Meghan Markle’s surprising revelation to Oprah Winfrey that she and Prince Harry were secretly married three days before their extravagant royal wedding was contradicted by the couple’s legal marriage certificate, published Monday by a British tabloid.
A representative of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex later confirmed to the Daily Beast and NBC’s “Today” that there was in fact no early legal marriage, but that “the couple exchanged personal vows a few days before their official / legal marriage on 19 may “three years ago.
Markle told Winfrey in an interview broadcast on March 7 that she and her prince were married in the backyard of their home with the Archbishop of Canterbury apparently presiding over three days before their wedding in St. George’s Chapel at Windsor Castle.
“You know, three days before our wedding, we got married. Nobody knows that, ”said Markle. “We called the archbishop and just said, ‘Look, this thing, this spectacle, is for the world. But we want our union between us. ‘So the vows we cast in our room are just the two of us in our backyard with the Archbishop of Canterbury. “
Harry joked: “Just the three of us”, referring to the archbishop, the Most Reverend Justin Welby.
At the time, their backyard was at Nottingham Cottage – their home at the time in Kensington Palace.
But a copy of the couple’s marriage certificate obtained by The Sun reveals that they were legally married on May 19, the day of their public wedding in Windsor.
The discrepancy is important because British critics are determined to undermine the Sussex interview, particularly the disturbing revelation that someone in the royal family has expressed “concern” about how dark their baby’s skin would be.
Former TV presenter Piers Morgan, a frequent critic of Markle, immediately addressed the issue of marriage on Monday, asking in a tweet, “Do we still have to believe her?”
Journalists had previously quoted sources as saying that Markle was talking about private votes and not a legal marriage, but that was far from clear in the interview.
The British press was immediately skeptical about the disclosure of the marriage after the interview because official marriages require two witnesses, in addition to “just the two of us”.
Officials questioned by British reporters initially tiptoed around the matter. An official said that Markle was “confused”. Another source said that the Archbishop of Canterbury “does not have private weddings”, adding: “Meghan is American; she does not understand.”
But after The Sun obtained the marriage certificate, ex-registrar Stephen Borton told the newspaper: “I’m sorry, but Meghan is obviously confused and clearly misinformed. They had not been married three days earlier in front of the Archbishop of Canterbury. “
The “Special License I helped write allowed them to get married in St. George’s Chapel in Windsor and what happened there on May 19, 2018, and [what] it was seen by millions around the world, it was the official marriage recognized by the Church of England and the law, ”he added.
Borton said he suspected the couple had exchanged some “simple vows” in front of the archbishop – or “more likely it was a simple rehearsal”. He said Nottingham Cottage “is not an authorized location” for a royal wedding and, in addition, they did not have enough witnesses.
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