THEY both married into the royal family, but sadly it appears Meghan Markle and Princess Kate’s rumoured feud shows no signs of thawing.
The Duchess of Sussex gave a rare insight into their relationship as she welcomed a journalist from The Cut into the £12million Montecito mansion she shares with Prince Harry.
During the chat, Meghan, 43, claimed she was never required to sign anything by the palace that prevented her from talking about her royal experiences.
She revealed: “It’s interesting, I’ve never had to sign anything that restricts me from talking.
“I can talk about my whole experience and make a choice not to.”
Meghan was then asked why she doesn’t say more about her time as a working royal with Prince William, Princess Kate and the rest of the royal family.
She answered: “Still healing.”
‘Wonderful’ Kate
Meghan and Kate are said to have had a rather fractious relationship, although it started fairly amicably.
After announcing their engagement, Meghan and Harry gave an interview to the BBC’s Mishal Husain from their home Nottingham Cottage in the grounds of Kensington Palace.
During the interview, Meghan praised the Royal Family, The Queen and her future sister-in-law Kate Middleton for all being so welcoming.
Describing how there was a period of time where they kept their romance under wraps, Harry said Prince William was desperate to meet his girlfriend.
He said: “William was longing to meet [Meghan] and so was Catherine, so you know, being our neighbours, we managed to get that in quite a few times now and Catherine has been absolutely -“
Meghan interrupted Harry mid-sentence to describe Kate as “wonderful”.
However, Meghan claimed there was a difference between how formal she and Kate were behind closed doors.
In her Netflixdocumentary Harry & Meghan, the Duchess said: “Even when Will and Kate came over and I was meeting her for the first time I remember I was in ripped jeans, I was barefoot.
“Like I was a hugger, I have always been a hugger I didn’t realise that is really jarring for a lot of Brits.
“I started to understand that the formality on the outside carried through on the inside, that there is a forward facing way of being and then you close the door and think ‘OK we can relax now’.
“But that formality carries over on both sides and that was surprising to me.”
Meghan ‘in tears’
Prince Harry and Meghan tied the knot in a fairytale ceremony in Windsor in May 2018 – but it wasn’t without drama.
In the lead-up, it was reported that the bride-to-be and Kate had a disagreement that ended in tears.
The fallout between the two soon-to-be sisters-in-law came after alleged disagreements surrounding Meghan’s choice of the flower girls’ dresses.
Royal sources said the pressure of the “stressful” fitting became too much and that Kate was left shaken and in tears.
But, in an explosive tell-all chat with Oprah Winfrey, Meghan revealed it was Kate that made her cry just days before her wedding.
When Oprah asked Meghan if it was true that she’d made Kate cry, the Duchess replied: “No, no, the reverse happened.
“I don’t say that to be disparaging to anyone. She was upset about something, she owned it, she brought me flowers and brought a note apologising.
“She did what I would do if I hurt someone.”
The Duchess said the confrontation had “really hurt my feelings” and was a “turning point” in their relationship, adding: “I don’t think it’s fair to her to get into the details of that because she apologised, and I’ve forgiven her.
Meghan explained to Oprah during the interview that it wasn’t the flower girl dresses argument that upset her but the lack of response from the royal family when false reports came out that she was the one who made Kate cry.
Speaking to Oprah, Meghan said: “What was hard to get over was being blamed for something not only I did not do, but that happened to me.”
‘Baby brain’
Prince Harry recalled in his bombshell memoir Spare that the women had a bust-up after Meghan made a comment about Kate’s hormones.
He recalled the feud began during a phone call about wedding rehearsals when Meghan said the Princess of Wales must have “baby brain”.
“We are not close enough for you to talk about my hormones,” Kate is said to have replied.
During all three of her pregnancies, Kate suffered from hyperemesis gravidarum– excessive nausea and vomiting caused by a hormone imbalance.
Harry tells how Kate was upset – but that Meghan apologised and said that is how she speaks to her friends.
Lip gloss snub
Harry also shared how Meghan once asked to borrow his sister-in-law Kate‘s new lip gloss as she’d forgotten hers.
He called the moment, which happened ahead of the Waleses’ Royal Foundation Forum, an “American thing”.
The Prince wrote: “Kate, taken aback, went into her handbag and reluctantly pulled out a small tube.
“Meg squeezed some onto her finger and applied it to her lips. Kate grimaced.”
Will Meghan make peace with Kate?
During her interview with The Cut, Meghan was asked if she thought there was hope of a reconciliation between her and the rest of the royal family.
Meghan said: “I think forgiveness is really important. It takes a lot more energy to not forgive.
“But it takes a lot of effort to forgive.
“I’ve really made an active effort, especially knowing that I can say anything.
“I have a lot to say until I don’t. Do you like that? Sometimes, as they say, the silent part is still part of the song.”
A timeline of Prince Harry's family feud
The first hints of friction reportedly came after William was introduced to Meghan when she was staying at Kensington Palace.
Once she’d returned home to Canada, William and Harry sat down for a brother-to-brother chat.
He knew Harry was already head-over-heels for her but it has been claimed he advised him to take it slowly.
The younger prince reportedly didn’t take too kindly to the advice, with one royal source saying he “went mental”.
Then in June 2019 Harry and Meghan officially split off from the charity they shared with William and Kate.
The Royal Foundation will be divided between the Sussexes and Cambridges as the couples focus on their own separate charitable endeavours.
Prince William and Prince Harry first established the Royal Foundation in 2009 before Kate joined two years later shortly after their engagement was announced.
The trio would often appear together at events and the Foundation had huge successes with projects like the Invictus Games for injured veterans and the mental health Heads Together campaign.
The Royal Foundation said the decision was made following the conclusion of a review into its structure – but added both couples will continue to work together in the future.
Harry and Meg were living in close proximity to Kate and Wills within the Kensington Palace estate, but they switched to Frogmore Cottage in Windsor before baby Archie was born.
The move further increased rumours of a fallout.
Harry also hinted in his ITV documentary “Harry and Meghan, An African Journey” that he and his brother had grown apart.
In 2021, Harry and Meghan give their bombshell interview with Oprah Winfrey where Harry accused his dad of cutting him off financially.
Harry then jetted back to UK to join William in unveiling a statue to their mother Princess Diana in the grounds of Kensington Palace. But sources claimed William didn’t want to attend the memorial amid their ongoing rift.
In 2022, just before their grandmother the Queen died, sources claimed Kate acts as a “peacemaker” between the brothers.
Harry claimed his brother “knocked him to the floor” during an argument about Meghan, in his memoir.
In Spare, Harry said William branded Meghan “rude” and “difficult” during a row.
Harry alleged William “grabbed me by the collar, ripping my necklace, and … knocked me to the floor”.
He said he was left with a visible injury to his back following the argument in 2019 at Nottingham Cottage on the grounds of Kensington Palace, where he was living at the time.
In January this year, Harry flew in to be with Charles after the monarch’s shock cancer diagnosis.
Harry flew back to the US the following day – without seeing Wills.
In May he visited the UK for a three-day visit without seeing King Charles or Prince William.