Today is the funeral of Queen Elizabeth II, who died on 8th September 2022 at the age of 96 after a reign of over 70 years.
You can read more about Queen Elizabeth II, her life and reign, and how she is descended from Margaret Tudor and the Boleyns, in an article I wrote – click here.
But here is what is going to happen today:
- Approx 10.35am (5.35am Eastern time) – The start of the procession from Westminster Hall, where the Queen’s coffin has been lying in state, to Westminster Abbey. The Queen’s Company, 1st Battalion Grenadier Guards will lift the coffin off the catafalque in Westminster Hall and carry it to the gun carriage. The state gun carriage, drawn by members of the Royal Navy, will make its way to the nearby Westminster Abbey followed by King Charles III and senior members of the royal family on foot. The procession will be led by a massed pipes and drums of around 200 members of the Scottish and Irish Regiments, the Brigade of Gurkhas, and the Royal Air Force.
- 11am (6am Eastern time) – The funeral service will begin at Westminster Abbey. David Hoyle, Dean of Westminster, will lead the service and Justin Welby, Archbishop of Canterbury, will give the sermon and commendation.
- Approx 11.55am (6.55am Eastern time) – The Last Post will sound and there will be a national 2-minute silence.
- Approx midday (7am Eastern time) – The funeral service will be brought to an end by the singing of the National Anthem and a lament played by the Queen’s piper.
- After the service, Queen Elizabeth II’s coffin will be processed from Westminster Abbey to Wellington Arch with King Charles III and senior members of the royal family following on foot. As they process, Big Ben will toll at 1-minute intervals. A car carrying Queen Camilla, the Princess of Wales, the Duchess of Sussex and Countess of Wessex will follow the procession.
- When it reaches Wellington Arch, the coffin will be transferred to the state hearse. It will then be driven to Windsor.
- Approx 3pm (10am Eastern time) – The hearse will arrive at Windsor. It will then be driven slowly to St George’s Chapel via The Long Walk.
- 4pm (11am Eastern time) – There will be a service of committal at St George’s Chapel. At the end of the service, Lord Andrew Parker, the late Queen’s Lord Chamberlain, will break his stick of office over the coffin, which will then be lowered into the royal vault.
- 7.30pm (2.30pm Eastern time) – A private family service in which Queen Elizabeth II will be interred with her late husband, Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, in the King George VI memorial chapel within St George’s Chapel.
A useful guide to the day, with maps and plans of the procession route, Westminster Abbey and St George’s Chapel, can be found at https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-60617519
Absolutely wonderful I was glued to my screen, I did not like the hymns much and I think the queens full name should have been read out, but it was very very moving and like all the royal funerals, medieval – a journey back to the long lost days when majesty ruled supreme and complete adulation and deference were the order of the day, the Abbey of course is beautiful and very ancient, it has seen lots of weddings and funeral services over the years, the weather was perfect and on Sunday my friend and I travelled to Buck house but no access was allowed, too many crowds so we went to Green Park and St James Park and saw the floral tributes, then we walked to The Mall and saw people with their tents and food and drink, we walked to Horse Guards Parade and Trafalgar and chatted to other visitors, it was nice to be caught up in the atmosphere and it was a lovely warm day, took plenty of photos but getting home on the tube there was a delay, not for too long though, when the queen was taken to Windsor Castle it was such a lovely poignant gesture seeing her beloved pets, her horse Emma and corgis, Sandy and Mick outside, Emma seemed to raise her hoof as the cortège passed, the committal was very beautiful also, i preferred that to the service in the abbey, it was a lovely send of a great tribute to a woman who was only twenty five, like her other namesake who became queen at the same age, a woman who did indeed serve her country as she so claimed at her coronation, and that her life would be dedicated to us all, as the Dean of Westminster himself declared she did indeed devote herself to her duty and it was something, in the seventy years of her reign she never wavered from, the lone piper at the end as the coffin was lowered into the vault below was mournful very moving and like a last lament, the moment when the symbols of royalty were removed from her coffin, the orb the sceptre and lastly, the imperial state crown that moment to me, made me realise that everyone has their day, royal or commoner we all return to dust, we know that of course that we do not live forever, but something inside makes us think that our parents are somehow invincible that somehow they will cheat death, it is only when death arrives when we see those beloved faces in their coffins that we realise they are indeed dead, that they have left us forever, and the sight of the coffin can be so harrowing, some people cry uncontrollably at funerals, watching King Charles he looked broken, I could see he was also finding it hard to come to terms with the fact that his beloved mother was dead, at the beginning I saw Prince Andrew look like he was about to burst into tears, it was Princess Anne stoic as always a true child of her parents, who held herself well although her countenance was one of extreme sadness, we have to remember that royalty they maybe, they are also very real flesh and blood people burying their beloved parent grandmother and great grandmother, their grief we can all feel because many of us have felt the same real grief, and they did not the luxury of a private family funeral but was held in the spotlight of the worlds media, like many I grew up with the queen as my sovereign, there’s some today who may have been around when her father was king, but it was her face I saw on the postage stamps on the bank notes, and it was her I watched on Christmas Day when she addressed the nation, it seems strange now to hear the name King Charles instead of Queen Elizabeth, she has indeed made history by becoming our longest reigning monarch, I doubt somehow any of her descendants will come near to or ever beat that record, for that achievement she is unique.