Prince Harry Says He and William Asked Charles Not to Marry ‘Villain’ Camilla, Accuses Her of Trading Stories About Him to Curry Favor With Brit Press
Prince Harry spilled more sordid details of his fraught relationship with his family on 60 Minutes Sunday, telling Anderson Cooper that he and Prince William asked their father not to marry Camilla and even accused his stepmother of currying favor with the British press by trading unfavorable stories about him and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex.
Harry and Meghan have raised eyebrows with a series of candid confessions and shocking accusations against the royal family in a May 2021 interview with Oprah, a Netflix documentary series, and Harry’s new autobiography, Spare, referring to his role in the shadow of his older brother and heir to the throne, William.
The second-born son sat down with Cooper to discuss his memoir and how the conflict within the British royal family has developed in the aftermath of the death of his mother Princess Diana in a 1997 car crash in Paris, the marriage of his father King Charles III to Camilla in 2005, Harry’s own relationship with Meghan and 2018 marriage, Charles’ ascension to the throne after the death of Queen Elizabeth II, and the Sussexes’ decision to step back from the royal family.
In her infamous 1995 BBC interview with Martin Bashir, Diana described her turbulent marriage to Charles as “a bit crowded” because “there were three of us in this marriage,” referring to his ongoing affair with Camilla.
“The British tabloids ran with it” — that quote from Diana — Cooper narrated to introduce the clip, “and Prince Harry has never forgotten.”
PRINCE HARRY: She was the villain. She was the third person in their marriage. She needed to rehabilitate her image.
ANDERSON COOPER: You and your brother both directly asked your dad not to marry Camilla?
PRINCE HARRY: Yes.
ANDERSON COOPER: Why?
PRINCE HARRY: We didn’t think it was necessary. We thought that it was gonna cause more harm than good and that if he was now with his person, that — surely that’s enough. Why go that far when you don’t necessarily need to? We wanted him to be happy. And we saw how happy he was with her. So, at the time, it was, “Okay.”
ANDERSON COOPER: You wrote that she started a campaign in the British press to pave the way for a marriage. And you wrote, “I even wanted Camilla to be happy. Maybe she’d be less dangerous if she was happy.” How was she dangerous?
PRINCE HARRY: Because of the need for her to rehabilitate her image.
ANDERSON COOPER: That made her dangerous?
PRINCE HARRY: That made her dangerous because of the connections that she was forging within the British press. And there was open willingness on both sides to trade of information. And with a family built on hierarchy, and with her, on the way to being Queen consort, there was gonna be people or bodies left in the street because of that.
COOPER [Narrating]: Harry says over the years, he was one of those bodies. He accuses Camilla and even his father, at times, of using him or William to get better tabloid coverage for themselves. Prince Harry writes, Camilla “sacrificed me on her personal P.R. altar.”
PRINCE HARRY: If you are led to believe, as a member of the family, that being on the front page, having positive headlines, positive stories written about you, is going to improve your reputation or increase the chances of you being accepted as monarch by the British public, then that’s what you’re gonna do.
Watch the video above via 60 Minutes on CBS.
