Earl Spencer’s memoir reopens painful questions around Diana’s final days
Sandego.net – Nearly three decades after Princess Diana’s death, her younger brother, Earl Charles Spencer, has returned to the center of a royal controversy. In a new memoir, Spencer recounts an emotionally charged dispute with King Charles III in the days following Diana’s fatal 1997 car crash.
The account has drawn a firm response from Buckingham Palace and revived attention on Spencer’s complicated place within Britain’s most famous family. For many people, he remains indelibly associated with the funeral tribute in which he promised to protect Diana’s sons, Princes William and Harry, from the pressures that had caused their mother such distress.
A disputed account of the funeral arrangements
Spencer says that, after Diana died, he argued that William and Harry should not be expected to walk behind her coffin in the funeral procession. He believed their mother would not have wanted the boys to take part. The princes were 15 and 12 at the time.
He describes King Charles, then the Prince of Wales and Diana’s former husband, responding in anger during a telephone call. Spencer also attributes a particularly stark remark to him:
“We’ll forget her soon enough.”
Buckingham Palace has rejected the allegation. Its response suggested that grief could have affected Spencer’s recollection, stating that “the pain of fraternal grief can cloud reason.”
Spencer has strongly objected to that characterization, calling it gaslighting, a term used for conduct intended to make someone doubt their understanding of events.
“It is not every day you wake up to find you’ve been gaslit by the King.”
The dispute has prompted debate over whether such private memories should be revisited so long after Diana’s death. Supporters of Spencer see his account as an expression of a brother’s enduring loyalty; critics question the impact of reopening a period that remains deeply personal for William and Harry.
A childhood shaped by Althorp and family upheaval
Charles Edward Maurice Spencer was born in London on May 20, 1964. He and Diana were less than three years apart in age, and their early lives were closely tied to Althorp, the Spencer family’s historic estate in West Northamptonshire, England.
The Spencer family bought Althorp in 1508, and it remains their ancestral seat. Located roughly two and a half hours north of London by road, the estate has become inseparable from Diana’s story as both her childhood home and her final resting place.
Spencer has recalled that he and Diana spent much of their childhood together, particularly during the difficult period surrounding their parents’ divorce. Their bond, however, was not without strain. Correspondence made public during the 2002 theft trial involving Diana’s former butler illustrated disagreements between the siblings.
One dispute concerned Diana’s wish to live in Garden House at Althorp after separating from Prince Charles. Spencer initially accepted the idea, but later declined and proposed other homes on the estate instead. Another letter referenced a telephone exchange in which Diana ended the call with her brother.
Those episodes underline the ordinary tensions that can exist even in highly visible families. Yet they did not erase the depth of Spencer’s affection for his sister, which was laid bare at her funeral.
The eulogy that defined his public image
At Westminster Abbey in September 1997, Spencer delivered one of the most memorable addresses of the modern royal era. He praised Diana as the “very essence of compassion, of duty, of style, of beauty,” while also speaking with unusual frankness about the forces that had surrounded her life.
He remembered the sister who had cared for him, argued with him during their school years and shared long weekend train journeys between their parents’ homes.
“Mothered me as a baby, fought with me at school and endured those long train journeys between our parents’ homes with me at weekends.”
Spencer also condemned the treatment Diana had received from parts of the British press, describing her as the “most hunted person of the modern age.” His words brought applause inside the abbey and among the crowds gathered outside.
Most notably, he offered a public pledge concerning William and Harry, whom he called Diana’s “blood family.” The promise carried lasting weight because it was made at a moment when the young princes had lost their mother under overwhelming global attention.
An aristocrat, journalist and author
Spencer was born into one of Britain’s best-known aristocratic families, with longstanding ties to the royal household. Queen Elizabeth II, who died in 2022, was his godmother.
He attended Eton College in Berkshire, the prestigious school near Windsor Castle, before studying modern history at Magdalen College, Oxford. His career later took him into television journalism. Beginning in 1986, he spent a decade working for NBC News as an on-air correspondent.
Alongside his media work, Spencer has built a substantial career as an author. His books have examined the Spencer family’s history and prominent royal figures, including Charles II. His personal life has also remained subject to public interest: he has five daughters and two sons from his first three marriages.
His early impressions of the future King Charles were positive. When Diana and Charles first met at Althorp in 1977, Spencer later remembered him as “perfectly pleasant and charming.” Speaking in 1999 about their plans to marry, he said he had initially felt comfortable about the relationship.
Why the episode still resonates
The argument now surrounding Spencer’s memoir is not simply about one alleged phone call. It touches on the enduring sensitivity of Diana’s death, the highly scrutinized upbringing of her sons, and the tension between private grief and public royal history.
William and Harry’s walk behind their mother’s coffin became one of the defining images of 1997. For some, it represented duty and national mourning; for others, it remains a troubling symbol of the expectations placed on two grieving children.
Spencer’s latest claims ensure that the choices made in those days will again be examined. Whatever conclusions readers draw from the opposing accounts, the renewed dispute shows how powerfully Diana’s legacy continues to shape the royal family’s public story.
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