A look at Prince Harry's relationship with Lady Susan Hussey

2023-01-09

Prince Harry says he ‘loves’ Susan Hussey and Meghan thinks she’s ‘great’ despite race row – yet aide previously ‘said their marriage would end in tears’ for the royals and was ‘rejected’ as a mentor for the Duchess

Prince Harry, 38, defended late Queen’s lady-in-waiting who was embroiled in a race row last November and had to resign from her royal duties as a result
Lady Susan Hussey, 83, had to resign from her post after she asked black campaigner Ngozi Fulani ‘where part of Africa she was from’ during a reception
Her remarks were strongly slammed by her godson, Prince of Wales, 40, who said ‘racism had no place in society’, but was resolved by face-to-face meeting
Speaking in bombshell interview on ITV last night, Harry said he was ‘delighted’ Lady Hussey and Ngozi Fulani had reconciled and that he and Meghan ‘love her’
Read more: Harry tells of his delight of Lady Susan Hussey and Ngozi Fulani reconciling over their racism row – as he uses his TV interview to say HE wants accountability from his relatives

While his latest round of TV interviews were laden with yet more jibes at the royal family, it was perhaps surprising to hear Prince Harry’s warm words for Lady Susan Hussey, who last month was embroiled in a high profile race row.

Revealing that his wife Meghan thinks Prince William’s godmother, who was lady-in-waiting to the late Queen, is ‘great’, the Duke declared: ‘I love Susan Hussey’, even though she resigned from her honorary role at Buckingham Palace after repeatedly asking black charity boss Ngozi Fulani where she came from.

However, Lady Susan met with Ms Fulani in December to apologise and Prince Harry said she was delighted by their reconciliation, hailing it as the standard he wants to see from the rest of the royal family.

This is despite reports Lady Susan’s role as a mentor to Meghan when she first joined the royal family failed to off the ground, and rumours that the older woman said the couple’s marriage would ‘end in tears’ for The Firm.

The Duke of Sussex said he and his wife Meghan Markle, pictured in Windsor, last September, ‘love’ his brother’s godmother Lady Susan Hussey. But comments she’s made about the couple suggest she might feel differently about them

The Duke told Tom Bradby: ‘All we’ve ever asked for in the last – certainly the last few years – is some accountability.

‘And I’m very happy for Ngozi Fulani to be invited into the palace to sit down with Lady Susan Hussey and to reconcile, because Meghan and I love Susan Hussey. (Meghan) thinks she’s great.

‘And I also know that what she meant – she never meant any harm at all.

‘But the response from the British press, and from people online because of the stories that they wrote was horrendous.’

Lady Susan Hussey, 83, Prince William’s godmother and one of Queen Consort Camilla’s closest aides, resigned from her honorary role at Buckingham Palace after asking Ms Fulani where she came from. However, she met with Ms Fulani in December to apologise, pictured

His backing comes in contrast to his brother, Prince William, whose spokesman condemned as ‘unacceptable’ the comments made by Lady Susan in the wake of the furore.

Having been a loyal aide to the Queen for decades, and the godmother of his elder brother, Prince William, Lady Hussey has been a constant presence in the life of Prince Harry.

Lady Susan was actually one of the senior royal aides who were tasked with helping Meghan Markle ‘acclimatise’ to her royal role in 2018, several royal experts revealed in 2022.

In former Vanity Fair editor Tina Brown’s book The Palace Papers, the author claims that the Queen offered Meghan ‘the ear of her most senior lady-in-waiting, Lady Susan Hussey’ as well as communications aide Sam Cohen ‘to support the new Duchess’s learning curve.’

A source also claimed in 2021 that Lady Susan and other ladies-in-waiting met Harry and Meghan and their team for tea at Kensington Palace to introduce themselves.

However, the expert went on to say that there was an immense generational divide between the two women.

Pictured from left to right: Prince Harry, King Constantine, Princess Diana, Lady Susan Hussey, Prince William, Princess Alexandra, King Charles, the Duchess of Westminster, The Queen and Lord Romsey present in Windsor Castle’s White drawing room on the occasion of Prince William’s confirmation in March 1997

Tina wrote: ‘The glaring but unspoken problem was that none of these experienced Palace hands were women of colour.

‘As for the lady-in-waiting the Queen had offered for support, what on earth did the eighty-year-old Lady Susan Hussey have of use for a thirty-eight-year-old biracial American actress trying to navigate the treacherous Palace system?’ she asked.

The royal expert and author went on to say that Prince Harry’s own mother, Princess Diana, ‘couldn’t stand’ Lady Susan Hussey, who had also been tasked with teaching her the ropes of royal ropes back in the 1980s.

And while Harry appeared supportive of his brother’s godmother in last night’s interview, it appears she may not have been as generous about him.

In his book Revenge: Meghan, Harry, and the War Between the Windsors, which was released earlier this year, the investigative author Tom Bower claimed Lady Susan had a premonition that the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s marriage would ‘end in tears’ for The Firm.

A few months before the couple’s wedding in May 2018, the lady-in-waiting reportedly attended a lunch with theatre executives where conversation turned to Meghan’s future royal patronages.

Lady Susan Hussey was one of the Queen’s closest aides and was retained by King Charles as ‘lady of the household’ after the late Monarch’s death in September last year (pictured at a Service of Thanksgiving in 2016 at Westminster Abbey)

The expert alleges: ‘While discussing the possibility that Meghan might become linked with the National Theatre after the wedding, Hussey became unexpectedly serious about the couple’s future.

‘“That will all end in tears,” she is alleged to have warned. “Mark my words.”

Lady Susan, who was married to former chairman of the BBC’s board of governors, Marmaduke Hussey, enjoyed a particularly close relationship with Queen Elizabeth.

At the height of the coronavirus pandemic, Lady Susan was part of the ‘HMS Bubble’ at Windsor Castle, which only included a small teams of trusted aides that lived with the late Monarch and the Duke of Edinburgh.

In April 2021, she was chosen to accompany the Queen alone in her car as she was driven to the funeral of Prince Philip of Edinburgh in Windsor.

As the late Monarch’s lady-in-waiting she was deeply involved in Palace life, and attended several events Prince Harry and Prince William would have had to attend in their teenage years as well as in their adult lives.

So key was Lady Susan’s role in the royal household that King Charles kept her on as Lady of the Household after the death of the late Queen Elizabeth II.

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