In the messages released in Meghan and Harry’s lawsuit against Associated Newspapers, the publisher of tabloids MailOnline on The Mail on Sunday, the duchess writes about her plans to write a letter to her father. The reason for the letter was that Thomas, with whom she had hardly any contact, always sought the media in the run-up to her marriage to Harry to give interviews about his daughter.
–
That this situation was also a thorn in the side of the British royal family, is apparent from the messages Meghan sent to Knauf at the time. “The reason for doing this is because I see how much it hurts H,” Meghan wrote, referring to H as her fiancé Harry. “Even after a week with his dad and endlessly explaining the situation, his family doesn’t seem to understand and they keep asking ‘if I can’t just go to him and stop it’. They just don’t understand, so writing the letter allows H to say to his family ‘she has written and he is still doing it.’ I hope this will protect H from the continuous name-calling, and while it’s unlikely my father may stop for a while.”
–
The messages also show that Meghan took into account that the letter would be leaked. “Obviously all I’ve prepared with the knowledge is that it can be leaked, so I’ve been careful in my choice of words.”
–
The reports have been made public to find out whether Associated Newspapers have infringed the Duchess’s privacy by publishing the letter to her father. A judge ruled that was the case in 2018, but the newspaper appealed. According to the publisher, the duchess would also have collaborated on a book about her life, Finding Freedom, and therefore do not take her privacy so closely. Where the Duchess previously said she did not cooperate with the book, she had to admit last week that she did. She said she had “forgotten” that.
–
The judge is expected to rule at a later date.
–
