Queen Elizabeth Reportedly Refused to Answer Prince Harry’s Phone Calls Without a Witness Present

Following his farewell to the royal family and move to the United States, Prince Harry has had a fraught relationship with his relatives. In 2021, the Duke of Sussex and Meghan Markle gave a bombshell interview to Oprah Winfrey that suggested the Windsors had been racist. At the time, Queen Elizabeth II, who died in 2022, responded with a diplomatic official statement: “The issues raised, especially the racial ones, are troubling. Although some memories may vary, they will be taken very seriously.”

Now, in his new book Queen Elizabeth II: A Personal History, historian Hugo Vickers says the sovereign was “deeply hurt by her grandson’s attacks.” After that interview, the queen became very “distrustful of Harry,” Vickers claims, so much so that she reportedly “refused to answer his phone calls unless there was a witness who could record what was said.” Per Vickers, whenever Prince Harry called her, “the queen would ask her lady-in-waiting to be with her.” When she responded, Queen Elizabeth II reportedly limited herself to “monosyllabic conversations made up only of ‘yes’ and ‘no.’” According to A Personal History, Elizabeth was “trying to protect herself from her grandson.” Vickers, a longtime friend of the royal family, writes, “One cannot underestimate the pain the Sussexes caused the queen in the last years of her life.”

The royal biographer shares another alleged episode that suggests the queen may have been distrustful of Harry and Meghan. In June 2022, during the Platinum Jubilee celebrations, the queen refused to meet the couple privately when they first introduced her to her granddaughter, Lilibet Diana. The queen, Vickers writes, “demanded that the Sussexes’ visit take place in the presence of her lady-in-waiting.” Prior to the meeting, Elizabeth gave strict orders: No photographer would be allowed at the event. “This is a family affair and must remain in the family,” the queen reportedly told Harry and Megan, who purportedly would have liked to capture the moment. “It wouldn’t have been a photo for the family album; it would have gone straight to the US media or Netflix,” writes Vickers. “The queen knew this very well, so she wanted to put a stop to it immediately.”

In his book, which hits stands in the UK on April 8, Vickers also states that the queen advised Harry not to rush things with Meghan. “The queen suggested that her grandson wait a year before marrying Meghan,” writes Vickers. “Harry did not wait: The wedding was staged in May 2018.” Per Vickers, the queen did not like the bride’s dress, finding it too white and with ungainly shoulders. “A person close to the queen told me that her attitude about the wedding in general was this: ‘Go ahead. It doesn’t affect me,’” writes Vickers. There were allegedly problems, the royal biographer continues, even when Harry and Markle moved to Frogmore Cottage on the Windsor estate, near the castle where Queen Elizabeth spent most of her time. “When they lived there, Meghan was rude to one of the gardeners in charge of property maintenance,” he writes. “One of the head gardeners told the queen about it, and she flew into a rage. She got into her car, drove to the site, and scolded Meghan for her rudeness to the staff.”

Original story appeared in VF Italia.