Queen Elizabeth was so angry that Prince Harry and Meghan Markle had named their daughter Lilibet—the late queen’s pet name, used by those closest to her—that she told aides: “I don’t own the palaces, I don’t own the paintings, the only thing I own is my name. And now they’ve taken that.”
The Daily Mail’s Royal Editor Rebecca English revealed the anguished quote after her colleague Robert Hardman, in his new book, Charles III: New King, New Court. The Inside Story (published as The Making of a King: King Charles III and the Modern Monarchy in the US), wrote that Lilibet’s naming had so infuriated the late monarch that one source described her as being “as angry as I’d ever seen her” as a result.
English wrote that Harry and Meghan “would not have intended to cause her grief—over this, at any rate. Barricaded in their Californian cocoon, blanketed by the cosy schmaltz of their new showbiz life, it simply wouldn’t have occurred to the couple that such a gesture would cause offense.”
Hardman’s book sheds new light on the bizarre row that developed after the queen’s team denied she had given her approval for the name to the BBC, only for Harry and Meghan’s team to insist she had.
As The Daily Beast revealed at the time, newspapers were threatened with legal action by Harry and Meghan if they repeated the BBC claims, but the threat was never actioned.
The affectionate nickname Lilibet was used by the late queen’s parents, King George VI and the Queen Mother, and a handful of other people, including her sister, Princess Margaret, and her husband, Prince Philip.
At the time, the palace briefed that the queen had not been asked for her permission, and a spokesperson for the Sussexes responded: “The duke spoke with his family in advance of the announcement—in fact his grandmother was the first family member he called. During that conversation, he shared their hope of naming their daughter Lilibet in her honor. Had she not been supportive, they would not have used the name.”
Hardman writes in his book: “One source privately recalled that Elizabeth II had been ‘as angry as I’d ever seen her’ in 2021 after the Sussexes announced that she had given them her blessing to call their baby daughter ‘Lilibet,’ the queen’s childhood nickname.
“Once again, it was a case of ‘recollections may vary’—the late queen’s reaction to the Oprah Winfrey interview—as far as Her Majesty was concerned.”
— Robert Hardman
“The couple subsequently fired off warnings of legal action against anyone who dared to suggest otherwise, as the BBC had done. However, when the Sussexes tried to co-opt the Palace into propping up their version of events, they were rebuffed.
“Once again, it was a case of ‘recollections may vary’—the late queen’s reaction to the Oprah Winfrey interview—as far as Her Majesty was concerned. Those noisy threats of legal action duly evaporated and the libel actions against the BBC never materialized.”
The Daily Beast contacted Harry and Meghan’s office for comment.
