Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s unexpected move to step back from their roles as senior royals sparked a whirlwind of media attention, culminating in an intense focus on their experiences within the royal family. This intense scrutiny reached its peak with the release of Prince Harry’s memoir “Spare” in 2023, a book that made headlines for its candid revelations about the inner workings of the royal family.

In “Spare,” Prince Harry, at 41, shared several startling anecdotes, including a particularly vivid account involving his brother, Prince William, who is two years his senior. Harry described an incident where an argument about Meghan’s alleged treatment of palace staff escalated into a physical altercation, resulting in William knocking him into a dog bowl, which shattered and injured Harry’s back.

The impact of these personal disclosures was magnified by the manner in which they were revealed. The memoir’s sensitive content was leaked inadvertently when a Spanish bookseller mistakenly released copies before the official publication date. This blunder allowed parts of the book to be translated and disseminated worldwide before the scheduled release.

Renowned author Robert Hardman, in his book “Charles III,” highlighted how this mishap derailed what had been a meticulously planned public relations campaign, marking it as one of the most significant PR challenges in recent publishing history. The book was slated to hit shelves globally on January 10, but the premature sale in Spain ignited a media frenzy as translated excerpts quickly spread across the globe.

In his book, Charles III, Robert Hardman noted how ‘the most carefully and expensively choreographed public relations operation in modern publishing history went careering off the tracks’ three years ago. 

While Spare was due to be released on January 10, a bookseller in Spain accidentally put a few copies up for sale ahead of the ‘globally enforced publication date’ – as translated excerpts spread like wildfire around the world. 

Outside Buckingham Palace, these stories couldn’t be printed fast enough as fans hung on every word of what Mr Hardman described as ‘the most caustic and candid royal memoir ever written’. 

Behind the palace’s closed doors, however, Prince William couldn’t bring himself to read his brother’s tell-all, as Mr Hardman revealed: ‘His staff remain adamant that he and the Princess [of Wales] refused to open a book which has caused so much pain.’ 

The release of the Duke of Sussex’s memoir Spare in 2023 that was notable for two reasons; first, it included several damaging claims about Prince Harry’s family members.

It included several damaging claims about Prince Harry’s family members, including his brother Prince William (pictured), that were being drip-fed after the Spare was leaked in Spain 

Prince Harry’s ghostwritten memoir became the fastest-selling non-fiction book ever in Britain after it went on sale on January 10, 2023. 

More than three million copies of Spare were sold around the world in its first week alone, 1.4 million in the first 24 hours.

The book was said to have been the result of a $20 million deal with Penguin Random House and its widespread commercial success gave Prince Harry a new voice. 

Mr Hardman wrote: ‘None could be unmoved by his account of his mother’s [the late Princess Diana’s death and his part in her funeral procession.’ 

The Duke also shared a number of personal anecdotes, including losing his virginity to an ‘older woman’ in a field outside a ‘very busy pub’ when Harry was 17. 

He wrote extensively about his experiences with drugs, including ‘smoking a spliff’ during his time at Eton as well as taking ketamine, cocaine, and magic mushrooms. 

Harry credited the use of psychedelic drugs with helping him deal with the ‘grief’ and ‘trauma’ he felt after the death of his mother, Princess Diana.

He said they ‘cleared away the idea’ that he needed be sad to prove he ‘missed’ his mother as he got older. 

However, the book also took aim at many senior royals – including Harry’s older brother and Britain’s future King, William.

The book was said to have been the result of a $20 million deal with Penguin Random House and its widespread commercial success gave Prince Harry a new voice, as Robert Hardman noted ‘none could be unmoved’ by the Duke’s emotional account of his mother Diana’s funeral in 1997. Pictured: William, looking at the camera, and Harry, with his head bowed, at the funeral service in London on September 6, 1997

The Duke described an alleged physical altercation between William and Harry, when they began arguing abut the latter’s wife Meghan on the eve of ‘Megxit’ in 2019. 

William is said to have branded Meghan ‘difficult’, ‘rude’ and ‘abrasive’ and insisted he was trying to help his younger brother during a meeting about ‘the whole rolling catastrophe’ of their failing relationship and Harry’s rows with the Press.

Harry accused his brother of ‘parroting the Press narrative’ about his American wife before a screaming match escalated into a physical fight. 

He said he gave William a glass of water and said: ‘Willy, I can’t speak to you when you’re like this’.

Insisting he was ‘scared’ of his brother, Harry continued: ‘He set down the water, called me another name, then came at me. It all happened so fast. So very fast.

‘He grabbed me by the collar, ripping my necklace, and he knocked me to the floor. I landed on the dog’s bowl, which cracked under my back, the pieces cutting into me. I lay there for a moment, dazed, then got to my feet and told him to get out’.

Elsewhere, he appeared to place part of the blame for his Nazi costume fiasco in 2005 on his brother and his now-wife Kate, as he claimed they thought it was funny. 

William was said to be ‘mortified by Harry’s casual betrayal of so many fraternal secrets’, Mr Hardman quoted the prince’s friends. 

Publicly, however, the heir to the throne didn’t address any of Prince Harry’s claims in line with the royal family’s approach of ‘never complain, never explain’ – despite growing calls for comment. 

The Duke also shared a number of personal anecdotes, including losing his virginity to an ‘older woman’ in a field outside a ‘very busy pub’ when Harry was 17

However, the book also took aim at many senior royals – including Harry’s older brother and Britain’s future King, William – as Harry described a physical altercation between them over wife Meghan Markle’s behaviour 

 A senior adviser told Mr Hardman that William was briefed about the book’s ‘key points’ but adamantly refused to read Spare after all the hurt it caused his family – including father King Charles and Queen Camilla, who Harry compared to a ‘wicked stepmother’.

William was being ‘admirably grown-up’ as he resisted pressure from the ‘commentariat…to respond to some of the more incendiary charges’ including claims about Kate, the author said 

It appeared he was also guided by a desire to uphold the royal family’s values of privacy and stoicism – especially as future King – with one member of Prince William’s team telling Mr Hardman: ‘My boss would say: “Whatever the rights and wrongs, I hope that people feel I behaved properly in keeping my counsel.” 

‘You can imagine what he feels about this, especially regarding what has been said about his wife. But he is being admirably grown-up.’ 

While Mr Hardman claimed the future King was briefed about the book, Sussex biographer Omid Scobie said William had ‘read passages’ of Spare following its release. 

In his book Endgame, Mr Scobie recounts meeting one of the royal’s former aides and asking them whether William and Kate have made note of the ‘difficulties of being the spare to the heir’. 

The source allegedly said: ‘[Prince William] has read passages but not the full thing…

‘Harry’s experience is very different to [that of William’s] own children.’

Mr Scobie – known for his sympathetic coverage of Harry and Meghan – also alleged that William had rebuffed his younger brother’s attempts to set up a meeting shortly after Spare was published. 

He claimed Prince Harry tried to reach out to William on two separate occasions while visiting London – but to no avail. 

‘In February and March, the Prince turned to a mutual friend in London to try to set up a conversation with his brother, but the attempts were ignored,’ Mr Scobie wrote. 

‘Harry, said a source, chose to “keep focused on the future, not the past.”‘