At Sandringham her mother and sister waited for her, mired in their own grief. Princess Margaret had locked herself in her room, almost inconsolable. "It seems that life has stopped forever," she told her mother. "I wonder how it can go on." The fifty-one-year-old Queen, not yet in black, resisted wearing widow's weeds. She returned to her room and began writing letters. She knew that she was now consigned to the role of Queen Dowager, a t.i.tle that made her shudder. Ignoring protocol, she insisted on being called Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother. Her biographer, Penelope Mortimer, suggested that she had devised the t.i.tle because she could not cope with the sudden demotion she suffered from her husband's death. "In this way," wrote Mortimer, "she managed to be called 'Queen' twice over."*

Almost forgotten inside the big, hushed house at Sandringham was the King's three-year-old grandson, Charles, who was playing by himself, sliding a green toy crocodile up and down the great mahogany staircase.

"What happened, nanny? What happened?" he asked his nurse, Helen Lightbody.

"Grandpa's gone to sleep forever," she said, bowing to the bewildered little boy, who was now Duke of Cornwall, Duke of Rothesay, Earl of Carrick, Baron of Renfrew, Lord of the Isles, and Great Steward of Scotland. As heir apparent, he now outranked his father. Nanny took her royal charge by the hand and led him to bed for his nap.

Upstairs, the King's body was moved from his bedroom to the small family church of St. Mary Magdalene, where it was guarded around the clock by his estate workers, who wore the same green tweed knickerbocker suits they wore when hunting with their King. They laid his royal purple standard over the coffin they had built that morning from Sandringham oak. Next to it they placed a white wreath from Winston Churchill. In his own hand, the Prime Minister had written: "For Valour." The Queen's flowers for her father arrived soon after and were placed on top of the coffin with her card: "To darling Papa from your sorrowing Lilibet." When she curtsied to her father's body at the funeral, it was the last curtsy she ever made.

Historians a.s.sessed the King as an important symbolic leader for the British during World War II, but they noted that his reign marked the end of the British empire. No longer King and Emperor, George VI was reduced to head of the Commonwealth of Nations and sadly watched Great Britain evolve into a welfare state. But France's Amba.s.sador said the King had left his daughter "a throne more stable than England has known almost her entire history." To his countrymen the King remained a hero worthy of homage, a sovereign deserving respect. Soldiers wore black armbands after his death, and people contributed money for a memorial fund. Parliament voted $168,000 to pay for an elaborate state funeral on February 16, 1952, which included spreading purple cloth on the pavements so the white nylon ropes binding the King's coffin to the catafalque would not touch the ground.

On that day, two minutes of absolute silence were observed in memory of the monarch. A man, who defiantly slapped his feet on the street, was arrested for insulting behavior. Crowds of angry Britons mobbed him as he fled to safety in a policeman's arms. In court that afternoon, he was fined $2.80 for breaking the King's silence.

From the moment she stepped off the plane in London, the new Queen was engulfed by courtiers and advisers and equerries, all urgently directing her on her father's formal lying-in-state at Westminster Hall, his burial in St. George's Chapel at Windsor Castle, and the long period of national mourning. She was briefed on the protocol for entertaining prime ministers and high commissioners of Commonwealth countries attending the funeral and greeting the seven sovereigns from other countries, including her uncle David, the Duke of Windsor, who posed a ticklish problem. He wanted to discuss continuing the $70,000-a-year allowance he had been receiving from her father since 1936. Because those personal funds were now hers, she had to decide whether to keep paying him.

The Duke's lawyer argued that the money was a lifetime pension and his brother's compensation to the Duke for renouncing his inheritance. The Duke knew the new Queen would discuss the allowance with her mother and Queen Mary. "It's h.e.l.l to be even that much dependent on these ice-veined b.i.t.c.hes," he wrote to the d.u.c.h.ess from London. "I'm afraid they've got the fine excuse of national economy if they want to use it."

They didn't need it. The Queen Mother said the Duke already had millions of his own, which the d.u.c.h.ess simply squandered on fripperies like satin pillows for her dogs and Diorissimo perfume, which she sprayed on her flowers to give them added fragrance. Queen Mary, who collected antiques-frequently while visiting friends' homes and then sending her servant to "inquire" (that is, collect) the pieces she admired-said the spendthrift d.u.c.h.ess would only waste the money on her addiction to shoes, pointing out that she had once bought fifty-six pairs during one shopping spree. The new Queen deferred to her mother and grandmother and decided not to pay the Duke.

Upon the King's death, all royal possessions pa.s.sed directly to the new sovereign, including the King's palaces, his twenty mares, his courtiers, and his private secretary, Sir Alan (Tommy) Lascelles. So, technically, Elizabeth's mother and sister no longer had homes or horses or courtiers. Worse, their eviction from Buckingham Palace would mean that Elizabeth and Philip would have to leave Clarence House, something neither wanted, and move into Buck House, as they called Buckingham Palace.

"Oh, G.o.d, now we've got to live behind railings," she said.

"b.l.o.o.d.y h.e.l.l," said her husband. He dreaded exchanging the modern comforts of Clarence House for the drafty caverns of Buckingham Palace, with its 10,000 windows, three miles of red-carpeted corridors, 1,000 clocks, 10,000 pieces of furniture, 690 rooms, 230 servants, and 45-acre backyard. King Edward VII had referred to it disparagingly as "the Sepulchre." King Edward VIII, later the Duke of Windsor, complained of the "dank, musty smell," and the Queen's father, King George VI, called it "an icebox." So Prince Philip, who said he "felt like a lodger," proposed using the Palace as an office and place of official entertainment while maintaining Clarence House as their home. The Queen put the idea to Winston Churchill, who sputtered indignantly. He insisted that Buckingham Palace was the sovereign's home as well as the sovereign's workplace-a focal point for the nation, the locus of the monarchy.

Hesitant to argue with the venerable Prime Minister, the Queen acceded and dutifully scheduled the move. Her husband was so incensed that he had the white maple paneling stripped from his study at Clarence House and moved to his bedroom in Buckingham Palace. Churchill then recommended that the Queen consider exchanging residences with her mother and sister. The Prime Minister confided his concern over her mother's mental state. He said he had heard that in her grief the distraught widow had turned to spiritualism and even partic.i.p.ated in a seance to speak to her dead husband. Churchill was so disturbed by the notion of the Queen Mother spirit rapping with ghosts that he traveled to Sandringham to persuade her to come out of retirement. He said that the government needed her more now than when her husband was alive. He offered to ease her return to public life by making Clarence House her London home.

"The Queen Mother had always thought highly of the bright comfort in which her daughter and son-in-law lived at the modernized Clarence House," said John Dean, "and even envied it. But when it was suggested that she should take over Clarence House, she seemed reluctant to leave the Palace. This was very understandable, for her large suite there was rich with memories of a beloved husband."

The Queen Mother told Churchill that she did not like the color scheme at Clarence House. He offered to change it. Then she said she could not bear to leave her bedroom in Buckingham Palace because the marble fireplace there had been a personal gift from the King. Churchill offered to move the fireplace to Clarence House. Still, she resisted, saying she couldn't afford to live in such luxury anymore. Churchill said that her presence was so vital to the monarchy that the government planned to allocate $220,000 to refurbish the mansion for her and to provide a yearly allowance of $360,000, plus a staff of fifteen. She also was given two other palaces: Royal Lodge, an elegant Gothic house in Windsor Great Park near Windsor Castle, and Birkall in Scotland. In addition she purchased the Castle of Mey, surrounded by twenty-five thousand acres of heather in Scotland. Still, she hesitated accepting Churchill's offer. "I was going to throw in Big Ben," he said later, "but she yielded-in time."

And the new Queen agreed to everything. She sympathized with her mother's sixteen years of royal prerogatives suddenly yanked-the crown jewels, the palaces, the servants, the t.i.tle. What the Queen did not realize was how much her mother missed sharing the power of the throne. The Queen understood better as soon as she saw the letter the Queen Mother wrote to her friend Lady Airlie: Oh, Mabel, if only you knew how hard it has been; how I have struggled with myself. All through the years the King always told me everything Oh, Mabel, if only you knew how hard it has been; how I have struggled with myself. All through the years the King always told me everything first. first. I do so miss that. I do so miss that.

The Queen quickly ordered a new red leather dispatch box to be emblazoned in gold with the words "HM Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother."

But the Queen did not extend this extraordinary privilege to her husband. In fact, she denied Philip the honor of sharing the red dispatch boxes that contained the confidential doc.u.ments of government sent for royal approval. In this she broke all precedents: Queen Victoria had shared her boxes with Prince Albert. And her son and heir, King Edward VII, even shared his boxes with his daughter-in-law because he was so impressed by her devotion to the monarchy that he wanted her to be prepared to play her part behind the scenes when her husband became King. When he did become King, George V continued "doing" his boxes with his wife, Queen Mary, and his successor, George VI, did the same with his wife. But Queen Elizabeth II declined to carry on the royal responsibility with her spouse. Her advisers were so startled by her refusal that they posed the question again of permitting Philip to have access. Her reply: "No to the boxes." To her husband she blamed her advisers.

A few weeks later her friend Lord Kinross, third Baron of Glasclune, wrote a profile of Philip in The New York Times Magazine The New York Times Magazine and quoted the Queen on how to manage husbands: and quoted the Queen on how to manage husbands: "What do you do when your husband wants something very badly and you don't want him to have it?" Elizabeth asked a friend.

"Well, ma'am," the friend replied, "I try to reason with him and dissuade him, and we sometimes reach a compromise."

"Oh," Elizabeth said reflectively, "that's not my method. I tell Philip he shall have it and then make sure that he doesn't get it."

The Queen held so tightly to her royal prerogatives that she would not even let her husband enter the Wedgwood blue room in Buckingham Palace during her weekly audiences with the Prime Minister.

"Before... whatever we did, it was together," Philip said of his marriage before the accession. "I suppose I naturally filled the princ.i.p.al position."

No longer. The strong, dominant, take-charge husband was suddenly unmanned. He was no longer on an equal footing with his wife. Const.i.tutionally he had no status, except what he received from the Queen.

"I remember attending a dinner for only ten people," said Evelyn Prebensen, the daughter of the dean of the Diplomatic Corps. "And even then poor Philip could not sit down if the Queen was still standing. She was very much the monarch in the early years and insisted on her royal prerogatives. If Philip came into the room after she did, he had to bow to her and say, 'I'm sorry, Your Majesty.' "

His friends watched helplessly as Philip sank into depression after Elizabeth's accession.

"You could feel it all underneath," ex-King Peter of Yugoslavia told his wife after the King's funeral. "I don't know how long he can last... bottled up like that."

"He used to say, 'I'm neither one thing nor the other. I'm nothing,' " recalled Michael Parker's wife, Eileen.

Philip, who had aspired to be an admiral, recognized that his career in the navy was sunk. He locked himself in his room and spent hours shut away by himself, confiding only in his eldest sister, Margarita.

"You can imagine what's going to happen now," he said with foreboding.

The day after the King's funeral, the Mountbattens entertained their German relatives at Broadlands, where Uncle d.i.c.kie boasted that the House of Windsor no longer reigned. With a Champagne flute in hand, he proposed a toast to the new House of Mountbatten. He boasted that the blood of Battenberg had risen from obscurity on the banks of the Rhine to the highest throne on earth. His cousin Prince Ernst August of Hanover reported the conversation to Queen Mary, who was outraged. As someone who studied genealogy like a miner a.s.saying gold, she knew that Philip's family descended from the House of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glucksburg-Beck. She ticked off his royal antecedents like a child reciting the alphabet.

"Philip's name is not not Mountbatten," she said. "If he has any name at all, it is Glucksburg." Mountbatten," she said. "If he has any name at all, it is Glucksburg."*

She summoned Churchill and reminded him that her husband, King George V, had decreed in 1917 that the House of Windsor was to be the royal family's name forever, and she said no amount of posturing by that "ambitious upstart" d.i.c.kie Mountbatten could change the royal edict. The Prime Minister listened respectfully and marveled at how effectively the elderly Queen had buried her German roots to become an icon of Great Britain. She told him she had always despised Hitler because his German accent was so horrible. "He never could speak the language properly," she said.

Churchill called a cabinet meeting to discuss Mountbatten's claim. The cabinet ministers, mindful of the two world wars England fought against the hated Huns, insisted that the new Queen make a public announcement: she must affirm herself a Windsor and proclaim that all her descendants would bear the Windsor surname. Churchill and his ministers felt that anything less would cause political insurrection, so suspicious were they of Mountbatten's dynastic ambitions and liberal politics. The Queen was duly informed. Churchill told her that "the feeling of the government reinforced by public opinion was that Her Majesty should drop the Mountbatten name and reign under your father's name of Windsor." Philip argued strenuously for the House of Mountbatten and Windsor and, failing that, pleaded for the House of Windsor and Edinburgh. But she relied on her Prime Minister and his advisers, which thoroughly humiliated her husband. The Queen was duly informed. Churchill told her that "the feeling of the government reinforced by public opinion was that Her Majesty should drop the Mountbatten name and reign under your father's name of Windsor." Philip argued strenuously for the House of Mountbatten and Windsor and, failing that, pleaded for the House of Windsor and Edinburgh. But she relied on her Prime Minister and his advisers, which thoroughly humiliated her husband.

"I'm just a b.l.o.o.d.y amoeba," he was heard to cry. "That's all."

Many years later Martin Charteris said, "I've always taken that to mean Philip [figured he] was just there to deposit s.e.m.e.n."

The Queen even deprived her husband of that function. Having let it be known the year before that she had wanted to have another child, she now changed her mind. But she was angry when she read newspaper reports hinting at her pregnancy. During a meeting with Churchill and members of his cabinet to discuss the name change, she said sharply, "I expect these rumors to stop!" The next day the Prime Minister was quoted as saying, "She may not be pregnant, but she is certainly regnant."

After the row about renaming the House of Windsor, Queen Elizabeth II, the fourth sovereign of that dynasty, dutifully announced on April 9, 1952, that unlike every other wife in the realm, she would not carry her husband's name.

"It was very hurting to Prince Philip that the one thing he felt he brought to his marriage, which was his name, was no longer possible," said Patricia, Countess Mountbatten. "But Churchill was an old, very experienced man, and [Elizabeth] was a very young and new Queen, and, understandably, she felt... it wasn't her place to stand up to him and say, 'I don't want to do this.' "

Philip's position was uncomfortable. When a man ascends to the throne and becomes King, his wife automatically becomes his Queen Consort and is crowned with him. Not so when a woman ascends and becomes Queen. There are no rules defining the position of her husband. The husband of Mary, Queen of Scots, became King Consort as did the husband of Mary I. Queen Victoria honored her husband with the t.i.tle Prince Consort. Elizabeth declined to do the same for Philip.

She tried to mollify her husband by elevating his position within the realm. She declared that "His Royal Highness, Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, henceforth and on all occasions... shall have, hold and enjoy Place, Pre-Eminence and Precedence next to Her Majesty." This declaration of rank put Philip ahead of everyone in the kingdom, including someone who had once been King (the Duke of Windsor) and someone who would become King one day-Prince Charles.

The Queen then promoted her husband from lieutenant to Admiral, which ent.i.tled him to wear the uniform and receive full honors as Admiral of the Royal Navy.* She also elevated him to the highest rank in each of the other military services, making him Field Marshal of the Army, Marshal of the Royal Air Force, and Captain General of the Royal Marines. Despite these honors-sudden and unearned-Philip had no authority: he was only background music for the melody. During the painful adjustment to his wife's accession, he learned what his father-in-law, King George VI, had meant when he said: "Being a consort is much more difficult than being a sovereign. It's perhaps the most difficult job in the world." She also elevated him to the highest rank in each of the other military services, making him Field Marshal of the Army, Marshal of the Royal Air Force, and Captain General of the Royal Marines. Despite these honors-sudden and unearned-Philip had no authority: he was only background music for the melody. During the painful adjustment to his wife's accession, he learned what his father-in-law, King George VI, had meant when he said: "Being a consort is much more difficult than being a sovereign. It's perhaps the most difficult job in the world."

Days after moving from Clarence House to Buckingham Palace, Philip had an attack of jaundice, a liver disease his friends attributed to stress and depression. Engorged with bile, he was confined to bed for three weeks. His valet, John Dean, served him his meals-"all boiled and bland"-and the Queen visited him three times a day.

"The Duke's complexion went a sickly yellow, and he was very disgusted and depressed when told what he had got," said his valet. "I paid great attention to him all the time he was ill, doing my utmost to meet his every wish, because I felt so sorry for him in that gloomy room."

Prince Philip recovered his health gradually but continued to feel diminished in his marriage. A few months later he rallied for the coronation because his wife had put him in charge of the ceremony, but the bleakness of being the Queen's Consort nearly capsized him.

"People forget what it was like when the Queen was twenty-six and I was thirty, when she succeeded [to the throne]," he told the writer Fiametta Rocco. "Well... that's when things started...."

SEVEN.

The black armbands disappeared three months after the King's death, and for the next year the coronation of the Queen seemed to dominate the country's newsrooms, barrooms, boardrooms, and drawing rooms. The event was set for Tuesday, June 2, 1953, at 10:30 A.M. A.M., and until that moment, everything revolved around regalia.

The coronation, which was to be England's reward for prevailing in the war, resonated with the memory of sacrifice and the hope of rebirth. The hyperbolic British press wrote reams about the advent of "the New Elizabethan era" and compared the country's advances under Elizabeth I with the wonders that would occur under Elizabeth II. Then she herself spoke up to dampen the extravagant effusions.

"Frankly," she said, "I do not myself feel at all like my Tudor forebear, who was blessed with neither husband nor children, who ruled as a despot and was never able to leave her sh.o.r.es."

In distancing herself from her predecessor, Elizabeth II wrapped herself softly in marriage and motherhood. Forty-five years later she would be respected as a dutiful monarch and the most traveled in British history, but lacking as a wife and mother. Elizabeth I, though, would still be admired for the skill, intelligence, and fort.i.tude with which she guided her country.

Coronation fever rose in 1953, and the holiday mood swept over London and into the farthest reaches of the British Isles and dominions. British housewives carried brown ration books that controlled their b.u.t.ter, cheese, margarine, meat, and sugar. But now sugar restrictions were lifted, and people who had been deprived of cake, candy, and cookies for fourteen years indulged in sweets. Tea was derationed, and so were eggs. Wartime preoccupation with rifles, gas masks, and helmets stopped as everyone discussed jeweled swords, tiaras, and coronets. In honor of what was trumpeted as the New Elizabethan era, London turned itself into a gigantic merry-go-round of triumphal arches and twinkling lights. Purple flags and gold pennants with elaborate designs of crowns and scepters decorated the main streets. Shields and medallions adorned office buildings, and lampposts on major thoroughfares were painted a giddy combination of yellow, lavender, black, white, and red. Festive streamers and bunting festooned the seven-mile coronation route the Queen would take after her crowning. Exotic flowers flown in from Australia filled the gigantic boxes in front of Parliament, and two thousand square feet of new carpeting was laid in Westminster Abbey to accommodate the 7,700 guests the Queen had invited to witness her enthronement.

Recognizing the global interest in this event, the British Broadcasting Corporation suggested televising the coronation, but the Queen's courtiers said no. They said they did not want television cameras recording an event that they felt should be seen only by the aristocracy. They argued that it would be a commercial intrusion on a sacred ritual.

"I don't see why the BBC should have a better view of my monarch being crowned than me," said Prime Minister Churchill.

"Quite right," said the Queen's private secretary, Sir Alan Lascelles.

The Queen was consulted and was expected to concur. Instead she started asking technical questions about transmitting the ceremony to the far corners of the earth, how many microphones would be required, how the sound system would work, and where the cameras would be placed in the Abbey.

"But... but... the great and blinding light," protested Lascelles.

And the Archbishop of Canterbury chimed in, "It would be unfair to expose you... to this searching method of photography, without the chance of correcting an error, for perhaps two hours on end."

The Queen listened but disagreed. "I have to be seen to be believed," she said.

Days later she sent her husband to the Prime Minister's office with her decision: The BBC would be allowed to televise the coronation, but with one restriction: no close-ups. The Queen's democratic gesture astonished the conservative Prime Minister, but he recovered and presented her views to his cabinet.

"Her Majesty believes all her subjects should have the opportunity of seeing the coronation," he said.

His ministers argued and tried to reverse her decision, but Churchill said there were no options.

"After all, it was the Queen who was being crowned," he said later, "and not the cabinet."

The Queen's decision enabled the world to watch seven and a half hours of continuous live reporting. The television audience was the largest ever at the time-three hundred million. Later, when she visited the BBC to view her coronation coverage, she was delighted by what she saw. "She enjoyed it so much," said Peter Dimmock, the BBC coronation producer, "that she knighted George Barnes, who was director of television at the time. She knighted [him] on the spot in Limegrove, where she watched the recording."

"Allowing television cameras into the sacred precincts of Westminster Abbey was a key decision of her reign," said writer John Pearson. ''It meant that the coronation... would be unique in the annals of the monarchy, the first time in history a sovereign had been crowned with millions of close and fascinated witnesses to the strange and powerful event...."

No other country has a coronation so steeped in mystique and majesty, laden with history, and imbued with religion. The occasion is celebrated with a festive holiday that includes songs, fireworks, and street fairs. Vendors hawk royally embossed gewgaws such as tea strainers, egg timers, pocket combs, and napkin rings. The commercial hoopla precedes a high church ceremony that combines the solemnity of a Papal installation with the impact of a presidential inauguration. All that plus the romance of a crown, orb, scepter, and gilded coach.

Nothing in the world is as elaborate as the pageantry surrounding a coronation, and nothing better defines the British monarchy. So the Queen was determined to stage the most magnificent crowning in British history. And it cost her government over $6.5 million-about $50 million in 1996 dollars. She felt it was a necessary investment for her impoverished country because the monarchy was, in her view, its most precious possession and the symbol of its historic continuity. Most other monarchies had crumbled under the weight of the two world wars, but the monarchy of Great Britain still dominated the life of the country. As Queen, Elizabeth II would reign over a shrinking kingdom known as the Commonwealth, a group of nations that included Australia, New Zealand, Canada, a few ports in the Caribbean, and some parts of Africa. But even without an empire, her crown still tied the Hong Kong coolie to the Australian Aborigine and the Rhodesian farmer and the Welsh miner. As Winston Churchill said, "The Crown has become the mysterious link-indeed, I may say, the magic link-which unites our loosely bound but strongly interwoven Commonwealth of nations, states and races." He did not need to add that the Crown also represented the biggest draw for tourist dollars. With at least two hundred thousand overseas visitors expected for a week in London, spending an average of $8 a day, the total amount estimated was $1.6 million every twenty-one hours.

"More money will change hands during coronation week than most English banks handle in an average year," predicted the Times of London. Times of London. The newspaper estimated $300 million would be spent at the time, including $28 million for coronation decorations, $280,000 for fireworks on coronation night, and $10 million for the coronation parade. The newspaper estimated $300 million would be spent at the time, including $28 million for coronation decorations, $280,000 for fireworks on coronation night, and $10 million for the coronation parade.* "The British-after 14 years of war, reconstruction and austerity-just don't care." "The British-after 14 years of war, reconstruction and austerity-just don't care."

The left-wing Tribune Tribune criticized the expenditure: "It really should be possible to crown a const.i.tutional monarch in a democratic country without giving the impression that Britain has been transformed into Ruritania." The editorial page of the criticized the expenditure: "It really should be possible to crown a const.i.tutional monarch in a democratic country without giving the impression that Britain has been transformed into Ruritania." The editorial page of the Chicago Tribune Chicago Tribune shouted, "Wake up, Fairyland!" And the communist shouted, "Wake up, Fairyland!" And the communist Daily Worker Daily Worker said, predictably, the coronation represented the worst excesses of "luxury and flunkyism." said, predictably, the coronation represented the worst excesses of "luxury and flunkyism."

Unperturbed, the Queen summoned her personal couturier, Norman Hartnell. She requested ten designs for the lavish white satin gown she wanted to wear. She wanted to emphasize her small waist, so Hartnell designed an underskirt with nine layers of stiffened net to give her the fullness she desired. Then she decided she wanted the emblems of the eleven Commonwealth countries embroidered on the gown and encrusted with semiprecious jewels. So Hartnell refashioned his design to include England's Tudor rose, Scotland's thistle, Ireland's shamrock, the leek of Wales, Canada's maple leaf, South Africa's protea, the lotus of India and Ceylon, Pakistan's wheat, Australia's wattle, and New Zealand's fern. Then he hired six young women, who spent two months embroidering the Queen's gown. Money was no object to Elizabeth in her role as sovereign, but as the mistress of her own home, she was cheeseparing. Even as she d.i.c.kered over the details of a gown that would cost her government $1 million, she scrimped on curtains.

"I was at her side while she leafed through a sample book of Bon Marche fabric with pretty designs for draperies," said William Ellis, former superintendent of Windsor Castle. "The Queen saw the prices and lifted her eyes toward me, lowered her head, and said with regret, 'They are truly pretty, Mr. Ellis, but I believe they are too expensive for me. It will be necessary to find something better priced.'

"The same thing happened with the lighting," Ellis recalled. "She refused a great number of excellent lampshades. Reason: too expensive. All of the lampshades that I finally bought for her had to be purchased locally in town and could only cost a few shillings. The Queen is very prudent about money."

At her other country homes, she regularly inventoried supplies and foodstuffs. "I remember her checking the liquor levels on the whiskey bottles every time she came," said Norman Barson, her former footman. "And she counted all the hams in the larder, too. Everything was logged. She was very businesslike and could spot if something was missing. She'd want to know why the cigarette box she remembered as full was half-empty, even though she didn't smoke. Or she'd ask why the gin was empty and where had the angostura bitters gone."

Absorbed with the mind-numbing details of the coronation, the Queen rehea.r.s.ed by walking up and down the halls of Buckingham Palace with sheets trailing from her shoulders so she could learn how to walk regally with a sixty-foot train. She sat at her desk and worked on her dispatch boxes wearing the crown of St. Edward to get used to balancing the seven-pound weight on her head. In choosing her coronation stamp, she examined sixty-three designs. And to select her most flattering picture for her official souvenir,* she examined 1,500 photos. she examined 1,500 photos.

The Palace issued strict orders about what to wear during the ceremony. Gentlemen were required to wear dress uniforms, full decorations, and knee breeches. The Foreign Office cabled a series of instructions to emba.s.sies around the world: "If black knee breeches are worn, they should be of the same material as the evening dress coat, and should have black b.u.t.tons and black buckles at the knee. Black silk stockings should be worn and plain black court shoes with bows-not buckles." Women were told to wear head coverings-preferably a diamond tiara-or a shoulder-length veil that dropped no lower than the waist. The diplomatic cables specified: "Any colour excepting black can be used for this headdress and it should be made in a suitably light material such as tulle, chiffon, organza or lace. It can be attached by a comb, jewelled pins, flowers or ribbon bows-but not with feathers."

Within Buckingham Palace, the livery room worked to outfit the men of the royal household in black velvet knee breeches with white silk stockings, black waistcoats, gold-braided tailcoats, lace neck ruffles, and patent-leather pumps with silver buckles. Fifteen thousand policemen were brought to London to handle the coronation crowds, and twenty thousand soldiers were a.s.signed to line the coronation route. In accordance with ancient custom, the troops were ordered to abstain from s.e.xual intercourse for forty-eight hours before the sacred crowning. The six young women who wore white satin gowns and carried the train of the Queen's gown were required to be virgin daughters of earls-"unmarried and untarnished." They were described by the London Sunday Times London Sunday Times as the Queen's maids of honor-"the girls the whole world envied." as the Queen's maids of honor-"the girls the whole world envied."

No movie star ever had a greater hold on her fans than this beloved twenty-six-year-old sovereign had on her subjects. They remembered her as a young girl "digging for victory" in her vegetable garden at Windsor during the war and recalled her as a fourteen-year-old, rea.s.suring them sweetly over the radio "that in the end all will be well." They believed her then, and now, as she became the sixth Queen of England* in her own right in four centuries, they gave her their hearts. One besotted subject, who stood in line all night to wave to her on coronation day, quoted: in her own right in four centuries, they gave her their hearts. One besotted subject, who stood in line all night to wave to her on coronation day, quoted: I did but see her pa.s.sing by I did but see her pa.s.sing byYet I will love her 'til I die.

Even the elderly Prime Minister fell in love with the young Queen. " 'Gracious' and 'n.o.ble' are words familiar to us all in courtly phrasing," said Churchill on the eve of the coronation, "but tonight they have a new ring in them because we know they are true about the gleaming figure which Providence has brought to us in a time when the present is hard and the future veiled." He was so enraptured with the photograph of the Queen smiling from her carriage window with her left arm raised in a wave that he ordered a large print, which he had framed. He hung the picture over his bed at his country estate, Chartwell.

The Archbishop of Canterbury also succ.u.mbed to the monarch's considerable charm. "On Coronation Day," he recalled, "this country and the Commonwealth were not far from the Kingdom of Heaven."

The London Times London Times wrote: "The Queen represents the life of her people... as men and women, and not in their limited capacity as Lords and Commons and electors." wrote: "The Queen represents the life of her people... as men and women, and not in their limited capacity as Lords and Commons and electors."

To her subjects, the Queen was an exemplar of respectability and the epitome of rect.i.tude. She and her handsome husband and their two young children personified the ideal English family with simple values and ordinary virtues. In 1953 Britons revered their sovereign as someone ordained by G.o.d. Someone ent.i.tled to devotion. Someone they would lay down their lives for without hesitation. Allegiance to the monarchy filled a basic human need to believe in a cause beyond self-interest-something grand and momentous that excited the fervor of religion and patriotism. During the darkest days of the war, the royal family had made people feel good about themselves and the sacrifices they were making. When the King and Queen drove from Windsor to London every day during the Blitz to share with their subjects the risk of being bombed, they inspired fort.i.tude. They fulfilled the fantasy of royalty, which was to always behave splendidly. To be above mere mortals. To be as n.o.ble as the legend of King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table. By meeting these grandiose expectations, the King and Queen brought reverence and respect to the House of Windsor and bestowed a magic on the monarchy that made it una.s.sailable.

The magic of the throne, heightened by the glamour of palaces and heart-stopping pageants, was so enchanting in 1953 that hordes of foreigners swarmed into London for the coronation, hoping for a glimpse of history. Americans, especially, were drawn by the allure of shining armor, prancing horses, and gilded coaches. They flocked to London in droves, captivated by the prospect of dancing at Hampton Court or attending a tea party at Buckingham Palace. The young Queen was so well liked in America that in a U.S. popularity poll she topped President Dwight D. Eisenhower, the most revered man in the country. In 1952 Time Time magazine named her "Woman of the Year," an honor previously bestowed on only one other woman-Wallis Warfield Simpson in 1936. magazine named her "Woman of the Year," an honor previously bestowed on only one other woman-Wallis Warfield Simpson in 1936.

Major American newspapers, news services, and networks sent reporters to cover the coronation. The Washington Times-Herald Washington Times-Herald sent a young woman named Jacqueline Bouvier, whose fascination with royalty eventually revolutionized fashion in the United States. sent a young woman named Jacqueline Bouvier, whose fascination with royalty eventually revolutionized fashion in the United States.* To cover the coronation, she crossed the ocean on the SS To cover the coronation, she crossed the ocean on the SS United States United States and reported back to her newspaper, "The pa.s.senger list aboard this ship reads like the and reported back to her newspaper, "The pa.s.senger list aboard this ship reads like the Mayflower Mayflower in reverse." She cited names like Freylinghusen, McLean, Reventlow, Arpels of Van Cleef & Arpels, CBS correspondent Walter Cronkite, Whitelaw Reid (publisher of the in reverse." She cited names like Freylinghusen, McLean, Reventlow, Arpels of Van Cleef & Arpels, CBS correspondent Walter Cronkite, Whitelaw Reid (publisher of the New York Herald Tribune New York Herald Tribune), and the Duke and d.u.c.h.ess of Windsor. The Windsors were traveling with five pugs, two valets, and the d.u.c.h.ess's h.o.m.os.e.xual companion, Jimmy Donahue, the thirty-seven-year-old Woolworth heir. He was accompanied by his maid, his valet, his chauffeur, and his mother.

"Pa.s.sengers stare at the Duke," reported Jacqueline Bouvier, "aware that if he had not abdicated, they would not be sailing to the coronation of his niece. Sometimes children ask him for autographs, which he gives cheerfully."

The Duke and d.u.c.h.ess were among the few pa.s.sengers on board not not going to England for the Queen's coronation. going to England for the Queen's coronation.

"Why should he?" asked the d.u.c.h.ess. "He didn't go to his own."

The Windsors disembarked at Le Havre, France, took the train to Paris, and watched the ceremony on television at a party in the home of an American, Margaret Thompson Biddle. The Duke had received $100,000 for writing a ten-thousand-word article on the coronation for a U.S. magazine. He also sold exclusive rights to United Press to photograph him watching the ceremony on television. At the party, he explained the long, complex ritual to the d.u.c.h.ess, providing historical details on the six phases of the ceremony-the recognition, the oath, the anointing, the invest.i.ture, the enthronement, and the homage. He sang all the hymns and identified the dignitaries as they moved across the screen, pointing to his friends and cursing his enemies. Seeing a close-up of the Queen, whom he affectionately called Lilibet, he complimented her regal carriage and pointed to her necklace of diamonds, which were as big as quail eggs. He also sold exclusive rights to United Press to photograph him watching the ceremony on television. At the party, he explained the long, complex ritual to the d.u.c.h.ess, providing historical details on the six phases of the ceremony-the recognition, the oath, the anointing, the invest.i.ture, the enthronement, and the homage. He sang all the hymns and identified the dignitaries as they moved across the screen, pointing to his friends and cursing his enemies. Seeing a close-up of the Queen, whom he affectionately called Lilibet, he complimented her regal carriage and pointed to her necklace of diamonds, which were as big as quail eggs.

"A Queen enjoys a marked advantage over a King on such an occasion," the Duke wrote, "when a combination of humility and resplendent jewelry play so important a role. A woman can go through the motions far more naturally and gracefully than can any man."

On the eve of the coronation, the Queen received the news that after several attempts the British had scaled Mount Everest.* She later bestowed a knighthood on Edmund Hillary of New Zealand for placing the Union Jack atop the world's highest mountain. In 1953 this summit of 29,002 feet was the last outpost on earth unknown to man. For a kingdom reduced from empire to commonwealth, and one suffering awful deprivation, the conquest of Everest triggered a national celebration. Months before the coronation, a census disclosed that 4.5 million people in England had no bathroom plumbing, and more than 900,000 Britons had no running water. Relatively few families had a car, a refrigerator, or a television set. She later bestowed a knighthood on Edmund Hillary of New Zealand for placing the Union Jack atop the world's highest mountain. In 1953 this summit of 29,002 feet was the last outpost on earth unknown to man. For a kingdom reduced from empire to commonwealth, and one suffering awful deprivation, the conquest of Everest triggered a national celebration. Months before the coronation, a census disclosed that 4.5 million people in England had no bathroom plumbing, and more than 900,000 Britons had no running water. Relatively few families had a car, a refrigerator, or a television set.

Peers of the realm attend the coronation as their traditional right to recognize, acclaim, and do homage to the new ruler. This was one of the few times when they wore their coronets and robes of rank and, for a few hours, relived times past when the power and privilege of the peerage predominated. In 1953 Great Britain was so impoverished that most of its 860 peers and peeresses could not afford to spend $600 for new coronation robes of red velvet trimmed with ermine. Some patched up old robes that had been used in 1937 for the coronation of King George VI, but most of the lords and ladies resorted to renting cotton velveteen capes st.i.tched with shaved rabbit. The white fur trim was officially called miniver to make it sound richer and more imposing. For the coronation parade, the country's cavalry, which had to sell most of its horses during the war, borrowed 350 dray horses from breweries and rented 100 horses from Alexander Korda's film company. to make it sound richer and more imposing. For the coronation parade, the country's cavalry, which had to sell most of its horses during the war, borrowed 350 dray horses from breweries and rented 100 horses from Alexander Korda's film company.

Coronation Day arrived under gray skies, but when the Queen left Buckingham Palace and stepped into her gold state coach,* the rain stopped briefly. The huge carriage, weighing four tons, swayed back and forth as the eight gray horses, led by one named Eisenhower, the rain stopped briefly. The huge carriage, weighing four tons, swayed back and forth as the eight gray horses, led by one named Eisenhower, cantered down the Mall. The Queen, who had rehea.r.s.ed every detail of this day for the past year, sat next to the Duke of Edinburgh. When she saw the columns of people lining the street to honor her, she smiled. Some had camped out all night, enduring steady rain and freezing winds just to see her pa.s.s by. The Queen tilted her head from side to side, and as she had practiced, she recited the phrase devised by her courtiers to carry her through the two-hour procession to and from the Abbey so that she would look as though she were talking to her subjects. cantered down the Mall. The Queen, who had rehea.r.s.ed every detail of this day for the past year, sat next to the Duke of Edinburgh. When she saw the columns of people lining the street to honor her, she smiled. Some had camped out all night, enduring steady rain and freezing winds just to see her pa.s.s by. The Queen tilted her head from side to side, and as she had practiced, she recited the phrase devised by her courtiers to carry her through the two-hour procession to and from the Abbey so that she would look as though she were talking to her subjects.

As her coach glided past her subjects, she said, "So kind, so nice, so very, very loyal," and she raised her arm in an elegant wave. "So very, very loyal."

She repeated the refrain over and over as the Duke of Edinburgh, sitting by her side, smiled easily and returned the salute of soldiers standing at attention under the Admiralty Arch.

Inside the Abbey, the peers of the realm began their stately procession down the long aisle. The measured line was broken when the Prime Minister, stooped from the weight of his seventy-eight years, saw his old friend, George C. Marshall, former Chief of the U.S. General Staff in World War II and now chief of the U.S. delegation to the coronation. Marshall had been a.s.signed the most prestigious seat in the Abbey out of respect for the rebuilding plan for Europe that bore his name and later won him the n.o.bel Peace prize. Churchill was so moved to see the seventy-two-year-old General that he impulsively broke ranks to clasp his hand. Flushed and happy, the Prime Minister looked like a big red tomato.

The lords and ladies took their places on their little gold chairs with tufted velvet cushions. Outside, the populace camped on the curb or sat in one of the $14 stadium seats erected to watch the Queen pa.s.s in her golden carriage, wearing her heavy crown and holding her orb, a jeweled globe, in one hand and her scepter, a jeweled rod, in the other.

Heralded by trumpets and the voices of four hundred young Westminster choirboys, the Queen made her way down the aisle of the Abbey to begin the ancient ritual of her coronation. Throughout the ceremony, the Duke of Edinburgh, sitting with the Princes of the Blood Royal, the Duke of Gloucester and the young Duke of Kent, never for one moment took his eyes off her. At times he leaned forward tensely as she went through the elaborate ceremony.