Princess Eugenie, who celebrates her 34th birthday today, is known to be extremely close to her cousin Prince Harry – and when she helped him out with some matchmaking, Harry claims it almost ended in disaster
Prince Harry confided in his cousin, but it didn’t go as planned.
The Duke of Sussex is believed to be extremely close to his younger cousin Princess Eugenie, who celebrates her 34th birthday today, with the two royals growing up together, sharing family holidays as children and hitting London’s hottest nightspots when they were older. And Eugenie, who is now a mum-of-two, is one of the only royals to have appeared in Harry and wife Meghan Markle’s Netflix docuseries after visiting them at their home in Montecito, California.
Their strong bond means that Harry was happy when his cousin attempted to play matchmaker between him and her friend, Cressida Bonas – but it ended up with the two royals then having to endure an awkward phone call. In his memoir Spare, Harry recalled how he was introduced to actress and model Cressida thanks to Eugenie and sparks flew. They arranged to go out on a date, getting to know each other over dinner – and a few weeks later there was a second date, where Harry dropped her home afterwards.
She didn’t invite him in but Harry says he went in for the kiss, however, his “aim was off” resulting in a very awkward moment. He writes: “She turned, I tried again on the return trip, and we managed something like a graze. Painfully awkward.” The next day, Harry says he called his cousin to tell her about the evening and to fill her in on the awkward end – but Cressida beat him to it.
He writes: “Discouraged, I told her the date had gone well but the ending had left something to be desired. She didn’t disagree. She’d already spoken to Cressida. She sighed. Awkward.” However it obviously wasn’t as bad as Harry feared, and Cressida was up for trying again so they arranged another date. The pair ended up dating between 2012 and 2014. They split when Cressida reportedly became overwhelmed with the spotlight that came with dating a royal.
Now happily married to Meghan and with children Prince Archie and Princess Lilibet, Eugenie is also married to husband Jack Brooksbank. They also have a two children, August, who is now three, and Ernest, who was born last May.
Ernest’s full name is Ernest George Ronnie Brooksbank, which Eugenie revealed on her Instagram account days after he was born. Explaining her choice of names, she wrote: “He is named after his great great great Grandfather George, his Grandpa George and my Grandpa Ronald.”
Meanwhile, Eugenie’s oldest son August’s name pays tribute to her late grandfather, Prince Philip, who died just weeks after Eugenie welcomed her son. In a documentary in September 2021, Eugenie revealed August got to meet Philip shortly before he passed away.
Holding back the tears, Eugenie explained: “We named August, August Philip because grandpa has been such a huge, inspiring character in my life. I brought little August to come and meet him and told him that we had named him after him and it was such a lovely moment.”
