Despite exiting royal duties in 2021, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle are still regarded as the most popular couple in the Royal family. Here's a detailed look at how the couple really met.
The private life of royal family members has always been a coveted topic that could make eye-catching headlines. Even though they officially withdrew from senior royal duties in 2021, Prince Harry and his wife, Meghan Markle still receive a lot of public attention, from their secret relationship to the famous fairytale wedding.
Despite controversy over their decision to relinquish royal titles, the couple is still happy together. In May 2022, the power couple celebrated their fourth wedding anniversary, alongside beloved son Archie and daughter Lilibet. Here, we take a closer look at the whirlwind love story between the Duke and Duchess of Sussex.
How the couple met
People reports that Harry first met Markle when they both joined a mutual friend's invitation on a blind date at Soho House's Dean Street Townhouse. At that time, Markle didn't know much about who she was going to meet. In their first sit-down interview as a couple, Markle told the BBC:
I didn’t know much about him, so the only thing that I had asked [our mutual friend] when she said that she wanted to set us up, was, 'Well is he nice?' Cause if he wasn't kind, it just didn’t seem like it would make sense.
Despite initial ignorance, Markle immediately fell for the Prince, and vice versa. The whirlwind romance began to progress when Prince Harry and Markle went on their second date to Africa just three or four weeks later. According to Insider, regarding how their relationship developed so quickly, the Prince said on The Late Late Show with James Corden:
There were no distractions, and that was great, that was an amazing thing. We went from 0 to 60 like in the first two months.
How Markle met the Queen and the Royal Family
In 2016, after months of staying under the radar, their romance began to receive public attention when tabloids were all about Prince Harry's current relationship with Meghan Markle. According to The Sun, the Prince was happier than he's been in many years. In the same years, he even introduced Markle to his father, Prince Charles, hinting at the possibility of engagement.
Markle received severe criticism
It's just not that straightforward to be dating a member of the Royal Family. As their romantic story became viral, Markle began to receive defamatory insults and excessive media scrutiny. Even though the American actress was already used to the tabloid culture, the onslaught of negative press coverage was beyond her imagination. In response to this, Prince Harry released a formal statement, saying that he was dating Markle but demanding the press stop distorting facts about their private affair. In another interview with the BBC, Markle said:
I think we were just hit so hard at the beginning with a lot of mistruths that I made the choice to not read anything, positive or negative. It just didn't make sense and instead, we focused all of our energies just on nurturing our relationship.
Their relationship grew stronger
Having been through thick and thin only strengthened the couple's relationship. In 2016, the couple celebrated Christmas together and attended the play The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime in London.
According to Town&Country, in 2017, Markle was introduced to the Prince's sister-in-law, Kate Middleton, and her daughter, Princess Charlotte. In the same year, the couple made their second romantic vacation together when they traveled to the small Norwegian town of Tromvik to see the famous Northern Lights. September 2017 marked their first public appearance together when Markle and Harry attended a tennis event during the Invictus Games in Toronto.
Engagement and marriage
On November 27, 2017, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle finally announced their engagement, which excited both royal watchers and ordinary people around the globe. Almost a year later, the couple walked down the aisle at St. George's Chapel at Windsor Castle, which witnessed the appearance of many celebrities such as David Beckham and Winfrey Oprah.
Currently, after four years of marriage, Prince Harry and Meghan Markle are still happy together, raising their two children, Archie and Lilibet. Even though they exited royal duties in 2021, the couple still maintained close relationships with other royal members. In 2022, they returned to the UK to celebrate the Queen's birthday and Platinum Jubilee.
