Tomorrow the Royal Family will mark Commonwealth Day at Westminster Abbey – and the annual service five years ago was the tense final royal engagement for Prince Harry and Meghan Markle

The stage is set for one of the biggest events in the royal calendar that’s become known as Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s final farewell.

Tomorrow King Charles and Queen Camilla, as well as the Prince and Princess of Wales, will join together for the grand Commonwealth Day service at Westminster Abbey. Last year both Kate and the King missed the ceremony due to their cancer diagnoses – but both will return for this year’s celebration.

However, two family members who will definitely be on the missing list are the Sussexes. In fact, the event in 2020 marked their last royal engagement before quitting as senior royals to carve out new lives for themselves in North America.

The royals at the service in 2020 ( 
Image:
POOL/AFP via Getty Images)
They attended the service alongside other members of the Firm – and many remarked on the tension between the family members. And according to a book, Harry appeared to be “fighting back the tears” following what they perceived to be a “snub”.

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Before the ceremony, 2,000 orders of service had been distributed detailing that William and Kate would enter the Abbey with the main royal party. However, there was no mention of Harry and Meghan being in the procession, with the Daily Mail reporting the couple was “quite sensitive and emotional about it”.

This reportedly led to William and Kate not walking in the procession in an attempt to resolve the issue – despite the orders of service stating otherwise. And in his book Battle of Brothers, royal author and historian Robert Lacey says even though Meghan had a “megawatt” smile, Harry was more gloomy.

He writes: “Observers also noted that Harry’s face was ‘quite tense and unsmiling’ – and that when William sat down close to him, he barely greeted his brother. Throughout the service, Meghan megawatted away with her best TV smile but, as the ceremony progressed, Harry appeared to grow gloomier. According to one observer, “his accelerated blinking even suggested he might have been fighting back tears.'”

Harry said the service felt “cold” ( 
Image:
PA)
Harry later told how he felt at the service in his and Meghan’s controversial Netflix series released at the end of 2022. The service was the first time he and Meghan had seen many family members since an extended Christmas stay in Canada – and the news broke about them quitting the Firm.

Harry explained: “The first time that we saw the other members of the family was in Westminster Abbey. We were nervous seeing the family because all the TV cameras and everybody watching at home and everybody watching in the audience. It’s like living through a soap opera where everybody else views you as entertainment.

“I felt really distant from the rest of my family, which was interesting because so much of how they operate is about what it looks like, rather than what it feels like. And it looked cold. But it also felt cold.”

William, Kate, Charles and Camilla will also gather with the Princess Royal and the Duke and Duchess of Gloucester for the service tomorrow in Westminster Abbey, Buckingham Palace has announced.

This year’s Commonwealth Day theme is Together We Thrive, which celebrates the “enduring spirit of the Commonwealth family”. During the service, singer-songwriter Joan Armatrading will perform an arrangement of her well-known hit Love And Affection for the 2,000-strong congregation.

On the same day, the King will launch the inaugural King’s Baton Relay at Buckingham Palace, officially starting the countdown to the Glasgow 2026 Commonwealth Games. It marks the 18th official Commonwealth Games relay, and Charles’s first as King.

He will place a message inside the baton, which will be sealed and kept closed until the opening ceremony next summer, when the King’s words will be read out to signal the start of the sporting competition. Charles will hand the baton to the first baton bearer, six-time Olympic champion cyclist Sir Chris Hoy