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Meghan Markle's Texts Released in Court: Prince Harry 'Berated' by His Family over Strain with Her Dad

Meghan Markle
Meghan Markle

NDZ/Star Max/GC Images Meghan Markle

Meghan Markle said Prince Harry faced "constant berating" from members of the royal family over her relationship with her father, according to texts and emails released by London's Court of Appeal on Friday.

The messages were released as a result of her lawsuit against Associated Newspapers Limited, publisher of MailOnline and The Mail on Sunday.

In the messages, Meghan told her former communications chief Jason Knauf about her plans to pen a note to her father, Thomas Markle, who gave media interviews about his daughter after he pulled out of attending her May 2018 wedding.

"The catalyst for my doing this is seeing how much pain this is causing H," Meghan said via text in August 2018, using her pet name for Prince Harry. "Even after a week with his dad [Prince Charles] and endlessly explaining the situation, his family seem to forget the context — and revert to 'can't she just go and see him and make this stop?'"

The Duchess of Sussex continued, "They fundamentally don't understand so at least by writing H will be able to say to his family… 'She wrote him a letter and he is still doing it.' By taking this form of action I protect my husband from this constant berating, and while unlikely perhaps it will give my father a moment to pause.'"

(The palace had not responded to PEOPLE's request for comment at time of publication.)

Prince Harry and Meghan
Prince Harry and Meghan

Dia Dipasupil/Getty Prince Harry and Meghan Markle

Meghan added in the text, "Obviously everything I have drafted is with the understanding that it could be leaked so I have been meticulous in my word choice." She also discussed handwriting the letter with few paragraph breaks and numbered pages so it couldn't be easily manipulated.

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Meghan, now 40, also discussed the decision to pen the handwritten note to "Daddy."

"Given I've only ever called him daddy it makes sense to open as such (despite him being less than paternal), and in the unfortunate event that it leaked it would pull at the heartstrings," she wrote.

Thomas Markle 'Good Morning Britain' TV Show
Thomas Markle 'Good Morning Britain' TV Show

ITV/Shutterstock Thomas Markle

In February, a British judge granted summary judgment in Meghan's favor over five articles published by Associated Newspapers Limited in February 2019 that reproduced parts of a handwritten letter she sent her father following her royal wedding to Prince Harry.

On the same day lawyers for the Mail on Sunday's publishers appeared before the U.K. Court of Appeal this week to challenge her privacy and copyright infringement case win, Meghan joined The New York Times DealBook Online Summit in N.Y.C.

"In terms of this appeal, I won the case and this issue, frankly, has been going on when I had no children at all, I now have two children as you know," she told host Andrew Ross Sorkin when asked about the appeal case. "It's an arduous process."

"But again, it's just me standing up for what's right, be it in this case or in the [case for economic and professional parity] we're talking about today," Meghan continued. "At a certain point, no matter how difficult it is, you know the difference between right and wrong. You must stand up for what's right, and that's what I'm doing."

The Duke And Duchess Of Sussex Visit One World Observatory Meghan Markle prince harry
The Duke And Duchess Of Sussex Visit One World Observatory Meghan Markle prince harry

Taylor Hill/WireImage Meghan Markle and Prince Harry

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This week, Meghan apologized to the court for forgetting about communications with Knauf in which she authorized him to speak to the authors of the biography Finding Freedom.

"I had absolutely no wish or intention to mislead the defendant or the court," she said.