Harry’s relationship with Camilla didn’t seem to get off to the best start

Prince Harry didn’t hold back when it came to Queen Camilla in his memoir, Spare, laying bare his nerves and doubts about meeting her for the first time and what her role might mean in his life.

Now 41, the Duke of Sussex revealed that during the early days of his father’s relationship with Camilla, he even pleaded with King Charles not to marry her.

At the time, Harry admitted he feared she could turn into a “wicked stepmother”, a worry that lingered long before she officially joined the family.
The Duke of Sussex mentioned Queen Camilla in his memoir (Credit: Thomas Krych/ZUMA Press/Cover Images)

Prince Harry made Queen Camilla confession in Spare

Spare was packed with moments that made headlines, and Harry’s reflections on Camilla were among the most talked-about.

In the book, Harry explained that he and Prince William ultimately chose not to block their father’s relationship with Camilla. Even so, he admitted he had asked Charles not to marry again, openly referring to Camilla as “the other woman”.

I remember wondering if she would be cruel to me.

Camilla had long been labelled the “other woman” during Charles’ marriage to Princess Diana, Harry and William’s mother, and those feelings clearly coloured Harry’s early impressions.

Writing in Spare, Harry recalled: “Despite Willy [Prince William] and me urging him not to, Pa was going ahead. We pumped his hand, wished him well. No hard feelings. We recognised that he was finally going to be with the woman he loved, the woman he’d always loved.”

Prince Harry’s ‘wicked stepmother’ comment

Harry didn’t stop there when describing his first encounter with Camilla, comparing it to something he simply wanted to get over with.

“Close your eyes, over before you know it,” he wrote.

He added that he remembered Camilla seeming just as calm, or even bored, as he was. According to Harry, neither of them appeared particularly concerned about making a good impression. “She wasn’t my mother, and I wasn’t her biggest hurdle. In other words, I wasn’t the Heir. This bit with me was mere formality,” he wrote.

Still, his worries were clear. “I remember wondering if she would be cruel to me. If she would be like all the wicked stepmothers in the stories,” Harry admitted.

In a 2023 interview with Good Morning America, Harry later softened that view, addressing the phrase directly. “I don’t look at her as an evil stepmother,” he said. “I see someone who married into this institution, and has done everything she can to improve her own reputation and her own image, for her own sake.”
Harry also made claims about William in his book (Credit: Neil Warner)

Prince Harry on ‘physical altercation’ with William

Elsewhere in Spare, Harry turned his attention to his fractured relationship with Prince William, detailing an incident he claims became physical.

According to Harry, the brothers clashed in 2019 after William allegedly criticised Meghan Markle, calling her “difficult”, “rude”, and “abrasive”.

Harry wrote that as tempers flared, he stepped into the kitchen and offered his brother a glass of water. What happened next, he said, took him by surprise.

“He set down the water, called me another name, then came at me. It all happened so fast. So very fast. He grabbed me by the collar, ripping my necklace, and he knocked me to the floor,” Harry claimed.

“I landed on the dog’s bowl, which cracked under my back, the pieces cutting into me. I lay there for a moment, dazed, then got to my feet and told him to get out.”

Harry added that the future king later left “looking regretful, and apologised”.