Prince Harry once let a little girl sit on his shoulders at the Invictus Games because she couldn’t see what was happening on stage.
The 34-year-old royal has recalled the special moment during the closing ceremony of the inaugural games in London in 2014, when he picked up Isabelle Nixon – the daughter of UK athlete and veteran Adam Nixon – and put her on his shoulders, because she was "almost in floods of tears" after being unable to see Foo Fighters perform on stage.
Reflecting on five years of the Invictus Games in a video posted to Instagram through IGTV, Harry said: "I found her at the Foo Fighters concert, the closing concert in London, and she’d had such an amazing time watching her dad play amazing at wheelchair basketball. But she was almost in floods of tears because she couldn’t see the stage. And I just stuck her on my shoulders and she just started bopping away. That for me, even though it was year one was amazing because these kids were able to see their parents – their father or their mother – being themselves again."
Harry – who has four-month-old son Archie with his wife Meghan, Duchess of Sussex – also looked back on how "nervous" he was when giving his speech at the games’ very first opening ceremony.
He added: "On the actual night that we had the lectern right in front of all of the competitors, so I could just see all of their faces. They started chanting and I was so nervous. I was shaking. I knew I had a certain window to get my words out and we were also running behind so I rushed it and it’s probably one of the worst speeches I’ve ever given."
The flame-haired royal set up the multi-sport event in 2014, in which wounded, injured or sick armed services personnel and their associated veterans take part in nine sports including wheelchair basketball, sitting volleyball, and indoor rowing.
Prince Harry recalls heartwarming moment with little girl at inaugural Invictus Games
