OH, BABY!
Glow that says Harry & Meghan are starting a new royal family – just two years after they met
BEAMING with joy, Meghan Markle shows the world her delight at starting a family with Prince Harry.
The royal couple, who are visiting Australia, announced yesterday that they are expecting their first child in the spring.
Harry is an ‘emotional wreck – but in a good way’, a source revealed last night. ‘It is something he has wanted for a long time and he couldn’t be happier. He is so protective of her.’
The happy couple were in Sydney last night at the start of a 16-day tour that also takes in New Zealand, Fiji and Tonga.
They insisted on going ahead with the trip in spite of Foreign Office advice to pregnant women about the risk of the Zika virus in the
South Pacific islands. There is no vaccination against the infection, which causes foetuses to develop severe deformities. Last night it emerged that:
Meghan’s mother Doria Ragland was said to be among the first to know;
She was ‘very happy about this lovely news’ and ‘looks forward to welcoming her first grandchild’;
Meghan’s estranged father Thomas Markle is ‘delighted’ and told her by letter: ‘You will make a great mother’;
The baby will be seventh in line to the throne and is likely to be titled Earl of Dumbarton or Lady (first name) Mountbatten-Windsor;
Moments after the baby announcement, Sarah Ferguson began tweeting pictures from her daughter Princess Eugenie’s wedding – leading some to question if she felt upstaged.
Meghan, 37, is understood to have just had her 12-week scan. It means she is already in her second trimester, when the risk of miscarriage is deemed to lessen considerably.
The couple excitedly told the rest of the Royal Family last Friday when they saw them at Princess Eugenie’s wedding. It sets the seal on a whirlwind year for Harry, 34, who has made no secret of his desire to start a family.
It is only 12 months since the couple stepped out together in public for the first time, when they appeared together at the Invictus Games in Toronto.
At the time, Meghan was still living full time in Canada and the couple were not even engaged. After Harry popped the question at the end of last year, they married in May and just two months later, toward the end of July, conceived their first child.
In the middle of that month, they were on a ‘mini-moon’ royal tour to Dublin, their first trip together as a married couple. And on August 4, they were partying at the wedding of Harry’s best friend Charlie Van Straubenzee.
Yesterday a Kensington Palace spokesman said the Queen, the Duke of Edinburgh, the Prince of Wales, the Duchess of Cornwall and the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge were all delighted for the couple.
‘They were able to share their happy news with the Royal Family in person at Friday’s wedding,’ said an aide, which may have accounted for their low-key appearance at the nuptials.
A friend added: ‘They didn’t make a grand announcement but had conversations with their family and friends and told them their news.’
Meghan is said to be in good health and has not had to cancel any public appearances because of her pregnancy. The Duchess of Cambridge suffered from hyperemesis gravidarum, a severe form of pregnancyrelated sickness.
Her pregnancy is likely to be monitored closely, however, as by the age of 35 any woman expecting a baby is technically classed by doctors as a ‘geriatric mother’.
The couple’s tour will be highly demanding. It includes opening the prince’s Invictus Games for injured service personnel in Sydney later this week. Yesterday they flew into the city, where they were staying at Admiralty House, the residence of the governor-general.
Harry and Meghan have insisted their trip to the two most remote South Pacific islands will go ahead despite the risk of Zika.
The Foreign and Commonwealth Office advises pregnant women to avoid ‘all but essential travel’ there. It is believed one of the first to know about the pregnancy was Meghan’s mother, who friends suspect she told in person when she came to visit her in London last month.
In a statement issued through Kensington Palace. Miss Ragland said she was ‘very happy about this lovely news’ and ‘looks forward to welcoming her first grandchild’.
Meghan’s father, Thomas Markle, from whom she is estranged after a series of hugely public embarrassments, is believed to have been informed by Miss Ragland ‘a little while ago’, said a friend, and is ‘absolutely overjoyed’ at the news.
The couple’s new baby will be seventh in line to the throne but will not be a prince or princess because of rules brought in by George V.
In its statement yesterday, Kensington Palace said: ‘Their Royal Highnesses have appreciated all of the support they have received from people around the world since their wedding in May and are delighted to be able to share this happy news.’
‘Partying at the wedding’