Two days ago, Prince Harry made a surprise appearance at the memorial service for an uncle by marriage. He slipped discreetly into the church in the rural village of Snettisham in Norfolk and left just as inconspicuously when the service was over.
Everyone present – there were about 300 people – must have wondered whether he would be speaking to his brother, the Prince of Wales.
William, however, apparently left the church without exchanging a single syllable with his foolish younger brother. The wounds inflicted by Harry’s absurdly offensive memoir Spare – which not only details an incident in which William knocked him to the ground but also made derogatory remarks about his wife Kate – are still too raw to heal.
The occasion that brought the brothers together was a memorial service for Robert Fellowes, the late private secretary to the Queen from 1990 to 1999, who was given a life peerage when he stepped down from the post.
Lord Fellowes was the embodiment of courtier discretion and loyalty. He was a devoted member of our late monarch’s household and the embodiment of everything that makes the Royal Family tick.
Despite the ongoing coldness between Harry and William, AN Wilson hopes they can forgive each other’s mistakes and build bridges before it’s too late.
Our constitutional monarchy is a machine whose wheels are greased by people like Robert Fellowes. And we can be sure that he would have fully understood why William feels that Harry falls outside the bounds of the norm.
After all, Harry and Meghan have dealt with their departure from the royal family in the worst possible way.
They tried to convince the Queen to accept a crazy formula where they would be part-time royals: half their time living the celebrity life in California, and the other half carrying out royal duties in Britain or elsewhere around the world. (Of course, they expected to keep their royal titles and be treated with the special deference afforded to working royals in this hybrid role.)
They seemed unaware that we show such respect for people like the late Queen and Prince Philip, Prince Charles and Princess Anne, not because we revere them personally – although we have good reasons for doing so – but because we revere the idea of the monarchy that they serve.
Harry flew in to attend the memorial service for Robert Fellowes (pictured), the late Queen’s private secretary, but it appears his brother left the church without saying a word to him
St Mary’s Church in Snettisham, Norfolk, where the service took place on Wednesday
Prince William with his aunt, Lady Jane Fellowes, in 2021
Harry and Meghan missed the point. They saw the monarchy as a vehicle for them to steal the limelight. And they felt perfectly free to be indiscreet and malicious about the rest of the royal family who— not If you’re a B-list celebrity, you’re in no position to answer.
So Willem was right – in a way – to cut his brother at Lord Fellowes’ memorial service. Because the kind of part-time role Harry and Meghan wanted would never have been offered to them before they went to America, and certainly won’t be offered to them now that they’ve behaved so exhibitionistically, so spitefully, so utterly idiotically.
According to some reports, it appears that the king’s spiritual advisers, notably Bishop Richard Chartres, the former Bishop of London, urged him to reconcile with his youngest son.
None of us will live forever and the King’s recent health problems only underline how important it is for family members to love each other, forgive each other’s mistakes and build bridges before it is too late.
There was something terribly sad about Harry’s fleeting visit to that Norfolk church. Whatever he so self-pityingly claimed in Spare, he and William used to love each other.
They lived together through an unimaginable tragedy when their mother died. And it would have been somehow fitting if they had hugged and made up at the memorial service for their mother’s brother-in-law (Fellowes was married to Princess Diana’s sister, Jane).
So let’s all hope – whatever negative reactions we may have to Harry and Meghan’s behaviour – that there will be a reconciliation.
The late Queen made it clear that the Duke and Duchess of Sussex could not be part-timers. You either are or you are not a working royal, and they chose to step out. And they must stay out.
But this doesn’t mean they should ignore him forever, or that Harry can’t be reunited with his father and brother behind closed doors.
After all, they have both experienced the same terrible tragedy and know better than anyone what that must be like.