The Duchess of Sussex has made contact with her estranged father in hospital in the Philippines, a week after he had surgery to amputate his leg.
Thomas Markle, 81, begged his daughter to see him “one more time before I die”, saying she had not called him after his life-saving operation.
On Wednesday morning, the Duchess of Sussex’s team confirmed that a letter, written from her home in California, had been delivered to her father who is staying at a hospital on the island of Cebu.
It is understood she was unwilling to speak to her father for fear the conversation would be overheard or relayed to the tabloids, after he gave a damaging interview to a journalist, whom he counts as a friend, about his daughter last week.
“Given that a Daily Mail reporter has remained at her father’s bedside throughout, broadcasting each interaction and breaching clear ethical boundaries, it has been exceedingly difficult for the duchess to contact her father privately, despite her efforts over the past several days,” a spokesman said. “With the support of reliable and trusted contacts, her correspondence is now safely in his hands.”
Her team cited the difficulties posed by time zones and logistics for the delay in sending the note. It is understood Meghan, 44, is hopeful the note will remain private.
The situation echoes her letter to her father in the weeks after her wedding, large parts of which were published by The Mail on Sunday in 2018. Three years later, she won a court case against the paper with a judge ruling the letter was “personal, private and not matters of legitimate public interest”.
Meghan herself was criticised for sharing details of private conversations with members of the royal family, most notable her claim on Oprah Winfrey’s chat show that someone had expressed “concerns … about how dark” her first baby Archie’s skin might be.
It was claimed the duchess had personally rung round hospitals in Cebu with no success, and emailed the address she held for her father. She had, however, either lost or deleted her father’s number during their years of estrangement.
Her father underwent emergency surgery last Wednesday after a 14-inch blood clot in his left thigh caused his foot to go black and blue, and swell to twice its normal size. A team of surgeons removed his left leg below the knee, preventing an infection in his foot spreading to his body.
One of his doctors said, with Markle’s permission, that the surgery was a matter of “life or death”.
“Had the infection in the foot moved to his heart, it would most likely have been fatal,” the doctor said. “He is doing well but he is not out of the woods yet.”
Markle and his daughter have been estranged since the run-up to her wedding to Prince Harry, 41, in 2018, and he has never met her husband, Prince Archie or Princess Lilibet.
Meghan and Harry in October
EVAN AGOSTINI/INVISION/AP
Her father had been due to walk her down the aisle at St George’s Chapel in Windsor but strained relations and two heart attacks led him to pull out. Relations became strained after it emerged that he had staged pictures with a paparazzi photographer. In his absence Charles, then Prince of Wales, gave Meghan away.
Their relations then deteriorated further after her 1,250-word letter was leaked.
This year Markle moved from his home in Mexico to the Philippines. He now lives with his son, Thomas Markle Jr, 59.
The Daily Mail’s owner, DMG Media, said this week: “Any suggestion we have ‘puppeteered’ Mr Markle is entirely false and strongly denied.”