Meghan Markle and Harry confirm they DID NOT have secret backyard wedding, they only 'exchanged personal vows'
Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have finally admitted that they were NOT married three days before their official ceremony, as they had reportedly claimed in their March 7 interview with Oprah Winfrey, reported The Daily Beast. A spokesperson for the couple had conceded on Monday, March 22, that "the couple exchanged personal vows a few days before their official/legal wedding on May 19."
A backyard exchange of personal vows does not constitute marriage, the report added. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex had earlier claimed in the bombshell CBS interview that they were married in their backyard by the Archbishop of Canterbury three days before their fairytale wedding, however, The Sun, in a statement had revealed that Meghan may not have been telling the complete truth.
RELATED ARTICLES
Meghan Markle LIED about secret wedding to Harry: Wedding certificate revealed after shocking claim
The belated admission on the record marks the end of a tortuous saga that began with Meghan's claim of a secret backyard wedding, a claim that was highly disputed since a minimum of two witnesses are needed for a legal marriage to take place in the United Kingdom.
Some argued that Meghan was merely making the point that for the Sussexes as a couple, it was more important to make a personal than a public commitment and that the focus on discrepancies in the interview was a deliberate strategy by the 'Suits' actor's detractors to steer away her wider credibility and the specific claim that “concerns” over her baby’s likely skin color were raised and expressed to her husband.
Did Meghan LIE about secret 'backyard' wedding?
"I was thinking about it, you know our wedding — three days before our wedding, we got married. No one knows that," Meghan Markle told Oprah during the interview. "We called the Archbishop and we just said, look, this thing, this spectacle is for the world. But we want our union between us, so the vows that we have framed in our room are just the two of us in our backyard with the Archbishop of Canterbury."
However, the copy of the official wedding certificate verified that the actual ceremony did take place on May 19, 2018, at Windsor with Prince Charles and Meghan’s mother Doria Ragland as witnesses. The date of March 16, 2021, at the bottom, is the day before The Sun obtained the certificate.
Stephen Borton, former chief clerk at the Faculty Office, dismissed the claim, saying: “I’m sorry, but Meghan is obviously confused and clearly misinformed." He added, "They did not marry three days earlier in front of the Archbishop of Canterbury."
An American thing
Mark Edwards, a priest from Newcastle, said to The Daily Beast in a report last week that he checked with the archbishop’s office and was told that the claim that they got married in their backyard may simply have been the result of a misunderstanding, considering the fact that “Meghan is an American.”
Edwards said he had gone to Archibishop Justin Welby's office to “get some clarity” on the issue. He said the person he spoke to told him, “Justin had a private conversation with the couple in the garden about the wedding, but I can assure you, no wedding took place until the televised national event.”