Meghan Markle has detailed how Prince Harry’s son Archie and her good self narrowly escaped a fire in his bedroom on the their royal tour to South Africa.

The Duchess of Sussex recounted the experience on her long-awaited Archetypes podcast, released on Spotify on Tuesday, in a conversation with tennis star Serena Williams.

Prince Harry’s wife said: “There was this moment where I’m standing on a tree stump and I’m giving this speech to women and girls, and we finish the engagement, we get in the car and they say there’s been a fire at the residence. What? There’s been a fire in the baby’s room.”

Archie and Lilibet’s mum added : “We came back. And, of course, as a mother, you go, ‘Oh, my God, what?’ Everyone’s in tears, everyone’s shaken. And what do we have to do? Go out and do another official engagement. I said, ‘This doesn’t make any sense’.”

The couple had dropped their young son off at the housing unit they were staying in for a sleep straight after flying in for their official tour in 2019. 

Archie’s then nanny, named only as Lauren – a Zimbabwean who liked to tie him on her back with a mud cloth – had taken him downstairs with her instead while she went to get a snack, just as the heater in the nursery caught fire.

Talking about the inner turmoil that public figures can experience behind the scenes, she added: “And so much, I think, optically, the focus ends up being on how it looks instead of how it feels.”