Prince Harry was seen laughing with veterans during his whistle-stop trip to the UK for the 10th anniversary of the Invictus Games in a newl…
Prince Harry was seen laughing with veterans during his whistle-stop trip to the UK for the 10th anniversary of the Invictus Games in a newly released video.
The Duke of Sussex spent three days in Britain at the beginning of the May as he attended a Service of
Thanksgiving at St Paul’s Cathedral in London.
The event was attended by Harry, as well as senior figures from the Invictus Games Foundation, wounded veterans who have taken part in the sporting event and famous faces such as actor Damian Lewis, MP Johnny Mercer and former triple jumper Jonathan Edwards.
In a video released by the foundation on Saturday night which gives viewers a look at what happened behind closed doors after the service, the father-of-two was seen laughing and joking with attendees.
The Duke was also seen giving a speech from the pulpit in St Paul’s in which he quoted a verse from the Bible, saying: ‘To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good.’
In the footage, actor Lewis can also be seen giving a reading of Invictus by English poet William Ernest Henley, a work which has been closely linked to the sporting event founded by Harry.
‘It matters not how straight the gait, how charged with punishments the scroll, I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul,’ Mr Lewis said.
An emotional reading was also given by Michelle Turner who is the UK Invictus Games Team vice-captain. She read a personal poem about how the games had helped her recovery and impacted her family.
At the end of the reading she tearfully said: ‘Thank you Invictus, for giving me my life back.’
Harry was the only member of the Royal Family to attend the service, with King Charles hosting the first annual garden party at Buckingham Palace – attended by other senior members of The Firm – across the capital at the same time.
The Duke had been in good spirits when he arrived earlier in the day, waving and smiling at the crowd outside the cathedral before warmly greeting the Dean of St Paul’s the Very Reverend Andrew Tremlett, exchanging words with his uncle Earl Spencer and sitting next to his mentor Mark Dyer.
In the service Harry read a passage from Corinthians 12 ahead of a sermon.
He said: ‘To one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit, to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another the discernment of spirits, to another various kinds of tongues to another the interpretation of tongues.’
Upon leaving the event he took the opportunity to do an impromptu walkabout, speaking to and joking with members of the public who were waiting outside.
In all Harry spent three nights in the capital without seeing any family members before meeting his wife, Meghan, at Heathrow airport and flying onto Nigeria for a quasi-royal tour.
Despite the time spent in the capital, Harry did not meet with any members of the Royal Family with a row breaking out after a spokesman for the Prince suggested his father King Charles was ‘too busy’ to see him.
Harry is said to have turned down an invitation by the King to stay at a royal residence when he visited the UK earlier this month because he had ‘security concerns’.
He is said to have declined his father’s offer because it did not come with any taxpayer-funded personal security provision, which would leave him staying in a ‘visible location with public entrance and exit points and no police protection’.
Instead he chose to stay at a hotel – presumably with members of the public – because it meant he ‘could come and go unseen’, claimed The Telegraph.
The newspaper further maintained that the Duke of Sussex ‘remains devastated’ about the withdrawal of his automatic right to police protection which is still battling the Home Office over through the British courts.
He now has to give the Metropolitan Police 28 days’ notice before coming to the UK if he wants to apply for security provision, with each request assessed on an individual basis by Ravec, the committee which oversees the protection of royalty and public figures.
While it has not been revealed where the King offered Harry a room, St James’ Palace is a strong possibility.
Princess Beatrice has a permanent apartment there, while Princess Anne has a suite of rooms – and a parking place – she uses when staying in London.
Other members of the Royal Family use it on an ad hoc basis.
A row had broken out after a spokesman for Harry suggested Charles, pictured here mingling with guests at the garden party on May 8, had been ‘too busy’ to see Harry during his time in Britain
Moreover it is situated directly adjacent to Clarence House where the King stays when in London.
It would have allowed father and son a place to meet in relative privacy and is guarded round-the-clock by a ‘ring of steel’.
In fact all royal residences – whichever one Harry was offered – feature armed guards at entry and exit points, unlike any London hotel, and boast the most sophisticated security systems in the country to protect working members of the family.
Buckingham Palace has consistently declined to comment on anything to do with Harry and his father.
But a spokesman for the prince chose to issue a statement when he came to London at the beginning of May for a service to mark the 10th anniversary of the Invictus Games.
It strongly suggested that while Harry was keen to meet his father, the King was effectively ‘too busy’ to see him.
However it has since become clear that while His Majesty did indeed have a packed programme of engagements that week, the King had made conciliatory overtures that would have enabled him to see his son.
Buckingham Palace declined to comment at the time, while a request for comment was put to the Sussexes UK spokesman.
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