Meghan Markle's family issue

There are many reasons why Samantha Markle will never forget the day she found out her half-sister was dating Prince Harry.

The news itself, a bombshell for any group of relatives, was all the more remarkable given the less-than-elevated circles in which the Markles, a working-class family from Los Angeles, moved.

But it was how the news was delivered that speaks volumes about the different worlds these two women inhabit. For the announcement came not from Meghan herself, or even from another family member, but from a friend who had read it in a magazine.

‘She said: “Are you sitting down? Did you know your sister is dating Prince Harry?” ’ recalls Samantha, who shares a father with Meghan. ‘My friend obviously thought I’d be shocked.’

With good reason. For while Samantha today is eager to paint a picture of affection and pride in the little sister, 16 years her junior, who has captured Prince Harry’s heart, in truth their relationship is far from close.

Indeed, so fractured are the Markle family bonds — amid claims of racial slurs and financial tension — that the sisters haven’t seen each other in almost ten years. It is a situation that Samantha, 52, a writer and mental health counsellor who lives in Florida, is trying desperately to address.

She claims this is the little sister she helped to raise, the one who ‘could always light up a room’. By Samantha’s own account, she helped Meghan learn to walk and talk and insists the little girl adored her. The pair were once so close that she would walk around the house with Meghan on her hip.

‘She used to call me Daff Duck because I’d make Daffy Duck noises to get her to laugh,’ she says. ‘She called me that up until she was 12, then she would call me “Babe”. She’d ring me up and say: “How’s it going, Babe?” ’

There have been no ‘Hi Babe’ phone calls from Meghan for some years now. 

Samantha last saw her sister in 2008, when Samantha graduated from university and Meghan — by then a successful actress — flew in to share her big day. Will the next shared celebration be Meghan’s wedding day?

This article was first published on dailymail.co.uk and is republished here with permission.