What is next for Meghan Markle?

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A big (sort of)  announcement from American actress Meghan Markle today:  she is shutting down her website, The Tig.

http://thetig.com/

This decision will lead to many discussions on social media on why?  Why now?

I brought my crystal ball back to Crystal Balls Are Us some years ago, due to a royal speculation malfunction.  (The Ball insisted the Duke of York would remarry Sarah, Duchess of York.)

The British tabloid press has been reporting that Miss Markle is now living with Prince Harry at his home, Nottingham Cottage, on the Kensington Palace estate.
Miss Markle is one of the co-stars of the USA network series, Suits, which is currently in production for the next season.  So far there has been no announcement that  Miss Markle, 35, will leave the TV series.

[Miss Markle's clothing line, sold at Reitmans, a Canadian department store, is no longer available.]

So what does this all mean?  Perhaps we should read nothing into the announcement.  Perhaps Miss Markle got tired of writing a blog, and decided to close it down.  This does happen all the time.  Nothing to see here ... move along.

Or ..  or ... could Miss Markle being moving toward playing a new role that will include a lot of smiles, new clothes, local and foreign travel,  sparkly jewels, a tiara here and there, and facing the flash of cameras on most days of the week?  I am beginning to lead toward this new role.

Oh, role will be the wife of HRH Prince Henry of Wales (aka Prince Harry.)

In the past few weeks, there have been a dozen or so articles speculating on the position of Harry's wife.  She won't be a princess. No, a princess! She will be a duchess, blah, blah, blah.

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For the record:  Prince Harry is a prince of the blood royal.  This does not change even after he is created a peer of the realm, which will probably happen on the morning of his wedding.

Thus, the wife of a Prince of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is a princess (not of the blood royal), but by marriage.

In 1923, when the Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon married HRH Prince Albert (the Duke of York), she was styled as HRH The Duchess of York.  She was also a princess.    Several reporters contacted the palace for an acknowledgement of the new royal bride's status.  Lord Stamfordham,

When Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon married HRH The Duke of York,  the media asked the palace about the new royal bride's status.  Lord Stamfordham responded:  "In accordance with the settled general rule that a wife takes the status of her husband Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon on her marriage has become Her Royal Highness the Duchess of York with the status of a Princess."

Lord Stamfordham served as Queen Victoria's private secretary in the final years of her reign, and was also King George V's private secretary.

Focus on the final words: "with the status of a Princess."   Harry is a prince.  His wife will be a princess.  Yes, a princess, even after Harry and the Mrs. are styled as the TRH The Duke and Duchess of Sussex.

Sussex is a relatively new royal dukedom, which has been used only once before by Prince Augustus, the sixth son of George III, who created the dukedom in 1801 for his son.   (The secondary titles for this peerage were Earl of Inverness and Baron Arklow.)

Yes, the Queen could create another peerage for her grandson, but I am holding out for Sussex.   Harry's wife would be the first ever Duchess of Sussex as Prince Augustus's two marriages were in contravention of the Royal Marriages Act, which meant that his wives could not share his titles and royal status.

http://www.express.co.uk/news/royal/775077/Royal-wedding-rumours-mount-Prince-Harry-Meghan-Markle-Jamaica


I have been quoted in several articles, although I spoke only to Camilla Tominey, the Sunday Express' Royal Editor.  Other newspapers and websites, including the Sunday Mirror, lifted my comments from Camilla's excellent article.

But what does this all mean, Marlene?  Do I think Harry and Meghan are headed down the aisle at Westminster Abbey?  I DO NOT KNOW!

I do think, however, that Meghan has closed down her site not because no one was reading it, but because a royal-in-waiting needs to be putting her old life in order.  There are things that Harry's wife will no longer be able or allowed to do. This includes maintaining a lifestyle blog.

(There would have been far less Royal Musings if I had married the Prince of Wales.)

If Meghan is to be a royal bride, the only wares she will be able to hawk will be the UK -- and all the charities that she will be taking on as a member of the Royal Family -- and in the fullness of time,  she will be one of King Charles III's two daughters-in-law.

Engagement, marriage,  babies!   Harry's children will not be royal if they are born during the reign of Queen Elizabeth II.  This is due to the 1917 Letters Patent that limited the HRH and title of Prince and Princess to the children of the sovereign, grandchildren of the sovereign in the male line, and the eldest son of the eldest son of the Prince of Wales.

On January 9, 2013, Queen Elizabeth II issued a Letters Patent that extended the HRH and title of Prince or Princess to all the children of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge.  This was done as a response to the new succession law, where the eldest child regardless of sex is first in line.

The new act of Succession made no reference to titles as Parliament can promulgate laws, but no titles .. that is the job of the Sovereign.   If the Duke of Cambridge's first child had been a girl, she would have been styled as The Lady Charlotte Mountbatten-Windsor, and her brother as HRH Prince George of Cambridge.  Other children, boys and girls, would have been styled as younger children of a duke.

It took nearly 96 years for the Royal Family to have an eldest son of the eldest son of the Prince of Wales.  So what about Harry's kids?  Unless the Queen issues another Letters Patent to extend the HRH and title of Prince or Princess to Harry's children,  they will be styled as younger children of a duke as Lord or Lady Christian name Mountbatten-Windsor.

If Harry has a peerage, the eldest son would be styled by the secondary title, Earl of whatever.

There is a loophole in the 1917 Letters Patent.   When Charles III is on the throne, Harry's children will be grandchildren in the male line, and will become HRH and Prince or Princess.

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Now, it is possible that Harry and his wife will not want their children to have royal titles, even though the 1917 Letters Patent provides for it.   Lady Louise Windsor and her younger brother, Lord Severn, the two children of the Earl and Countess of Wessex, are a princess and prince of the blood royal ... but ARE NOT STYLED as princes and prince, but as children of an earl.

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex may decide that their children will be styled as children of a duke, and will not be raised to have a royal role.

Just offering several scenarios.  As I said, my crystal ball was defective and had to be returned.  The warranty had expired, and no replacement was offered.

The Tig's premature death may mean nothing ... or something, but the something must also include an announcement that Miss Markle has decided to leave Suits, and has chosen to leave the acting profession to explore other pursuits.

Here are links to several other Musings on being a British princess.

http://royalmusingsblogspotcom.blogspot.com/2015/05/why-catherine-is-princess-redux-with.html   (This article has several other links in it, to click on and read.)

http://royalmusingsblogspotcom.blogspot.com/2011/05/primer-catherine-is-princess.html

Rachel Meghan Markle was born at Los Angeles on August 4, 1981, the only child of Thomas Wayne Markle and Doria Loyce Ragland.


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