Prince Harry’s feud with William started after Nazi costume scandal, book claims
Prince Harry’s feud with older brother William began at least 15 years before Megxit — sparked the night the young prince was snapped wearing a Nazi costume, a new book claims.
The then-20-year-old Duke of Sussex was already being nicknamed “Hash Harry” for his drug use when his photo was plastered on UK papers’ front pages in January 2005, with The Sun headlining it, “Harry the Nazi.”
The backlash sparked a festering feud between the two brothers after William completely escaped critique despite playing a key role in selecting the offensive costume, royal historian Robert Lacey has claimed in a new book, “Battle of Brothers,” being serialized in the Daily Mail.
“Harry chose his costume in conjunction with his elder brother,” Lacey wrote of “the future King William V,” who “laughed all the way back to Highgrove with the younger sibling he was supposed to be mentoring.”
“The young prince began re-evaluating his elder brother’s involvement and the unfairness of William’s subsequent emergence smelling of roses.
“It made Harry feel resentful and even alienated,” Lacey wrote, claiming William was the one who would “coax” Harry into his “errant and self-destructive ways.”
“For the first time, their relationship really suffered and they barely spoke,” one former aide told Lacey.
“Harry resented the fact that William got away so lightly.”
The fallout sparked “no speaks” between the pair in the ensuing years, as Harry repeatedly resented being painted as the “comical fall guy” to his brother’s “glittering hero,” the book claimed.
“Meghan [Markle] was not the original factor in Prince Harry’s decision to get shot of his family in January 2020,” Lacey wrote in the extract.
“He already had very solid reasons to get shot [get rid] of the rest of us and our smiling assumptions of the inferior — and actually rather demeaning — role that he should be grateful to play. Truly a ‘spare’ in more than one sense.”