Meghan Markle‘s ex-bodyguard has said he feels ‘sorry’ for the former actress as marrying into the royal family was ‘stressful’ for her because she struggled to go from a B-list celebrity to the ‘most famous family in the world’.

Steve Davies was first introduced to Meghan in 2018, when he was hired by Suits broadcaster NBC to protect Meghan while she was in Toronto, Canada.

‘It was stressful for her – all the publicity,’ he told InTouch.

After their first meeting, Davies ‘felt sorry [for her] because she’d gone from being a celebrity to being a member of the biggest family in the world,’ he told the US outlet.

‘We had people following us around everywhere we went. We had problems with drones, vehicles chasing us. It was a nightmare.’

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Meghan Markle’s ex-bodyguard has defended the duchess against claims she’s difficult to work with

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Steve Davies said he ‘felt sorry [for her] because she’d gone from being a celebrity to being a member of the biggest family in the world’

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Davies also said the duchess was ‘warm and considerate all the time’ he knew her

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His interview comes days after a report examined why a slew of Harry and Meghan’s employees stateside have jumped ship in recent years

A former British special forces soldier, Davies said he feared that ‘what happened to Princess Diana might have happened to her’ while comparing her life in England after her 2018 wedding to being in a ‘goldfish bowl’.

Davies also defended the Duchess of Sussex against claims she’s ‘not a very good person to work with’, adding: ‘There’s one huge lesson I learnt from her: It’s give respect to get respect.

His interview comes days after a report examined why a slew of Harry and Meghan’s employees stateside have jumped ship in recent years.

‘Everyone’s terrified of Meghan,’ a source close to the couple told The Hollywood Reporter, adding ‘she’s absolutely relentless’.

Contrary to accusations that Meghan ‘belittles’ her staff, as reported by The Hollywood Reporter, Davies said the duchess was ‘warm and considerate all the time’.

‘She’s great to her fans, and she would go out of her way to help people,’ he continued. ‘That’s what hurts me – that people believe [otherwise].’

Since the duke and duchess relocated to California in 2020, 18 of their top aides and staffers – including their chief of staff Josh Kettler and Meghan’s private secretary Samantha Cohen – have quit working for them.

When asked why, a source close to the couple told The Hollywood Reporter: ‘Everyone’s terrified of Meghan.

‘She belittles people, she doesn’t take advice,’ they continued. ‘They’re both poor decision-makers, they change their minds frequently.’

The source described Harry as a ‘very, very charming person’ and yet ‘very much an enabler’ of Meghan’s behaviour, adding the 41-year-old duchess ‘marches around like a dictator in high heels‘

‘I’ve watched her reduce grown men to tears,’ they said.

Meghan has always denied claims of bullying staff.

After the story sparked backlash amongst the Sussexes’ supporters, the publication’s Co-Editor-in-Chief Maer Roshan said he stands by the report.

Roshan told Access Hollywood that the reporter who wrote the piece spoke to ‘a very high up source’ who still works for Harry and Meghan, adding it ‘probably isn’t true’ that the moniker ‘Duchess Difficult’ was manufactured by the Palace after Megxit.

‘Duchess Difficult is a nickname that has trailed Meghan Markle for quite a few year,’ Roshan said.

‘What is new is that this notion, since coming to America, that a lot of these rumours were manufactured by the Palace and the reporting that we did suggests that probably isn’t true and there is still this undercurrent of fear.’

Friends of Meghan have said that they have never seen ‘a negative side to her’.

Roshan told the American outlet: ‘Two things can be possible at once. The couple does help a lot of people. Meghan and Harry declined to comment on our story.

‘I think Meghan would have said that barking around orders is something that we expect from men and it would never raise an eyebrow’.

Meghan has touched on the subject in her Archetypes podcast.

She said: ‘You’re allowed to set a boundary. You’re allowed to be clear, [it] does not make you demanding. It does not make you difficult, it makes you clear’.

While a spokesperson for the Sussexes declined to comment on Roshan’s statement when approached by MailOnline, a source close to Harry and Meghan called the claims in The Hollywood Reporter story ‘fabricated’.

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Since the duke and duchess relocated to California in 2020, 18 of their top aides and staffers have quit working for them

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A source recently told The Hollywood Reporter that Harry is ‘very much an enabler’ of Meghan’s behaviour

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The report sparked backlash among the Sussexes camp, with one source calling the claims ‘fabricated’

‘These quotes were fabricated by someone lacking knowledge of our company,’ they said.

‘The Duke and Duchess work from Montecito, and we’re based in Hollywood. They likely think we’re all in the same office and that this quote would fly, but the circumstances don’t even allow for it. If she’s ‘marching around’ and ‘barking orders’ no Archewell employee could factually claim that.

‘It’s total nonsense’, they said.

They also rejected the accusation that Meghan has sent her staffers ‘angry 5am emails’.

 They said: ‘Who hasn’t sent an email when they can’t sleep or are awake early?

‘I’ve never once ever gotten an email from either of them at that hour and even if I did, The Duchess specifically notes in her email signature that everyone has a different working day and to not feel obligated to respond outside of normal business hours.

‘These source quotes don’t make any sense.’

The allegations Meghan is difficult to work with date back to 2021 when The Times reported that Meghan’s former communications secretary Jason Knauf submitted a complaint claiming she was bullying staff at Kensington Palace in 2018.

Knauf alleged that Meghan’s behaviour had forced two of her personal assistants to quit, while undermining the confidence of a third staff member.

The complaint prompted royal aides to launch an inquiry into claims of Meghan’s ‘belittling’ behaviour but the details of the report were never revealed.

Meghan has strongly denied the allegations, with lawyers for the duchess describing them as a ‘calculated smear campaign’ at the time.