Prince Harry gave his grandmother, Queen Elizabeth II, a secret mobile phone so he could contact the monarch directly after he and his wife, Meghan, left senior royal duties, former royal butler Paul Burrell writes in memoir extracts published by the Daily Mail.
Burrell, who served as personal butler to Diana, Princess of Wales, says in The Royal Insider: My Life with the Queen, the King and Princess Diana that Harry sent the device without informing his father or his brother. The former aide wrote that the plan was intended to give Harry "a secure line direct to the CEO of the family firm, bypassing not just his family but all her courtiers."
According to Burrell, the mobile phone never became a working line for the monarch. He recounts that when the package arrived, the Queen asked: "What am I supposed to do with it?" and that courtiers worried it might interrupt official engagements. Burrell wrote that the device was placed "in the top drawer of a servant's desk at the end of the long green corridor," alongside a similar phone he says had been sent by Prince Andrew.
Burrell's account places the episode against the backdrop of Harry and Meghan's public break with royal life. The couple announced in January 2020 that they would step back from senior royal duties, a decision widely called "Megxit." They relocated to the United States by the summer and later announced a multi‑year production agreement with Netflix.
The memoir extracts also describe an encounter between the Queen and her great‑granddaughter Lilibet in June 2022 during Platinum Jubilee events. Burrell says Harry and Meghan had sought to film the Queen meeting their daughter, then an infant, but that the Queen vetoed the idea. Burrell wrote that the monarch was concerned photographs or footage captured by the couple's team might reach U.S. media beyond the royal household's controlled communications apparatus.
Burrell recounts that the Queen nonetheless invited Harry, Meghan and the children to a tea that proved divisive within the royal party and that the Sussexes left before the Jubilee celebrations ended. He quotes from Harry's own memoir, Spare, recalling the monarch's reaction to seeing the children: "'Sweetest children', Granny said, sounding bemused. She'd expected them to be a bit more... American, I think?" Burrell notes the meeting occurred weeks before the Queen's death at Balmoral in September 2022.
Paul Burrell's book is being serialised in the Daily Mail ahead of its publication by Sphere on Sept. 11. Burrell, who became a well‑known royal household figure following his long service to Diana, said his memoir offers insight into what he describes as the Queen's "special relationship" with Harry and her efforts to placate the Sussexes amid the family's public rifts.
The serialised passages provide a rare behind‑the‑scenes depiction of private attempts to maintain ties after Harry and Meghan stepped away from royal duties. The accounts offered by Burrell reflect his long association with the royal household and are drawn from his recollections rather than contemporaneous palace documents. The palace did not immediately comment on the claims reported in the extracts.