Counting One's Blessings

by William Shawcross

  ‡ Gwendoline Suckling (1905–90), Queen Elizabeth’s dresser 1952–72.

  * Beryl Poignand, Elizabeth Bowes Lyon’s governess, confidante and friend during the First World War and after, died in January 1965. Queen Elizabeth had kept in touch with her always and had helped arrange her nursing-home care. She last visited her in December 1964. After her death, her family returned all Queen Elizabeth’s letters to Clarence House – they were later sent to the archive at Glamis.

  * Queen Elizabeth had admired Coward since first seeing Cavalcade in 1931. More recently she had enjoyed spending weekends with him at Fairlawne, the home of Peter and Zara Cazalet, where Coward would always entertain the guests, with his songs and his wit. On a visit to Jamaica in early 1965 to receive the first honorary degree awarded by the University of the West Indies, she went to an enjoyable lunch at his home, Firefly Hill. When she invited him to Sandringham to hear the Russian cellist Mstislav Rostropovich, Coward asked her if he should brush up his Russian. ‘It is limited at the moment to “How do you do?”, “Shut Up you Pig”, and “She has a White Blouse”. But I am eager to improve’ (RA QEQM/PRIV/PAL). She mourned his death in 1973, and in March 1984 she unveiled a memorial to him in Westminster Abbey.

  † In March 1966 the Queen Mother made the trip to Australia and New Zealand which her appendectomy had delayed in 1964. She had an enthusiastic reception throughout both countries. The trip was enhanced for her by the fact that Prince Charles, on leave from Gordonstoun, was studying for two terms at Timbertop, the rural outpost of Geelong Grammar School in Victoria. They met in Canberra and together they visited the Snowy Mountains hydro-electric project in New South Wales.

  ‡ The Duke and Duchess of Gloucester and Prince William of Gloucester.

  * Harold Wilson, Baron Wilson of Rievaulx KG OBE FRS FSS PC (1916–95), Labour politician and Prime Minister, won the 1964 general election with a majority of four seats. In May 1966 he called another election and won a ninety-six-seat majority.

  † James Pearl, keeper at Birkhall, 1949–76.

  * After his marriage to Princess Margaret, Lord Snowdon had resumed his photographic career with great success. He had just published a pictorial essay on India in the Sunday Times Magazine.

  † Bernard Edward Fergusson, Baron Ballantrae of Auchairne and the Bay of Islands KT GCMG DSO OBE (1911–80), soldier, military historian and the last British-born Governor General of New Zealand. Married to Laura Grenfell (1920–79).

  * Dame Frances Campbell-Preston DCVO (1918– ), Laura Fergusson’s sister. Lady in waiting to Queen Elizabeth 1965–2002. Kind, witty and outspoken, she later wrote an autobiography in which she described Queen Elizabeth’s household with affection as a pre-1939 ‘world of butlers, chefs, housekeepers, housemaids, pages and footmen in smart uniforms, kitchen maids, chauffeurs and gardeners.’ (The Rich Spoils of Time, Dame Frances Campbell-Preston (with Hugo Vickers), Dovecote Press, 2006, pp. 268–311)

  † Ernest Pearce, the wounded soldier whom she had met at Glamis in 1915, was still working as a gardener at Royal Lodge.

  * Robert Urquhart Brown, ghillie at Balmoral since 1932.

  * Queen Elizabeth had been diagnosed with cancer of the colon. A successful operation to remove the tumour was carried out on 10 December at Sister Agnes, King Edward VII’s Hospital for Officers.

  † Richard Austin Butler, Lord Butler KG CH DL PC (1902–82), distinguished Conservative politician better known as Rab Butler, who had been Chancellor of the Exchequer, Home Secretary and Foreign Secretary but was twice passed over for Prime Minister. Among his greatest achievements was shepherding the reforming 1944 Education Act through Parliament. In 1965 he was appointed Master of Trinity College, Cambridge.

  * Senator Robert Kennedy was assassinated in Los Angeles on 5 June 1968.

  † The Lays of Ancient Rome by Thomas Macaulay.

  * After Trinity, Cambridge, Prince Charles studied at Aberystwyth University. On 1 July 1969 the Queen formally invested her eldest son as Prince of Wales at Caenarfon Castle, Wales. Much of the ceremony was designed and directed by Lord Snowdon, the Constable of the Castle.

  * Prince Philip’s mother, Princess Andrew of Greece, died at Buckingham Palace on 5 December 1969.

  † Lady Diana Cooper, widow of Duff Cooper and mother of John Julius Norwich, lived in Little Venice, with the Regent’s Canal on her doorstep.

  * The concert of music by Mozart and Britten was given by Britten and Peter Pears on 1 August 1970.

  * The Queen and her family enjoyed an annual summer cruise of the Western Isles of Scotland in Britannia. It was one of the few times they could relax together without much press intrusion. They developed the tradition of stopping off at the little port of Scrabster to go to lunch with Queen Elizabeth at the Castle of Mey. These were convivial occasions much enjoyed by all the family.

  † The Rev. Anthony Harbottle LVO (1925–2009), Chaplain of the Royal Chapel in Windsor Great Park, 1968–81. A distinguished lepidopterist and the first person in Britain to breed the New Pale Clouded Butterfly, he had served in the Royal Marines during the war. After he left Windsor, he would write every year to the Queen Mother on the anniversary of the King’s death, to express his kind sympathy. Every year she replied, equally kindly.

  * Queen Elizabeth flew from Royal Lodge by helicopter for lunch with the Penns to attend a concert at the Maltings at Snape and returned in the evening. Lady Penn sent a copy of this letter to Benjamin Britten and he replied, ‘How kind of you to let me see that letter from Queen Elizabeth, & what a nice one it is. She is a lovable and remarkable woman, & it was a great pleasure to have her with us. I hope she will come back! I only wish someone could persuade her to call me Ben like the rest of them!’ (21 June 1971, Penn Papers)

  † The Prince of Wales began his naval career in September 1971, with a six-week training course at the Royal Naval College, Dartmouth.

  * One of the best pools on the River Dee at Birkhall. Ashe Windham, one of Queen Elizabeth’s devoted younger courtiers, once caught twelve salmon there before breakfast.

  † The Prince of Wales had received the Order of the Chrysanthemum, Japan’s highest honour, that year.

  * The Royal Family, and the Queen Mother in particular, were under attack over financial matters. In 1970 the new Prime Minister, Edward Heath, set up a House of Commons select committee on the Civil List, by which the monarchy was financed. The committee included such implacable critics of the monarchy as William Hamilton, Labour MP for Fife (1917–2000). Hearings began in May 1971 and in December that year the matter was debated in the House of Commons. Labour Members of Parliament, led by Willie Hamilton, made fierce criticisms of the Queen Mother and Princess Margaret, with Hamilton demanding to know of the Queen Mother’s staff, ‘What the blazes do they do?’ Princess Margaret he dismissed as ‘an expensive kept woman’ who did ‘even less than her old Mum’. In the end, the House of Commons, controlled for now by the Conservatives, fixed the Civil List for ten years so that there need not be a disagreeable debate every year.

  * Robert Brown had recently died.

  * Joyce Grenfell OBE (1910–79) witty actress, comedienne, song writer, who entranced generations and who had a family connection with Rachel Bowes Lyon through Waldorf Astor, Rachel’s uncle. In the Second World War she toured the world entertaining Allied troops. Afterwards she performed constantly on the BBC and played in many film comedies such as The Happiest Days of Your Life and the original St Trinian films. Her comic monologues delighted everyone – including Queen Elizabeth.

  † Prince Philip had enjoyed painting for many years. He gave the Queen Mother two paintings which she hung in the dining room at the Castle of Mey – one was of the east face of the Castle’s tower, the other a view of St Kilda painted from the Royal Yacht.

  * Sir Edward Cazalet DL (1936– ), barrister, High Court judge and authority on P. G. Wodehouse; son of Peter Cazalet and his first wife Leonora, step-daughter of Wodehouse.

  † The last of the 250
winners Peter Cazalet trained for Queen Elizabeth was Inch Arran, which won the Topham Trophy at Liverpool in March 1973. Cazalet was by this time terminally ill with cancer; he and Queen Elizabeth watched the race on television together at Clarence House. Nothing could have moved the pair of them more than their horse’s victory. Cazalet died on 29 May 1973.

  Queen Elizabeth said goodbye to Fairlawne after twenty-four years on 25 June 1973. She saw each of the stable lads and jockeys separately and gave them each a present – a mix of cufflinks, travelling alarm clocks, small silver objects, all inscribed with her crest and initials. Edward Cazalet recalled, ‘They all knew how much she loved her horses and how much interest she had taken in everyone who worked at Fairlawne. There was not a dry eye in the place as she was driven out of the yard for the last time.’ (Edward Cazalet to the author, 21 May 2012)

  Queen Elizabeth moved her horses from Fairlawne to the stable of Fulke Walwyn (1910–91) at Lambourn, sometimes known as ‘The Valley of the Racehorse’, in Berkshire. He also trained successfully for her and she became fond of him and his wife Cath. When Fulke Walwyn died, aged eighty, in February 1991, Cath took out a training licence and continued to train for Queen Elizabeth until 1993.

  * The Prince of Wales was serving in the 845 Naval Air Squadron, based at Yeovilton.

  * Blenheim Palace in Oxfordshire and Hatfield House in Hertfordshire, homes of the Spencer Churchill and Cecil families respectively.

  † On 6 December 1973, on her receipt of an Honorary Doctorate of the Royal College of Music, Britten and Pears had sent Queen Elizabeth a telegram welcoming her ‘to the ranks of honourable musicians’.

  ‡ Britten had been suffering from ill health, particularly heart problems, for some years.

  * Sir John Betjeman CBE (1906–84), Poet Laureate from 1972, broadcaster, gentle but passionate defender of English traditions, countryside and especially Victorian architecture. QueenElizabeth loved his poetry and his other enthusiasms. He was a frequent guest at Royal Lodge. At Stratford on 1 June Queen Elizabeth reopened the Upper Avon River, which had been unnavigable since the nineteenth century, and Betjeman recited his poem composed for the occasion.

  * BBC television series created by Lord Clark which traced and celebrated the triumph of Western civilization through its art. It was a model of public service broadcasting which was hard to equal.

  † Sir Ralph Anstruther (1921–2002), Coldstream Guards officer, courtier, Treasurer to Queen Elizabeth after the death of Sir Arthur Penn. His attempts to bring order to Queen Elizabeth’s finances were never-ending.

  * Lt-Col. Sir Martin Gilliat GCVO MBE (1913–93), soldier and courtier, Private Secretary to the Queen Mother, 1959–93. He shared his employer’s love of people (and steeplechasers) and contributed mightily to the spirit of bonhomie that pervaded Clarence House. His friend Martin Charteris, formerly Private Secretary to the Queen, chose P. G. Wodehouse’s phrase ‘like a prawn in aspic’ to describe how well he fitted into Queen Elizabeth’s Household.

  Captain Sir Alastair Aird GCVO (1931–2009) joined Queen Elizabeth’s staff as an equerry in 1960, became Comptroller of her Household in 1974, and Private Secretary after the death of Martin Gilliat in 1993. He carried on the welcoming traditions of Clarence House and was courteous, unflappable and meticulous in his attention to detail.

  † The Queen Mother had learned that the drum horse of her regiment the Queen’s Own Hussars was being retired. She asked the Crown Equerry, Sir John Miller, who was in charge of the Royal Mews, to find a suitable horse. He did so, through the St Cuthbert’s Co-operative Society in Edinburgh; the price was £300. The regiment accepted the horse with pleasure and named him Dettingen.

  * The Schweppes Hurdle, run at Newbury. Tammuz was ridden by Bill Smith. The race carried a purse of £9,000, Queen Elizabeth’s most valuable win to date.

  † Lord Porchester, later Lord Carnarvon (1924–2001), close friend of the Queen and her racing manager from 1969.

  ‡ Feola was an outstandingly good brood mare at the Royal Stud at Sandringham from 1938 to 1953; Aureole in his turn had sired many winners there.

  § One of Queen Elizabeth’s favourite horses, trained by Peter Cazalet and Fulke Walwyn, Game Spirit never succeeded in winning the Cheltenham Gold Cup but won 21 other races for her. Sunyboy and Isle of Man were also successful horses, the latter winning 14 races.

  * The Goon Show, broadcast by the BBC Home Service from 1951 to 1960, starred Spike Milligan, Harry Secombe and Peter Sellers in various ludicrous if not surreal conversations and situations. Prince Charles was a great enthusiast for the show’s madcap humour.

  † Queen Elizabeth’s official visit to Iran was undertaken on the advice of the British government, anxious to improve relations with the Shah. Her analysis of the country as ‘agitating and uncertain’ was correct – the Shah’s attempts to modernize Iran while retaining his autocracy failed. Four years later he was overthrown and the country was engulfed in a brutal Islamist revolution which did incomparable harm at home and abroad for decades to come.

  * Princess Ludwig of Hesse and by Rhine (1913–97), née Margaret Geddes. Her husband, who died in 1968, was a great-grandson of Queen Victoria. They were close friends of Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears, and ‘Princess Peg’ became President of the Aldeburgh Foundation.

  † The Patron’s Choice concert, with pieces chosen by Queen Elizabeth, began with Britten’s Prelude and Fugue for Strings and ended with Berlioz’s Nuits d’été sung by Janet Baker.

  * The Queen had secretly asked Benjamin Britten to compose a piece of music for her mother’s seventy-fifth birthday on 4 August 1975. He proposed writing a cycle of seven songs for the harp, using poems by Robert Burns. The Queen was enthusiastic. Britten called the composition A Birthday Hansel, which is a Scottish word for gift. The composition was presented to Queen Elizabeth at a birthday party given by the Queen in August 1975 and the work was first performed at Uphall, Ruth Fermoy’s home near Sandringham, on 16 January 1976. The audience included the Queen, the Queen Mother and Princess Margaret, Lady Fermoy, Britten himself and his nurse, Rita Thomson. Peter Pears was the tenor and Osian Ellis played the harp. (Queen Elizabeth II to Sir Benjamin Britten, 12, 22 January, 25 March and 26 April 1975, Red House Archives, Aldeburgh)

  * Trousered Apes: Sick Literature in a Sick Society, by Duncan Williams (1971). Williams’s argument was that ‘Great literature is that which over the centuries sustained and elevated mankind … Such art involves a prodigious effort and concentration on the part of its creator and demands a cultivated response from its audience … It therefore constitutes a minority culture … detested and feared by the majority of contemporary artists and writers with their egalitarian aims and allegiance.’ The book created a stir when published but then fell out of print.

  † Colonel (‘Charlie’) William George McHardy MC CVO, resident factor on the Balmoral Estates, 1965–79.

  * Alfons, Prince Clary and Aldringen (1887–1978), and his wife Princess Ludwine (1894–1984). The family were the lords of Teplitz (Teplice) in north-west Bohemia, next to Saxony, from 1634 until 1945. The Prince was a man of great courtesy, a historian, an art lover and a fine raconteur who had many friends in London.

  * The 1976 Gold Cup at Sandown was won by Otter Way, ridden by Jeff King and trained by Oliver Carter.

  * Lord Howard de Walden (1912–99), racehorse owner and breeder of great skill, three times elected as a senior steward of the Jockey Club.

  † The Order of the Garter is the senior British order of chivalry, founded by King Edward III in 1348 and limited to the sovereign and twenty-four knights, conferred for service to the nation or to the sovereign personally. Its emblem is a blue garter with the famous motto ‘Honi Soit Qui Mal Y Pense’, worn by knights below the left knee. The sovereign invests new knights with the insignia of the Order – including, as well as the garter itself, the blue velvet mantle, the collar and badge, and star – during a Chapter of the Order in the Throne Room at Windsor Cast
le.

  ‡ Dame Freya Stark DBE (1893–1993), British travel writer; her letters were published in eight volumes from 1974 to 1982, followed by a one-volume selection, edited by Caroline Moorehead, in 1988.

  * The 11 November Armistice Day celebration commemorating the dead in two world wars and other conflicts, at which the sovereign and other members of the Royal Family as well as politicians, high commissioners and ambassadors lay wreaths.

  † The chorus of Weston & Lee’s song had been famous since it was first heard in 1917:

  Goodbye-ee, goodbye-ee, / Wipe the tear, baby dear, from your eye-ee! / Though it’s hard to part I know, / I’ll be tickled to death to go. / Don’t cry-ee, don’t sigh-ee, / There’s a silver lining in the sky-ee, / Bonsoir, old thing, cheer-i-o, chin, chin, / Nap-poo, too-dle-oo, / Goodbye-ee.

  * The Queen was celebrating her Silver Jubilee.

  † The row of brawny knees (in kilts) belonged to Prince Charles, Prince Andrew and Prince Edward. Of the Queen’s children, only Princess Anne had already married; in 1973 she wed Mark Phillips, who shared her love of horses and Three Day Eventing. An accomplished horsewoman, Princess Anne was a member of the British Eventing Team at the 1976 Montreal Olympics. She and Mark Phillips had two children, Peter and Zara; the latter inherited her mother’s equestrian skills and was a member of the British Eventing Team at the London 2012 Olympics, gaining a silver medal. The Phillips marriage ended in divorce in 1992. Later that year the Princess married Timothy Laurence, a commander in the Royal Navy who had served as an equerry to the Queen.

  * The choreographer Frederick Ashton was appointed to the Order of Merit in October 1977. Queen Elizabeth had admired his work since the 1930s. In 1985 she celebrated her eighty-fifth birthday at Sandringham by dancing with him to a wild mazurka played by Mstislav Rostropovich, the exiled Russian cellist.

  * The Prince had written: ‘… ever since I can remember, my grandmother has been the most wonderful example of fun, laughter, warmth, infinite security and, above all else, exquisite taste in so many things. For me, she has always been one of those extraordinarily rare people whose touch can turn everything to gold – whether it be putting people at their ease, turning something dull into something amusing, bringing happiness and comfort to people by her presence or making any house she lives in a unique haven of cosiness and character. She belongs to that priceless brand of human beings whose greatest gift is to enhance life for others through her own effervescent enthusiasm for life …’ (Foreword by HRH The Prince of Wales to The Country Life Book of Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother by Godfrey Talbot, Country Life Books, 1978)