Counting One's Blessings

by William Shawcross

  † Lady Katharine Farrell (niece of Lady Diana Cooper) and her husband Charles were old friends and Queen Elizabeth enjoyed bucolic summer lunches at their home in Oxfordshire. Other guests often included the philanthropist Paul Getty and his wife Victoria. Getty’s love of almost all things English was similar to that of Queen Elizabeth herself.

  ‡ Queen Elizabeth was installed in the historic post of Warden of the Cinque Ports in 1979. She enjoyed her annual visits to these once strategically vital harbours on the Kent coast and would stay at Walmer Castle, which her staff from Clarence House furnished and fitted entirely for her short sojourns.

  * Sir Charles Johnston GCMG KStJ (1912–86), senior British diplomat who translated Russian poetry, including Pushkin’s Eugene Onegin, and whose wife Natasha was a member of the Georgian Royal Family. They were friends of Queen Elizabeth and regular, enthusiastic guests at Royal Lodge.

  * Robert Fellowes, Baron Fellowes GCB GCVO QSO PC (1941– ), son of Sir William Fellowes, the Queen’s Land Agent at Sandringham, and his wife Jane. Joined the Royal Household in 1977 and was Private Secretary to the Queen 1990–99, a difficult decade. Married to Jane, elder sister of Lady Diana Spencer, later Princess of Wales.

  † One of Queen Elizabeth’s favourite horses, Special Cargo went on to win the biggest race she had ever won, the Whitbread Gold Cup at Sandown in 1984, as well as several other major races. A statue of him was erected at Sandown.

  * The Queen had embarked on a tour of the Middle East (to Kuwait, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Oman).

  † Dr David Owen, Foreign Secretary in the Labour government, 1977–9; afterwards co-founder of the Social Democrat Party, peer and negotiator for peace in Bosnia.

  ‡ Tāufa’āhau Tupou IV (1918–2006) became King of Tonga on the death of his mother Queen Salote, who gave great pleasure to the London crowds when she drove to the Coronation in an open carrage despite the rain. His Queen was Halaevalu Mata’aho ‘Ahome’e.

  * Princess Margaret and Lord Snowdon had divorced in 1978. Queen Elizabeth remained on close terms with Lord Snowdon for the rest of her life. She was a loving and dependable grandmother to their children, David and Sarah.

  * Nicholas Soames, MP for Mid Sussex, grandson of Winston Churchill. A convivial and loyal friend of the Prince of Wales.

  † Hugh van Cutsem, a Norfolk neighbour. He and his wife Emilie were close friends of the Royal Family, particularly of the Prince of Wales.

  ‡ Queen Elizabeth II usually sent long letters to her mother while on official tours abroad.

  * For Queen Elizabeth’s eightieth birthday, family and friends clubbed together to buy her a Scandinavian log cabin which was erected by her favourite pool, Polveir, close to Birkhall on the River Dee. The cabin was an inspired gift – it was much used for picnic lunches over the years to come. It was often called ‘The Old Bull and Bush’.

  * The Queen was on tour in Tunisia.

  † Habib Bourguiba (1903–2000), President of Tunisia. Queen Elizabeth had made an official visit in 1961, four years after Tunisia gained independence from France.

  ‡ Arsenicum album, a homeopathic remedy.

  * Queen Elizabeth had hankered since the mid 1950s to revisit France, which she had loved as a young woman. In 1963 this dream came true and over the next thirty years she made twenty-two private tours – progresses, perhaps – through different regions of France and then Italy, staying in some of the loveliest chateaux, visiting churches, galleries and other sites of historical interest. The visits were complicated for her Treasurer, Sir Ralph Anstruther, and her hosts to arrange, but they were greatly enjoyed. The maid at one chateau where she stayed commented, ‘La Reine Mère est bien plus commode que Madame.’ (Anstruther account, 5 April 1965, RA QEQMH/PS/VIS)

  * Peter Carington, sixth Baron Carrington KG GCMG CH MC PC DL (1919– ); married to Iona (1920–2009). A politician of distinction, Carrington was Foreign Secretary in Mrs Thatcher’s government. He resigned in April 1982, accepting responsibility for the Foreign Office’s failure to anticipate Argentina’s invasion of the Falkland Islands. Such principled resignations were by this time rare in British politics.

  † Lord Snowdon had designed a bridge to cross a stream on his property, Old House in Sussex.

  * Colonel Andrew Parker Bowles, Lieutenant Colonel in the Blues and Royals. Son of Queen Elizabeth’s friend Derek, and a frequent visitor to the Castle of Mey, sometimes with his wife Camilla. On 20 July 1982, the IRA committed twin atrocities in London – they blew up the bandstand in Regent’s Park when a band from the Royal Green Jackets was giving a concert; this attack killed seven bandsmen and wounded many in the audience. On the same day an IRA car bomb in Hyde Park killed three soldiers and seven horses from the Queen’s Life Guard (found from the Blues and Royals). One horse, Sefton, suffered a severed jugular and Parker Bowles ordered a groom to staunch the wound with his shirt. The horse survived and became something of an icon. Parker Bowles and his wife divorced in 1995, and in 2005 she married the Prince of Wales, becoming HRH The Duchess of Cornwall.

  * Prince William Arthur Philip Louis, first child of the Prince and Princess of Wales, was born on 21 June 1982.

  † The Queen was on an official tour of Australia and the Pacific islands.

  ‡ Sir Michael Oswald, KCVO (1934– ), the Manager of the Royal Studs at this time, and Queen Elizabeth’s Racing Manager from 1970 to 2002. He and his wife Lady Angela, a lady in waiting to Queen Elizabeth from 1981 to 2002, accompanied her on her racing engagements.

  * A fishbone had lodged in Queen Elizabeth’s throat and she had needed an operation under anaesthetic to remove it.

  † P. G. Wodehouse’s first book, The Pothunters, was published in 1902, and sold well enough to encourage him to leave the Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank to start his career as a writer. It was dedicated to Joan (1888–1954), Effie (1889–1981) and Ernestine ‘Teenie’ (1891–1981) Bowes Lyon, the young daughters of Hon. Ernest Bowes Lyon, Queen Elizabeth’s uncle. Wodehouse had an avuncular relationship with them and told their mother, ‘I occupy in your house a position equivalent to that of cold beef … If there is nobody new to talk to, the Lyon cubs talk to me’ (Robert McCrum, Wodehouse: A Life, Viking, 2004, pp. 53–4).

  * Clive James CBE AM (1939– ), Australian writer, broadcaster, poet and wit.

  † The Social Democratic Party, formed in 1981 by four senior Labour politicians, Roy Jenkins, David Owen, Bill Rodgers and Shirley Williams, who believed the Labour Party had become too left-wing. In 1988 the party merged with the Liberal Party to form the Liberal Democrats.

  * The Queen was on her way to the USA and Canada after visiting Jamaica and the Cayman Islands.

  * Princess of Wales to Queen Elizabeth, 19 May 1983, RA QEQM/PRIV/RF.

  * Gay George, a handsome dark-brown horse owned by the Duke of Devonshire and trained by Walwyn, fell at a fence at Warwick and died.

  * King Olav V of Norway.

  † Men, Machines and Sacred Cows, a collection of Prince Philip’s views and speeches, published by Hamish Hamilton. Later in 1984, A Windsor Correspondence was published – this was a collection of Prince Philip’s letters to and from the Right Rev. Michael Mann, the Dean of Windsor. Their letters dealt with evolution, fundamentalism and morality.

  * Rear Admiral Sir Oswald Cecil KBE CB (1925– ), became Lieutenant Governor of the Isle of Man in 1980, a post he held for five years.

  † Earl Granville, husband of Queen Elizabeth’s sister Rose, was Lieutenant Governor of the Isle of Man 1937–45, Governor of Northern Ireland 1945–52. One of Queen Elizabeth’s older sisters, Rosie died in 1967.

  * Henrietta Knight B.Ed (1946– ), successful racehorse trainer, whose husband, the former champion jockey Terry Biddlecombe, rode many times for the Queen Mother.

  * Sarah Ferguson married Prince Andrew, Duke of York, and became Duchess of York on 23 July 1986. They had two children, Princess Beatrice and Princess Eugenie; they were divorced in 1996.
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br />   * Bishop Robin Woods KCMG KCVO (1914–97), son of Right Rev. Edward Woods, Bishop of Lichfield, whom the Queen had valued as a spiritual counsellor. Edward Woods was ‘Librarian’ to the King and Queen in the sense that he often sent the Queen books dealing with religious matters, particularly during the Second World War. Robin Woods was a distinguished Dean of Windsor, 1962–70; he reorganized the Chapter and was the founder of the inter-faith consultation centre, St George’s House, in which Prince Philip played a major role.

  † The Upper Room described the work of Toc H.

  * Dick Hern CVO (1921–2002), racehorse trainer to the Queen.

  † The Prince of Wales, the future King Edward VIII.

  ‡ Prince Henry, Duke of Gloucester.

  * Camilla, The Hon. Lady Cazalet (1937– ), daughter of sixth Viscount Gage, wife of Edward Cazalet.

  † Sir Frederick Ashton died on 19 August 1988.

  * Tony Hancock (1924–68), English comedian and actor, famous for the BBC series Hancock’s Half Hour.

  † Ashe Windham CVO (1957– ), Irish Guards officer, equerry to Queen Elizabeth and extra equerry to HRH the Prince of Wales; from 1996 Chairman of the Queen Elizabeth Castle of Mey Trust. By way of thanking Queen Elizabeth for her hospitality at the Castle the previous summer, Windham organized annual midwinter dinners for her guests and equerries.

  * A member who visited the Club before this dinner recalled a sign on the wall with words to the effect ‘Gentlemen, the Club will be closed for dinner on 9 February 1989. I will tell you why afterwards. Devonshire.’ (Pratt’s was owned by the Duke of Devonshire.)

  † Asolo, a Renaissance hill-town in the Veneto where Dame Freya lived for most of her life and where Queen Elizabeth visited her while touring the Palladian villas of the region in 1987.

  * Sir Antony Acland KG GCVO GCMG (1930– ), Permanent Under-Secretary of State at the FCO, 1982–6; British Ambassador in Washington, 1986–91. He then became Provost of Eton College until his retirement in 2001.

  † Hyde Park, New York State, the home of President and Mrs Roosevelt, to which the King and Queen had made their memorable visit in 1939, weeks before the outbreak of the Second World War.

  * Sophie, Princess George of Hanover (1914–2001), sister of Prince Philip.

  † Margaret Thatcher, Prime Minister 1979–90. Queen Elizabeth admired Thatcher for her patriotism and her robust approach to the problems of Britain. At private meals, Queen Elizabeth amused her friends by lowering her glass out of sight to ‘toast’ those of whom she disapproved, such as some Socialist or Liberal politicians, and raising it to those whom she favoured, like General de Gaulle or Mrs Thatcher.

  ‡ Queen Elizabeth’s goddaughter Elizabeth Johnston (1927–95), younger daughter of second Baron Hardinge of Penshurst (see p. 226 footnote) and his wife Helen (née Cecil), Queen Elizabeth’s friend from girlhood. Wife of Lieut-Col. Sir John Johnston, Assistant Comptroller then Comptroller of the Lord Chamberlain’s Office 1964–87.

  § Sarah Legh was the wife of Sir Piers ‘Joey’ Legh. Her son, Alfred Shaughnessy, the scriptwriter of the London Weekend Television series Upstairs Downstairs, edited Sarah: The Letters and Diaries of a Courtier’s Wife 1906–1936 (1989).

  * Sam Dickson – see letter to Beryl Poignand, 13 June 1918 (p. 59).

  † A Romanov Diary: The Autobiography of Her Imperial and Royal Highness Grand Duchess George of Russia (1988); the Grand Duchess was Prince Philip’s aunt. The book includes letters written by her husband from prison during the Bolshevik Revolution; he was shot in 1919.

  * Ted Hughes OM (1930–98), British poet, named Poet Laureate in 1984. He became a friend of Queen Elizabeth after she had invited him to dinner at Sandringham in summer 1997. They shared a love of Britain, the countryside and fishing. She found his craggy good looks ‘very striking’ and he found her ‘interested in everything, amused by everything. Her secret is – one of her secrets – to be positive about everything.’ (Ted Hughes to Gerald Hughes, 18 May 1991, Ted Hughes papers, Manuscript Archives and Rare Book Library, Emory University.) In the 1990s the friendship meant a great deal to each of them.

  † William Tallon RVM (1935–2007), Steward to Queen Elizabeth, who joined the Royal Household in 1951 and remained with Queen Elizabeth until her death. He was a flamboyant, engaging character with good taste and good cheer; the mutual affection in which he and Queen Elizabeth held one another, his cheekiness and his generosity with martinis and other libations helped make her Household one of the most relaxed and amusing in the Royal Family.

  ‡ The Thistle and the Rose, a song cycle for soprano and choir, commissioned by Prince Charles from the British composer Patrick Doyle (1953– ) to celebrate the Queen Mother’s ninetieth birthday.

  § Raymond Leppard (1927– ), conductor and harpsichordist. He grew up in Bath and he first encountered the King and Queen when they visited the city after it was heavily bombed in the so-called Baedeker raids, which targeted Britain’s heritage, in April 1942. Leppard was a schoolboy serving meals at an improvised soup kitchen for the homeless and saw the ‘magical and powerful effect’ the King and Queen had as they went ‘climbing over rubble, talking to everyone, unguarded and caringly sympathetic’. He saw them as ‘the symbol of the spirit of England’. (Raymond Leppard, On Music, Pro/Am Music Resources, New York, 1993, pp. 442–3.) Later he became a good friend of Queen Elizabeth and often played the piano for her.

  * Hughes had written, for her ninetieth birthday, an epic poem called ‘A Masque for Three Voices’, which was an exploration of the great, awful and lovely moments of the century. He began with lines on the significance of monarchy:

  A royalty mints the sovereign soul

  Of wise man and of clown

  What substitute’s debased those souls

  Whose country lacks a crown

  Because it lies in some Swiss bank

  Or has been melted down …

  ‘A Masque for Three Voices’, first published in the Weekend Telegraph, 4 August 1990.

  * Oliver Messel (1904–78), designer and uncle of Lord Snowdon. In 1953 he created a suite at the Dorchester Hotel, which included a lavish mix of rococo and baroque styles and a ‘considerable dose of fantasy’. It was said to have been adored by such stars as Noël Coward, Marlene Dietrich and Elizabeth Taylor. In the late 1980s Lord Snowdon restored the suite and he gave occasional lunch parties there with eclectic groups of people.

  † Woodrow Wyatt, Baron Wyatt of Weeford (1918–97), British politician, journalist and writer. A committed follower of Margaret Thatcher, he was also close to Rupert Murdoch and wrote a political column for the News of the World.

  * George Weidenfeld, Baron Weidenfeld GBE (1919– ), one of Britain’s most distinguished publishers and philanthropists who fled from Nazi Austria to Britain in 1938.

  † Rain-Charm for the Duchy, a collection of Hughes’s Laureate poems, published in 1992.

  * The affectionate nickname for a golden statue of Buddha in the grounds of Sandringham.

  † One of Queen Elizabeth’s favourite homeopathic cures.

  ‡ The Queen and Princess Margaret were constantly urging their mother, usually without success, to take more care of herself. The stick was a recent gift.

  * Nigel Jaques, master at Eton and frequent guest at Royal Lodge, wrote to her on the anniversary of King George VI’s death recalling how, at Eton, the boys had responded to the news in February 1952.

  † Hughes appealed to Queen Elizabeth’s lifelong enjoyment of mystical matters. In 1919 she had given D’Arcy Osborne her ‘Magic Stone’ – and then requested it back. On his recent visit to Birkhall, on a picnic below Lochnagar, she asked Hughes if he thought trees could communicate with each other. This led him to write his picnic poem: ‘And what were the great pines whispering? / We would have liked to know. / With rooty thoughts and needle tongues / They murmured: “There they go / Looking for mountain sunshine just / In time to meet the snow! / Toasting Queen Victoria / For blazing the trail to Lochna
gar.” ‘

  * In 1992 the monarchy was beset with troubles. The Palace announced that the Duke and Duchess of York were to separate and then in June the Sunday Times began to serialize a book called Diana: Her True Story, which created a sensation, especially when it became clear that the Princess had covertly given her version of events to the author, Andrew Morton. The Queen Mother was appalled – loyalty came close to duty in her canon. She was greatly saddened at the end of the year when the Prince and Princess of Wales announced their separation.

  On 20 November 1992, fire damaged large parts of Windsor Castle. The Queen was distraught and stayed the weekend with her mother at Royal Lodge. Then a fierce newspaper campaign was launched, demanding that the Queen, not the government, should pay for the restoration. Four days after the fire, the Queen made a remarkable speech in which she said ‘1992 is not a year on which I shall look back with undiluted pleasure. In the words of one of my more sympathetic correspondents, it has turned out to be an “annus horribilis”.’

  * The Edinburgh Tables: an updated version of the original Mountbatten relationship tables. These were prepared by Earl Mountbatten of Burma, based initially on the memory of his mother, Victoria, Marchioness of Milford Haven, in 1939. They were first published by him on the Viceregal Press in New Delhi in 1947, when he was the last Viceroy of India. The Edinburgh Tables, started by Prince Philip in 1991, traced the descendants of the grandfathers of both the Queen and himself – namely King George V and the fourteenth Earl of Strathmore & Kinghorne, and King George I of Greece and Prince Louis of Battenberg (later the Marquess of Milford Haven).