It is generally said that one cannot know what is going on behind closed doors. But thanks to Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's new documentary series, Harry & Meghan, the world now has a pretty good idea.
The door in question? That of Sandringham, where on January 13, 2022, Prince Harry, Prince William, Prince Charles and Queen Elizabeth II, then monarch in office, discussed the future of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex within the Royal family. Days earlier, the couple released an explosive Instagram statement saying they would be "stepping back" from their duties. After that private meeting concluded, it turned out that "stepping back" actually meant "leaving," as on January 18, Buckingham Palace released a statement declaring that Prince Harry and Meghan Markle were "no longer working members of the royal family.”
In the Liz Garbus-led Netflix series, the couple reveal the chaotic and explosive moments that led to this decision. In doing so, they not only bring more clarity to their own experience, but also pull back the curtain on one of the most private families in history.
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle: The Defamations and the War Between Royal Family Offices
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have portrayed the Windsors as a deeply divided group driven by individual agendas, with offices leaking stories about other family members to ensure that “their senior royal ” enjoys more favorable media coverage. This toxic dynamic, according to Prince Harry, catalyzed their departure: the Sussexes were awash in relentless negative media coverage, such as when an intimate letter between Meghan Markle and her estranged father was published in the Daily Mail. Harry says his family didn't do much to protect them despite it all: "They knew how bad the situation was. They were like, 'Why can't she just deal with the situation? No one wanted to have private conversations with reporters to tell them 'enough is enough,'" he said.
“And seeing my brother's office do the same thing we promised never to do, it broke my heart” - Prince Harry.
However, Prince Harry affirms that the complicity of "the Firm" went well beyond their silence. Claiming they felt threatened by the Sussexes' explosive popularity, Harry suggests the offices of some family members gave the tabloids damning information about himself and his wife. “There are leaks, but there is also story creation. So if the communications team wants to be able to take down a negative story about the member they are dealing with, they will switch and give you something else about someone else's royal," he explains. "You can always say, 'I didn't know about that'. But did you do anything to prevent it? And the answer is no." Worse still, he believed his brother William's team was behind some of this: "William and I both saw what happened in our father's office, and we made an agreement that we would never let that happen to our respective offices. I'd rather get destroyed by the press than play this little game. And to see my brother's office do the same thing we promised never to do, broke my heart," he said.
Here, Prince Harry makes the source of the leak clear: "The key part of this story that made me realize that the contents of the letter between my father and me had been leaked was that we were prepared to give up our Sussex titles. That was the starting point." "Our history, our life, literally flew under our feet." Afterwards, the couple posted their now (infamous) statement on Instagram.
“And you, as mother, wife and target, in many ways are not invited to have a seat at the table” - Meghan Markle
Prince Harry then called his grandmother and asked to speak to her when the couple returned to the UK. He claims Queen Elizabeth II initially agreed, but her office later canceled the meeting. Instead, the Sandringham summit was held - which ruled out Meghan Markle. "Imagine a conversation, a roundtable about the future of your life. When the stakes are this high," she says. "And you, as mother, wife and target, in many ways are not invited to have a seat at the table."
Meghan Markle and he therefore drew up a plan to move abroad. They first considered New Zealand before settling on South Africa…until someone leaked the project to The Times of London. Prince Harry believes it to be a family member, although he does not name who. “This whole plan was then abandoned because it became a public debate,” he notes. The couple tried again with Canada: In December 2019, he called his father from a rented house on Vancouver Island, where they were spending Christmas, to talk about it. The former Prince of Wales, Prince Charles, he explains, asked him to put the idea in writing. "Five days later, it was on the front page of a newspaper," says Meghan Markle.
The meeting, according to Prince Harry, was bitter. He wanted to keep a part-time role in the family, but he says his family couldn't find common ground. Prince William, in particular, reportedly raged: "It was terrifying to see my brother yelling at me, my dad saying things that just weren't true and my grandmother just sitting there quietly taking it all in. That." A few days later, Buckingham Palace confirmed that the couple would no longer be taking any official engagements and would no longer represent the Queen.
What rubbed the knife in the wound? After an article in The Times in January 2020 claimed that Prince Harry and Meghan Markle felt "intimidated" by Prince William, Kensington Palace released a denial signed by both brothers. Prince Harry said he never endorsed such a statement. When he told Meghan Markle, he said she burst into tears. "In four hours they were happy to lie to protect my brother, and yet for three years they never wanted to tell the truth to protect us," he recalls.
