The Queen: Elizabeth II and the Monarchy

Much depended on the central actor, who made little secret of his deep anxiety about the whole proceeding. Afterwards the King told the former Prime Minister, Ramsay MacDonald, that he had been so dazed by fear for much of the ceremony that he was unaware of what was happening.

However, the Westminster Abbey service went without a hitch, and the Monarch performed his part in it with appropriate gravitas. ‘He carried himself well,’ judged Chips Channon, who witnessed the ceremony as one of several thousand MPs, peers and other dignitaries in the congregation.

A more privileged position among the spectators was given to the two princesses, who sat in the royal box with Queen Mary. For Elizabeth, particularly, the day was an important part of her education. Her governess prepared her for it by reading her Queen Victoria’s account of her own Coronation, written exactly a century before, which began, ‘I was awoke by the guns in the Park and could not get much sleep afterwards on account of the people, bands etc.’ According to Crawfie, the elder princess took such a deep interest that she became ‘one of the greatest living experts on Coronations’.

The girls rode to the Abbey in a glass coach. Chips Channon looked on as they ‘whipped their robes on to their left arms as they had been shown, pushing up their frocks with the same movement and showing bare legs above socks’.

During the three-hour ceremony, Elizabeth watched intently as the Archbishop of Canterbury performed the complex rites, and her father, with the utmost difficulty, repeated the words ‘All this – I promise to do’.

For any child to view the Coronation at close quarters was a memorable experience: only a handful had the opportunity. For the Heiress Presumptive to see her own parents crowned, and to take part in the procession, must have been awesome. What did she think and feel? The Royal Library contains her own answer – an essay, both vivid and prosaic, written in pencil on lined paper just after the event, and carefully tied with pink ribbon. On the cover is inscribed, in neat red crayon, the words:

The Coronation

12th May; 1937

To Mummy and Papa

In Memory of Their Coronation

From Lilibet

By Herself

An Account of the Coronation

It describes how she was woken at five in the morning by the band of the Royal Marines outside her window (much as her great-great grandmother had been woken by the guns in the Park), and how, draped in an eiderdown and accompanied by her nurse-maid Bobo MacDonald, ‘we crouched in the window looking onto a cold, misty morning’. After breakfast (‘we did not eat very much as we were too excited’) they got dressed and

showed ourselves to the visitors and housemaids. Now I shall try and give you a description of our dresses. They were white silk with old cream lace and had little gold bows all the way down the middle. They had puffed sleeves with one little bow in the centre. Then there were the robes of purple velvet with gold on the edge.

We went along to Mummy’s bedroom and we found her putting on her dress. Papa was dressed in a white shirt, breeches and stockings, and over this he wore a crimson satin coat. Then a page came and said it was time to go down, so we kissed Mummy, and wished her good luck and went down. There we said Goodmorning to Aunt Alice, Aunt Marina and Aunt Mary with whom we were to drive to the Abbey. We were then told to get into the carriage . . . At first it was very jolty but we soon got used to it.

Princess Elizabeth describes the procession down the Mall, along Whitehall, to Westminster Abbey, and the walk up the aisle with her family, before she went up into the royal box with Queen Mary:

Then the service began.

I thought it all very, very wonderful and I expect the Abbey did, too. The arches and beams at the top were covered with a sort of haze of wonder as Papa was crowned, at least I thought so.

When Mummy was crowned and all the peeresses put on their coronets it looked wonderful to see arms and coronets hovering in the air and then the arms disappear as if by magic. Also the music was lovely and the band, the orchestra and the new organ all played beautifully.

What struck me as being rather odd was that Grannie did not remember much of her own Coronation. I should have thought that it would have stayed in her mind for ever.

At the end the service got rather boring as it was all prayers. Grannie and I were looking to see how many more pages to the end, and we turned one more and then I pointed to the word at the bottom of the page and it said “Finis”. We both smiled at each other and turned back to the service.

. . . When we got back to our dressing-room we had some sandwiches, stuffed rolls, orangeade and lemonade. Then we left for our long drive.

On leaving the Abbey we went along the Embankment, Northumberland Avenue, through Trafalgar Square, St. James’s St. Piccadilly, Regent St. Oxford St. with Selfridge’s lovely figures, through Marble Arch, through Hyde Park, Hyde Park Corner, Constitution Hill, round the Memorial and into the courtyard.

Then we went up to the corridor to see the Coach coming in. Then Mummy and Papa came up and said “Goodmorning” and were congratulated. Then we all went on to the Balcony where millions of people were waiting below. After that we all went to be photographed in front of those awful lights.

When we sat down to tea it was nearly six o’clock! When I got into bed my legs ached terribly. As my head touched the pillow I was asleep and I did not wake up till nearly eight o’clock the next morning.

PRINCESS ELIZABETH was eleven at the time of the Coronation, and it was an initiation for her, as well as for her parents. The day was not far off, as one writer put it in the royalty idiom of the time, when she would move out of childhood ‘into a swifter current of life.’

Pretty and pubescent, she attracted nearly as much attention as the King and Queen during the two months of state drives, official tours and youth displays that followed. Although she continued to be dressed as a little girl, there was an increase in the number of grand occasions in which she was involved. There was also a sudden seriousness about equipping her for future duties.

One new initiative was the establishment of a Girl Guide company at the Palace, to which a Brownie pack was attached, with the specific purpose of providing the two princesses with a training ground. Based on a romantic myth of imperial kinship, the Scouts and Guides were at their zenith, and several members of the Royal Family had honorific titles within the movement. The Buckingham Palace Company met on Wednesday afternoons and gathered together about twenty children of friends and vetted acquaintances – some, like the royal princesses, taught at home by governesses, others attending London day schools. The Guides were grouped in three patrols. Princess Elizabeth was second-in-command to Patricia Mountbatten, who was a few years older, in the Kingfisher patrol. In winter they met in one of the vast rooms in Buckingham Palace, in the summer in the gardens. There were also trips to Windsor, involving the normal activities of Girl Guides everywhere, though in an abnormal setting: tracking, bird watching, trekking with a hand-cart, cooking sausages and ‘dampers’ (flour balls on sticks) over a campfire. At the Palace, the long corridors were used for signalling practice.

Princess Elizabeth received no special treatment, and mixed in well with the other girls. According to Lady Mountbatten, she was ‘a very efficient and capable deputy,’ already with an air of authority, and popular in the Company, ‘nice, easy to deal with, you’d want her as your best friend’.

Another member of the Company, Elizabeth Cavendish, confirms the impression of the Heiress Presumptive as a highly competent Girl Guide, who took the various activities and rituals seriously, and did well at them.

When a Scottish dancer came to give them special instruction, Princess Elizabeth showed a particular proficiency at dancing Highland reels.

The picture is of a conventional, unquestioning child, making the most of what was presented to her. Yet if Princess Elizabeth was not singled out, there was something different about her. ‘She was very aware that how she behaved in public was very important,’ says Lady Mountbatten. ‘For instance, she couldn’t burst into tears. If she hurt her knee she knew she must try not to cry.’

The Company Captain was a Miss Synge, held in awe by the girls, with Miss Crawford assisting. Some of the Guides, Patricia Mountbatten and Camilla Wallop (later Lady Rupert Nevill), for instance, became lifelong friends.

Punch, 28th April 1937

It was not just cut knees. Incidents in the Kingfisher patrol were not, in general, leaked or reported. However, other events in Princess Elizabeth’s life now were – as the press, less intrusive than later but no less curious, sought to cater for a huge public appetite for details about the royal children’s lives. The princesses might not be able to cry over a minor mishap, but grazes and slight colds often got into the papers just the same. Even before their teens, public appearances had become performances. If the royal children were taken to the theatre, the newspapers automatically treated them as the main attraction – reporting every movement or gesture next day. Sometimes the theatre management, delighted by the privilege of entertaining royalty, would shower honours on them, and the spotlight would be turned in their direction. When the Heiress Presumptive attended the 1937 Christmas production of ‘Where the Rainbow Ends’ at the Holborn Empire, along with fifteen hundred other children, everybody was asked to stand and sing a specially composed children’s verse of the National Anthem.

‘Normal’ expeditions and natural behaviour were difficult.

The birthday of Princess Elizabeth, meanwhile, became a national event. Birthday presents were listed even in the serious newspapers, together with details of the guests and of how the anniversary was being celebrated. Stimulated by these public announcements, well-wishers would gather wherever the Princess happened to be, to cheer her and convey greetings, and she would be required to appear, and politely acknowledge them.

She also became the recipient of a flow of unsolicited mail, often from children in disaster areas, like Chinese orphans fleeing from the Japanese.

Some aspects of the princesses’ lives did not greatly alter. The family continued to come together for weekends at Royal Lodge, where their existence remained much as it had been before. The press made much of the ‘simplicity’ of life at the Lodge, although actually the Royal Family enjoyed every luxury, opportunity for recreation, and service that anybody could wish for. Still, it was possible to enjoy a degree of informality. Here they could enjoy, if not simple living, then the kind of rustic domesticity which had been the greatest pleasure of the Duke and Duchess of York before the upheaval, in the company of horses and dogs unconscious of rank, with grooms, stable boys and kennel hands to look after, handle and talk about them. Princess Elizabeth’s ponies had names like Peggy and Comet; the dogs included corgis, labradors and a Tibetan lion dog, and had names like Dookie, Spark, Flash, Scruffy, Mimsey and Stiffy. The public took a keen interest in these animals. ‘Dookie is unquestionably the “character” of the princesses’ delightful canine family,’ declared one authority in 1942.

On Sundays, the girls and their parents attended services at St George’s Chapel or the Chapel Royal in the grounds of Royal Lodge; on Saturdays, and other days during holidays, the princesses went riding in the morning. Sometimes they walked in Windsor Forest, cycled in the royal gardens at Frogmore or swam in an outdoor pool at the Lodge. All that was lacking was the company of other children of whom they saw as little, or less, than at Buckingham Palace.

Juvenile guests were rare. However, the King and Queen had to entertain official, and especially foreign, visitors who were invited to stay with increasing frequency as fears about the international crisis grew. According to Crawfie, Princess Elizabeth began to take an interest in politics at about this time, ‘and knew quite a bit of what was going on in the world outside’.

She certainly had a unique vantage point compared with most other children of her age. In one month in 1938, four kings, a regent and a crown prince called on her parents, mainly on trips to London to rally support in defence of their countries. Visitors to Windsor early in the reign included the newly appointed American Ambassador, Joe Kennedy, and his wife Rose, who stayed for a weekend in April 1938. Rose Kennedy was moved by her brief contact with British royalty, especially its younger members. She recorded in her diary that she ‘found it a great conversational convenience’ that her own large brood included two children, Teddy and Jean, who were about the same ages as the princesses. During her stay, she watched out for the royal daughters, much as one might look out for rare and exotic birds when visiting their habitat, and she was not disappointed. While walking in the park surrounding the Castle, she and Joe ‘ran into Princess Elizabeth hiding behind the shrubs. She had on a pink coat and was hatless and she smiled at us’. The Kennedys saw her again over luncheon, when Elizabeth and Margaret appeared together, clad identically in rose dresses with checked blouses, red shoes with silver-coloured buckles, white socks and necklaces of coral and pearl. Elizabeth, not quite twelve, was placed next to the wicked old envoy, to his saturnine delight. After the meal, the princesses were required to accompany their parents and the ambassadorial couple as they walked ‘very informally’ over to Frogmore.

Learning how to handle distinguished guests was one important part of an Heiress’s education, and was soon extended. Shortly after the Kennedy visit, Princess Elizabeth was promoted from white socks to silk stockings, receiving a box from her mother as a birthday present.

She started to attend the huge, thousands-strong, garden parties held annually at Buckingham Palace. She also began occasionally to take a leading role at small-scale semi-public events, presenting rosettes at children’s pony shows, and cups and shields to children at the Bath Club. When she was thirteen, she was allowed to accept the presidency of the Children’s League of the Princess Elizabeth of York Hospital, which had been named after her.

There remained the question, both practical and philosophical, of what an Heiress Presumptive and future Queen should be educated to be like – a conundrum that had not faced the Court or Government since the 1830s, when Princess Victoria’s education had been entrusted to the remarkable Baroness Lehzen. Marion Crawford had been employed to help the princesses become lady-like, not monarchical. After George VI’s accession, there was a hesitant appreciation that being lady-like was not enough, but there remained a tension between the training felt suitable for a Head of State, and the needs of an idealized princess. The result was an incongruous mix. If the notion, as an authorized account claimed, that the Princess was subjected to ‘a strenuous tutelage increasing in measure with the passing years’,

was simply a pious invention, there was at least some expansion of the curriculum. Princess Elizabeth began to take twice weekly lessons in constitutional history at Eton College, close to Windsor Castle and Royal Lodge, given by the Vice-Provost, Henry (later Sir Henry) Marten. Later this tuition was supplemented by that of the Vicomtesse de Bellaigue, who taught both princesses French, French literature and European history.

Yet there was also a deep concern to avoid the taint of an ‘intellectual’ as opposed to ‘practical’ princess. It was therefore announced that she was taking cooking lessons in the Royal Lodge kitchens, that she sometimes baked cakes in her little Welsh cottage which were sent to children in hospitals or to unemployed areas, that she had learnt to sweep and scrub and to polish furniture, and that Queen Mary, ‘a keen housewife,’ had admired her efforts.

Marten did his best. The theme of his tutelage combined the traditional and the modern, reminding the Princess of where she came from, but also of the changes wrought by modern conditions. Later, he recalled teaching her that the British Monarchy was exceeded in antiquity only by the papacy, that it went back more than a millennium to King Egbert, ‘the first to unite all England,’ and that the secret of its survival was its ability to adapt. He also taught her what he considered the two great events affecting the Monarchy in their own time, the 1931 Statute of Westminster and the advent of broadcasting. The Statute, he explained, had founded the modern British Commonwealth by making a common allegiance to the Crown the sole surviving link between Great Britain and the Dominions; while broadcasting enabled the Royal Family, by talking personally on the air, to sustain that link.

How much his pupil retained is hard to say, though he may have fired her interest in the past a little. When Princess Marie Louise apologized over dinner at Windsor during the Second World War for indulging in an old lady’s reminiscences, the teenage Princess replied: ‘But Cousin Louise, it’s history, and therefore so thrilling.’