An intruder who reportedly claimed to be a priest and spent the night with soldiers at a Windsor barracks had also tried to blag a free pub meal by pretending to be a friend of Prince Harry, it has been claimed.
The Coldstream Guards have launched two inquiries after the man – whose name has not been publicised – sparked the security alert last week at the site that houses around 500 personnel near Windsor Castle.
The man, who was wearing a vicar’s dog collar, managed to convince the guards on duty that he had a meeting with another military chaplain. At the time, the Queen was at Sandringham for Easter.
He was invited to spend the night at the barracks – and eat and drink in the officers’ mess room – despite some of the soldiers having doubts over the stories he told, such as that he had transplants of organs that were resistant to G-forces and that he had worked as an ejector-seat test pilot.
The next day, Thames Valley Police officers escorted him from the site. No arrests have been made.
Before the barracks incident, he had unsuccessfully tried to trick a pub into giving him a free meal by claiming to be an American friend of the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, The Telegraph reported.
The landlord of The Prince Harry pub in Windsor – who turned the man away – said that the man had been hanging around the town for a number of days before the incident at the barracks.
He told the newspaper: “He came in here on Monday morning at around 11.30pm, saying he was a priest and had a collar on. He had two cups of tea and fish and chips.
“He said ‘Prince Harry is a friend of mine and when I was here last year in 2021, I had to go back to the States to sort stuff out, and Prince Harry and Princess Markle said whenever I was in Windsor, I could come into The Prince Harry pub and have lunch and they’ll sort it out’.
“Needless to say, I just said ‘no’. I knew it was a con, so I wasn’t that interested. And when I saw the news earlier, I just started laughing. I think he was just out to see what he could get.”
The owner of a Lebanese restaurant near the pub had told the Telegraph that the man had been spotted in the area in the days preceding the barracks intrusion.
George Ghanem, the manager of Maison Meejana, had said: “He had an American accent and came to eat here twice last week. I had a long conversation with him and he said he worked at the next-door church, but I’d never seen him before.
“The first time, I gave him coffee on the house. He wasn’t wearing any robes. He had a black suit, black jumper and he had his collar on. He seemed a very respectable guy. We did not think there was anything wrong with him at all.
“He was so tired, he fell asleep on the bar at 1pm. He looked fit, slim... a presentable guy with black hair.”
The man reportedly has an American accent, is known to local officers, and has had mental health issues.
