Prince Harry Seemingly Ended His Relationship with Stepmom Camilla with a Single Word
Prince Harry has not really held back in letting his opinions about Queen Camilla be known, despite it straining his relationship with father King Charles.
Whether it was his explosive memoir Spare or Netflix docu-series Harry & Meghan, Prince Harry has not really held back in letting his opinions about Queen Camilla be known. In Spare, Harry revealed that he and his brother, Prince William, weren't initially encouraging of their father, King Charles's decision to remarry. In his interview with 60 Minutes in 2023, he elaborated on the brutal words he used to describe Camilla in his memoir.
He stated, "Because of the need for her to rehabilitate her image...That made her dangerous because of the connections that she was forging within the British press. There was an open willingness on both sides to trade information. And with a family built on hierarchy, and with her, on the way to being Queen Consort, there were gonna be people or bodies left in the street because of that." Harry shared that for years, he felt like a piece in the royal PR game. He claimed that Camilla — and sometimes even his father — used him and William to score better headlines.
He explained, "She was the villain. She was the third person in their (Charles and Princess Diana's) marriage. She needed to rehabilitate her image." Harry and William personally urged their father not to marry Camilla, worried she might take on the role of a 'wicked stepmother.' Harry stressed, "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, 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, 'Ok.'"
When details of Spare reached Camilla, she wasn’t thrilled to discover she’d been cast as the villain, especially after years of rebuilding her public image. Fiona Shelburne, the Marchioness of Lansdowne — one of Camilla’s very close friends and the godmother of her daughter — revealed how the Queen Consort reacted to the harsh words. She said, "Of course it bothers her, of course it hurts. But she doesn't let it get to her. Her philosophy is always, 'Don't make a thing of it, and it will settle down — least said, soonest mended.'"
Looking back at the past, Shelburne recalled how Camilla lived through constant media scrutiny, as reported by The Sunday Times. Before she married Charles in April 2005, Camilla was often kept in the background, rarely seen beside Charles in public and excluded from official royal events. Undeterred, Charles let his family know that Camilla was to be a non-negotiable part of his life when getting the late Queen Elizabeth to bestow her blessings. Reflecting on the same, Shelburne stressed that Charles and Camilla make an exceptional couple and highlighted just how much he depends on her.
