I’m giving this a name now: these articles are part of “The Mail Remembers” series. The Mail Remembers various years-old stories about the Duchess of Sussex, and re-reports those stories with zero new information. The purpose is, I believe, to examine where everything went wrong for them, postmortem-style. “Remember when the Middletons were really tacky about Meghan in 2017? Could we have handled it differently?” And “Remember when Meghan told off Harry’s bigoted friends? Should we have reported it differently?” Perhaps I’m giving the Mail too much credit for self-reflection. It’s more likely that they’re recycling all of these old stories because they’re just sad that they bet big on a bunch of losers. Anyway, the latest in “The Mail Remembers” series is: remember how Harry felt a real urgency to marry Meghan quickly, without a ten-year waitying courtship?
When a royal couple gets engaged before they really get to know each other, it often has disastrous results. The Royal Family learned that lesson after Prince Charles proposed to 20-year-old Diana after only dating for around six months, meeting in person just a reported 13 times over that period. So after Prince Harry started dating Meghan Markle in July 2016, and rumours of an engagement started to swirl by 2017, his family were quick to step in.
It’s claimed Prince William, who dated Kate for eight years before proposing, was ‘nervous’ about how quickly the couple were moving, as he was worried Meghan would struggle to transition into the life of a royal in such a short period of time. But Harry brushed off his brother’s concerns, claiming that he had to marry her quickly because her ‘biological clock was ticking’ as she was almost 35 years old, according to royal author Tina Brown.
However, the author claimed William’s unsaid biggest worry was for his younger brother’s ‘mental fragility’ and that he wouldn’t be able to cope with all the ‘scorching scrutiny and harassment’ that Meghan would come to endure.
Shortly after Harry, now 40, and Meghan, now 43, started dating, the couple met the Queen at an informal drop by at Royal Lodge in Windsor after church. According to Ms Brown, who was a confidante of Princess Diana’s and met with her just weeks before her death, the Queen reserved judgment and was ‘just happy Harry was happy’. However the author wrote in her bestselling book, The Palace Papers: Inside the House of Windsor: ‘But William knew Harry all too well and feared he was heading for trouble. Every time his brother fell in love, it was an eruption of Vesuvius. “You do realise this is the fourth girl you’ve taken to Botswana”, he couldn’t help but remark after Harry’s starry-eyed account of the trip.’
For her book, Ms Brown spoke to 120 royal insiders over the course of two years, and claims most of the family – including Prince Charles and the Queen – appeared to like Meghan, but it was Prince William who had the biggest reservations. William also had concerns Meghan would not have enough time to create a life for herself in the UK and make new friends. She would also have to give up her entire life in North America, including her acting career. At that time, Meghan knew almost nobody in London and had little understanding of British culture.
But perhaps more importantly she was not prepared for the ‘scorching scrutiny and harassment’ that comes with being a member of the Royal Family, claims Ms Brown who previously edited Tatler and The New Yorker. She quotes sources from Palace veterans who knew the coming storm would be nothing remotely like the kind of benign exposure a TV actress had to endure. But according to the book, Harry’s response to William’s fears was that the most effective way to protect Meghan would be to marry her ‘as quickly as possible’ so that she would receive the same police protection that he did while he was still a working royal. Harry was also claimed to have said since she was a month away from turning 35, her biological clock was ticking.
All of these “The Mail Remembers” stories have made me laugh, but this one has some special sauce to it. They’re seriously banging their heads against the wall and wailing “where did it all go wrong?!?”… and Harry and Meghan are still happily married and completely in love. “They married too quickly!” No, they didn’t, but even if they did, they’re happy? The “where did it all go wrong” problem is that the moment Harry figured out that Meghan was and is The One, that was the beginning of the unfolding catastrophe of the House of Windsor. Harry and Meghan are fine, and the Windsors and the British media can’t handle that.
As for the actual trip down memory lane… I think Harry didn’t want to make Meghan wait around indefinitely for years for multiple reasons: he was constantly worried that she would “come to her senses” and leave him if he didn’t lock it down quickly; he was crazy in love and they both wanted to start a family ASAP; Meghan probably needed to be engaged/married to stay in the UK; when you know you know and they both knew they had found the One; and Harry was very concerned about Meghan’s security and he saw an engagement and marriage as the easiest way to protect her and keep her safe.
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red, Cover Images.
