Official photos of wedding released
PRINCE Harry and his wife Meghan on Monday thanked all those involved in their lavish wedding at the weekend as they released official photographs from their big day.
Harry and Meghan, now officially known as the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, tied the knot last Saturday at Windsor Castle, Queen Elizabeth’s home to the west of London, in a splendid display of British royal pomp and ceremony.
“The Duke and Duchess of Sussex would like to thank everyone who took part in the celebrations of their wedding on Saturday,” Prince Harry’s office Kensington Palace said in a statement.
“They feel so lucky to have been able to share their day with all those gathered in Windsor and also all those who watched the wedding on television across the UK, Commonwealth, and around the world.”
The couple also issued three official portrait pictures taken by Alexi Lubomirski.
One shows the couple pictured in the castle’s Green Drawing Room flanked by Meghan’s mother, Doria Ragland, and Prince Harry’s father, the heir-to-the-throne Prince Charles.
It also includes the 92-yearold queen and her husband Prince Philip, 96, sitting alongside, together with Prince William, his wife Kate and Prince Charles’s second wife Camilla.
A second has just the couple with the bridesmaids and page boys, including beaming a Prince George and Princess Charlotte, two of Prince William’s young children. The third was a black and white picture of the newlyweds taken on the castle’s East Terrace.
The couple married last Saturday in a dazzling ceremony that blended ancient English ritual with African American culture, infusing the 1,000-year-old British monarchy with a blast of modernity.
Wearing a veil, diamond tiara and a sleek dress with a long train, the American actress was accompanied up the aisle of St George’s Chapel by Prince Harry’s father, Prince Charles.
The couple kissed on the steps of the 15th century chapel, before delighting the sea of wellwishers, some of whom had camped for days to witness the spectacular show of British pomp and pageantry, by touring Windsor in a horse-drawn carriage.
The union of Prince Harry, 33, a former royal wild child and sixth-in-line to the British throne, and 36-year-old Meghan, a divorcee whose mother is African-American and father is white, was like no other the royal family has seen before.
“We can break the barriers down, it can be done,” said 40year-old black Briton Yvonne Emanuel, one of the 100,000strong crowd that thronged Windsor’s streets.
The ceremony was typical of royal weddings in many ways. The service was conducted by the Dean of Windsor while Justin Welby, the Archbishop of Canterbury, declared the couple man and wife, beneath the banners of the knights of the Order of the Garter, the world’s oldest chivalric group dating back to 1348.
But throughout the wedding, there were significant breaks with tradition, in particular when US Episcopalian bishop Michael Bruce Curry delivered a passionate sermon that was a far cry from the sober tones of the Church of England.
“There’s power in love,” he boomed at a congregation that included Queen Elizabeth, senior royals and celebrities ranging from Oprah Winfrey to George Clooney and David Beckham.
“Do not underestimate it. Anyone who has ever fallen in love knows what I mean,” said Bishop Curry in an energetic address that quoted Martin Luther King.
As well as traditional Church of England anthems and delicate English choral music, the ceremony also featured a gospel choir singing Stand by Me, the 1960s hit by American soul singer Ben E King.