Prince Harry's Historic Witness Testimony Puts Major Insecurity to the Test

Prince Harry will be questioned for a day-and-a-half by a high-powered attorney after a lifetime of being "belittled" for "his intellectual capabilities."

The Duke of Sussex was, on Monday, hours away from becoming the first royal to enter the witness box in a U.K. court since 1891. Royals do not generally subject themselves to hostile news interviews of the kind reserved for leading politicians.

When Prince Andrew submitted himself to a mere hour with the BBC's Emily Maitlis over allegations over his friendship with Jeffrey Epstein, the outcome prompted him to retreat from public life.

However probing Maitlis may have been, the journalist's approach was rather more gentle than can be expected from the high-powered lawyer Harry will face on Tuesday.

Andrew Green has been described in The Legal 500, a guide to help clients find a lawyer, as "a fearless and fearsome cross-examiner."

Oprah Winfrey; journalist Tom Bradby, a friend of Harry's; and even Anderson Cooper in his 60 Minutes interview in January all tested the prince. The trio asked Harry some questions he may have felt pressured in answering.

But none called the prince a liar or saw it as their purpose to pull his account to pieces. This is the job of the attorney seeking to wreck Harry's allegations of historic phone-hacking against U.K. tabloid publisher Mirror Group Newspapers.

The emotional stakes may be particularly high for Prince Harry. His book, Spare, and its ghostwriter, J.R. Moehringer, have both revealed that the prince has an insecurity relating to his "intellectual capabilities."

Moehringer described in a recent article for The New Yorker how Prince Harry had repeatedly asked for a particular anecdote to be included in his memoir. This centers on when the prince gave a clever riposte during an army training exercise in which he was subjected to a mock torture.

The ghost wrote: "Finally, he exhaled and calmly explained that, all his life, people had belittled his intellectual capabilities, and this flash of cleverness proved that, even after being kicked and punched and deprived of sleep and food, he had his wits about him."

Only time will tell whether his evidence at the High Court in London on Tuesday will be as arduous as the mock torture by his army trainers. However, it is clear that Harry believes he has been wrongly characterized as unintelligent.

In Spare, the prince describes being accused of cheating by an art teacher and wrote: "This was the official start of that dreaded title: Prince Thicko.

"This had the look of a role that would last a lifetime," he added. "'Prince Harry? Oh, yeah, not too bright. Can't pass a simple test without cheating, that's what I read!' I talked to Pa about it. I was near despair."

Harry also appeared to clash intellectually with senior palace staff, including one high-ranking courtier he nicknamed "The Wasp": "You'd assert a fact, something seemingly incontrovertible—I believe the sun rises in the mornings—and he'd stammer that perchance you might consider for a moment the possibility that you'd been misinformed: 'Well, heh-heh, I don't know about that, Your Royal Highness, you see, it all depends what you mean by mornings, sir.'

"Because he seemed so weedy, so self-effacing, you might be tempted to push
back, insist on your point, and that was when he'd put you on his list," the prince added.

Again, Harry's account of friction with "The Wasp" falls someway short of the hostility he will meet when he is cross-examined by an attorney determined to sink his case. The prince will be in a situation where he cannot get up and walk out.

It all means that Harry is about to put to the test the aspect of his character—mental agility—that he appears to feel is most undervalued by those around him.

The experience may be an opportunity for Harry to prove his mettle if he is successful. However, if he falls apart in the witness box, it will dig at a lifelong wound.

Harry's portion of the seven-week trial got off to an unexpected start when he did not attend court in London on Monday due to his daughter Princess Lilibet's birthday the day before. Meghan Markle is believed to have stayed behind with their son, Prince Archie.

Judge Sir Timothy Fancourt said he was "surprised" at the prince's absence, having asked Harry to be there. Green got in an early swipe at his opponent when he told the court that it was "absolutely extraordinary" the prince was not there.

And the emotional stakes will be high for Harry as his case includes allegations Daily Mirror journalists hacked his mother, Princess Diana. It is said that they damaged her relationship with a U.K. celebrity friend, the comedian and presenter Michael Barrymore.

David Sherborne, Harry's lawyer, read a letter Diana sent to Barrymore. In it, she wrote she was "devastated" that a meeting between them had been leaked to the Daily Mirror. Sherborne said the TV personality did not reply, demonstrating Diana's "isolation."

Many of the stories also relate to the break-up of a past relationship between Prince Harry and Chelsy Davy against the backdrop of fevered reporting by the media.

A statement by Prince Harry, quoted in court documents, demonstrates his strength of feeling on the subject. He said the Mirror Group's titles "placed a huge amount of unnecessary stress and strain" on their relationship and Davy reached the conclusion that "a royal life was not for her."

However, the newspaper's counterattack began late on Monday afternoon when Green told the High Court: "There is no evidence to suggests that any phone belonging to the Duke of Sussex was hacked on even one occasion.

"There is no call data whatsoever for the Duke of Sussex and scant call data for his many pleaded associates," Green added. "That is a very difficult starting point for a claimant who seeks to prove that he was habitually hacked, or even that he was hacked once."

Green said that any hacking targeting Prince Harry was carried out by the News of the World, a now-defunct Rupert Murdoch-owned tabloid.

Meanwhile, many of the payments made to private investigators—said by Harry's team to be evidence of criminality—were for lawful searches of the U.K. electoral roll [poll book]: "They are self evidently, on their face, absolutely legitimate." Others, Green said, were to "photographic agencies for photographs."

Jack Royston is chief royal correspondent for Newsweek, based in London. You can find him on Twitter at @jack_royston and read his stories on Newsweek's The Royals Facebook page.

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