, wanted to bring to light the fate of drug addicts in a part of Sao Paulo known as Cracolandia, due to the proliferation of crack cocaine, which sold at the time for 80p per rock.

Courtiers, by Valentine Low, describes how it was not a normal royal visit, and it was uncertain whether Harry would "get out in one piece" as the crowd around him became frenzied.

However, the tense scene was leant a touch of farce by the fact that Harry had forced his then-private secretary to wear his T-shirt.

The book reads: "It is all getting a bit out of hand, as people jostle and push around Prince Harry, and the police start getting heavy-handed.

"They shove people aside as they get Harry out to the safety of a waiting car, but not before he has a quick hug with one of the policemen on security duty.

"Lurking in the background is a tall, slightly balding figure, casually dressed, with his sunglasses tucked into the front of his green T-shirt.

"There is a military air about him: he looks like he might be a bodyguard. In fact, he is Harry's private secretary, Ed Lane Fox.

"And the green T-shirt? With its mildly saucy image of a woman eating a hot dog? That's Harry's. Harry has made Lane Fox wear his T-shirt for the day, as a forfeit for some minor transgression."

Courtiers, out on Thursday, paints Harry as a demanding boss who had constant battles with the media but who also brought fun into the way he conduct his job as a royal.

It says that Lane Fox was the cautious one, while Harry was the "visionary with the exciting ideas," who was determined to go ahead with the visit, despite knowing "there were a hundred things could go wrong."

Low wrote: "This is not your average royal tour. Private secretaries do not normally wear T-shirts on duty. Members of the royal family do not normally impose forfeits on their staff.

"And neither do they willingly throw themselves into situations where one wonders whether they are going to get out in one piece. But this is Harry. And Harry is not like other members of the royal family."

More generally, Low said of Harry: "It was not all fun. There was a lot of anger, which, although it was not necessarily directed at the staff, made for an intense atmosphere."

A source told the author: "There were constant battles with the media, and expecting the team to be on your side. That was a big part of the relationship with the office, the battles he was fighting all the time...He was always on Twitter. You then had to be on everything, too. Every minor infraction was a big deal."