Sept. 16, 2026Up to date Sept. 17, 2026, 12:15 p.m. ET
In a uncommon assertion, Buckingham Palace is pushing again in opposition to allegations Earl Charles Spencer ranges in opposition to former brother-in-law King Charles in a forthcoming guide about his late sister, Princess Diana.
Spencer writes in “Swan Track: Diana, My Sister,” due for launch Sept. 22, that days earlier than his sister’s funeral, Charles, then the Prince of Wales, hissed, “Relaxation assured, we’ll overlook her quickly sufficient!” The excerpt was revealed by the Day by day Mail on Sept. 16, with extra passages set to be serialized within the newspaper within the coming days.
In an unusually agency assertion to the BBC, a Buckingham Palace spokesperson mentioned: “Whereas we don’t touch upon books as a matter of precept, His Majesty is aware that the ache of fraternal grief can cloud cause, have an effect on judgment and color reminiscence in methods others don’t recognise, even a few years after such a loss.”
USA TODAY reached out to the Palace and Spencer’s rep for remark.
Earl Charles Spencer writes King Charles ‘went nuts’ over Diana funeral plans
In response to the Day by day Mail, Spencer says in his guide that when a senior aide to Queen Elizabeth advised him that Prince William, 15 on the time, and 12-year-old Prince Harry would participate in Princess Diana’s funeral procession, he replied, “That is not going to occur.”
He alleges that minutes later Charles known as to debate the matter, noting he had walked within the procession for his great-uncle Lord Mountbatten in 1979. When Spencer mentioned Charles was 30 years outdated on the time, the prince allegedly “went nuts.”
Charles, whose divorce with Diana was finalized in 1996, “unleashed down the telephone what I’ve at all times taken to be his pent-up contempt for Diana, and his horror that the world was so stunned by her loss of life,” Spencer wrote.
Spencer allegedly responded, “I can’t consider you simply mentioned that,” and hung up.
Earl Charles Spencer will ‘converse on Diana’s behalf’ in his guide
Spencer was impressed “to inform the reality about Diana from her brother’s perspective” with August 2027 marking the thirtieth anniversary of her loss of life, in accordance with a information launch shared by Penguin Press on Aug. 20.
“This has satisfied me to jot down down my very own ideas and reminiscences, as soon as and for all, somewhat than having the discomfort of once more studying the opinions of others, a lot of that are based mostly on untruths which have turn into accepted over time,” Spencer mentioned. He added that within the guide, he goals to “converse on Diana’s behalf and achieve this in an brazenly constructive approach.”
Within the early morning hours of Aug. 31, 1997, a automobile that Princess Diana and her boyfriend, Egyptian filmmaker Dodi Al-Fayed have been touring in together with her bodyguard, Trevor Rees-Jones, crashed into one other car and a pillar inside Paris’ Pont de l’Alma tunnel.
Fayed and driver Henri Paul, who was discovered to be intoxicated on the time of the accident, died on the scene. The Princess of Wales, 36, died of her accidents a number of hours later in a hospital.
The guide’s launch was not too long ago beset by an obvious theft, Penguin Random Home confirmed to USA TODAY on Sept. 16. 4 copies of “Swan Track” have been allegedly “stolen from a parked truck within the Netherlands on the best way from their printer to their warehouse,” a spokesperson mentioned in a press release.
