Prince Harry has a new life, but what’s next?
When Harry met Meghan …
Set up on a date by a mutual friend: The prince and the soap-opera actress.
Maybe it was always destined to end up this way — family alienation, clash of wills with the monarchy, turmoil at the palace.
Maybe, too, British princes should steer clear of American divorcées. It’s never served the Crown well.
Meghan Markle is no Wallis Simpson, of course. And Harry hasn’t been sent into exile. But he’s certainly been defrocked as a royal, stripped of his military regalia, divested of his honorary appointments and deplatformed from his royal patronages.
All for the woman he loves, to quote his great-great uncle, the duke of Windsor, fleetingly king Edward VIII, before he abdicated the throne.
Of course, His Royal Highness Henry Charles Albert David, as the spare to the heir, was never going to ascend the throne, barring some disaster in the House of Windsor which doesn’t bear thinking about. But some are now even clamouring for the removal of the “HRH,” as the title was similarly peeled away from his mother Diana following divorce from Charles, Prince of Wales. Surely that would be one spite too far.
Harry and Meghan will still be known as the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, the peerage gifted to the couple upon their wedding by Queen Elizabeth. That should be sufficient prestige for an American audience, even if Harry has been royally emasculated.
The topic will doubtless be explored — lob-balled — when Harry and Meghan sit down with Oprah, dowager of the chat shows, next month. Again, the royals have a poor history with tell-all TV confessionals — Charles famously admitting adultery to Jonathan Dimbleby, Diana getting her own back (“there were three of us in this marriage, so it was a bit crowded”) to Martin Bashir, the latter a bombshell parley that is the subject of an internal BBC inquiry a quarter-century later, over allegations Bashir used subterfuge to trick the princess into telling her side of the story.
That TV sit-down was the death knell for Diana’s turbulent marriage. For Harry and Meghan, it’s also the final straw, apparently, far as grandmama was concerned. Blindsided when news broke about the upcoming Oprah special, the Queen on Friday announced that Harry and Meghan are to be stripped of most titles and patronages and would not be returning to The Firm as working royals, as of March 31. No more half-inhalf-out deal from overseas, as the couple had desired when they stepped back from royal duties 11 months ago, an arrangement to which the Queen had given her blessing reluctantly, and to be reviewed within a year’s time.
So, Megxit has been finalized. It is permanent. Decree absolute in the divorce.
The palace statement: “In stepping away from the work of the Royal Family, it is not possible to continue with the responsibilities and duties that come with a life of public service.”
The Queen is said to be “saddened.” But she has other things on her mind — 99-yearold Prince Philip was admitted to hospital last week after feeling unwell. Harry is reportedly isolating at the couple’s $15-million mansion outside Santa Barbara, should he have to hastily fly to the U.K.
Harry, 36, is still sixth in the line to the throne, though destined to be pushed further down, should brother William have more children with Kate. He would then fall behind their future children.
Meghan will be blamed for this divorce-of-sorts. And it certainly does appear like Harry has done her bidding from the outset. The Californian may have had the best of intentions when she said her I-do’s in 2018, but the media honeymoon didn’t last long, as she quickly fell out of favour, particularly with the red-top tabloids, held responsible for the rift that opened between Harry and William. The tabs, and the television commentator likes of Piers Morgan, have been absolutely vicious toward Meghan, much of the criticism steeped in racism regarding her biracial heritage.
Gobs of sniping over the weekend, too, with accusations Harry and Meghan had peevishly disrespected the Queen in their statement-response to the statement: “We can all live a life of service. Service is universal.” As if — the nerve! — they were refuting the Queen, had denied her the last word, and don’t know the difference between self-promotional philanthropy and public duty.
Little wonder Meghan bolted, making a temporary stop with Harry and baby Archie in B.C., although they were clearly always headed for La-La-Land and nearness to her mother.
It had been such a good week for Meghan, too, before the Queen pulled the pin: Announcement that she is expecting her second child (after a miscarriage last summer, which she wrote about poignantly in an essay for the New York Times), the couple releasing a tender photograph, lying beneath a tree on their vast property. (The Baby Tree, one London columnist snarked, ridiculing the orchestrated stagecraft.)
She’d also just won a lawsuit against the Mail on Sunday for invasion of privacy — the paper had published parts of a private letter Meghan had written to her estranged father before her wedding. And that followed close on the heels of Harry winning an apology and substantial damages from the same paper, over a story claiming he’d turned his back on the military after leaving the army.
While Harry and Meghan may have sought to carve out their own identity, untethered from stifling Royal constraints and obligations — endlessly judged — pursuing “financial independence” and a private life, thus far it’s pretty much been all to Meghan’s benefit, her professional interests, her boldface celebrity.
The couple has signed megabuck deals with Disney, Netflix and Spotify. (The Queen was also purportedly concerned that the couple’s aggressive financial enterprises could compromise the monarchy.) Meghan’s wheelhouse, not Harry’s. What is he to do, except squire his wife around town, like some kind of royal prop? He’s lost the military role close to his heart, and well-earned from a decade in service that included two tours on the front line in Afghanistan, rising to the rank of captain.
Lost his role as CaptainGeneral of the Royal Marines, among three honorary military titles — now to be redistributed among the royal family’s “B” team, and there are 20 of them in the Queen’s immediate family (including the disgraced and erased Prince Andrew, sent to Coventry for his ties to sex offender Jeffrey Epstein). Lost his position as patron of England Rugby. Lost his patronage of the London Marathon Charitable Trust. Can’t even wear his military uniform, though permitted his medals and regimental beret for events such as Remembrance Day.
That, especially, has broken Harry’s heart. Military life was always the best of him, where Harry straightened out and found his place in the world.
He can keep his patronage of the Invictus Games, the charity he set up for wounded service personnel. (It was at the Invictus Games in Toronto, in 2017, where Harry and Meghan made their first public appearance as a couple, she wearing a boyfriend shirt.)
Perhaps it was a hollow experience, on display as a royal ornament, the dreary routine of shaking hands with strangers for a living. Meghan wasn’t born and raised to it, and had her fill of it after only a couple of years. But, apart from his time as a soldier and helicopter pilot, that’s all Harry has known.
Now he’s at risk of being the empty shirt. He’s the one who’s making all the sacrifices.
But Harry is still the son of a future king, the brother of another, and the beloved grandson of a Queen.
Now he’s going to genuflect before Queen Oprah.
It is to cringe.