The British Royal family has been embroiled in a slew of scandals and drama in recent years. Yet few have provoked the same enduring furore as the story of Diana, Princess of Wales, whose death continues to reopen old wounds more than two decades later.
Now, Charles Spencer, the 9th Earl and Diana’s younger brother, is revisiting her death with intimate revelations in his forthcoming memoir, Swan Song: Diana, My Sister.
An extract from the memoir, which is being exclusively serialised via The Daily Mail, has already prompted an unusually pointed response from King Charles, after Spencer claimed that the then Prince of Wales told him, mere days after Diana’s death: “Rest assured, we’ll forget her soon enough.”
Buckingham Palace issued a rare statement in response, saying: “While we do not comment on books as a matter of principle, His Majesty is mindful that the pain of fraternal grief can cloud reason, affect judgment and colour memory in ways others do not recognise, even many years after such a loss.”
Earl Spencer’s memoir also delves into the bitter disagreement over whether Diana’s young sons, William (then 15), and Harry (then 12), should walk behind their mother’s coffin during her funeral procession.
While Spencer writes that he was unequivocally opposed to the decision, he allegedly received a phone call from Charles, who argued that he himself had to walk in the funeral procession of his great-uncle, Lord Mountbatten, 18 years earlier.
According to Spencer, the conversation quickly soured when he noted that Charles had been 30 at the time of Lord Mountbatten’s funeral, rather than the young ages of William and Harry.
Spencer claims that Charles then “went nuts” before unleashing what Spencer interpreted as long-held resentment towards Diana and anger at the extraordinary public reaction to her death. “Rest assured,” Spencer recalls him saying, “we’ll forget her soon enough!”
Spencer writes that he was so stunned by the alleged remark that he took several seconds to respond. “‘I can’t believe you just said that,’ I said flatly, before hanging up,” he writes.
Swan Song: Diana, My Sister is due to be published on September 22. The revelations come against a backdrop of continuing tensions within the Royal Family. Relations between Diana’s sons, William and Harry, remain strained, while Harry is understood to have maintained some communication with his father since returning to the UK.
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