Archbishop Justin Welby rejects Harry and Meghan’s secret wedding, Couple admit they lied

Archbishop Justin Welby denies that Harry and Meghan were married three days before the royal wedding.

In an article released in an Italian newspaper on Wednesday, the archbishop of Canterbury seemed to refute Meghan Markle's assertion that he married them before their televised wedding.

On May 19, 2018, Harry, a descendant of Queen Elizabeth II and the youngest son of her heir Prince Charles, married American actress Meghan Markle in a star-studded ceremony.

However, Meghan announced in an interview with Oprah Winfrey earlier this month that they exchanged vows in private before Archbishop Justin Welby three days before the public event.

Welby told the daily La Repubblica, “I had a series of private and pastoral meetings with the duke and duchess before the wedding.”

“The legal wedding was on the Saturday (May 19). I signed the wedding certificate, which is a legal document, and I would have committed a serious criminal offence if I signed it knowing it was false.

“So you can make what you like about it. But the legal wedding was on the Saturday. But I won't say what happened at any other meetings.”

“We got married three days before our wedding,” Meghan said in the Oprah interview.

“No one knows that. But we called the archbishop, and we just said, ‘Look, this thing, this spectacle is for the world, but we want our union between us,'” she said.

Meghan Markle and Prince Harry admit the secret wedding did not happen

Meghan Markle and Prince Harry also admitted that they did not secretly marry three days before their royal wedding in May 2018 in front of a worldwide audience.

The Duke and Duchess of Sussex's spokeswoman assured The Daily Beast that they exchanged “special vows,” but that this private event was not a “legal” or “official” service.

The couple's detractors have used these comments to call into doubt the validity of other claims they said during their dramatic interview with Winfrey.

Immediately after the conversation, Church of England officials doubted the rumors of a backyard wedding. A wedding isn't lawful unless it's witnessed by two individuals or takes place in a “certified place of worship,” according to church authorities.

“Justin does not perform private weddings,” the archbishop's office advised a Newcastle vicar. Meghan is American, she doesn't get it.” Mark Edwards, the vicar, told ChronicleLive that he asked the archbishop's office for confirmation.

“Justin had a private conversation with the couple in the garden,” Edwards was informed, “but I can assure you, no wedding took place until the televised national event.”