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Daily Mirror
Daily Mirror
Sophie Goodall

Queen's sweet gesture to Meghan Markle on their first ever joint royal visit

Gyles Brandreth has claimed the Queen made a sweet gesture to Meghan Markle when they embarked on their first joint royal visit.

The broadcaster published an excerpt of his new book, Elizabeth: An Intimate Portrait, to The Mail On Sunday, in which he put forward the ways in which the Queen had been supportive towards the Duchess of Sussex.

Gyles wrote about the time the Queen took Meghan on her first solo outing to Chester, bringing along her former assistant private secretary Samantha Cohen.

Apparently, Cohen accompanied the royal party after she had been asked to stay on in order to help Meghan settle into the Firm.

READ MORE: Queen's sweet gesture to Meghan Markle on their first ever joint royal visit

The trip to Chester occurred less than a month after Meghan married Prince Harry, on the first anniversary of the Grenfell Tower fire.

Gyles made a point to note that while the Queen wore green in memory of the victims of the fire, Meghan did not.

He wrote: “Meghan (in cream-coloured Givenchy) looked beautiful – and did her bit, effortlessly and well, to the manner born.

“She kept a step behind the Queen without fail, she smiled, she chatted, she coped with her hair in the blustery weather, she admitted she had never been to the North of England before but was ‘loving it already’.”

Gyles reported that the Queen had deemed Meghan’s behaviour as “top marks”.

He also said that “the Queen, who had chosen this particular day for her new granddaughter-in-law’s induction to Royal duty, in part because it was ‘a fairly typical day’, but mainly because the programme included a visit to a theatre – ‘and she is an actress after all’.”

However, despite the promising start, the writer noted that Cohen, alongside other members of staff including another private secretary, two personal assistants and two nannies, left the Sussexes’ service.

He wrote: “Cohen, after she had left, reportedly said it had been like 'working for a couple of teenagers'.

"Others called Meghan 'an outrageous bully' and 'a narcissistic sociopath'. Meghan's solicitor denied the allegations, saying they were part of a 'calculated smear campaign'.”

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