Princess Diana's brother reveals Charles' 'contempt' for her, hopes she'd be forgotten

Get ready for another storm to descend on Buckingham Palace and the reign of King Charles III following the tempestuous return of Prince Harry and Meghan Markle to the United Kingdom.

The Daily Mail on Wednesday published a preview of a hotly anticipated new book on the late Princess Diana, and it reveals comments that Charles allegedly made nearly 30 years ago that “are certain to send shockwaves” through the British royal family.

The book is “Swan Song: Diana, My Sister,” a memoir by Diana’s brother, Charles Spencer. In the Daily Mail preview, Spencer reveals that the king expressed “pent-up contempt” for his ex-wife, six days after her 1997 death in a Paris crash. The then-Prince Charles also allegedly told her brother, “Rest assured, we’ll forget her soon enough.”

The king made these alleged comments during a heated conversation he had with Spencer after Diana’s death sparked a global outpouring of grief, the Daily Mail reported. The men were talking about plans for Diana’s funeral and whether her sons, Prince William and Prince Harry, then ages 15 and 12, would walk behind her coffin in the funeral procession.

Spencer said he heard about this idea from one of Queen Elizabeth II’s senior aides and declared, “That’s not going to happen,” the Daily Mail reported. Spencer said he received a phone call from Charles a few minutes later, during which he told Charles that his sister would not have wanted her sons to endure such a public ordeal.

According to Spencer, Charles questioned the Spencer family’s sense of duty and said the idea came from his own experience, 18 years earlier, when he walked in the funeral procession of Lord Mountbatten. Charles’ adored great-uncle was killed in a 1979 terrorist bombing. Spencer claimed that Charles “went nuts” after he pointed out that the then-Prince of Wales was 30 years old at the time of Mountbatten’s funeral.

In what the Daily Mail called “one of the book’s most extraordinary passages,” Spencer wrote: “Prince Charles continued his stream of anger, without me interrupting. Then he stopped.”

“I assumed the pause signaled an effort to bring himself under control, but then he unleashed down the phone what I have always taken to be his pent-up contempt for Diana, and his horror that the world was so bowled over by her death,” Spencer continued.

That’s when, according to Spencer, Charles “hissed” and said, “Rest assured, we’ll forget her soon enough!”’

Spencer wrote that he was “so stunned” by the future king’s alleged remarks that he took a few seconds to reply.

“‘I can’t believe you just said that,’ I said flatly, before hanging up,” he wrote.

Spencer’s description of the king’s outburst threatens to reopen national wounds about Diana’s death and the controversy surrounding her troubled marriage to Charles, their eventual divorce and his subsequent marriage to Camilla, who had been his mistress, the Daily Mail said. Spencer’s book, described as “historic” and ‘extraordinarily moving,” is due to be published worldwide next Tuesday.

A Buckingham Palace spokesperson offered a seemingly sympathetic but ultimately dismissive response to Spencer’s recall of the phone call and news about the book’s publication, People magazine reported.

“His Majesty is mindful that the pain of fraternal grief can cloud reason, affect judgment and color memory in ways others do not recognize, even many years after such a loss,” the spokesperson said.

The book could amplify divisions within in the royal family. The king is facing criticism over his handling of Harry’s return to the U.K., while William reportedly wants nothing to do with his younger brother, from whom he is estranged.

Royal observers also have written about tensions between the brothers because of Harry’s reported attempts to somehow claim that he’s the true heir of their mother’s legacy as both a public figure and as a global philanthropist. There have been reports that one reason that Harry and his American wife have moved back to the U.K. after six turbulent years in the United States is so that they can produce a documentary about Diana’s life to mark the 30th anniversary of her death.

Back in 2017, when the brothers were still close, they participated in the BBC documentary, “Diana: 7 Days,” which explored the week of public grief following her death, People reported. In that documentary, both William and Harry confirmed that it was a “group decision” for them to join their mother’s funeral procession, with William saying, “It wasn’t an easy decision, and it was a collective family decision to do that.”

In his 2023 memoir, “Spare,” Harry said that “it seemed a lot to ask of two young boys” to join the procession. He also said that “several adults were aghast” and recalled that his Uncle Charles “raised hell.” An alternative plan was proposed, in which William would do the walk, while the younger Harry would not have to participate.

“Back came the answer,” Harry wrote. “It must be both princes. To garner sympathy, presumably.” Harry also acknowledged that he didn’t want his older brother to have to do the walk on his own, “so, come morning, bright and early, off we went, all together.”