HM Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother (1900-2002)


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Charles commissions concert for Queen

A concert dedicated to the Queen Mother will be staged this summer, it was has been announced.
The highlight of the musical event will be the world premiere of a piano concerto commissioned by the Prince of Wales in memory of his beloved grandmother, who died in March 2002.
The piece has been written by award-winning composer Nigel Hess, whose scores for television, theatre and film have won him critical acclaim. The announcement of the musical tribute came as the final design for the national memorial to the Queen Mother - a bronze statue of the royal matriarch in Order of the Garter robes - was unveiled.
 
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Queen Mother memorial plans submitted
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About time. I walk past the King George statue almost every day and it looks sadly lacking without the Queen Mother beside it.
 
I'm so glad they're going to have the statue show her at the same age as the King, otherwise they'd look idiotic together, even though most people remember her in her Queen Mum role.
 
Didn't Queen Mary insist that her effigy of her coffin show her as being the age she was when George V died? I think it was done for the same reason - to show her at the age she was when she was the Queen Consort of the deceased King rather than as the mother/grandmother of the subsequent monarchs.
 
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As you have said, most people simply don't remember her when she was younger and married to the King.
It is very fitting that it should be placed in The Mall, next to her husband, for all to see. :flowers:
 
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What a grotty little man Trevor Phillips is.
 
Off with his head! Not only rude and off colour but also untrue! I dont remember her having a colostomy operation. Although that would not be something that I could see being announced from Buck House. What a nasty man.
 
It's unconfirmed speculation. See here and scroll down to December 1966.
 
I know that the Royal Standard is flown at Buckingham Palace or other residences when the Sovereign is in residence. Lately, I ran across a statement in a book (written in 1947 when the Queen Mother was still Queen Consort) which said that her "personal standard, always to be seen flying over Buckingham Palace when she is in residence alone". I took this to mean that if the King was not in residence there the Queen's standard would be displayed if she was there but he was not.

Can any you out there who are knowledgable about these things tell me whether this is true? Thanks in advance.
 
I don't see why it wouldn't be true, although I'm pretty sure this isn't extended to other members of the family who have their own standards. Since the Duke of Edinburgh is rarely resident alone in the Palace I don't know if his standard is ever flown.

What (through observation) seems to be the practice is that the standard of the highest-ranking occupant is the only one typically flown, even if there are other family members with standards resident when the principal occupant is gone. Of course, when a higher-ranking family member comes, their standard would be flown so as not to be rude.
 
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Precedence observed at funeral ?

In the official funeral arrangements I see that in the procession the members of foreign royal families were placed as such:

The Prince and Princess Ernst-August of Hannover
The Hereditary Prince of Monaco - Princess Muna of Jordan
The Grand Duke and Grand Duchess of Luxembourg
The King and Queen of the Hellenes
The King and Queen of Romania
The King and Queen of Norway
The King and Queen of Spain
The King and Queen of Sweden
Prince Gustav zu Sayn-Wittgenstein-Bereleburg (son of Princess Benedikte of Denmark)
The Queen and The Prince Consort of Denmark
The Sultan of Brunei
The King of the Belgians and the Duke of Brabant
The Queen of the Netherlands

You see that the list is logical, beginning with the non reigning Hannovers, to the reigning HSH from Monaco, to Grand Dukes, the to former Kings and then to Kings, all in order of Reign.

The list 'should' have been

The Prince and Princess Ernst-August of Hannover
The Hereditary Prince of Monaco - Princess Muna of Jordan
The Sultan of Brunei
The Grand Duke and Grand Duchess of Luxembourg
The (former) King and Queen of the Hellenes (1964)
The (former) King and Queen of Romania (1927)
The King of the Belgians and the Duke of Brabant (1997)
The King and Queen of Norway (1991)
The Queen of the Netherlands (1980)
The King and Queen of Spain (1975)
The King and Queen of Sweden (1973)
The Queen and The Prince Consort of Denmark (1972) and Prince Gustav zu S-W-B

Anyone has an idea why the logic precedence was not observed? That Queen Beatrix was ranked the highest (by ending the procession)?
 
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A friend of mine lives in Kennington just over the road from where Mr Tallon used to reside. Whenever I go to visit her, we always see some famous face as the road is packed with 'names' but I never once saw Backstairs Billy despite him living the closest to her. Then again, if I had seen him, what could I have said? Sad to hear he passed away.
 
He seems like a really interesting guy and a very devoted employee. Hopefully they're all having tea together on The Otherside.
 
Henri M. said:
In the official funeral arrangements I see that in the procession the members of foreign royal families were placed as such:
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This is a very interesting and challenging question.
Following comparison of the two lists ("obserbed" versus "should-have-been" precedence) the question may be narrowed down to why
1) The Sultan of Brunei received a senior place,
2) The King and CP of the Belgians the second most senior one, and
3) The Queen of the Netherlands the most senior place.

I thought about it again and again and realized that it had to do with either of two issues, both equally important to the Wndsors and the British people, political/diplomatic reasons [considering their strong instinct for survival] or history.

In the case of the Sultan of Brunei, the reason is obvious. Some people may call it expediency, others pragmatism or realism.
In the case of the King of the Belgians [and his son] and Queen Beatrix, the reasons are strong historical and symbolic ones.
The Royal House of the Belgians is both, a senior as well as a reigning branch of the House of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, to which the late Queen Mother's husband was born until the family name was changed to Windsor.
Insofar as Queen Beatrix is concerned, she is [and I quote from Wikipedia]
"a direct descendant of Sophia, Electress of Hanover via her great-granddaughter Anne, Princess Royal (1709–1759). The queen could claim British nationality because of her descent from Sophia, based on The Act for the Naturalization of the Most Excellent Princess Sophia, Electress and Duchess Dowager of Hanover, and the Issue of her Body (the Sophia Naturalization Act) from 1705, as she was born before the act was repealed in 1948. "

One question I have and could not trace his origin is who this "Prince Gustav of Denmark, cousin of the late Queen Mother" is.
To the best of my knowledge, there was Prince Georg of Denmark, son of Prince Axel who married Anne Bowes-Lyon, daughter of the Queen Mother's brother. Prince Georg of Denmark appears to have died in 1986. Unless they were referring to Princess Benedikte's son (who may have stood in her place?), Prince Gustav, but he belongs to the House of Sayn-Wittgestein-Berleburg and is not a prince of Denmark.
Can someone help here?
 
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One question I have and could not trace his origin is who this "Prince Gustav of Denmark, cousin of the late Queen Mother" ?
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As far as i know it could be Prince Gustav Sayn-Wittgenstein-berlebrug, who represented his mother Benedikte, the Queenmother was godmother to her. Probably the british Court mixed the titles and called him of Denmark instead of Sayn-Wittgenstein-Berleburg.
 
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Philippe Egalite' said:
One question I have and could not trace his origin is who this "Prince Gustav of Denmark, cousin of the late Queen Mother"?
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Yes, there is an error in the list. Prince Gustav of Denmark died in 1944 and Prince Georg in 1986. I have checked both the Hello! and Point de Vue coverage of the funeral but unfortunately there is not a single picture of the Foreign Royals as a group. However, Royalty Digest #131 states that Prince Gustav of Sayn-Wittgenstein-Berleburg did indeed attend, so I will amend Henri's post.
 
Actually there was no oversight on the part of Henri. What he quoted [above] as "observed" precedence was transcribed verbatim from the official document.
The reader is referred to the Official Website of the British Monarchy, under Life of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth, The Queen Mother -> Funeral Arrangements -> Funeral Ceremonial, where it is still quoted, under Members of Foreign Royal Families (attending), Prince Gustav of Denmark.
Evidently, the mistake was on the part of the author(s) of the official List of Foreign Royals attending the Funeral.
And a quick remark. Upon perusing the British Monarchy's official Website, I realized that Queen Elizabeth, The Queen Mother's Funeral was not a State Funeral but a Royal Ceremonial one. A State Funeral carries a somewhat greater gravitas but, importantly, due to the official attendance of foreign dignitaries, it follows an entirely different protocol regarding these guests.
 
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It is of my opinion that Mr. Tallon should not have been chastised and kept from the Queen Mother in the final days of her life because of his faux pas regarding Princess Margaret attending in frail health the birthday celebrations of her mother. Perhaps if this was a direct diobedience of an strict order then Mr. Tallon was in the wrong, but maybe there was some confusion...as is often the case with the elderly and the ill.

Princess Margaret was professionally photographed in her role as "Lady of the Imperial Order of the Crown of India" for the lavish book "Keepers of the Kingdom". The princess is obviously in terrible health and severe decline. Even more so than the image of her in the wheelchair we associate with Mr. Tallon.

It is ironic that the Queen Mother is featured (also in obvious decline of health) on the back of the dust jacket of this fascinating book.
 
pinkie40 said:
It is of my opinion that Mr. Tallon should not have been chastised and kept from the Queen Mother in the final days of her life because of his faux pas regarding Princess Margaret attending in frail health the birthday celebrations of her mother.
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It appears from this article that if he was chastised by anyone, it wasn't the Royal Family.

Telegraph Article

On the Queen Mother's 101st birthday in August 2001, William had wheeled Margaret out to join a royal line-up at Clarence House. Many were shocked by her fragility and the decline in her appearance and said she should never have been exposed in that way.
William was devastated and wrote to express his sorrow to the Queen. The letter that he received back, written in her own hand, dispelled any rumour of coldness or resentment that was supposed to have followed.
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Skydragon,
Thanks for the article!:flowers:
I have been greatly surprised to read unfavourable facts about the Queen Mother. “There was much propaganda to the effect that the Royal Family subsisted on the same clothing coupons as the rest of the population, but there is considerable doubt about this. One nervous courtier asked the Queen if “Your Majesty feels it is quite correct for you to wear your best dresses when visiting the bomb sites” (Thornton, 2008) shocked me the most.
 
This doesn't shock me at all but I can't see anything but a negative reaction coming from stories like this. As one of the commenters said, by the end of it how can you be anything else but a committed republican?
 
Al_bina said:
One nervous courtier asked the Queen if “Your Majesty feels it is quite correct for you to wear your best dresses when visiting the bomb sites” (Thornton, 2008) shocked me the most.
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Her response is wonderful, though.

'"But of course," replied Elizabeth. "They would wear their best dresses if they were coming to see me."'

I do wonder how she managed to raise at least one daughter with the opposite view on money.
 
I do appreciate the Queen Mother's witty response, though I have to agree with Thornton naming her “the Empress of Extravagance”. She reminded me of Marie Antoinette with her “Let them eat cake” in this case.
Yes … yes … I know no one could corroborate that the last Queen of France did actually utter this infamous phrase.:)
 
To BeatrixFan

"This doesn't shock me at all but I can't see anything but a negative reaction coming from stories like this. As one of the commenters said, by the end of it how can you be anything else but a committed republican?"

If you think that presidents are better than you're quite wrong! Just look at Argetina of the Perons, the Philipines of Imelda Marcos and co or Romania's Ceasescu couple or some African presidents and I could go on with them...
 
Have any statues been unveiled to the Queen Mother as mentioned on previous pages of this thread yet?
 
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