The royal relatives Prince William, Prince Harry, Peter Phillips, Zara Tindall, and Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie were pictured front and center at the wedding of our now-King and Queen, grinning broadly.
As the smiling and laughing relatives strolled side by side outside St George’s Chapel in Windsor in 2005, it was evident how close they were.
However, when Princess Anne’s 48-year-old son Peter marries his NHS nurse fiancée Harriet Sperling on June 6 at All Saints’ Church in Kemble, Gloucestershire, there probably won’t be any such heartwarming moments between the cousins.
Rather, the marriage will reveal the depressing condition of relations between the royal cousins, who grew up together and were once so close.
The two have “lost touch,” thus Prince Harry, who is closest to Peter in the previously mentioned photo from Charles and Camilla’s wedding, is not anticipated to be at his cousin’s wedding next month.
“Peter and Harry haven’t spoken for several years and have simply lost touch, so he hasn’t been invited,” a close friend of The Princess Royal’s son told HELLO!
In the Cotswolds, Peter and Harriet’s wedding is a private event surrounded by their close friends and immediate relatives. According to a friend, “it’s an area where they grew up and is very special to them both.”
To make matters worse, the groom once talked about how it “was a lot of fun” to spend family vacations in Sandringham, Balmoral, and Windsor with his cousins.
The royal cousins Prince William, Prince Harry, Peter Phillips, Zara Tindall, and Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie were pictured front and center at the wedding of our current King and Queen in 2005. “There was a lot of space for kids to run around in, and it wasn’t just us – it was the Waleses, Freddie and Ella Windsor, and the Gloucesters,” Peter remarked during a 2016 appearance on Good Morning Britain.
Growing up at that age, there was a big group of us, and it was a lot of fun. Fortunately, I don’t think we broke too much despite the mayhem and turmoil we produced!
Hello! I’m Richard Eden, the diary editor and newsletter writer for Palace Confidential.
The then-Meghan Markle raised red flags even prior to her marriage to Prince Harry with what my sources described as “a punch to the solar plexus.” It speaks volumes about everything that has transpired since. To read what I found, subscribe to the newsletter here.
However, with further turmoil surrounding Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie’s potential participation at Peter’s wedding, the cousins are unlikely to display their well-known closeness.
In what will be their first significant public appearance in months, the daughters of Prince Andrew and Sarah Ferguson are anticipated to attend the wedding alongside senior royals.
Following increased attention to their parents’ connections to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein earlier this year, Beatrice and Eugenie—who is expecting her third child—have maintained a noticeably quieter profile.
“The Royal Family needs good news, and nothing unites like a big church wedding,” an insider told The Sun. Eugenie is in the second trimester of her pregnancy but hopes to travel, and Beatrice is going. The King has always wanted both to stay in the family. They are welcome at family gatherings, he clarified.
The Mail on Sunday has been informed that Queen Camilla is one of those “leading the anti-York faction,” closely followed by Prince William, even if King Charles may be eager to make sure Eugenie and Beatrice are not penalized for their parents’ transgressions.
Senior members are still very concerned about how the scandal has affected the Firm’s reputation, and the Prince of Wales is still incensed about how his uncle’s wrongdoings have clouded the monarchy he will eventually inherit.
After attending the Service of Thanksgiving for the late Queen’s reign at Saint Paul’s Cathedral in London on June 3, 2022, Peter Phillips, Meghan Markle, Prince Harry, Zara, and Mike Tindall depart.
More recently, Camilla reportedly came to the conclusion that Beatrice and Eugenie, director of the Mayfair art gallery Hauser & Wirth, ought to cease using their titles, albeit voluntarily.
According to reports, Prince William is also worried about his cousins’ connections to Epstein, a topic on which both have remained awkwardly silent.
“William was eager to keep the girls close and not let them be tarnished by the sins of their father and the stupidity of both parents, but the Epstein revelations mean he has abandoned that plan,” the insider claims.
“He and Kate’s deliberate refusal to publicly celebrate the baby news is an indication of how things have changed.”
“Relations between the Yorks and the rest of the royals are at an all-time low,” stated Phil Dampier, a royal scholar and biographer.
“If attempts are being made to remove Andrew from the line of succession, there must be a chance that Beatrice and Eugenie, along with their offspring, will be removed as well, putting an end to the conflict.”
According to a royal insider, Charles is being pressured by the Queen and William to take “clearer action to distance the institution from the entire York branch of the family.”
Peter Phillips and Harriet Sperling attend the Cheltenham Festival. “The King is still very fond of Beatrice and Eugenie though,” the source continued. “William isn’t as close to Beatrice and Eugenie as Harry is, but in the past few years he has invited Beatrice and Eugenie along with other cousins to help him and Catherine host one of the Buckingham Palace garden parties.” “They weren’t there at this year’s one.” Among the cousins, only Zara was present. Right now, everything will be totally overshadowed by their participation at any royal occasion.
As the future King and Queen, Mr. Dampier feels that the Prince and Princess of Wales “need to separate themselves from any toxic relationships.”
“Kate has not said anything publicly, but friends tell me that although she was concerned about Andrew’s mental state and future, her attitude has hardened and she fully supports anything William does to distance themselves from them,” he continued.
It seems that only Zara, the groom’s cherished sister, and her equally cherished husband, Mike Tindall, will be able to unite the cousins on the day of Peter’s wedding.
Princess Anne’s daughter and her former rugby union player husband are close to William, the heir apparent, and have special ties to Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie. They are often regarded as the glue that keeps the Royal Family together.
In fact, Zara was one of the few people who was given the most recent information on Eugenie’s pregnancy, and she even convinced her to write to the King before it was made public.
King Charles and Queen Camilla, the groom’s mother Princess Anne, Vice Admiral Sir Tim Lawrence, Zara, and Mike Tindall are all anticipated to attend Peter’s wedding.
The Prince and Princess of Wales, Prince Edward, the Duke of Edinburgh, and Sophie, the Duchess of Edinburgh, are also anticipated to attend the Gloucestershire event.
But according to reports, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor has not been invited to the private wedding as the Firm continues to distance itself from the former prince in the wake of the long-running controversy involving convicted sex criminal Jeffrey Epstein.
After becoming connected in May 2024, Peter, 48, and Harriet, 45, formally announced their engagement in August of last year. They stated both families were “delighted” in a statement announcing the happy news.
After his marriage to Canadian-born Autumn Kelly ended, Peter will begin a new chapter with the wedding.
Before divorcing in 2019, they had two children, Savannah, who is now fifteen, and Isla, who is thirteen. They were married in a sumptuous wedding at St George’s Chapel in 2008. In 2021, their divorce was finalized.
With a 13-year-old daughter named Georgina from her former marriage, Harriet has swiftly established herself as a well-known and well-liked figure in royal circles.
She was spotted laughing with the King at Royal Ascot last summer after accompanying members of the Royal Family in the formal carriage parade, which is a clear indication of how well-liked she has grown inside the Firm.
The couple looked happy than ever when they went to the Cheltenham Festival earlier this year with Mike and Zara.
As Harriet proudly exhibited her engagement diamond, which was made by the same jeweler who fashioned the Queen’s famous 1946 engagement ring, Peter became visibly enamored. The brilliant design is claimed to feature a heartfelt tribute to the late Elizabeth II.
Harriet herself had affluent ties; through her late father, Rupert Sanders, she was related to the Duke of Gloucester.
According to royal biographer Richard Fitzwilliams, Peter’s first wedding, which supposedly left some members of the Royal Family “bewildered,” will be very different from the impending nuptials.
In the past, Harriet has talked candidly about the significance of faith in her life and how Christianity enabled her to overcome the difficulties of being a single mother.
She stated in an earlier interview that her “faith was always in me, but it was kind of dormant.”
“It didn’t seem relevant to my life in London,” she continued. But for me, the breakup of a seven-year relationship marked a sea change. I felt like something was lacking, so I went to church.
Harriet also frankly discussed the challenges of raising a child alone while finding solace in her faith in a piece she wrote for the Christian journal Woman Alive last year.
Harriet is “passionate about early brain development in babies and seeing children thrive,” according to her professional description. She works as a paediatric nursing specialist for the NHS and resides in Gloucestershire.
She was a member of a specialized medical team in 2010 that is credited with saving the life of a severely ill infant who had contracted a fatal infection at the age of three weeks.
Now, Peter and Harriet’s wedding is expected to be one of the most important private Royal Family celebrations of the year, with almost all senior royals expected to congregate in the Cotswolds this summer.
