Prince Harry Takes on Those Rumors About His Parentage

Calls the rumors about James Hewitt 'hurtful, mean, and cruel'
By Evann Gastaldo,  Newser Staff
Posted Jun 7, 2023 12:30 AM CDT
Prince Harry Addresses Rumors the King Isn't His Dad
Prince Harry leaves the High Court after giving evidence in London, Tuesday, June 6, 2023.   (AP Photo/Alberto Pezzali)

In a witness statement released Tuesday as Prince Harry testified in London's High Court, the Duke of Sussex addressed longstanding rumors that King Charles III is not his biological father. "Numerous newspapers had reported a rumor that my biological father was James Hewitt, a man my mother had a relationship with after I was born," Harry wrote in one portion of the statement, which was obtained by the New York Times, in which he referenced a 2002 article in one of the British tabloids he's fighting in court. "At the time of this article and others similar to it, I wasn't actually aware that my mother hadn't met Major Hewitt until after I was born."

He says it wasn't until 2014 that he learned the timeline of his mother's relationship with Hewitt "didn't even add up," Harry wrote, according to E! Online, but he says the tabloids had long known that. Harry had previously addressed the rumors in his memoir, Spare, noting that "Tabloid readers were delighted by the idea that the younger child of Prince Charles wasn't the child of Prince Charles. They couldn't get enough of this 'joke,' for some reason. Maybe it made them feel better about their lives that a young prince's life was laughable." (He also said in the memoir that his father used to joke with him about the possibility Hewitt was his father.) He said in the statement that the stories about Hewitt were "hurtful, mean, and cruel," Page Six reports. See more from Harry's testimony here. (More James Hewitt stories.)

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