Palace Responds After Spencer Alleges King Charles Said Diana Would Be “Forgotten”

Buckingham Palace has issued an unusually direct response after Charles Spencer, Princess Diana’s brother, alleged in a forthcoming memoir that King Charles told him days after Diana’s death that “we’ll forget her soon enough.”

The allegation appears in Swan Song: Diana, My Sister, Spencer’s memoir publishing globally on September 22, ahead of the 30th anniversary of Diana’s death in 2027.

An extract published Wednesday by a British newspaper, the Daily Mail, which secured exclusive rights to serialise the book, describes a tense phone call between Spencer and the then Prince of Wales in the days following Diana’s death.

Diana, Princess of Wales, died on August 31, 1997, aged 36, after a car crash in the Pont de l’Alma tunnel in Paris.

According to Spencer, a senior Palace aide told him that Diana’s sons, Prince William, then 15, and Prince Harry, then 12, would walk behind their mother’s coffin in the funeral procession.

Spencer objected, believing Diana would not have wanted her grieving sons exposed to such a public spectacle.

What Spencer Alleges Was Said

Spencer wrote that Charles called him shortly afterward and the conversation became heated, with Charles reportedly noting that he himself had walked in the funeral procession for his great-uncle, Lord Mountbatten, in 1979.

Spencer says he remained opposed, and Charles grew angrier.

“Prince Charles continued his stream of anger, without me interrupting. Then he stopped,” Spencer wrote. “I assumed the pause signaled an effort to bring himself under control, but then he unleashed down the phone what I have always taken to be his pent-up contempt for Diana, and his horror that the world was so bowled over by her death.”

He alleged Charles then said: “Rest assured, we’ll forget her soon enough!” Spencer wrote that he replied, “I can’t believe you just said that,” before hanging up.

According to CNN, a spokesperson for Penguin Random House confirmed to it that the quoted passages are accurate.

The allegation remains Spencer’s account of a private conversation nearly three decades ago, with no recording or independent witness publicly available to verify it.

In the end, both princes walked behind their mother’s coffin on September 6, 1997, alongside their father, grandfather Prince Philip and Spencer himself, watched by millions worldwide.

Why The Palace’s Response Is Unusual

Buckingham Palace, which typically avoids commenting on books about the royal family — it did not publicly rebut Prince Harry‘s 2023 memoir Spare — chose to respond this time.

“While we do not comment on books as a matter of principle, His Majesty is mindful that the pain of fraternal grief can cloud reason, affect judgment and colour memory in ways others do not recognise, even many years after such a loss,” a Palace spokesperson said.

Royal biographer and Majesty magazine editor-in-chief Ingrid Seward told the Press Association the intervention was highly unusual.

“It’s unprecedented as far as I can think… I imagine it’s because the King was very upset and wanted to set the record straight — more on behalf of his sons than anything else,” she said.