Royal Funeral at Windsor Castle

It is a bright sunny afternoon on 15 February 2002. Right now as I write, 400 specially invited mourners are gathered inside St. George's Chapel at Windsor Castle to join with The Queen, the Queen Mother and all the members of the Royal Family at private funeral of Princess Margaret. Only the frail 100 year old Dowager Duchess of Gloucester and Princess Alexandra's husband, the critically ill Angus Ogilvy, are absent.

Earlier on television we had watched the arrival of The Prince of Wales, his sons William and Harry, the Princess Royal and her husband Commander Tim Laurence, the Duke of York and the Earl and Countess of Wessex . The men wore formal morning dress of black swallow-tailed coat and gray and black striped trousers, the ladies were in black. The Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh arrived separately and the Queen Mother took her place at the Chapel in a wheelchair, unseen by the cameras outside. The media have been unanimous in their admiration of the indomitable spirit of the Queen Mother, who was determined to be at her daughter's funeral despite her dangerously weakened state caused by her 101 years, a long bout of chest cold and a fall two days ago.

In an extraordinary coincidence of fate it is exactly 50 years to the day that the funeral of King George VI, the late Princess's father took place here. 50 years ago the dead King was brought to his final resting place in St. George's Chapel in a State Funeral of pomp and ceremonial dignity that gripped a silent nation. On that day I stood on ceremonial duty at the Henry VIII Gate leading into Windsor Castle. I was one of the thousands of men in uniform who lined the funeral route through London and Windsor standing with arms reversed at the passing of our dead King on his last journey. . The King's hearse on a gun carriage drawn by lines of Royal Navy ratings passed by me through the castle gates followed by his surviving brothers the Duke of Windsor, onetime King, and the Duke of Gloucester. Behind them a carriage drew the heavily veiled Queen Mother and daughters. Thousands thronged the route in London and Windsor up to the gates. Behind me stood a group of British Legion veterans of two World Wars, their Legion standards lowered in solemn last farewell to their Commander-in-Chief.

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