Charles Spencer is not just reminiscing about Princess Diana. After the second Daily Mail serialisation of Swan Song, it is clear why Buckingham Palace responded so fast. He is challenging nearly 30 years of royal mythology about Diana’s death, funeral, her sons, and how some royals still viewed her as millions mourned.

The central controversy is Spencer’s account of a phone call with then-Prince Charles after Diana died. They argued over making 15-year-old Prince William and 12-year-old Prince Harry walk behind their mother’s coffin. Spencer opposed it. He says Charles told him: “Rest assured, we’ll forget her soon enough.”

Buckingham Palace replied: “While we do not comment on books as a matter of principle, His Majesty is mindful that the pain of fraternal grief can cloud reason, affect judgment and colour memory…” Notice what is missing: “I did not say that.” Six words would have done it. Instead, the Palace suggested Spencer’s grief made his memory suspect. The Guardian called it a careful royal rebuke; Charles’s former communications secretary said the Palace wanted to deny the remarks. But the statement itself did not.

Spencer noticed. He says he had only ever had two phone conversations with Charles. “I was hyper alert to what he was saying and those are precisely the words that he said… I don’t hear him saying he didn’t say that.” He told the BBC: “I’m telling the truth.” He says the comment shocked him so much he immediately repeated it to friends and relatives. That does not prove it, but it explains why he rejects the idea that grief invented the conversation.

The Palace’s implication is strange. Grief can scramble memory. But cruel words? Those are often exactly what people never forget. If someone says something breathtakingly cruel while you are burying your little sister, those words can stay burned into memory forever. And if grief distorted Spencer’s memory, was Charles not grieving? Or does grief only cloud the accuser’s recollection?

Spencer Says Harry Was Left Alone in His Grief

Part Two also says Philip overruled Charles at the funeral. Spencer claims Charles wanted to walk in the centre, William right, Harry left. Philip shut it down: “No, that isn’t how we will do it.” Spencer represented Diana and the Spencer family, so he would walk in the middle with the boys beside him; Philip and Charles took the outside. Charles “looked pained” but accepted. The footage matches. It was Diana’s funeral. Her brother represented her family. Yet Charles initially saw himself at the centre.

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The saddest part is Spencer watching Harry. He remembers 12-year-old Harry looking “tiny, and slight, and bereft.” He had already fought against the children walking behind the coffin. The procession, he says, was the most harrowing experience of his life, a “tunnel of grief” where they were told to stare straight ahead. At one point, away from public view, Spencer hugged Harry and said: “Well done, Harry! You’re doing bloody brilliantly!”

His chief memory of the train to Althorp was the “lack of obvious care for Harry.” Harry needed Diana’s hugs, forever denied him, and was instead “allowed to spin out of control.” A more caring hand, Spencer believes, would have helped. Instead, Harry seemed “so very alone in his despair and torment.” Nearly 30 years later, Diana’s brother says he noticed immediately that something was wrong. Harry was 12. He had just walked behind his mother’s coffin before the world.

Diana Was Still Being Treated as the Problem, Even After Her Death

Spencer also claims Princess Michael of Kent mocked Diana’s loss of her HRH. Princess Margaret refused to bow at her coffin over the Panorama interview, and the Queen asked before the crash’s seriousness was clear: “What is she up to now?” Irritation, not just concern. Diana was still being framed as a problem. Princess Michael is also the royal who wore a blackamoor brooch to the Queen’s 2017 Christmas lunch attended by Meghan Sussex, then Harry’s fiancée

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Then there is the extraordinary detail that after Diana’s funeral, Robert Fellowes told Spencer the Queen wanted to offer Diana her HRH title back. After she died. Spencer replied: “What’s the point, Robert? Now? I mean, Diana’s dead.” The title should never have been removed in life, he concludes, so it would not have been necessary to offer it in death.

At the burial, the Royal Standard was replaced by the Spencer family flag. Charles took a single stem from Spencer’s bouquet and dropped it onto Diana’s coffin. Spencer remembers thinking: “How very generous.” Brutal.

The Smear Cycle Begins as Charles Spencer Stands by Every Word

Predictably, the smear cycle has begun. Claims that Spencer refused Diana a home have already cost newspapers money: Associated Newspapers paid damages in 2018, and The Times corrected another version in 2021. Spare me the concern about his reliability while recycling corrected smears.

Some media outlets want to try and make this a credibility battle between two men named Charles. The BBC asked Spencer which Charles should the public believe. His answer: “I’m telling the truth.” I believe him, not because Diana’s brother is infallible, but because he attaches his name to specific conversations instead of hiding behind “royal insiders” or “palace sources.”

Buckingham Palace responded to the most damaging allegation with a statement about grief clouding memory. Spencer effectively replied: fine, then say I’m lying. The Palace still has not used those words. I believe Charles Spencer.

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