A breakthrough book has shed light on the Prince and Princess of Wales’ feelings about devastating royal split with Prince Harry and Meghan Markle.

The book, William and Catherine: The Monarchy’s New Era: The Inside Story by British royal editor Russell Myers, reveals that Kate, 44, fought less than her husband for Harry to stick with the royals.

“She had seen Harry and Meghan become ever more bitter at having to follow the rules of a hierarchical and hereditary monarchy, until they felt as if they could follow them no longer,” he writes.

“[However,] Catherine had less interest than her husband in trying to persuade Harry to stay in his current role.”

Myers says that Kate first thought arguments between Prince William and Harry were “rooted in immaturity or stubbornness, on both sides”.

“But Harry and Meghan’s attitude towards palace staff, who she and William cared about, set the couples on an entirely different course,” the book says.

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex officially quit royal duties in 2021 and have lived in the US since.

The claims are among several in the book, which was released in Britain last week. It also details more about Kate and William’s feelings amid the infamous royal racism row – and how they told their children of her devastating cancer diagnosis.

1. ‘He was p–sed off’

Myers says William, 43, was furious that his wife was named as one of the so-called royal racists.

The damaging row began after Meghan claimed that while she was pregnant with her son Archie, some royals had raised “concerns and conversations about how dark his skin might be”. In 2023, a Dutch translation of a Meghan and Harry book named Kate and the King as those involved.

“William was vexed at the audacity of dragging his father and wife into the racism row without any foundation,” one source, described as well-placed, told Myers.

“He was p–sed off. He thought it was callous and purposeful. To be accused of something so abhorrent was completely beyond the pale and couldn’t be further from the truth of how they are as people and as a family.”

2. William v Andrew

One of the biggest bombshells in the book is William’s apparent demand from some years ago that his disgraced uncle Andrew be immediately banished from the royal fold “before the rot set in”.

Myers says the prince’s appeal to his father and Queen Elizabeth II came in 2019, after Andrew’s “car crash” BBC Newsnight interview about his friendship with paedophile Jeffrey Epstein.

The then Duke of York quit royal duties soon after. Only in recent months, he has been stripped of all of his titles, while he remains under investigation by police for misuse of information in public office.

Myers writes that William believed the monarchy faced “a full-scale fire fight” and a genuine threat to its survival due to public revulsion at the Epstein scandal.

“Once you understand the fact that everything that happens in the here and now, affects everything in the future, William’s future, it is very easy to put yourself in his shoes. He never much liked his uncle and wanted him out of the picture immediately before the rot further set in,” a source told Myers.

“William’s view was that he [Andrew] got himself into the whole mess, so he should be left to his own devices to sort it out.”

But there was a furious reaction from the late queen and then Prince Charles, who delivered a stern rebuke in which William was “very much put in his place”.

Kate and William with the late queen and the then Prince Charles and Duchess of Cornwall. Photo: Getty

3. QEII’s intervention

Years earlier, Kate and William’s relationship appeared on the rocks after a split in 2007. It followed some difficult months and a terse conversation.

“Catherine was distressed. She was miserable, but she certainly wasn’t desperate. She felt as though she had nothing to lose and for the first time she probably relayed her true feelings to William,” a source told Myers.

“She wasn’t demanding an engagement, but she wanted a commitment, and if he couldn’t deliver that, well, then she left him in no doubt that it was best they go their separate ways.”

William reportedly told her they were on “different pages” and refused to offer a guarantee of marriage. They agreed to split, leaving him “according to one well-placed source, ‘completely broken’ “, the book reveals.

“In that moment, the queen advised her grandson that the only certain path is the one supported by faith. It was all she had to say,” the source said.

Some months lather, a quiet reunion began by text message. Soon after that, Kate and William found themselves at a party together.

“Fellow guests said as soon as William and Catherine set eyes on one another, it was clear their love had not extinguished,” Myers says.

The couple spent the night locked in quiet talks – before Kate delivered her own ultimatum.

“Catherine, of course, knew that she still loved William deeply. That was why she had been so explicit in her demands. She was willing to agree to a future, if only he would stop allowing outside factors to affect his judgment,” Myers says.

“The couple returned to the party. As the cocktails flowed and the dance floor filled, they only had eyes for each other.”

The prince and princess with one-year-old Prince George.

4. Clash over George

The book also reveals an apparent disagreement between Kate and William in 2013 over the name for their first-born son.

“Catherine had her heart set on Alexander for a boy or Alexandra (also Queen Elizabeth’s middle name) for a girl,” Myers writes.

He says William joked with staff that the names Rodney and Graham were also on the shortlist. In reality, “the future king, who favoured a more traditional route for his heir, settled on a shortlist of two names for a boy: George and Louis”.

William won that battle, with the baby eventually named George Alexander Louis.

5. ‘Ground beneath him vanished’

Then, in early 2024, came perhaps the biggest crisis the couple has faced – Kate’s cancer diagnosis.

“A close friend spoke of the prince’s reaction: It was like being hit by a bus, sudden, brutal, and completely disorienting,” Myers wrote.

“One moment, life was normal, and the next, everything changed. He worships her, truly. She’s his world, and when the diagnosis came, it was as if the ground beneath him vanished.”

An aide revealed that the couple “both very calmly told the children what was going on and how long Catherine would need to be away for”.

“Everything they live for is for those children; they are their absolute world,” Myers writes. “There were a lot of tears from everyone.”

Kate kept in touch with her children – Prince George, now 12, Princess Charlotte, 10, and Prince Louis, 7 – from hospital via video calls, listening to their stories and asking if “papa” had cooked for them.

William later told actor Eugene Levy that 2024 – in which he also had to deal with his father the King’s own cancer diagnosis – was “the hardest year” he’d faced.

“His father’s illness brought into focus just how quickly his life, and that of his family, as well as the whole landscape of the institution, could change very quickly,” the aide said.

The Princess of Wales announced the end of her chemotherapy in September 2024. In January 2025, she said she was in remission.