Queen Elizabeth’s Jubilee: Harry and Meghan reconcile with the royal family and celebrate their daughter’s birthday

“Happy birthday, Lilibet!” Queen Elizabeth, Prince Charles and Camilla, Kate and William, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, cast aside any differences between Real to wish a very happy birthday on Twitter this Saturday morning to Harry and Meghan’s daughter, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, who is celebrating her first year at Frogmore Cottage, her British home. But they didn’t accompany her with a photo of her.

The baby is named in honor of the queen. Lilibet is what her children, grandchildren and close friends of her call the sovereign. The American great-granddaughter of Elizabeth II will celebrate her first birthday away from Montecito, where she lives. It is for the first time in his father’s reign being socially introduced to a family who have never seen or visited her, except Princess Eugenie, Prince Harry’s best friend.

Together with her parents and brother Archie, she flew to Britain on a private plane to meet her family and attend great-grandmother’s Platinum Jubilee celebration.

Nobody saw her after the brutal split between the Sussex and the real, after his departure for exile, in search of his independence, in the face of differences with his brother Guglielmo and the courtiers. Him except Meghan’s hairdresser.

secret meeting

The two Lilibets met at Windsor Palace, just 24 hours after landing in the kingdom. Harry and Meghan, who live a 10-minute walk from the palace, were received by the queen to meet her great-granddaughter and Archie, the couple’s first child, who is already 3 years old and the queen only saw the day of her baptism in Windsor. Nobody knows what happened in that meeting.

The Sussexes have decided to celebrate their daughter’s first birthday “in private, at home” and “as a family”. I’m in Windsor. It was not known if any of her cousins ​​would be at the little party.

Surely Lili will not be able to meet her cousins. William and Kate, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, arrived in Cardiff along with two of the three boys, George and Charlotte, for their official jubilee visit this Saturday.

The queen did not participate this Saturday in the Epstom Derby, the horse race she has only jumped three times in her lifedue to his mobility problems. She had planned to celebrate her niece’s birthday and to attend the concert of the greatest British musicians at Buckingham Palace from Windsor, his last residence, accompanied by Harry and Meghan.

Those “beloved members of the family” who on Friday at the thanksgiving ceremony in St Paul’s Cathedral were deliberately ignored by their father, Prince Charles, and brother William and his wife Kate.

half reconciliation

A public reconciliation, as the queen imagined, which did not unfold in the terms she would have liked. Although it was a big step, one that she followed closely from television to Windsor.

But with a choreography designed so that there were no clashes or hateful public glances between the irreconcilable parties, as in the last joint ceremony in Westminster Abbey.

Elizabeth II’s idea was to show the world a Royal Family united in celebration but with different statuses. The hard-working Royal Family, who cut ribbons, plant trees, unveil plaques in support of the queen, in the first row and all the others in the second row. There were Meghan and Harry, along with Andrea’s daughters, the forbidden Duke of York, the princesses Eugenia and Beatrice, their husbands and Sara Chatto, the elegant daughter of Princess Margaret, the queen’s sister, with whom they chatted animatedly. It was the fun line at the cathedral, but not the front line.

For the first time, Harry, sixth in line to the throne, experienced the pain of not being one “Full real”. Despite being the son of the future king and brother of his neighbor, after his departure for exile and his accusations against the royal family of “racism” and father of him for having cut off “all financial support”.

An isolation that forced him to sign his millionaire contract with Netflix for a documentary series and a biographywhich will appear in September.

These are two facts that worry the Royal Family, in particular Prince Charles and William, for how they can be represented and to what extent they will be there. uncomfortable revelations, in full transition to the House of Windsors.

The eyes of the world, in London

In the gigantic and baroque St. Paul’s Cathedral, neither his brother nor his father have spared them a glimpse into their past. They had met Prince Charles that morning for a private meeting to settle differences in his palace at Clarence House.

But the eyes of all the guests were on Harry and Meghan, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, who entered the church before the next heirs, hand in hand.

“Low profile” was the watchword. But they were the big draw of a no-honored ceremony with William and Prince Charles, plus Camilla and Kate in the front row, not even looking at them. Meghan had a stamped actress smile. Harry seemed more tense, sometimes with his head down.

Stunned, the British were unable to see the Sussexes at the ceremony. Too much colors. in homage to the sovereign on television.

Photographers found them, with an 800mm lens and blurry. The strategy was not to be seen in order not to “steal the show” from the sovereign in her day. Not to represent the “Sussex bomb” that the courtiers expected if they came to the ceremony because they would concentrate all the press on them.

Even so, after shocking ceremony thanks for a queen who was unable to attend, the cover of TimesBritain’s most prestigious newspaper went to Harry and Meghan in the cathedral.

The low key strategy

The Sussexes chose an intelligent communication strategy, which contrasted with what the British tabloids imagined. To be but only to be seen in a limited way and not to show her children, Archie and Lili, so as not to overshadow the queen’s celebrations. The only one who reached out to reintegrate them into the family who expelled them.

That’s why they only went to the thanksgiving ceremony. But they decided not to attend the Mansion House banquet, where they would meet William and Kate, Prince Charles and Camilla plus Prime Minister Boris Johnson, former British heads of government and opposition leaders.

They quietly returned to Frogmore Cottage from the cathedral, accompanied by official Queen custody and two cars, as promised. They wanted to avoid another icy family welcome when cameras were cleared in the British City mayor’s house.

With his Dior coat High fashion gray white jubilee, his sober hat and Harry in a suit, the Sussexes were more royal than members of the royal family at that ceremony. They focused absolutely all the eyes of the cathedral and smiled.

Omid Scopbie, who wrote their bio and knows them, said that “nothing should be expected from this private birthday”. He won’t lose anything. It’s a long-awaited moment between them and the queen. “

The newspaper The mirror announced on Friday that this Saturday she would be baptized Lilibet in Windsor. But the news faded in the morning. The Archbishop of Canterbury is in bed with Covid and was supposed to officiate the ceremony. But anything is possible.

The Sussexes arrived in Britain with a plan, which includes Meghan’s mother, head of her grandchildren, whom only they know, just like the day of their departure.

So far they haven’t seen their British friends or visited their charities. We will have to wait for the end of the Jubilee, but reconciliation is still a long way off.

Paris, correspondent

CB