King Charles gave Prince Harry tea as they came face to face in London on Wednesday for the first time in 19 months.
The long-awaited reconciliation meeting, which defied expectations, popular opinion, and the wishes of Prince William, happened after Charles jetted to London from Balmoral for his weekly round of cancer treatment. A report in the Daily Telegraph said the meeting lasted 45 minutes.
A friend of the king’s told the Daily Beast that the king would be “delighted” by the encounter and that it suggested that Harry either intended to or already had privately apologized for scathing remarks he made about Camilla Parker Bowles in his memoir and in media interviews, when he called her a “wicked stepmother” and said she was prepared to leave “bodies in the street” in her quest to be made queen.
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The friend said, “The king has always been very clear that he loves both his sons. It is in everyone’s interest to move on.”
Prince Harry will be delighted with the outcome, having engaged in a round of extraordinary public lobbying in recent months, telling the BBC that he wanted to reconcile with his father as he did not know how long the king had left to live as he battles cancer.
Hopes began to build Wednesday morning that Charles would meet Harry, who is in London for a series of charitable endeavors, after Charles was spotted boarding a flight to London from Aberdeen airport.
Still, it was an extraordinary and unexpected moment when Harry was spotted being driven into Clarence House, the king’s residence, on Wednesday afternoon.
Charles’ other son, William, has been fiercely opposed to any meeting, believing that Harry’s betrayal of the family warrants total and permanent exclusion from the fold. A source told the Daily Beast last week that if Charles were to defy William and meet his son, which he dearly wanted to do, it would risk worsening the already tense relationship between father and son.
However, there were clues that Charles wanted to reconcile with Harry, despite William’s objections, including the revelation that Charles’ funeral plans have specified that Harry and wife Meghan Markle are to be given a prominent place in the arrangements.
It seems that Charles’ natural tendency to conciliate won out over his other son’s warnings in the end.
Harry last met his father when he flew back for a 30-minute meeting at Clarence House in February 2024 after the king announced he had cancer.
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