Prince Harry's move before marrying Meghan 'blew' his bond with late Queen, claims pal

Prince Harry 'blew' his relationshipwith the late Queen in the lead-up to marrying Meghan Markle after making a major decision, an author has claimed. It has been seven years since Harry and Meghan tied the knot at Windsor Castle in May 2018 in a fairytale wedding attended by the whole of the Royal Family.

The preparations leading up to the nuptials were known to have been fraught with Meghan's father dropping out of attending at the last minute. But today, a royal author has claimed that a so-called close friend of the late Queen told her that the former monarch was left 'dismayed' about some of the arrangements being made for the wedding and had become "very worried" about her 'weak' and 'besotted' grandson.

Writing on her Substack, Sally Bedell Smith claims that before her death, Lady Elizabeth Anson, a cousin of Elizabeth II and a high-society party planner, told her behind-the-scenes details about the run-up to the wedding.

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She claims that the former monarch had been left shocked that Harry had asked the Archbishop of Canterbury to perform the ceremony without asking the Dean of Windsor first and that the now Duke of Sussex thought his grandmother could just "do what she wants".

And according to Bedell Smith, Lady Anson said that due to this, Harry had "blown" his relationship with his grandmother. She writes that Lady Anson told her several months before the wedding: "She [the Queen] said she was really upset. I was shocked when the Queen told me this, how she was so saddened. I had no idea about the conversation, that he was rude to her for ten minutes.

"They had tea with her the day before yesterday. She was trying to find out about the wedding dress, and Meghan wouldn’t tell her."

However, the author later claims that several weeks closer to the nuptials, Lady Anson told her that Harry and his grandmother had "patched things up" after he let her into the details of what they had planned for their wedding. Bedell Smith says Lady Anson described Harry as "besotted and weak about women."

The author also claims that it was at this point that the late Queen hinted at tension between Harry and Meghan with the Prince and Princess of Wales with her telling her friend: "Meghan and William and Kate are not working well" and that it was particularly the case when it came to the "two girls". The Mirror has contacted the Duke and Duchess of Sussex for comment.

Lady Anson was the daughter of Thomas Anson, Viscount Anson, and his wife, Anne Bowes-Lyon, who would later become Princess Anne of Denmark when she remarried. She was a niece of the late Queen Mother and was a close friend of the Queen and responsible for arranging many of her private parties.

She founded the firm Party Planners in 1960 and went on to arrange events for a number of people in the royal houses as well as the Queen. Notable events Lady Shakerley planned include Sting's wedding, Margaret Thatcher's 70th birthday party and the Queen's 80th birthday party.

In 2020, the late Queen made her a Commander of the Royal Victorian Order, which is awarded to those having performed distinguished personal service to the monarch. Just months later she died at the age of 79.