Experts Reveal Queen Elizabeth’s Real Feelings About Meghan Markle’s Role in the Royal Family

Royal sources close to Queen Elizabeth II said her relationship with Meghan Markle was remarkably warm and unusually welcoming when it first began. The late monarch—interred at Balmoral Castle in 2022—had looked upon Prince Harry's partner as a fresh breath into the members of the royal family.

"The Queen believed that Meghan – a divorced, mixed-race American actress – would be a breath of fresh air and a great asset to the Monarchy," said royal reporter Richard Eden, who has been speaking with former courtiers close to the late Queen. Certainly, Her Majesty's early actions reflected well on that belief. In what was a rare break with convention, the Queen invited Markle to join her for Christmas at Sandringham in 2017, going out of her way to make the then-bride-to-be welcome many months before she married Prince Harry. That was quite a gesture, considering that Kate Middleton and Sophie Rhys-Jones were only invited after their respective marriages to Prince William and Prince Edward.

Even the Queen appeared to give Markle a sartorial wink in her Christmas broadcast that year, as she spoke warmly about "new members" joining the family. Markle herself was at first seen embracing this welcome. "I remember so vividly the first Christmas at Sandringham," she later recalled in her Netflix documentary. "Calling my mom, and she's like, 'How's it going?' and I said, 'Oh, my gosh, it's amazing.' It's just like a big family like I always wanted." The Queen's attempts at integrating Markle well into the family continued with profound gesture after profound gesture.

She hastened Markle's initiation into royal duties by inviting her to a Commonwealth Day service two months before the wedding, marking her first official engagement with the monarch. Later, Her Majesty made Markle the Vice President of the Queen's Commonwealth Trust and royal patron of the National Theatre, showing she has trust in her granddaughter-in-law's abilities, as per Elle. But according to sources in Buckingham Palace, warning lights began flashing well before wedding bells started ringing. One of the first signs was when Markle rebuffed the Queen's suggestion that she might want to learn a thing or two from Sophie, Countess of Wessex, about how to navigate royal protocol. Most astonishingly, Her Majesty was taken aback when Markle announced she intended to wear a white wedding dress, even though this was her second marriage.

The most instructive incident, however, involved the choosing of Markle's wedding tiara. While Queen Elizabeth II had graciously offered access to her personal collection, awkwardness cropped up over subsequent fittings with Angela Kelly, the Queen's trusted dresser. Kelly, a unique position holder of servant and confidante to the Queen, reportedly clashed with the couple on arrangements. Things took a more dramatic turn when Harry and Markle announced in January 2020 that they were leaving royal duties. The move—followed by the explosive Oprah Winfrey interview and the Netflix series, in which Markle appeared to mock the curtsy she had performed for the Queen—seemed a betrayal of the monarch's early faith in them, as per Daily Mail.