Prince Harry once came close to getting a tattoo, but his friends threatened to physically stop him. The Duke of Sussex, who is not believed to have any tattoos, recounted the incident in his 2023 memoir Spare.
Las Vegas trip in 2012
During a trip to Las Vegas in 2012, Harry stayed in a suite with friends and dined like "kings" at a steakhouse. The next day, after breakfast and Bloody Marys, they attended a pool party. After a day of drinking, Harry wrote: "I was in rough shape, and filling up with... ideas."
He decided to commemorate the trip with a tattoo, choosing his foot as the spot for a design of Botswana, a country he has called his 'second home'. However, his friend Billy the Rock and others refused to allow it.
Friends' intervention
Harry wrote: "My mates backed him up. Absolutely not. In fact, they promised to physically stop me. I was not going to get a tattoo, they said, not on their watch, least of all a foot tattoo of Botswana."
He added: "They promised to hold me down, knock me out, whatever it took. A tattoo is permanent, it's forever! Their arguments and threats are one of my last clear memories from that evening. I gave in. The tattoo could wait till the next day."
Aftermath
Instead of getting the tattoo, the group went to a nightclub and later returned to their suite with women they had met. A game of strip pool allegedly took place, and photos were published by TMZ. Harry later said: "At the end of the day I probably let myself down, I let my family down, I let other people down. But at the end of the day I was in a private area and there should have been a certain amount of privacy that one should expect."
He added: "It was probably a classic example of me probably being too much Army and not enough prince. It's a simple case of that."
