Meghan Markle and Prince Harry’s first Christmas almost exposed their then-private relationship

Meghan Markle and Prince Harry’s first Christmas together turned out to be more eventful than planned when their then-private romance was nearly exposed to the world. 

• Meghan Markle and Prince Harry's first Christmas together back in 2016 took place before any clear pictures of the couple had been published.
• But a royal author has claimed that photographs were taken of the couple Christmas tree shopping and could have been made public, exposing their secret romance to the world. 
• In other royal news, the royal Christmas tradition Meghan Markle was allowed to break but Kate Middleton never did has been revealed. 

Meghan Markle and Prince Harry’s first Christmas together took place back in 2016 after around six months of dating. This came only a month after news that Prince Harry was seeing the American actor was supposedly revealed by the Daily Mail. However since no pictures of them together had been published yet, the popular couple still had a level of anonymity. 

A year after, in 2017, Meghan Markle and Prince Harry's relationship had been made public to the world, with Meghan attending Christmas at Sandringham with key royals. 

Now a royal author has claimed that their first Christmas together almost meant that their love was exposed to the world before they had officially announced it. 

Royal author Omid Scobie reportedly revealed this during a Q&A with co-author Carolyn Durand and CNN’s Max Foster. 

According to Elle, Omid suggested that the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s first Christmas in London as a couple very nearly became far more public than they intended after being asked about what stories didn’t make it into his and Durand’s book, Finding Freedom.  

Scobie revealed, "One of the stories that didn’t make the final cut was about their first Christmas in London."

He added that "at the time, there was so much talk about their relationship" and that the couple "had gone out in London to buy their first Christmas tree together, and we later found out about that through one of the papers".

However, Scobie claimed, this was not the whole story. "What we didn’t know is that someone had actually taken photos of the couple, and this was going to, much to their sort of surprise, this was going to be probably the first pictures that we saw of them," he explained.

"But because it was so dark when they went shopping, those photos never saw the light of day, and they were able to enjoy a few more months of privacy".

Prince Harry and his now-wife Meghan might have hoped for a little more time away from public scrutiny, with their bombshell Netflix documentary highlighting the struggles they faced in the public eye.

The two were in fact seen looking for a tree at Pines and Needles in Battersea, with a spokesperson from the shop reportedly telling Hello! at the time, "Prince Harry was with Meghan and hilariously the staff only recognised Meghan at first – they were so excited to have the girl from Suits there."

The source then reportedly revealed exactly how long the couple took to decide, stating, "They arrived in a car and picked up a tree – they were there for about 15 minutes browsing and then having a look”. 

After viewing the selection they then "selected their tree and Harry carried it on his shoulder once it was netted up, back to the car",