There are visits that accomplish what they set out to accomplish, and there is Harry’s July 6-10 trip to the United Kingdom, which ends tomorrow having accomplished the Chatham House Invictus Foundation event, the Royal Hospital Chelsea appearance, and the discovery that every plan surrounding it had a complication built into it that the preceding four years of preparation had not resolved.
Meghan, Archie, and Lilibet did not travel to London. Harry ruled it out after RAVEC denied police protection outside royal grounds, meaning that the children have now not been on British soil since the Platinum Jubilee in June 2022, which was four years ago, and which Lilibet attended at fourteen months old, which is an age at which she formed approximately no memories of the occasion that could be built on by subsequent visits that did not happen.
Harry was reportedly very keen to take the children to Althorp Park in Northamptonshire, the Spencer family’s ancestral estate where Princess Diana has been buried since September 1997. Althorp House is closed July 10 and 11, per the estate’s own website, which is the window of the trip. Whether they could still fly to Birmingham for the Invictus Games One Year To Go ceremony was unresolved as of this morning, though even that possibility now involves flying his family from mainland Europe for a single day into a city that is not London, which is the definition of a plan that has been reduced to its smallest viable component.
His accommodation throughout has been in London in alternative private arrangements, after Buckingham Palace offered a royal residence, Harry accepted, the Palace withdrew the offer, Harry’s spokesman issued a furious 142-word statement, and the Palace cited the Daily Mail judgment that Harry subsequently lost. The King did not move to publicly support his son during any of this. The King has not been publicly confirmed to have met with Harry during the visit. A source described the visit as “tiresome.” Another said Harry has “painted himself into a corner.” Harry described himself as continuing to “explore every available option.”
Harry’s trip ends tomorrow. The next time he comes to Britain and under what circumstances and whether his family accompanies him are unanswered. The King has cancer. He has met Lilibet once.
When a four-day trip to Britain ends without a family reunion, a visit to a closed estate, and a diplomatic dispute about accommodation with the father’s own household, what exactly did the trip resolve?
Sources
GB News: Buckingham Palace left frustrated as Harry’s meeting with King Charles hangs in the balance
GB News: Prince Harry ‘distraught’ as hopes of Archie and Lilibet seeing King Charles are thrown into doubt
GB News: Prince Harry’s team issues furious statement in response to Palace denial
