Who are Meghan Markle’s family members, Prince Harry’s future in-laws?

Credit: DaytonDailyNews

It was announced on Tuesday that Prince Harry and Meghan Markle will marry in May at Windsor Castle. The official release from Kensington Palace -- home base of the future royal spouses as well as the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, aka William and Kate, and their children -- said the ceremony would take place at St. George’s Chapel, located on the grounds at Windsor.

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It’s a much more intimate setting than St. Paul’s Chapel, where Harry’s parents, Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer, were married in front of 3,500 invited guests, or Westminster Abbey, where 2,000 people watched as Harry’s older brother, Prince William, married Kate Middleton.

St. George’s seats only about 800 people.

Among the attendees are sure to be some of Markle's family.

Less is known about Markle’s family than Prince Harry’s royal family.

The 36-year-old American actress is the only child of an African-American mother and white father who divorced when she was six.

Here's more information about Markle's family:

Her father, Thomas Markle, is an Emmy-winning cinematographer and lighting director. His credits include such popular TV shows as "The Facts of Life" and "General Hospital," where he won a Daytime Emmy Award for lighting direction in 2011. From 1988 to 1996, he was director of photography on the bawdy Fox sitcom "Married ... with Children," where Meghan found a second home of sorts. "Every day after school for 10 years, I was on the set of 'Married ... with Children,'" the 36-year-old actress told Vanity Fair magazine in an interview in September, "which was a really funny and perverse place for a little girl in a Catholic school uniform to grow up."

Her mother, Doria Ragland, is a social worker and yoga instructor in Los Angeles. Growing up, Meghan lived with her mother, who was Thomas Markle's second wife. Mother and daughter remain close and the warm relationship now has extended to include Prince Harry. In September, Ragland, 61, was photographed smiling alongside her future son-in-law at the closing ceremonies of the Invictus Games in Toronto. "Her mum's amazing!" Harry said during the couple's first joint interview with the BBC on the night their engagement was announced. But life hasn't always been easy for Ragland, whom Meghan recalls hearing called the N-word when they were out together at a concert when she was in college. And Ragland's in the glare of the spotlight now: On Sunday, the day before the royal engagment was announced, photos appeared on the British tabloid site DailyMail.com of Ragland watering plants and getting into her car outside her home. By late Monday afternoon, the Los Angeles Times reported, a large "No Trespassing" sign had been hung on Ragland's front gate and a security guard was posted outside.

Markle's older half sister, Samantha Grant Markle, is one of two children from Thomas Markle's first marriage, Grant Markle, 52, is a former model and actress who lives in Florida. Her IMDb profile shows one acting credit, a 1993 episode of "Matlock" titled "The Competion." A year ago, Meghan and Harry's romance became public knowledge and another British tabloid, The Sun, quoted Grant Markle as saying of the "Suits" star: "Hollywood has changed her. I think her ambition is to become a princess." But she later disavowed those remarks, saying, "Don't believe what you read in tabloids." In a live TV interview with "Good Morning Britain" on Tuesday, Grant Markle said of the royal engagement, "It's lovely, but I have to say I think what's more important to our family, and certainly to her, is that you find the person that's the best fit for you, that you love. That really makes you happy."

Meghan's half brother, Thomas Markle Jr., seems to have avoided being bitten by the show business bug. He reportedly lives and works as a window fitter in Oregon. Press accounts say that the 51-year-old, also a child of Thomas Sr.'s first marriage, is engaged to Darlene Blount, 36. One tabloid has reported that Thomas Jr. has invited Meghan and Harry to his nuptials.

Her great-great-grandfather, Jerry Miah Ragland, was a Georgia native, according to a genealogist whom Daily Mail TV hired this fall to research Meghan's family history. The research found that "Meghan Markle's great-great-grandfather Jerry Miah -- or Jeremiah -- Ragland was born in 1883, in Jonesboro, Clayton County, Georgia." He and his Georgia-born wife, Claudia Ritchie, later moved to Chattanooga, where he worked as a tailor.

This story was originally posted on myAJC.com.

Credit: DaytonDailyNews

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