Just In: Royal Fans Left Furious as Prince Harry’s Seven “Explosive Attacks” on Princess Kate Before His Dramatic UK Return Are Revealed

Prince Harry was once the cheeky third wheel, trailing happily alongside Prince William and Princess Catherine, regularly pictured laughing and joking with the sister-in-law to whom he appeared remarkably close. Those photographs now belong to a very different royal era.

More than six years after the Duke and Duchess of Sussex walked away from royal life, the Duke is returning to Britain – and tentative signs of reconciliation with his family have raised hopes that some of those spectacularly broken relationships could eventually be repaired.

From the infamous bridesmaid row and Meghan Markle’s allegations, 45, about being denied a hug to Harry’s deeply personal account of private text messages between the two women, moments that would ordinarily have remained firmly behind closed doors were suddenly served up to a global audience. And Harry, perhaps more than anybody, knew the uncomfortable reality facing his sister-in-law.

The Princess of Wales is a working royal. She was hardly going to sit opposite Oprah the following week, sign a Netflix deal or publish her own memoir, setting out her version of events. Harry and Meghan had the microphone. Catherine largely had to remain silent.

And that is what makes Harry’s return to British soil particularly fascinating. This wasn’t always some distant royal relative caught in the Sussex crossfire. This was the woman Harry had known for years, laughed beside at engagements and shared countless public appearances with as he tagged along with his older brother.

Whatever affection once existed between them, that relationship was spectacularly fractured as Harry took private grievances and conversations public.

Now he wants to build a life back on UK soil, but coming home does not erase what was said while you were away.

From exposing Catherine’s private messages to revealing awkward encounters behind Palace doors, here are eight of Prince Harry’s most explosive claims and revelations involving the Princess of Wales.

1. Princess Catherine blamed for leaving Meghan ‘sobbing on the floor’

Prince Harry gave the world his version of one of the most notorious rows in recent royal history when he revisited the bridesmaid-dress saga in Spare. The Duke claimed the dispute erupted after Princess Catherine said her young daughter, Princess Charlotte, had “cried” because her dress was “too big, long and baggy”, before revealing the substance of private messages exchanged between the two women. Harry said he later found Meghan “on the floor sobbing”, although he acknowledged that his sister-in-law arrived with flowers and a card the following day to apologise. Nearly five years after the wedding, an intensely private disagreement involving the future Queen had been laid bare for millions.

2. Princess of Wales portrayed as cold over awkward hug

The Sussexes also punctured the warm public image surrounding the two couples in their Netflix documentary. Meghan recalled greeting William and Catherine while barefoot and wearing ripped jeans, explaining that her instinct had been to hug them – something she suggested proved “jarring”. The Duchess ultimately concluded that the formality displayed by the royals publicly “carried through on the inside”. While this was Meghan’s account rather than a direct allegation from Harry, the couple chose to include the awkward encounter in their highly publicised version of how relations with the Waleses deteriorated.

3. Catherine’s deeply personal ‘baby brain’ row exposed

The Duke disclosed an astonishingly personal disagreement involving the Princess shortly after she had given birth to Prince Louis. According to Spare, Meghan suggested Catherine had “baby brain” because of her hormones, prompting the future Queen to object that the two women were not close enough for the Duchess of Sussex to discuss her hormones. The Prince then detailed the tense confrontation that allegedly followed with Prince William and his wife. Whatever the rights and wrongs of the original spat, a deeply private conversation about his sister-in-law’s postpartum hormones was suddenly international news.

4. Harry dragged future Queen into Nazi costume disgrace

One of the most extraordinary claims in Spare concerned a scandal Harry had carried for almost two decades. The Duke alleged that he asked Prince William and his wife Catherine whether he should attend a 2005 fancy-dress party dressed as a pilot or in the infamous Nazi uniform – and claimed the pair encouraged the latter before laughing when they saw him wearing it. Harry had previously apologised for the costume, but his memoir dramatically expanded the story by placing his brother and the future Queen at the centre of the decision-making surrounding one of the most notorious episodes of his youth.

5. Princess said to have ‘grimaced’ at Meghan’s lip gloss request

Even a tube of lip gloss found its way into Harry’s account of the royal fallout. In Spare, he recalled Meghan asking to borrow Catherine’s before their 2018 Royal Foundation Forum appearance, describing the request as “an American thing”. Harry claimed the Princess was “taken aback”, reluctantly handed it over and then “grimaced” as Meghan applied some with her finger. An interaction that might ordinarily have been forgotten within minutes was instead preserved for posterity in Harry’s memoir.

6. Harry suggested Catherine felt threatened by Meghan

Harry went considerably further than simply recounting awkward encounters between the two women. In Spare, he speculated that the Princess was “on edge” because Meghan’s arrival meant she was “going to be compared to, and forced to compete with, Meg”. It was a striking characterisation of his sister-in-law, effectively suggesting the future Queen felt uneasy about the attention and comparisons generated by the Duchess’s arrival.

7. Princess portrayed as never truly warming to Meghan

Harry also challenged the idea that his wife and sister-in-law ever enjoyed the close relationship royal watchers once imagined. Speaking to ITV’s Tom Bradby, the Duke claimed there had been “a lot of stereotyping” surrounding Meghan and suggested Prince William and Princess Catherine had not expected him to enter a relationship with someone like her. Harry contrasted his early hopes that the two couples would work together with the increasingly strained relationship he later described. The once-glossy image of the “Fab Four” was replaced by Harry’s considerably frostier account of two women who, in his telling, never quite found common ground.