The Duke of Sussex has compromised the safety of the royal family by describing the layout of several royal residences as well as his personal protection detail, an expert has warned.
Dai Davies, a former head of royal patronage, said the duke was a “fool” for revealing such information in his memoir, Spare – details that could prove “dangerous” in the wrong hands.
The Duke wrote in the book that he always carried an electronic tracker and panic alarm and described how his security team operated and responded.
He added a detailed description of where the Queen Consort’s “posh bottles” of wine, “absurd gifts from foreign governments and potentates”, as well as “several storerooms full of paintings” could be found in Highgrove, the home of King’s Gloucestershire.
Minute details are also shared about the location of Queen Elizabeth II’s bedroom in Balmoral and the precise route from the entrance at Clarence House to the King’s private sitting room, complete with the exact number of steps.
Davies, who has worked in police and security for over 50 years, said: “These revelations are of great concern to me and are likely to be of great concern to Prince Harry’s current team.
“It makes the job of protecting him, private or otherwise, problematic. Only a fool would divulge details like this about the royals’ inner sanctuaries.
“Historically, there have always been people who have tried to access parts of royal palaces.
“Whether they are fixated individuals with mental health issues or terrorists, this information can be very helpful.
“There is a reason Buckingham Palace never discusses details of its security operations, big or small. It would never be expected of someone with such in-depth knowledge of royal private residences to disclose such information.”
The Duke recounted in his book the moment when the Duchess of Sussex was first introduced to the King and the Queen’s consort, when they were greeted at the door of Clarence House by a butler and a house manager.
“They led us down the long corridor, past the great paintings and gilded mirrors, past the crimson carpet with the crimson carpet, past the great display case filled with gleaming china and beautiful heirlooms, up the creaking staircase, which ascended three steps before he jogged to the right, up another 12 steps, then jogged to the right again,” he said.
“There, finally, on the landing above us, stood Dad.”
Elsewhere, the Duke described how, at his old cellar hideout in Highgrove, the home of King’s Gloucestershire – nicknamed Club H.
The former bomb shelter, he said, could be reached by “walking through a heavy white door on the ground floor, then down a steep stone staircase… past a damp stone floor, then down three more flights of stairs, down a long damp corridor with a low vaulted roof, then past several wine cellars, where Camilla kept her finest bottles, past a freezer and several storerooms filled with paintings, polo gear, and absurd gifts from foreign governments and potentates.
“Behind that last storage room were two green doors with little brass handles, and on the other side of those was Club H”.
The Duke also recalled in great detail the layout of Balmoral, the late Queen’s ‘happy place’ nestled in the grouse marshes of Aberdeenshire.
Prince Harry told Spare: “When I close my eyes I see the main entrance, the front panels, the wide portico and three grey-black speckled granite steps leading up to the massive front door of whisky-coloured oak, often propped open. by a heavy curling stone and often manned by a red-clad footman.
“And into the spacious hall… and then the light brown wooden door that leads into the hall with the crimson carpet and the walls hung with cream, a pattern of flecks of gold, raised like Braille, and then the many rooms along the corridor.. … and finally the main room of the castle, built in the 19th century.”
He went on to describe the grand staircase at the heart of the main room, writing that “whenever Grandma went up to her bedroom on the second floor, with corgis on her heels, she preferred the elevator.”
The King shares his mother’s love for Scotland and currently resides at Birkhall, his home on the Balmoral estate.
Meanwhile, the duke also detailed his former personal patronage, raising fears that it could endanger the safety of the rest of the royal family.
He wrote: “I needed someone to treat me normally, which meant ignoring the armed bodyguard sleeping down the hall whose job it was to keep me from being kidnapped or killed (not to mention of the electronic tracker and the panic alarm I carried with me).
The duke added that before his security protection was lost, he was “never allowed to go anywhere without three armed bodyguards”.
Moreover, he also revealed that the official threat level in the country is “used by palace security to allocate personnel and weapons”.
The Duke spoke at length about his guards, including a man he called Billy the Rock — who he admitted gave the go-ahead to follow his late mother’s final journey through the Alma tunnel in Paris at the same speed at which her car drove. crashed.
“Billy added that if the driver ever revealed to another human being that we asked him to do this, we would find him and there would be hell to pay,” he wrote.
