Meghan Markle has faced a number of accusations regarding her treatment of staff members over the years, giving her the nickname “Duchess Difficult”.
Meghan Markle has been in the headlines for various reasons over the years, with one being her reported treatment of staff.
Although the Duchess of Sussex has been placed under the nickname “Duchess Difficult”, Meghan, 43, has repeatedly and vehemently denied the claims that she mistreated staff, with her team calling the allegations a “calculated smear campaign based on misleading and harmful misinformation
However, with a number of her employees resigning and leaving soon after joining, people have been left wondering if there is any truth in the allegations, which date back to her time as a senior member of the Royal Family.
One of the first allegations to emerge was made by a royal correspondent who said a pregnant Meghan Markle reportedly “turned and hissed” at one of her members of staff on a tour of Australia, New Zealand, Tonga and Fiji in the autumn of 2018. Rebecca English of the Daily Mail said: “I was there at the time and witnessed Meghan turn and ‘hiss’ at a member of her entourage, clearly incandescent with rage about something, and demand to leave.
“I later saw that same — female — highly distressed member of staff sitting in an official car, with tears running down her face.”
A similar situation was also reported in The Times when Meghan Markle had allegedly phoned one staff member from the royal household “every 10 minutes” while she and Prince Harry were out for dinner.
According to the staff member, the Duchess of Sussex felt like she had been let down about an issue apparently worrying her, so had “repeatedly” contacted the royal staffer. Valentine Low, author of Courtiers: The Hidden Power Behind the Crown, quoted the staff member from the Palace in the book, which was later published in The Times. The worker reportedly said: “Every 10 minutes I had to go outside to be screamed at by her [Meghan] and Harry”.
The claims led to the Palace launching an investigation into the reports of the bullying.
Since quitting the Royal Family in 2020, Meghan has also been accused of treating her staff members poorly, with the Duke of Sussex’s chief of staff, Josh Kettler, reported to have quit this year at short notice after just three months in the post.