Ronald Reagan’s private thoughts, ranging from his fear of “Armageddon” in the Middle East to his embarrassment at a faux pas over a tea bag with the Prince of Wales, are revealed in the late president’s newly released diaries.

The five leather-bound volumes of the handwritten journal, to be published by Vanity Fair magazine, cover the eight years of his presidency, 1981-89, including the day that he was shot by John Hinckley. “Getting shot hurts,” he writes.

Mr Reagan comments on world figures, from the “mad clown” Muammar Gaddafi, the Libyan leader, to the “utterly paranoid” Secretary of State, Alexander Haig. After meeting Michael Jackson, he says that he was “surprised at how shy” the pop star was.

The diaries are written in Mr Reagan’s neat, rounded script, with few words crossed out and each page filled to the bottom. Even mild profanities such as “hell” and “damn” are rendered “h--l” and “d---”.

Mr Reagan found the Prince of Wales a “most likable person” at a 1981 meeting at the White House but he was mortified by a protocol gaffe in serving tea to the heir to the British throne. “The ushers brought him tea — horror of horrors they served it our way with a tea bag in the cup. It finally dawned on me that he was just holding the cup & then finally put it down on a table. I didn’t know what to do,” he wrote.

“Mike [Deaver, deputy chief of staff] escorted him back to the W.H. and apologized. The Prince, ‘I didn’t know what to do with it’.” Mr Reagan also records Mrs Thatcher’s visit to Washington in the early days of his Administration. “We had a private meeting in Oval office. She is as firm as ever re — the Soviets and for reduction of govt. Expressed regret that she tried to reduce govt. spending a step at a time & was defeated in each attempt. Said she should have done it our way — an entire package — all or nothing.”

Mr Reagan chronicled a sometimes troubled relationship with his family. He said his daughter, Patti, had “a kind of yo-yo family relationship” and was “lonesome” when his wife, Nancy, was out of town.

At one point, he stopped talking to his son, Ron. “I don’t know what it is with him . . . I’m not talking to him until he apologizes for hanging up on me,” he wrote.

Perhaps the most dramatic entry covers the day he was shot and wounded on March 30, 1981. “Left the hotel at the usual side entrance and headed for the car — suddenly there was a burst of gun fire from the left. S.S. Agent pushed me onto the floor of the car & jumped on top. I felt a blow in my upper back that was unbelievably painful. I was sure he’d broken my rib,” he wrote.

“The car took off. I sat up on the edge of the seat almost paralyzed by pain. Then I began coughing up blood which made both of us think — yes I had a broken rib & it had punctured a lung. By the time we arrived I was having great trouble getting enough air . . . I walked into the emergency room and was hoisted on to a cart where I was stripped of my clothes. It was then we learnt I’d been shot & had a bullet in my lung. Getting shot hurts.”

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