Thomas Markle Explains Releasing Letter From Daughter Meghan To Media: ‘I Have To Defend Myself’

It’s been a whirlwind last couple of weeks for the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle. They took their first international trip together with new baby Archie, traveling to southern Africa on a state-sponsored trip. Before the royal tour was over, Harry and Meghan made headlines for a completely different reason.

After finding out that excerpts from the private letter that Meghan wrote to her father were leaked by The Mail on Sunday, Harry released a statement stating that his wife was taking the publication to court, as reported by The Inquisitr.

Now, Meghan’s father, Thomas Markle, is explaining why he gave the publication a copy of his private correspondence with his daughter.

According to a new article published yesterday in The Mail on Sunday‘s sister publication, The Daily Mail, Thomas decided to break his silence on why he decided to hand over the letter to the tabloid. Meghan’s father wrote that it was due to the article written about her in People that he decided to take action.

“I decided to release parts of the letter because of the article from Meghan’s friends in People magazine. I have to defend myself. I only released parts of the letter because other parts were so painful. The letter didn’t seem loving to me. I found it hurtful,” Thomas told The Daily Mail. He continued by saying that he felt he had to set the record straight.

In the People article, Meghan’s “inner circle” spoke out about the private lives of Meghan and Harry, most likely in an attempt to mitigate the negative rumors that have been plaguing the actress since she was first linked to the prince. However, in defending their friend, they may have made things worse.

Thomas said he felt the interpretation by her friends of the five-page letter his daughter sent to him three months after her wedding was wrong. Her friends described the letter as loving and an attempt to reconnect, but Thomas said he felt the opposite.

“There was no loving message in there, nothing asking about my health, nothing from her saying, ‘Let’s get together and heal our differences,'” he described, saying he felt the letter was more of a “final goodbye” than an attempt at reconciliation.

Meghan’s father went on to say that he wrote his daughter back — in a letter he said was thought out and detailed — but he never heard back from her. He said he didn’t even know if she received the letter until one of Meghan’s friends went on mention his response in the People article.

In that article, Meghan’s friend said Thomas closed his own letter to Meghan with a request for a photo together, which Meghan interpreted to mean that her father didn’t understand anything that she had written in her own letter. Meghan, according to her friends, wanted to heal their relationship outside of the media.

For his part, Thomas said the negative press around his ex-wife — Meghan’s mother, Doria — went away after a photo was released to the press of her and the duke and duchess. He said he only wanted something similar to happen for him, stating that if the press got a photo of Meghan and him together, he thought they might back off, as he told The Daily Mail.

Instead of bringing the two together, this letter situation seems to have driven the two further apart. With the Sussexes taking legal action against The Mail on Sunday, it might still be a long time before Thomas and Meghan are able to heal the rift between them.