The Duchess claimed that the "catalyst" for writing the controversial letter to her father Thomas Markle was "seeing how much pain" it was inflicting on her husband.

       The accusations were revealed in a series of text messages sent to her former press secretary, Jason Knauf, which were published in full earlier today after the Duchess questioned why they were not being used in their full context.

       The text read: "Even after a week with his dad 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?'

       "They fundamentally don't understand so at least by writing [Harry] will be able to say to his family, 'she wrote him a letter and he's 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 messages were sent from "Tilly" - a pseudonym used by Mr Knauf for the Duchess.

       This comes after the former aide said that Ms Markle had drafted the letter "with the understanding that it could be leaked".

       Additional reporting by Francesca Edwards and Millie Cooke.

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