King Charles is said to want his disgraced brother Prince Andrew to leave his 30-room Royal Lodge in Windsor and move into Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s former residence Frogmore Cottage

Prince Harry is “upset” with King Charles’ plan to move Prince Andrew into Frogmore Cottage, according to a royal expert.

Harry and his wife Meghan Markle were given Frogmore Cottage as a wedding gift from the late Queen Elizabeth II and made the four-bedroom historic home their own with a £2.4million renovation. They moved in in 2019 and stayed until announcing their decision to step down from the Royal Family in 2020. King Charles then asked the Sussexes to officially vacate the property for good last March.

The Cottage was the couple’s last remaining foothold in the UK and they now live in a £12m mansion in Montecito, California. But the grand home isn’t expected to lay empty for long as now the King, 75, is said to be urging his disgraced brother to leave his 30-room Royal Lodge in Windsor and move into Frogmore Cottage.

But royal expert Tom Quinn claims Harry isn’t happy with the development. “However deep the rift with his father and brother, Harry always had hopes that he and Meghan might eventually be allowed to re-establish Frogmore Cottage at Windsor as their UK base,” Quinn exclusively tells The Mirror. “He will be deeply upset at the prospect of his uncle Prince Andrew moving into Frogmore – a very real prospect as King Charles insists that Andrew cannot continue to live at Royal Lodge, the 30-room mansion on the Windsor estate where Andrew has lived for decades.”

Harry and Meghan were given Frogmore Cottage as a wedding gift from the late Queen Elizabeth ( 
Image:
POOL/AFP via Getty Images)

The Duke of York was surrounded by controversy after his links with the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein came to light. Andrew was accused of having sex with Virginia Giuffre when she was 17. She claims she was trafficked by Epstein and passed between his friends for sex. Andrew has firmly denied the allegations.

In January 2022, after a New York judge ruled the Queen’s son would face trial over the accusations, Buckingham Palace released a statement announcing Andrew was to be stripped of his royal titles. A month later, Andrew settled the civil sexual assault case brought against him in the US by Ms Guiffre for a reported £12million. The settlement contained no admission of liability, guilt or wrongdoing on Prince Andrew’s part.

Now the Duke of York, said to be the late Queen’s favourite son, has been given his “marching orders” by his older brother, claims royal expert Quinn. “Andrew is furious that despite his pleas to his brother to be allowed to stay at Royal Lodge he has been given his marching order,” Quinn says. “The spat has been going on for some time. Always bullish and overly confident, Andrew was convinced that if he stood firm and continued to refuse to move his brother would give way, but now that Charles is king this is not going to happen.”

Charles is also seemingly sending a message to his son Harry “that he will never be allowed back to Frogmore Cottage” with the move. Quinn told us: “For King Charles, forcing Andrew to move to Frogmore solves several problems at once – it sends a message to Harry that, as a private citizen and no longer a working royal he will never be allowed back to Frogmore. It sends [a] message to Andrew that having disgraced himself, he can no longer expect to live in the grand style.

And, finally, it means that a suitably grand residence can be made ready for the royals who really matter – William and Kate. Charles is determined that Royal Lodge is the only residence on the royal estate at Windsor that is big enough and regal enough for his heir.”