The future King Charles has allegedly said Princess Diana would soon be forgotten, her brother Earl Spencer claimed in his new memoir. Buckingham Palace was quick to challenge his recollection of the days after her death.
Earl Spencer placed the potentially bombshell remark in an argument over whether William and Harry should walk behind their mother’s coffin.
His testimony, reported ahead of the publication of Swan Song: Diana, My Sister, has reopened a dispute over how the two boys were treated while Britain mourned the death of the ‘People’s Princess’ almost three decades ago, in 1997.
«Rest assured, we’ll forget her soon enough,» then-Prince Charles allegedly said at the time, according to The Guardian’s citation of the extract.
Spencer describes Charles as furious and says he interpreted the remark as contempt for Diana and resentment of the public response to her death. That is his interpretation of the exchange.
«I can’t believe you just said that,» Spencer recalls replying before hanging up, according to a different book extract.
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The argument over William and Harry
William was 15 and Harry 12 when their mother died. Spencer says he opposed plans for them to join the procession because he believed Diana would not have wanted it. The disagreement escalated during a telephone conversation with their father, according to The Independent.
The disagreement concerned a funeral held just six days after Diana’s death. She died following a Paris car crash on 31 August 1997.
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Palace questions Spencer’s memory
In a statement to The Independent, Buckingham Palace said it did not normally comment on books, then suggested grief could distort a bereaved brother’s recollection.
It said the King recognised that such grief could «cloud reason, affect judgement and colour memory in ways others do not recognise».
The royal family’s official account of that week records that Charles accompanied Diana’s coffin back from Paris with her two sisters. Charles and Diana had divorced in August 1996 but continued to share responsibility for their sons.
