The Duchess of Sussex claimed there were “concerns and conversations” about how “dark” her son Archie’s skin would be.
The former ‘Suits’ actress – who is biracial – claimed the royal family brought up the subject with her husband, Prince Harry, when she was pregnant with their first child, who is now 22 months old, and suggested the baby’s heritage was one of the reasons why the tot wasn’t given a title.
She said: “Those were conversations family had with him.
“They didn’t want him to be a prince or princess, not knowing what the gender would be, which would be different from protocol, and that he wasn’t going to receive security.
“In those months when I was pregnant, all around this same time, so we have in tandem the conversation of, ‘you won’t be given security, not gonna be given a title’ and also concerns and conversations about how dark his skin might be when he’s born.”
Asked by Oprah Winfrey if there were concerns her child would be “too brown” and it would be a problem, Meghan said: “If that is the assumption you are making, that is a pretty safe one.”
However, during the CBS sit-down interview, she declined to say who had raised concerns.
She said: “I think that would be very damaging to them”.
And when Harry joined the conversation, he confirmed the subject had been raised, but declined to say by whom.
He simply said: “I’m not comfortable sharing that”.
But the 36-year-old prince admitted he was “a bit shocked” by the discussion.
He said: “That conversation, I’m never going to share. But at the time, it was awkward. I was a bit shocked.
“That was right at the beginning… ‘What will the kids look like?’
“There was some real obvious signs before we got married that this was going to be really hard.”
The 39-year-old duchess – who revealed during the interview that she’s carrying a baby girl – admitted she was worried that her baby wouldn’t receive “protection” because they wouldn’t be given a title.
She said: “They didn’t want him to be a prince or a princess. He wasn’t going to receive security. This went on for the last few months of my pregnancy, where I’m going, ‘Hold on for a second.’
“We’re not saying don’t make him a prince, but if you’re saying the title is what’s going to affect the protection… our son needs to be safe.”
Meghan insisted she wasn’t “personally” concerned about Archie not having a title, but she was keen for him to be safe.
She said: “The idea of our son not being safe, and also the idea of the first member of colour in this family not being titled in the same way that other grandchildren would be… the other piece of that conversation is… when you’re the grandchild of the monarch, automatically Archie and our next baby would be prince or princess.
“It’s not their right to take it away.
“While I was pregnant, they said they wanted to take away that convention… why?”