That this anomaly arose at all shows how genuinely naive Meghan and Harry were, or how brazen, depending on your perspective. They could easily have trademarked something else - their names, their initials, anything beneath the ducal coronet such as the obscure Archewell which they have subsequently come up with - and not fallen foul of the law. But in presuming that they could simply exploit Sussex Royal they showed, at the very least, how ignorant they both were of even the most basic elements of English society, or then how confident they were that they would prevail over both precedence and the law.
Although Garter’s actions were on behalf of the Queen, and it is she who ultimately prevented Meghan and Harry from using the word royal in their branding, Her Majesty nevertheless had been intent on doing her utmost to paper over as many cracks as she could, despite always putting the good of the Crown before all personal considerations, as she has done time and again during her long reign.
In the past, there had been occasions when Elizabeth II’s personal choices were stark, such as when she accepted the advice of Sir Winston Churchill to retain the surname of Windsor for the dynasty in preference to Mountbatten, and in so doing created an issue between herself and Prince Philip which took the remainder of the decade to resolve. Or when she remained resolutely neutral during Princess Margaret’s marriage crisis over Group Captain Peter Townsend, which caused problems between her and her sister. Harry should have appreciated that his grandmother was no pushover, but possibly neither he nor Meghan understood the limitations to which they were subjected where exploiting their royal identity was concerned.
Despite being no cinch when the family trespasses on hallowed royal turf, the Queen nevertheless has been an extremely indulgent mother and grandmother. It is likely that this is what allowed Harry to believe that his and Meghan’s extraordinary demands would succeed. She has been the antithesis of the controlling parent and grandparent. Her critics would say that she has been too understanding. Had she been less so, she would have had less to understand.
Of all the royals present at that meeting in January 2020 when she, Charles, William and Harry were deciding how best to proceed, the Queen was the most inclined to take a lenient view, aiming for the couple to achieve as many of their objectives as would be realistically possible without damaging the monarchy - even if that meant recalibrating customs.
Her attitude was reflected in the statement she issued at the end of the meeting:
“Today my family had very constructive discussions on the future of my grandson and his family.
“My family and I are entirely supportive of Harry and Meghan’s desire to create a new life as a young family. Although we would have preferred them to remain full-time working members of the Royal Family, we respect and understand their wish to live a more independent life as a family while remaining a valued part of my family.
“Harry and Meghan have made clear that they do not want to be reliant on public funds in their new lives.
“It has therefore been agreed that there will be a period of transition in which the Sussexes will spend time in Canada and the UK.
“These are complex matters for my family to resolve, and there is some more work to be done, but I have asked for final decisions to be reached in the coming days.”
Understandably, the press examined the statement from all angles, including a few that have never existed. In reality, Meghan and Harry were sailing into uncharted waters. There was talk of them ‘abdicating’, and they were linked to the Duke and Duchess of Windsor.
There were indeed parallels between Harry and Meghan Sussex and David and Wallis Windsor. Both Meghan and Wallis were American and both were divorcees. Harry and his great-great-great uncle did indeed throw over their royal positions for the love of a woman. Both of them were compulsively and obsessively in love with the women who became their wives. Both were co-dependent upon their love objects, as indeed were David’s brother and Harry’s great-grandfather King George VI upon Elizabeth Bowes Lyon, later Queen Elizabeth, then the Queen Mother. This extreme co-dependency was a feature of several of the Hanoverian royals over the centuries, including their common ancestor King George III and his son the 1st Duke of Sussex, who was Queen Victoria’s Uncle Augustus. He had two unsuitable, indeed invalid, wives, the first being Lady Augusta Murray, the mother of his two children, and the second, Lady Cecilia Buggin. Ever the romantic, Queen Victoria took pity on her uncle and his invalid second wife once she became queen, and since it was not possible to revoke the Royal Marriages Act of 1772 and make Aunt Cecilia Duchess of Sussex, she instead made her the Duchess of Inverness in her own right. This was truly astonishing, and showed to what extent Victoria was both a romantic and flexible, an attitude some courtiers believe Queen Elizabeth II inherited from
