The impressive funeral cortege of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother goes down The Mall, having Buckingham Palace as backdrop. The long cortege included over 1600 service men from various regiments linked with the Queen Mother, as well as regiments from the Royal Navy, the Royal Marines, the Royal Air Force and the Army. Various regiments from the Commonwealth marched alongside 4 bands and the colourful Scots Guards and the Household Cavalry dismounted. Above Her Majesty’s coffin rested the Queen Consort’s Crown, created for her in 1937, as well as a wreath of white flowers from Her Majesty The Queen with a card reading “In loving memory, Lilibet”.
Up to 400.000 people lined the streets of London, from The Mall until Westminster Hall, to witness the impressive funeral cortege, the biggest military procession since the funeral of Sir Winston Churchill in 1965. The Queen Mother’s coffin was taken in the same gun carriage used to take His Majesty King George VI’s coffin from Sandringham House to the Train station near the Royal Estate, on the way to London. It was pulled by six black horses of The King's Troop,
Royal Horse Artillery, a mark of difference from a state funeral, in which the gun carriage would be pulled by sailors.
Three generations of the British Royal Family walked behind the Queen Mother’s coffin: in the picture, HRH The Duke of Edinburgh, HRH The Prince of Wales, HRH the Prince William of Wales and HRH The Duke of Kent are to be seen. Above left, the coffin goes past Horse Guards Parade. The long procession passed through various streets which were lined with over 1600 service men from the various branches of the Armed Forces.
After 30 minutes of magnificent pageantry and ceremonial, the cortege arrived at the Palace of Westminster, where a crowd of over 10.000 people is to be seen on the left of the picture waited throughout the morning. The Queen, Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie of York and Lady Sarah Chatto waited the members of the Royal Family that walked behind the gun carriage: the Duke of Edinburgh, the Prince of Wales, the Duke of York, the Princess Royal, the Earl of Wessex, Prince William of Wales, Prince Henry of Wales, Viscount Linley, Mr. Peter Philips, Mr. Daniel Chatto, the Duke of Gloucester, the Duke of Kent, Prince Michael of Kent and Commodore Timothy Laurence. Others walking behind the coffin included members of the Bowes-Lyon Family as well as members of the Queen Mother’s Staff.
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