Prince Harry and Prince William’s First Big Falling out Had Major Similarities to Today’s
Things between Prince William and Prince Harry seem to be worse than ever in the wake of Harry & Meghan. At one time they were, in the Duke of Sussex’s words, “on different paths.” Then the relationship became “space” and, finally, “heartbreaking.” Although this isn’t the first time the brothers have been at odds. They had a falling out decades earlier, which had similarities to their current rift.
Prince Harry visited a drug rehabilitation center with King Charles in 2002 after a tabloid incident
Harry and the now-Prince of Wales had a rare falling out in 2002, according to royal expert Katie Nicholl.
“Harry was caught underage drinking at a Gloucestershire pub and smoking cannabis at Highgrove,” she said (via Vanity Fair). “William was also at the pub with his brother while he was drinking heavily.”
“But unlike Harry,” she noted, “William’s name wasn’t splashed over the tabloids.” The New Royals author continued. King Charles III‘s then-aides had “damage limitation meetings with the News of the World, which broke the story.”
The meetings resulted in Harry, alongside King Charles III, visiting a “drug rehabilitation center to minimize the damage to his and his father’s reputation.”
Harry reportedly ‘resented taking the blame’ and didn’t talk to William in 2002
After the incident that caused the rift, Harry, per Nicholl, stopped talking to William in what became their first big falling out.
“According to one former palace aide, Harry resented taking the blame while William got away scot-free, even though William had been the one to introduce Harry to the pub,” she said.
“The palace had to be seen to protect Charles and William so it was Harry who took the stick,” the aide told her in William and Harry: Behind Palace Walls.
Mark Bolland, the king’s then-“spin doctor,” brought William to Eton College to see Harry. Quoting a former aide Nicholl noted William, now 40, “felt guilty that his brother had taken all the blame while he came out as Mr. Goody Two Shoes.”
“For the first time their relationship really suffered and they barely spoke,” the aide said. “In the end Harry forgave William but it took some time.”
Prince Harry told Netflix that Prince William got protection and he and Meghan Markle didn’t
Meanwhile, a number of Harry’s quotes from his and Meghan Markle’s six-part docuseries suggest the latest rift with William is, at least in some ways, history repeating itself.
“They were happy to lie to protect my brother,” he told Netflix. “They were never willing to tell the truth to protect us.”
Sound familiar? Additionally, Harry discussed the “wedge” between him and William.
“The saddest part of it was this wedge created between myself and my brother so he is now on the institution side,” he said. “Part of that, I get. That is his inheritance. To some extent, that is already ingrained in him, that part of his responsibility is the survivability and continuation of this institution.”
