Prince Harry's Relationship With Queen Elizabeth 'Badly Damaged'

Prince Harry's relationship with Queen Elizabeth II was "quite badly damaged by" his attitude around his wedding to Meghan Markle and further damaged by the Oprah Winfrey interview, according to a new biography.

The Duke of Sussex's "high-handed attitude" left the queen "dismayed," an extract of My Mother And I, by Ingrid Seward, serialized in the Daily Mail suggests.

The royal author quotes Lady Elizabeth Anson, the queen's cousin and confidante, suggesting Elizabeth was less than impressed with Harry's behavior.

"According to Lady Elizabeth," Seward wrote, "the Queen was dismayed by Harry's high-handed attitude both before and after the wedding, and their relationship was 'quite badly damaged by it all.'"

While Seward did not go into detail in the extract, past news reports have suggested tension over Meghan's wedding day tiara, which Harry also discussed in his book, Spare.

The Sun reported in November 2017 that Harry had received a dressing down from the queen over which tiara Meghan would wear during the May 2018 ceremony.

However, Harry disputed this account, saying the queen had been positive about Meghan's choice, but the Sussexes had clashed with Elizabeth's dresser, Angela Kelly, over arranging a hair trial.

"She put before me a release," he wrote, "which I signed, and then she handed me the tiara.

"I thanked her, though I added that it would've made our lives so much easier
to have had it sooner.

"Her eyes were fire. She started having a go at me. 'Angela, you really want to do this now? Really? Now?'

"She fixed me with a look that made me shiver. I could read in her face a clear
warning. This isn't over."

The wedding was not the last of the queen's difficulties in relation to Harry and Meghan, according to Seward's book, published on February 15.

"It [the relationship] was even more damaged when Harry decided to give up being a working royal and leave the country—a decision, said Lady Elizabeth, that the Queen never truly understood," Seward wrote.

"Then came the couple's infamous interview with Oprah Winfrey, in which Harry said his father was 'trapped' and heavily implied that the Royal Family were racist. The Queen was upset by his attitude, said Lady Elizabeth.

"However much she loved Harry—and she did—she couldn't condone the way he was speaking about the institution of the monarchy she'd spent 70 years preserving.

"At that point the Queen decided there was no longer any point in worrying about Harry as he wasn't going to take notice of anyone but his wife."

The queen did, however, like Meghan: "From their very first meeting, over tea at Buckingham Palace, the Queen approved of Meghan Markle."

Prince Philip had some reservations about the duchess though: "One of the few wary of succumbing to her charm offensive, however, was Prince Philip.

"While the Queen continued to champion Harry's new love, he warned his wife to be cautious. It was uncanny, he told her, how much Meghan reminded him of the Duchess of Windsor.

"He wasn't simply referring to the fact that both were pencil-slim, dark-haired and glamorous American divorcees. There was a wealth of subtext in his barbed remark."

Jack Royston is Newsweek's chief royal correspondent based in London. You can find him on X, formerly Twitter, at @jack_royston and read his stories on Newsweek's The Royals Facebook page.

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