Palace lied about the Princes' funeral walk, says Di’s brother

A PALACE aide ‘lied’ about a plan to force Princes William and Harry to walk behind their mother’s coffin, their uncle claimed yesterday.

Earl Spencer said he was ‘passionate’ that his nephews should not have to do so, but was told they wanted to.

He said it was only later he learned the brothers, then 15 and 12, had not wanted the ‘bizarre and cruel’ ordeal – and said he still suffered nightmares about the funeral procession.

Poignant images of the young princes walking behind Princess Diana’s coffin, their heads bowed, were beamed around the world as commentators reported that they had chosen to do so.

But Prince Harry has since spoken out about the experience, and political insiders have claimed William asked to be allowed to grieve in private, without his very public role in the cortege.

Alastair Campbell, adviser to then prime minister Tony Blair, has suggested Palace officials feared public anger would lead to attacks on Prince Charles if he followed the coffin without his sons.

Diana’s brother, who for 20 years has insisted his eulogy to her was not intended as an attack on the Royal Family, yesterday told BBC Radio 4’s Today he had wanted only to pay tribute to his sister, and not to use his platform to right wrongs.

Speaking about the cortege, Earl Spencer added: ‘I had been a passionate advocate for William and Harry not to have to walk behind their mother’s body.

‘I thought it was a very bizarre and cruel thing for them to be asked to do.’ He said he learned of the plan from ‘some courtier at Buckingham Palace’ and that his instant reaction was, ‘of course they’re not going to do that’.

The earl, 53, added: ‘Eventually I was lied to and told they wanted to do it, which of course they didn’t, but I didn’t realise that.’

Describing the procession, in which he, the Duke of Edinburgh, the Prince of Wales, William and Harry walked, he said: ‘It was the most horrifying half-hour of my life, it was just ghastly.’

He recalled a ‘crashing tidal wave of grief’ emanating from the crowds, saying: ‘ We would walk 100 yards and hear people sobbing and then walk round a corner and somebody wailing and shouting out messages of love to Diana or William and Harry.’

The earl said it must have been ‘a million times worse’ for his nephews, days after their mother was killed in a car crash in Paris in August 1997.

He described the procession as ‘really harrowing’, adding: ‘I still have nightmares about it now.’

Earlier this year, Harry spoke about the funeral after revealing he sought counselling to help him cope with suppressed grief.

‘My mother had just died … I had to walk a long way behind her coffin, surrounded by thousands of people watching me while millions more did on television,’ he told Newsweek magazine. ‘I don’t think any child should be asked to do that under any circumstances.’ A recent documentary claimed Earl Spencer wanted to be the only one to walk behind the coffin. He strongly denied the claim. It also alleged Prince William initially refused to join the cortege.

Mr Campbell claimed in his diaries that Prince Charles’s press secretary Sandy Henney was sent to Balmoral to plead with William. ‘She was obviously saying it was what his mother would have wanted … also the fact it would avoid the risk of Charles being publicly attacked,’ Mr Campbell wrote.

Blair adviser Anji Hunter was part of a committee organising the funeral and said: ‘The most tension in the room always came from Charles Spencer’s people.’

In his eulogy the earl promised to care for Diana’s sons as her ‘blood family’ and prevent them being ‘immersed by duty and tradition’. It was seen as deeply wounding to the Royal Family, but yesterday he said he thought it was honest and ‘very balanced’.

‘I don’t feel I said many pointed things, I believe that every word I said was true and it was important for me to be honest,’ he said.

The eulogy characterised Diana as ‘the most hunted person of the modern age’ – a reference to freelance paparazzi photographers.

Yesterday he said: ‘I was trying to celebrate Diana – and if by doing that it showed up particularly the Press in a bad way, well, they had it coming.’

‘Crashing tidal wave of grief’