Drugs, silence and Camilla “the villain”: Revelations from Prince Harry’s “60 Minutes” interview

Harry sought out multiple ways to handle his trauma and grief after the untimely death of his mother, Princess Diana. In 1997, when Harry was just 12 years old, his mother was killed due to injuries sustained in a high-speed car crash with pursuing paparazzi. Harry told Cooper he went to therapy. Harry also tried the psychedelics Ayahuasca and psilocybin, also known as magic mushrooms. Harry said he did not condone "people to do this recreationally. But doing it with the right people, if you are suffering from a huge amount of loss, grief or trauma, then these things have a way of working as a medicine." Harry also admitted to earlier marijuana use and trying cocaine, saying in his 20s he felt "lost."

Harry described the videos of himself and his brother William greeting mourners outside of Kensington Palace a few days before his mother's funeral as "bizarre." He recalled "the guilt that I felt" that the crowds were showing deep emotion while he, as a prince performing royal duties, was not allowed to. He shook hands wet from crying and said, "one of the strangest parts to it was taking flowers from people and then placing those flowers with the rest of them. As if I was some sort of middle person for their grief. And that really stood out for me."

When Queen Elizabeth II's health worsened and it was announced that the monarch was under medical supervision in Balmoral Castle in Scotland, multiple members of the royal family were flown in together. Harry was not invited on that plane, which included his brother William and William's wife, Princess Kate. By the time Harry made it on his own to Scotland, his grandmother had already passed away. He was able to see her privately after death for a few moments, and said he managed to summon happiness for her "because she'd finished life. She'd completed life, and her husband was — was waiting for her. And the two of them are buried together."

Harry described Camilla as "the villain." While his parents Charles and Diana were still married, "She was the third person in their marriage. She needed to rehabilitate her image." Neither Harry nor William wanted or thought their father should remarry after his divorce. The brothers directly asked Charles not to marry Camilla. "We didn't think it was necessary," Harry said. "We thought that it was gonna cause more harm than good and that if he was now with his person, that — surely that's enough. Why go that far when you don't necessarily need to?" 

Harry also spoke to Camilla's dangerousness "because of the connections that she was forging within the British press. And there was open willingness on both sides to trade of information. And with a family built on hierarchy, and with her, on the way to being queen consort, there was gonna be people or bodies left in the street because of that." Harry described himself as one of those bodies. 

In his book, according to "60 Minutes," Harry writes, Camilla "sacrificed me on her personal P.R. altar."

The revelation from "Spare," leaked earlier by The Guardian, that William had allegedly physically assaulted Harry, is one more example of the fractured relationship between the two brothers. Earlier, while the two were in school together, William allegedly told Harry he was going to ignore the younger boy, saying, "When we're at school we don't know each other." William also expressed coldness to Meghan, Harry's wife, calling her "the American actress." Harry admitted to Cooper that he has not spoken to his brother or his father for some time. Described in his book as a "full-scale rupture" between himself and the royal family, Harry told Cooper he didn't see himself ever returning to royal duties. But he did express hope that his relationship with his brother could be healed, telling Cooper, "I look forward to us being able to find peace."

From the quotes and stories that have already been leaked, Harry's book "Spare" is candid and revealing. But he never meant to harm anyone by telling his truth, especially not his family. He told Cooper, "None of anything I've written, anything that I've included is ever intended to hurt my family. But it does give a full picture of the situation as we were growing up, and also squashes this idea that somehow my wife was the one that destroyed the relationship between these two brothers."