Warring pair’s chance to make mother proud
As bombshell royal revelations about behind-the-scenes rows emerge, calm heads have called on everyone to remember the late princess’s legacy of love and to make this a time to...
PRINCESS Diana would be so distressed to see her sons at loggerheads.to her they were the most important men in the world.
Whatever problems she faced in life, she always found great comfort in the thought that Princewilliam and Prince Harry would always be there to support each other, come what may, against whatever slings and arrows fate decreed.
That was one of the few certainties in her life and she clung to it, all the more so after the sudden death of her beloved father, Earl “Johnny” Spencer, aged 68, in 1992, when she was skiing in Austria.
From that day on, “the boys” were all she had and most cared about.
The bitterness of the divisions that have opened up between the brothers, once so close, would have shocked her because she brought them up to love each other.
She instilled in them a belief in themselves and the importance of supporting each other.
In his first interview with Oprah Winfrey, Harry (pictured inset on show) referred to always being there for his older brother but did so almost ruefully, with what looked like a smile to cover his embarrassment.
There are few more terrible sights than brothers fighting. The fall-out from these royal brothers-at-war, with their wives maintaining what can best be described as armed neutrality, will cast a deep shadow, a veritable pall, across the unveiling of the first public statue to their mother’s memory on July 1, which would have been Diana’s
60th birthday.
It has been a fractious 23 years to get a statue raised using public donations. It wasn’t until 2017, the 20th anniversary of her death, that her sons took the job in hand.
The unveiling should have been an occasion to celebrate a wonderful person and a remarkable life, cruelly cut short at the age of 36 when Diana was on the brink of a new and exciting period during which, to my certain knowledge, she intended to extend the good work she had already achieved in new, surprising and inspiring ways.
Now, instead of representing the essential, the incomparable, the unforgettable Diana to a world that will always miss her, this new three-dimensional image of the princess will look down in disbelief on her sons, usually separated by 6,000 miles – the distance between Kensington Palace and a mansion on a hilltop in
Santa Barbara, California.
Meghan will not be present in thewhite Garden, planted with the princess’s favourite flowers and site of the photo call when Meghan’s engagement to Harry was announced, which now feels like light years ago.the birth of daughter Lillibet provides perfect cover for her absence.
Harry, however, is expected to attend and intends to make his own speech.
That would be the perfect opportunity for a public reconciliation.
I hope he takes it. It’s what his mother would have wished for – and expected.
THE country should come together to remember Princess Diana and ignore any lurid revelations threatening to overshadow events to mark her 60th birthday, MPS have said.
Royal experts have also urged warring William and Harry to set aside hostilities and turn their attention to honouring their late mother.
It follows another week of bombshell stories about the Princes’ palace battles and more light shed on how Prince Charles was interviewed by police following her death in 1997. William and Harry are due to unveil a statue at Kensington Palace to commemorate what would have been their mother’s 60th birthday on July 1.
Now Essex-based Conservative MP Andrew Rosindell has called for the nation to unite as the anniversary approaches.
The Romford MP said: “Obviously, there have been issues with Harry and Meghan but this is not a time to focus on that. It’s a time to focus on Diana’s contribution to the Royal Family and her contribution to Britain, which I think is very significant.”
He added: “I don’t think there’s much to be gained by raking these things up. It’s better to remember Diana for the good things she did and the life she led.”
Sir David Amess, a champion of the
Royal Family, agreed. He said: “I have been aware of these terrible stories. I think they are disrespectful, inaccurate – as far as I am concerned – and totally misplaced.
“I don’t think anyone should take the slightest bit of notice of them but just focus on what is such a positive thing to happen, the fact that we will have this memorial for us all to go and view.
He added: “They should stop the gossip, they should stop the sniping which I regard as very, very nasty,
[and] respect those who will have gathered in the knowledge that her two sons loved her.
“That’s what we’re going to be marking as far as I’m concerned – the death of a lovely spirit – and I hope there will be no unpleasantness.”
Writing in today’s Sunday Express, former BBC Royal Correspondent Michael Cole declares that Diana “would be so distressed to see her sons still at loggerheads,” adding that their feud would have shocked her, because she brought them up to love each other.
Royal author Margaret Holder added that Diana would be “mortified” to have seen her sons so divided as they prepare for the July 1 unveiling of the sculpture, installed at the palace’s Sunken Gardens, one of her favourite spots.
Ms Holder lamented: “William, devoted to
duty, and Harry, determined to go his own and Meghan’s way, will each read a separate speech. A sad way to honour the mother they loved so much.”
She added that Diana “would want them to find common ground, at least for her grandchildren’s sake. She would have made her peace with Charles and the Royal Family, and concentrated on making the world a better place. Uniting her sons should be her lasting memorial.”
The pleas for unity follow a week of claims over both Harry and William’s feud and the lead up to their mother’s death in a Paris car crash on August 31, 1997.
Writer Robert Lacey sparked uproar by claiming William split his household from his brother’s in the autumn of 2018 following a furious phone row over accusations that Meghan was bullying palace staff.
Harry and Meghan have always firmly denied the bullying claims.
In his book Battle of the Brothers, excerpts from which were published last week, he quotes a friend of the Sussexes as saying that “William threw Harry out”, and asserts that Meghan was “hostile” to the royal system from the start.
Then, it was reported that former Metropolitan Police Chief John Stevens
‘Let’s focus on the
positive things’
‘We fought hard, an awful lot, to save her’
personally interviewed Charles when he was spoken to as a witness in 2005 as part of a three-year probe into Diana’s death.
The Prince ofwales was questioned about a shocking note allegedly written by his exwife in 1995 in which she predicted she would die as a result of “brake failure and serious head injury” so Charles could marry his sons’ former nanny Tiggy Legge-bourke.
The note, which had been handed to Diana’s butler Paul Burrell, was published in full in a newspaper that said Diana wrote: “This particular phase in my life is the most dangerous. My husband is planning an accident in my car. Brake failure and serious head injury in order to make the path clear for him to marry Tiggy. Camilla is nothing but a decoy so we are being used by the man in every sense of the word.”
Asked by Stevens (now Lord Stevens), if he had ever discussed the note with Diana, the heir to the throne purportedly replied: “No. I did not know it existed.”
The surgeon who battled to save Diana’s life at Pitié-salpêtrière Hospital in Paris has told for the first time of his medical team’s desperate efforts to revive her, saying: “We fought hard, we tried a lot, really an awful lot.we could not save her.”
Dr Monsef Dahman said one reason for speaking out was to quash conspiracy theories that staff were “somehow part” of a murderous plot by the British establishment.