There’s something about being a former royal butler that gives you a lot of insight into how the royal family works. However, as one former butler, Grant Harrold, is publishing a book revealing secrets about one side of the royal family, there’s another who has been doing the same for longer and is still not done talking. And Paul Burrell, who has spoken out publicly multiple times about his time working with Princess Diana, is immediately coming for Prince Harry.
The Duke of Sussex and Burrell are not exactly on good terms, with Harry describing the former butler as a “two-faced s—” and a traitor. And Burrell, well, he admits his up-to-date memoir, The Royal Insider, was written partly to answer a “petulant” Prince Harry, and showcase how his truth “may not be the complete truth.”
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Burrell discussed this and more in an interview with The Telegraph. The former butler claimed he was “used” by Harry, and recounts how he was summoned to a meeting with both him and Prince William in 2017, where he shared anecdotes about Princess Diana. But then, years later, as he was battling Mirror Group Newspapers over phone hacking, Prince Harry said that both he and his brother had “very strong feelings” about Burrell, stating that he sold Princess Diana’s possessions.
“He got the information he wanted and then had actually another round with me,” Burrell said. “Do I just sit back and let that happen? I don’t think so.”
The Royal Insider: My Life with the Queen, the King and Princess Diana
Burrell, who claims he has a lot of affection for both of Princess Diana’s kids, recounted being upset at Harry’s decision. “He could reach me and tell me how he thinks, privately, but I’m not allowed to speak in public about his world? It seems to me to be hypocritical,” he said.
In the book, Burrell is similarly critical of Prince Harry. “He lives in a world where he directs, writes the scripts of, and stars in his own particular soap opera,” he explained. “And I think that’s unfair to talk about other people without them having a rebuttal.”
When called out about the fact that he is basically doing the same as Prince Harry did, publishing a book about his experience, Burrell pushed back. “His book was confrontational, mine isn’t,” he insisted. “His was setting out to be confrontational. Mine sets out to be honest and true.”
Burrell was charged with stealing hundreds of items belonging to the late Princess in 2002. Ironically, the reason Burrell has been so open with information about the royal family has to do with that trial. He did, after all, sign the Official Secrets Act when he began working for the royal family in 1976. “That stood for all my working life, until they came for me,” Burrell says.
That was lifted during the trial and never reinstated. “The rate they paid was the fact they set me free,” Burrell says. “My reward was the fact that I was set free.”
Another royal butler telling stories about the royal family, another day.
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