As King Charles grappled with the profound loss of his mother, Queen Elizabeth, he simultaneously assumed the role of monarch, a position he had been preparing for his entire life.
Having spent decades as the longest-serving Prince of Wales, Charles had diligently observed and learned from his mother, readying himself for the day he would become king. Yet, the transition to this new role was inevitably shadowed by his personal grief.
In the immediate aftermath of Queen Elizabeth’s death, a royal expert revealed that Charles’s struggle to balance his new responsibilities with his sorrow was evident in a brief interaction with a member of the royal staff.
The expert, Robert Hardman – an author and royal expert – revealed the quietly devastating moment in his new book Charles III: New King, New Court.
The Inside Story, which was serialised in the Daily Mail ahead of its publication. The newspaper reports that when Charles learned that his mother had died, he had known that the former monarch was approaching the end, but had “believed the Queen still had days, not hours, to live”.
He had advised his sons, Prince William and Prince Harry, to travel to Balmoral to say their final goodbyes, believing there would be time for them to see their grandmother. However, the Queen’s health deteriorated rapidly.
As Charles made the difficult calls to inform his sons of her passing, one moment highlighted the tension between his new responsibilities and his personal grief. While trying to reach William, Charles was forced to identify himself simply as “it’s me” when speaking to a palace switchboard operator, unable to reveal his new status as king.
“When Charles called William via the palace switchboard to break the news to him he was forced to tell the operator simply ‘it’s me’ as he suddenly realised he couldn’t reveal that he was king, yet,” it was claimed in the expert’s book, showing the complicated nature of the line of succession itself.
Charles also endeavoured to get hold of his youngest son Prince Harry, but wasn’t able to because the Duke of Sussex was flying at the time, and Harry has claimed that he found out the news from the BBC website. In his memoir Spare, Harry revealed that as his plane began to land his phone was suddenly filled with notifications and after checking the news, he realised “Granny was gone. Pa was King.”
