Princess Diana’s brother, Charles Spencer, is paying tribute to his sister 28 years after her death.
“Flowers we cut this morning from Althorp’s gardens for the Island,” Spencer, 61, wrote via Instagram on Sunday, August 31. “Always an impossible day.”
Alongside the message, Spencer shared a photo of a bouquet of pink and white flowers and another image of the private island where Diana is buried at Althorp Estate in West Northamptonshire, England. Charles has been custodian of the estate since 1992, after the death of his father, John Spencer.
Diana died at age 36 in a 1997 car accident in Paris. She was survived by her two sons, Prince William and Prince Harry, whom she shared with King Charles III. In 2024, Diana’s brother revealed that he visits her gravesite “nearly every day.”
“And of course, she’s buried at home,” Charles said on an episode of Good Morning Britain. “Yes, she is, and I go pretty much every day. Last week, one of her closest childhood friends came and was on the island. And that was so nice.”
The island where Diana is buried is currently only accessible by boat, with no access to the general public. At one point, there was a bridge that connected the island to the estate — but Harry, now 40, shared that it has since been removed to protect the family’s privacy.
“The bridge had been removed, to give my mother privacy, to keep intruders away,” Harry wrote in his 2023 memoir, Spare.
In the book, Harry recalled bringing wife Meghan Markle to the gravesite for the first time in 2022. (The couple, who tied the knot in 2018, have since welcomed son Archie and daughter Lilibet in 2019 and 2021, respectively. Lilibet’s middle name, Diana, was given to her in honor of Harry’s late mom.)
“No visit to this place was ever easy, but this one … 25th anniversary,” Harry wrote in Spare. “And Meg’s first time. At long last, I was bringing the girl of my dreams home to meet mum.”
Harry continued, “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. 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.”
When Harry and Meghan, now 44, walked back to the boat, he asked what she was praying for. “Clarity,” she said, according to Harry. “And guidance.”
