By Richard Eden for The Daily Mail
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He appeared in the ‘band of brothers’ snap — taken at Windsor Castle as the Duke of Sussex and six of his closest confederates stood shoulder to shoulder on the night of Prince Harry’s wedding.
Since then, it’s been suggested that Jack Mann was not just one of Harry’s ushers but was, in fact, his ‘real’ best man, rather than Prince William.
If that was so, perhaps Harry will now return the favour — because I can reveal that Mann, 40, is to marry beguiling osteopath Isabella Clark.
Neither Jack nor Isabella have publicly uttered a word about their impending nuptials.
Jack Mann (second from right) was said to be Harry’s ‘real’ best man at his wedding to Meghan
Perhaps Harry will now return the favour — because I can reveal that Mann, 40, is to marry beguiling osteopath Isabella Clark
Their aversion to the spotlight is perhaps understandable. Aside from his bond with Harry (they met as officer cadets at Sandhurst and were both commissioned into the Blues and Royals), Mann had a recent business trip to Libya interrupted.
He is co-founder of Alma Risk, a private security company.
‘We did not continue the journey from Malta on the advice of Maltese immigration to rectify our paperwork,’ Mann subsequently explained to the Daily Mail.
‘The issue was resolved within five days,’ he added, explaining that Alma Risk was providing medical training for Libyan clients.
The exploits of his father — Old Etonian adventurer and former SAS officer Simon Mann — mean that the family name can sometimes generate unfortunate attention. Mann senior was a participant in the so-called ‘Wonga coup’ of 2004.
Intended to remove Teodoro Obiang, president of Equatorial Guinea, from power, it ended in Simon ‘s imprisonment, with Obiang threatening to eat his testicles.
Mann Snr survived five years’ captivity and returned home intact.
I trust he will be on hand to toast the happy couple on their wedding day which could be held at Isabella’s family seat in Suffolk.
The daughter of property hotshot Stephen Clark, Isabella’s home is a magnificent, crenelated, 17th-century pile, with sweeping lawns down to a river.
Handy for landing a helicopter, as Harry and Meghan may care to note.
Pippa’s pool plans belly flop over Stone Age relics
They have already rustled up £15 million to buy a sumptuous country house, and have found time, as I disclosed, to issue eviction notices to various tenants occupying lesser properties on their newly acquired Berkshire estate.
But Pippa Middleton and her financier husband, James Matthews, don’t have things all their own way.
I can reveal that the couple’s plans to insert a mammoth 82 ft x 19 ft swimming pool in what, until now, has been a magnificent kitchen garden, and to create a brand new tennis court topped with AstroTurf, have been called into question by specialists employed by the local council.
‘I have a number of concerns,’ reports the conservation officer, citing the cessation of ‘horticultural use’ in favour of ‘recreational/leisure use’, and the potential loss of ‘historic fabric’ in one of the ancient walls which the Princess of Wales’s 39-year-old sister and James, 47, intend to perforate.
Pippa Middleton and her financier husband James Matthews have run into difficulties with the local council in renovating their mansion
The conservation officer is requesting more detailed plans of the tennis court and a proposed pergola.
Significant though those concerns are, they are eclipsed by those of the council’s senior archaeologist, who highlights apparent deficiencies in a heritage report which Pippa and James commissioned.
‘I am not aware that [its] authors consulted the Historic Environment Record,’ the archaeologist says, noting that this is required by the National Planning Policy Framework.
That’s not all. The Matthews’ mansion, they add, is close to ‘many Middle Stone Age sites’ — several little more than a quarter of a mile away.
If a new pool is dug, it could ‘have an impact on surviving archaeological deposits’.
The council recommends ‘the digging of trenches or test pits’ where work is proposed.
Would it be simpler, perhaps, to upgrade the existing pool and retain the kitchen garden — where, in time, there may be a blue plaque erected to commemorate a previous incumbent whose ownership, the official says, ‘adds to the historical significance of the house and grounds’?
The council’s senior archaeologist said the couple’s planned swimming pool could ‘have an impact on surviving archaeological deposits’
You can see why Prince Andrew is considering legal action to try to ‘restore’ his reputation after the scandal involving his ties with sex offender Jeffrey Epstein: he’s still a ‘non-person’ in polite society.
Former GQ editor Dylan Jones shared a photograph on social media this week of his former boss at Conde Nast magazines, Nicholas Coleridge, leaving their Mayfair offices at Vogue House.
However, Jones made sure to crop, with great care, Coleridge’s companion on that day out of the picture: the Duke of York.
Nigella’s ‘Aussie’ pud gaffe
Nigella Lawson has caused a diplomatic incident Down Under.
The domestic goddess, 63, posted a recipe online to celebrate Australia Day.
‘It’s a special one,’ she declared. ‘Lemon pavlova.’
While the pudding looked delicious, it left half of the Antipodes in uproar as lemon pavlova is claimed to be a Kiwi dish.
‘Madam, just so we’re clear, the pavlova is a New Zealand dessert,’ stated one of the more polite responses.
Another thought she was being deliberately provocative. ‘Way to wind up the Kiwis!’ was one gleeful reply.
Bespectacled documentary maker Louis Theroux, 52, became an unlikely sensation on the teenagers’ favourite video-sharing app TikTok last year when a cringe-making clip of him performing a rap that became known as Jiggle Jiggle ‘went viral’, attracting more than a billion views. Now, he’s trying to compose a sequel with the help of British YouTuber and rapper KSI, 29. ‘I don’t have enough inspiration for a follow-up, so I’ll be getting advice from him about that,’ Theroux tells me at the Amazon Prime screening of KSI: In Real Life.
Published by Associated Newspapers Ltd
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