Princess Diana’s Brother Charles Spencer Says He Visits Her Gravesite ‘Pretty Much Every Day’

Princess Diana’s brother Charles Spencer said that he visits his older sister’s gravesite “pretty much every day.”

Spencer, 60, made the revelation on an Oct. 15 episode of Good Morning Britain. Diana — who lost her life at age 36 after a Paris car accident on Aug. 31, 1997 — is buried at the Spencer family ancestral home, Althorp, which Spencer has been custodian of since 1992, after the death of their father, John Spencer, 8th Earl Spencer. The former Princess of Wales is buried on an island at an ornamental lake known as The Round Oval, nestled within Althorp Park’s Pleasure Garden on the property.

“Last week, one of her closest childhood friends came and was on the island. And that was so nice,” said Spencer, who is 9th Earl Spencer.

Diana’s resting place is only accessible by boat and is off limits to the public. When Diana died, her only brother eulogized her at her funeral on Sept. 6, 1997. (Diana also has two older sisters, Lady Sarah McCorquodale and Lady Jane Fellowes.)

“I’m sure pretty much everyone watching this program has had trauma in their family at some point,” he said on Good Morning Britain. “And, like everyone else, you sort of get used to it without it ever going away.”

There was once a bridge in place so that visitors could access the island, but it was later removed because of security reasons, Prince Harry wrote in his memoir, Spare, released in 2023.

“The bridge had been removed, to give my mother privacy, to keep intruders away,” he wrote.

Elsewhere in the book, Harry, 40, detailed bringing wife Meghan Markle to Diana’s gravesite for the first time in 2022 — which marked the 25th anniversary of her death.

Following what he referred to as a “little shove” from his uncle Charles Spencer through some stubborn mud, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex rowed out on a boat to the island.

“No visit to this place was ever easy, but this one… twenty-fifth anniversary,” Prince Harry wrote in Spare. “And Meg’s first time. At long last, I was bringing the girl of my dreams home to meet mum.”

“We hesitated, hugging, and then I went first. I placed flowers on the grave. Meg gave me a moment, and I spoke to my mother in my head, told her I missed her, asked her for guidance and clarity,” he continued. “Feeling that Meg might also want a moment, I went around the hedge, scanned the pond. When I came back, Meg was kneeling, eyes shut, palms against the stone.”

“I asked, as we walked back to the boat, what she’d prayed for,” Prince Harry added. “Clarity, she said. And guidance.”

The couple had traveled to the U.K. from their home base of California (where they relocated in 2020 after stepping back as senior members of the royal family) for a series of engagements with some of their longstanding charities. A week after the 25th anniversary of Princess Diana’s death, Queen Elizabeth died at age 96 at Balmoral Castle in Scotland, hours after her doctors announced they were “concerned” for her health on Sept. 8, 2022. 

Elsewhere in Spare, Harry shared the serendipitous way that his mother was connected to meeting Meghan. The Duke of Sussex wrote about how he was struck by Meghan’s beauty when he saw her photo for the first time in his Instagram feed. The then-Suits star playfully posed for a selfie with a friend named Violet, and Harry reached out to the mutual pal for her contact info on July 1, 2016 — his late mother's birthday.

Prince Harry said that Meghan messaged him first on the social media site, and they immediately connected over a shared love of Africa, as his feed was filled with photos from the continent (a revelation the couple first made in Harry & Meghan, which debuted on Netflix in December 2022).

“Eventually, we exchanged phone numbers, and mitigated the conversation over to text, going late into the night," Harry wrote in Spare, adding that he was “texting like a teenager” through the following day.

"It occurred to me how uncanny, how surreal, how bizarre, that this marathon conversation should have begun on July 1, 2016. My mother's fifty-fifth birthday,” he added.

Both Harry and his older brother Prince William continue to keep the memory of their beloved mother alive, specifically through The Diana Award, the only award named in her honor, Diana’s brother Charles Spencer said, per Hello!.

“They both recognize this is something of their mother’s and they both support that, and that’s all that really matters in this situation,” he said. 

He added, “It’s really extraordinary for me, as her brother, to think of the impact Diana continues to have, and it’s a source of great family pride for us that yes, she has been gone for over a quarter of a century now.”

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After announcing his divorce from his third wife, Countess Karen Spencer, in June, news broke this week that Spencer’s current partner, Dr. Cat Jarman, was suing the countess, alleging misuse of private information, according to reports.

The misuse of private information claim was filed on Oct. 10, according to the Telegraph. No further details are available.

Spencer declined to comment when reached by PEOPLE, while Jarman’s legal team has yet to respond to requests for comment. Karen, 52, also declined to comment when reached by PEOPLE.