![\"dad\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/dad-1746449728734.jpg\")
Source: Getty Images| Max Mumby\/Indigo<\/p>\n
King Charles and Prince Harry attend the Opening Ceremony of the Invictus Games in 2014.<\/p>\n
May 6 2025, Published 9:06 a.m. ET<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n Prince Harry has given several high-profile interviews and released a bombshell memoir<\/a> reflecting on his time within the royal fold. In his book, Spare, the Duke recounted that his father, King Charles, once made an insensitive joke about his \u2018real dad.\u2019 He claimed that the King had alluded to one of his late mother, Princess Diana\u2019s, ex-lovers.<\/p>\n Article continues below advertisement<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Long back, it was once widely speculated if Harry\u2019s \u2018real father\u2019 was Diana\u2019s former lover, Major James Hewitt. As reported by Page Six<\/a>, Harry penned in his memoir, Spare, \u201cPa liked telling stories, and this was one of the best in his repertoire. He\u2019d always end with a burst of philosophizing\u2026 Who knows if I\u2019m really the Prince of Wales? Who knows if I\u2019m even your real father?\u201d The Duke added, \u201cHe\u2019d laugh and laugh, though it was a remarkably unfunny joke, given the rumor circulating just then that my actual father was one of Mummy\u2019s former lovers: Major James Hewitt. One cause of this rumor was Major Hewitt\u2019s flaming ginger hair, but another cause was sadism.\u201d<\/p>\n Article continues below advertisement<\/p>\n<\/p>\n The Prince opened up about how the rumors about him and Hewitt deeply affected him. He shared, \u201cMaybe it made them feel better about their lives that a young prince\u2019s life was laughable. Never mind that my mother didn\u2019t meet Major Hewitt until long after I was born.\u201d Interestingly, this was only hearsay. In his memoir, Harry claimed Charles never spoke to him about the Hewitt rumors directly. <\/p>\n Diana met Hewitt in the summer of 1986 at a dinner party, two years after Harry was born. She then infamously began a five-year affair with the Major. Hewitt soon became a controversial figure in the UK for his attempts to sell the love letters he wrote to the late Princess.<\/p>\n Article continues below advertisement<\/p>\n<\/p>\n In his memoir, Harry also reflected how Charles would rudely refer to him as the \u2018spare.\u2019<\/a> He claimed that over time, the label was adopted by other senior royals as well, including the late Queen Elizabeth. He revealed that after his birth, Charles allegedly remarked to Diana, \u201cWonderful! Now you have given me an heir and a spare; my work is done.\u201d While the Prince expressed frustration over his name, OK! magazine <\/a>reports that the name is usually used to denote the line of succession and carries no judgment. Even Princess Margaret, the late Queen\u2019s younger sister, was dubbed the \u2018spare\u2019 by the family, as Prince Andrew, too, was of Charles.<\/p>\n Article continues below advertisement<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Charles was unsurprisingly not too pleased with Harry\u2019s bombshell revelations in his memoir. According to royal editor Rebecca English, Charles reportedly refused to read his son\u2019s memoir, even after six months of its release. A royal source told the Daily Mail,<\/a> \u201cWhy would he read something that he knows is going to be so hurtful?\u201d The Duke and the King allegedly continue to be on poor terms <\/a>owing to Harry\u2019s scathing media interviews about the royal family.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Source: Getty Images| Max Mumby\/Indigo King Charles and Prince Harry attend the Opening Ceremony of the Invictus Games…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":79266,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7708],"tags":[7709,7730,7731,7716,1760,1501,7710,519],"class_list":{"0":"post-79265","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-royals","8":"tag-british-royal-family","9":"tag-charles","10":"tag-charles-iii","11":"tag-heirs-spares","12":"tag-king-charles","13":"tag-latest-news","14":"tag-royal-families","15":"tag-royal-family"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114461178951676940","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79265","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=79265"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79265\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/79266"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=79265"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=79265"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=79265"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}