Philip’s death didn’t reach Harry quickly
Maybe it’s because Prince Harry’s relationship with the royal family had become so fraught that he didn’t receive a personal call from his father, brother or any other relative on the morning of April 9, informing him that his grandfather Prince Philip had died.
Or maybe the royal family is accustomed to delegating the delivery of such sensitive personal news to flunkies.
In any case, someone from the U.S. Embassy in London repeatedly tried to call Harry early that morning at his home in Montecito in Santa Barbara County, according to TMZ. It’s unclear if Harry’s ringer was turned off, or if he and his wife, Meghan, are sound sleepers, but the prince failed to pick up his phone after repeated attempts, TMZ said.
By 3 a.m., the mad dash to inform the Duke of Sussex of his grandfather’s death involved authorities on both sides of the Atlantic. The embassy contacted the Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Department, which obliged by dispatching a deputy to Harry and Meghan’s $14 million mansion, the Daily Mail added.
That deputy didn’t deliver the news himself. Stopped at the gate to Harry’s estate, the deputy told the person there to wake Harry up and have him call the U.S. Embassy ASAP, TMZ added.
That’s when Harry finally learned that his beloved grandfather had died at age 99. It appears that Buckingham Palace officials urgently wanted to make sure Harry learned about Philip’s death before the news was publicly announced at noon U.K. time, which would be 4 a.m. Pacific time, the Daily Mail said. News of Philip’s death immediately became international news.
TMZ added that the royal family wouldn’t want to come across as heartless by having Harry find out about his grandfather’s death from a news alert. “So the scramble to get to Harry ahead of the death announcement is understandable,” TMZ said.
As is well known, Harry made it back to the U.K. to attend Philip’s funeral on April 17 and to be photographed having a friendly conversation with his brother, Prince William.