When Prince Harry Upstaged Princess Charlotte’s 10th Birthday With Bombshell Move
Many believe Prince Harry's carefully timed move on Princess Charlotte's 10th birthday was a pointed attempt to rattle the royals.
What was meant to be a momentous occasion for the royal family turned sour after Prince Harry's bombshell BBC interview aired on May 2nd last year. The date, interestingly, also marked Princess Charlotte's 10th birthday, with her milestone double-digit entry overshadowed by his scathing remarks about the Firm. The Duke of Sussex gave the interview shortly after losing his court battle over taxpayer-funded security, a move many viewed as a pointed attempt to rattle the royals.
On the evening of May 2, the royals found themselves plastered in headlines once again, not for Charlotte's birthday, but due to the Duke's plea for reconciliation. He told BBC interviewer Nada Tawfik, "Of course, they [the royals] will never forgive me for lots of things, but...there's no point in continuing to fight anymore. Life is precious. I don't know how much longer my father has; he won't speak to me because of this security stuff. It would be nice to reconcile." Seemingly changing his tune minutes later, he blamed the firm for his loss, alleging that they were behind the court's decision to keep him from receiving similar security to that of working royals.
To add insult to injury, he stressed that he would not bring his wife and children to the UK until his publicly funded protection was retained. "Whether you're the government, the royal household, whether you're my dad, my family—despite all of our differences—do you not want to just ensure our safety?" he said during a discussion on his family's protection in his home country. Arguing that his security battle was at the heart of a "family dispute," he added, "It makes me really, really sad that we're sitting here today, five years later, where a decision that was made most likely, in fact, I know, to keep us under the roof."
Shortly after the interview aired, Buckingham Palace was forced to go into damage control mode and issue a statement, instead of keeping the focus on Charlotte's birthday. They said, "All of these issues have been examined repeatedly and meticulously by the courts, with the same conclusion reached on each occasion." As for the young Princess's big day, Prince William and Kate Middleton followed royal tradition and shared an adorable birthday portrait of her on the family's social media, sitting on a patch of grass wearing a camouflage jacket and flashing a bright grin in Cumbria.
