Walking behind Queen Elizabeth II’s coffin triggered emotional flashbacks for Prince William.
The Prince of Wales told a benefactor on Thursday that marching in his grandmother’s procession the day before “brought back memories” of sitting behind his mother Princess Diana’s coffin at her funeral in 1997.
William confessed it had been “very difficult” during a conversation with an emotional mourner in Sandringham, England, editor of the Sunday Times Roya Nikkhah tweeted.
“Don’t cry now, you’re starting me,” he added poignantly.
William, 40, also heard a mourner tell of the Queen as “everybody’s grandmother.”
He also said that his children Prince George (9) and Princess Charlotte (7) understood that their great-grandmother died, while Prince Louis (4) was less so.
Meanwhile, Kate Middleton, the new Princess of Wales, revealed to a woman that if she read too many condolences, she would cry.
William was only 15 and Prince Harry only 12 when they walked behind their mother’s coffin alongside Prince Charles, Prince Philip and their uncle Charles, the Earl of Spencer.
Initially, the boys had vehemently refused to walk.
“‘I’m not going to join a bloody parade,’ William had cried,” Tina Brown wrote in her book, The Diana Chronicles. Philip had persuaded him gently, ‘If I walk, will you walk with me?
“To prevent the boys from breaking down on the way, Philip spoke to them softly about each of the historic sites of London they passed.”
Harry, now 38, has been candid over the years with his criticism of the decision to let him and William participate in Diana’s procession.
“My mother had just died, and I had to walk a long way behind her coffin, surrounded by thousands of people watching me, while millions of others did on television,” he told Angela Levin for her book “Harry: Conversations with the Prince.” .”
He added: “I don’t think a child should be asked to do that under any circumstances. I don’t think it would happen today.
“No child should have to lose their mother at such a young age and then have their grief observed by thousands of people.”
In his Apple TV+ documentaries with Oprah Winfrey, “The Me You Can’t See,” Harry repeated, “What I remember most was the sound of the horses’ hooves going through the Mall.”