OPINION: Beatrice and Eugenie were once Harry’s safest place in the family, but Express reporter Chris Riches says the silence between them now is deafening.
Prince Harry, Princesses Eugenie and Beatrice were a tight little gang when they grew up – but those bonds have stretched so far in recent years, they could be about to shatter. The cousins grew up enjoying family gatherings and holidays together, such as skiing in the Alps, and maintained that easy-going relationship into adulthood, sharing a similar, relaxed nature. Even the bitter rancour surrounding Megxit did not seem to damage those ties; in Harry and Eugenie’s case, it appeared to bring them closer together. Eugenie, 36, knew Meghan Markle before Harry even did, as the two women were both friends with fashion designer Misha Nonoo.
During the angry UK fallout to Harry’s 2023 memoir Spare – and the deepening of his estrangement from his brother Prince William – it was claimed Eugenie was the only royal who reached out across the Atlantic. Harry reportedly introduced his future wife to Eugenie and her now-husband, Jack Brooksbank, before any other royal.
After Harry and Meghan moved out of the UK, they allowed Eugenie and Jack to move into their former Windsor home, Frogmore Cottage. Both couples have since acquired holiday properties in the same luxury resort area of Portugal – and it was no coincidence that at King Charles III’s coronation, Harry was positioned directly next to Eugenie and Jack.
Eugenie famously appeared in their 2022 Netflix docuseries and was known to regularly visit them in California. When Meghan penned her Covid lockdown children’s book, The Bench, in 2021, she gave a signed copy to her close friend Eugenie.
So it was odd when what appears to be the same signed copy, once given to Eugenie, went on sale on eBay for almost £20k. The handwritten message inside reading: “Dear Eug & Jack, Celebrating the special bond between father and son. I wrote this poem at Frogmore – I hope that Eug, you witness the same love there with your guys. All love, Meghan.”
Why would that be given away or sold? According to Hello! Magazine, a source claims the cousins are “not even in touch,” and Harry’s bond with the princesses is not as strong as it once was.
It added: “Harry and Meghan are not so close to Beatrice and Eugenie anymore, and Harry did not see Eugenie over the summer in Portugal. Harry has very few friends left from before. They’re going to have to make some serious social inroads and gatherings to get back in the fold.”
Speaking of the daughters of Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor and Sarah Ferguson, they added: “Beatrice and Eugenie are not even in touch – and Eugenie was once so close to him.” There have been some reports that Princess Beatrice, 38, may have visited Meghan and Harry at their new Cotswolds home, but these have not been confirmed.
Amid reports that the sisters are feeling the weight of the Epstein Files – and their parents’ friendship with US paedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein – on their shoulders, have the sisters taken a pragmatic approach? They both still have royal homes and could potentially be asked to return the keys.
Beatrice boasts an apartment in St James’s Palace while Eugenie has Ivy Cottage, a three-bedroom property at Kensington Palace, thanks to a ‘rental deal’ struck by their father, Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor. Harry may have returned to the UK expecting the sisters’ public support – but that dream could be evaporating quicker than water in the Sahara.
Andrew and Sarah have denied any misconduct in connection to Epstein and being mentioned in the DoJ’s files does not necessarily imply wrongdoing.