A palace insider has revealed the motivation behind Princess Kate and Prince William’s public birthday message to Prince Harry.
The Duke of Sussex received birthday wishes from both King Charles’s Royal Family account and the Prince and Princess of Wales’s account on X, formerly known as Twitter.
The Royal Family account posted at 8:28am on Sunday morning: “Wishing The Duke of Sussex a very happy 40th birthday today!”
The post was accompanied by an image of Prince Harry smiling.
Just over two hours after the Royal Family message, a similar one was posted on the Prince and Princess of Wales’s account which said: “Wishing a Happy 40th Birthday to The Duke of Sussex!”.
However, a palace insider said regarding the move: “It was just a company thing. Happy birthday blah blah blah.
A notable detail suggests that the birthday message was not personally from Prince William or Princess Catherine. The couple typically include their initials, W & C, at the end of their personal social media posts.
The absence of these initials in the message to Prince Harry indicates it did not come directly from them. It is unlikely that they were not consulted before a message was posted by their team.
The Prince and Princess of Wales are currently not on speaking terms with the Duke of Sussex, and the brothers did not interact at their uncle’s funeral in Norfolk last month.
The Duke of Sussex is expected to return to the UK in September for the WellChild awards, but a friend of Prince William has ruled out any potential reunion between the brothers later this month.
However, a friend of the Prince of Wales has ruled out a reunion between William and Harry later this month.
They said: “William’s focus is on his family right now and he won’t be meeting up with Harry”.
While a friend of Harry’s said: “Harry is not expecting the call-up from the King or William.
