The Queen's Houses

by Alan Titchmarsh

  On 14 September 1940 a delayed-action bomb, dropped the previous morning, finally exploded. The raid on 13 September had deliberately targeted the palace. With poor weather over the south-east, major daylight operations were cancelled by the Luftwaffe in favour of ‘nuisance’ raids. A lone aircraft dropped a single bomb on the garden of 10 Downing Street and then a stick of five high-explosive bombs on Buckingham Palace. Queen Elizabeth was in residence with The King and wrote later to her mother-in-law, Queen Mary, that at about 11 a.m., as she was ‘battling’ to remove an eyelash from The King’s eye, she heard ‘the unmistakable whirr-whirr of a German plane’ and then the:

  Above left: Bomb damage to the North Lodge of Buckingham Palace, 1941

  Above right: Winston Churchill and The King and Queen inspect the bomb damage after an air raid on Buckingham Palace, 1940

  ‘scream of a bomb … It all happened so quickly that we had only time to look foolishly at each other when the scream hurtled past us and exploded with a tremendous crash in the quadrangle. I saw a great column of smoke and earth thrown up into the air, and then we all ducked like lightning into the corridor. There was another tremendous explosion …’

  The bombing of Buckingham Palace gave rise to one of The Queen’s most famous sayings: ‘I am glad we have been bombed. Now we can look the East End in the eye.’ The attack on Buckingham Palace was discussed that day in Cabinet, which quickly saw the propaganda value The Queen had already spotted. The Cabinet duly invited the Prime Minister to send a message on their behalf to The King: ‘The War Cabinet offer their hearty congratulations to their Majesties on their providential escape from the barbarous attack made on their home and Royal Persons.’ It was also agreed that, ‘subject to His Majesty’s consent’, the fullest possible publicity should be accorded the message. Of the five bombs dropped, two hit the inner courtyard, one landed on the Royal Chapel to the west and the other two dropped either side of the railings of the forecourt. By chance the bombs fell in such a way that major damage – apart from to the Royal Chapel – was largely avoided. A great number of windows were blown in, causing damage from flying glass to paintings hanging opposite them, and a water main was ruptured.

  Crowds outside Buckingham Palace, VE Day 1945

  The chapel, originally one of four conservatories built by John Nash in the 1820s (one of which was later removed to Kew Gardens by William IV and now much used as a wedding venue), was converted in 1843 by Douglas Morison. Despite a great deal of red plush and twin pulpits, its exposed steel girders and cast-iron columns continued to betray its horticultural origins. It was never rebuilt as a chapel and in due course, after an initiative from The Duke of Edinburgh – so often the guiding light in such matters – it became The Queen’s Gallery, opened in 1966 to show off work from the Royal Collections in rotating exhibitions. In 1999 it was closed for renovation and opened again in time for the Jubilee of 2002, with a new and striking Greek temple portico and more than three times the exhibition space it had previously. It is now one of the most successful exhibition spaces in London.

  The palace had been bombed before the explosion of the delayed-action bomb, on 8 September 1940 and again on the following day, when the swimming pool was destroyed and the north wing damaged. On 15 and 17 September it was again targeted, bombs dropping on the lawns as well as destroying a bathroom. Further damage occurred in October from a parachute mine, which once more blew out a considerable number of windows. The attrition didn’t stop: the next month a bomb dropped on the lawns, its explosion damaging a bedroom and a number of windows and another in the courtyard of the Royal Mews; in March 1941 the North Lodge was partly demolished and a policeman killed, and the forecourt bombed again. And finally, in June 1944 a V1 flying bomb hit the garden wall near Constitution Hill, badly damaging a summer house.

  The royal family wave to the crowds from the balcony of Buckingham Palace, VE Day 1945

  On Victory in Europe (VE) Day, 8 May 1945, a hot summer’s day, thousands of men in uniform and girls in thin, bright cotton dresses – most of them happily inebriated – celebrated the fact that the war was over. Late in the afternoon the royal family came out onto the balcony and the crowd – 20,000 or more – cheered and shouted. Amongst the crowd were the two Princesses, Elizabeth and Margaret, who had slipped out of the palace to see what it was like on the other side. The future Queen Elizabeth II wrote later, ‘we stood outside and shouted, “we want the King”, and were successful in seeing my parents on the balcony … I think it was one of the most memorable nights of my life’. Eight times The King and Queen, eventually joined by the Princesses (and later by a beaming Winston Churchill), reappeared to appease the crowds, experiencing the ‘heartfelt expressions of joy’ as the Pathé News commentator described it. A drunken Australian waved his slouch hat from atop the palace gates in an effort to orchestrate the cheering. A couple, perched precariously on traffic lights, kissed and received a round of applause. Every lamp post was festooned with people and the Victoria Memorial became an anthill, dark with swarming bodies. As darkness fell searchlights lit up the palace, finally ending the dreary blackout that had been in force since 1939.

  Above left: A Beefeater and palace staff watch the spectacle on Coronation Day, 1953

  Above right: Crowds in London celebrate the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II, 1953

  On the death of King George VI in 1952, Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother, as she would now be known, knew that she would have to move out of Buckingham Palace. She found the prospect distressing but there was no alternative. Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh moved out of Clarence House and into the palace. The Queen Mother made the reverse move.

  In the 1950s, the road that led to the palace was, like every other road, the deep grey tone of asphalt. David Eccles, a Conservative politician who as Minister of Works had helped organize the coronation in 1953, ordered the transformation of The Mall the next year by the application of iron oxide pigment to create a giant red carpet, underlining its purpose as a ceremonial route. So it has been for over half a century, each year punctuated with royal occasions complete with horses and carriages and cheering crowds. It has been witness to intense jubilation – a million people thronged The Mall to celebrate The Queen’s Golden Jubilee in June 2002 – and great sadness as the route for royal funeral processions, mostly recently The Queen Mother and, before her, Princess Diana. As you stare down the broad red carpet lined with giant flagpoles you can feel the recent history of the nation swirling around you.

  The Queen with her children Prince Charles and Princess Anne in the grounds of Buckingham Palace

  The Queen in residence

  ‘Living above the shop’ is how The Duke of Edinburgh has referred to life at Buckingham Palace and, indeed, it is the working week that is spent there from Monday until Friday when the family retreats to Windsor.

  During the present Queen’s reign the palace has seen a number of changes – not least the summer opening when the public are allowed to view the state rooms. Silver and Golden Jubilees have been marked by processions down The Mall and, most recently, The Queen’s 60 years on the throne were celebrated in an event held on the Queen Victoria Memorial or, as it is known within the palace, ‘the wedding cake’.

  The Queen and The Duke of Edinburgh meet politicians in the White Drawing Room of Buckingham Palace, 2006

  It was 4 June 2012 – a bank holiday – when the Diamond Jubilee Concert took place. Organized by Take That singer Gary Barlow, my wife and I found ourselves sitting in a stand just outside the palace where we witnessed an A-list of performers giving their all for The Queen. Robbie Williams sang with the drummers and trumpeters from the Coldstream Guards, Cliff Richard, Annie Lennox, Tom Jones and many others belted for Britain before the interval. Grace Jones sang while rotating a hula-hoop around her waist and, in the row immediately behind us, the parents and sister of The Duchess of Cambridge joined in with the fun and waved their Union Jacks along with the rest of us; t
he royal family did the same a little further back in the Royal Box. The atmosphere was one of joyous celebration and good humour. The Queen arrived at 9 p.m. to be greeted by ‘Sing’, specially composed by Andrew Lloyd-Webber and Gary Barlow in her honour. Barlow was joined on stage by a band from the Commonwealth, the Military Wives and their choirmaster Gareth Malone. Shirley Bassey came and went, a film of The Queen’s reign was screened with excerpts from the coronation and her wedding to Prince Philip, and there followed another roll call of the great and the good … Elton John, Paul McCartney, Stevie Wonder amongst them as well as Madness who sang ‘Our House’ perched on the roof of the palace – transformed into a row of terraced houses by some clever projection.

  The Mall is illuminated for the Diamond Jubilee Concert, 4th June 2012

  The spirit of the occasion was summed up in an emotional speech by The Prince of Wales: ‘as a nation this is our opportunity to thank you and my father for always being there for us … and for making us proud to be British’. The national anthem followed, before The Queen lit the last in a chain of beacons which had been lit across the nation as excerpts from national favourites – including ‘Land of Hope and Glory’– were played by an orchestra, all guaranteed to stir the patriotic heart. It was a fitting celebration of a 60-year reign, but also a little slice of the ongoing history of a royal residence that dates back four centuries.

  And what of the old mulberry garden whose existence delivered the site into royal hands? Despite legends to the contrary, no original trees from the old 1608 garden have survived at Buckingham Palace (although one specimen is thought to be some 200 years old), but there is still one of James I’s original plantings to be found at Charlton House in Greenwich (built between 1607 and 1612 for the Dean of Durham, tutor to Prince Henry, James I’s eldest son) a scion from which has recently been planted in the west section of Buckingham Palace Garden. In 2000, The Queen’s Head Gardener, Mark Lane, asked Her Majesty’s permission to establish a definitive collection of mulberry trees in the palace garden. The work began with the searching out of trees initially from British nurseries and then from further afield. The collection was granted Full Collection Status in 2005. The Queen is now the named holder of the National Mulberry Collection with 29 species so far planted at Buckingham Palace where most of the collection is housed – a few are held at Kensington Palace and Marlborough House. A limited edition book: The Queen’s Mulberries – with illustrations by the botanical artist Alysia Hunt – was produced in 2012.

  Inside Buckingham Palace, The Queen greets Australian Prime Minister John Howard, 2005

  The Buckingham Palace gardens themselves – occupying some 39 acres (16 hectares) – contain an extraordinarily wide range of cultivated plants as well as 350 species of wild flower plus fungi, insects and birds and a lake that plays host to a variety of waterfowl. There are no flamingos any more – the foxes saw to that – but from the Waterloo Vase and the Rose Garden, to the mound designed by William Aiton to mask the smell of the ‘arisings’ from the Royal Mews, there is much within their confines to give a clue to the rich and varied history of the palace itself, and of its present incumbents: every couple of hours a small group of corgis and ‘dorgis’ (corgi/dachshund crosses) will be walked around by a footman. If you have to live over a shop, then this is an especially accommodating one.

  The Queen and The Duke of Edinburgh inspect the gardens at Buckingham Palace

  The Queen makes her speech during the state banquet for the Obama visit in 2011.

  ‘The tables were an explosion of damask, silver gilt, glass and flowers … By the serving tables stood batteries of footmen … The impact on entering can only be described as dazzling.’

  Sir Roy Strong, Diary, 1976

  A STATE VISIT – when one head of state visits another – wherever it may be in the world, follows the same time-honoured pattern. The incoming head of state walks down the steps of the presidential or royal aircraft onto a red carpet, newly rolled out and hoovered, is greeted by his or her counterpart, the visitor’s national anthem is played by a band, a guard of honour is inspected, ceremonial salutes are fired and then a limousine or open carriage will take the two heads of state back to the presidential or royal palace.

  If the head of state is also the chief executive he or she will conduct business over the next few days; trade and political pacts of one kind or another will be begun, advanced or concluded and relationships strengthened. The Japan Times noted that US President Barack Obama’s state visit to Japan in April 2014 came at a ‘crucial time … with defence and trade issues still to be resolved [the state visit] is a high-stakes game for both sides’. If the head of state is a royal, he or she will be accompanied by a band of politicians and businessmen and women, who will conduct business. As the centrepiece of the visit there will always be a state banquet, a show of lavish entertainment aimed to honour, and perhaps slightly overawe, the visitor. Speeches will be made, toasts drunk and the national anthem played.

  President Ronald Reagan speaks at a state banquet in 1982

  In the United Kingdom, who comes when is a matter for the government of the day, and more specifically the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, depending on the political or economic issues in play with a particular country. The serious buttering-up of a state visit – the highest form of diplomatic contact between two nations – can potentially advance national interests. Usually no more than two countries a year are accorded a state visit to Britain and the cost is met by the Treasury.

  The Queen has been the host, accompanied by The Duke of Edinburgh, at over a hundred state visits throughout her reign, roughly two per year, occasionally three – no head of state, alive or dead, can have presided over more. The great majority of the incoming heads of state have been entertained at Buckingham Palace, around 20 at Windsor Castle (used more often recently, especially now the kitchens and other service rooms have been completely rebuilt following the fire in 1992) and a very few at Holyroodhouse in Edinburgh.

  The Queen and The Duke of Edinburgh accompany President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama on their state visit to Britain, May 2011

  In Britain great emphasis is placed on the part the royal family plays in the unfolding drama of a state visit. Pomp and ceremony, executed with verve and precision, make for an impressive backdrop to the serious matters in hand. The monarch, and the deference paid her, the gloriously uniformed royal guards who surround her and the undeniable grandeur of her palaces smack of history, stability, power and prestige – all the things that subconsciously should impact on and stay in the mind of the visitor as he or she begins her rounds of negotiations over the following days. It was ever thus. We know that the protracted, elaborate and very costly entertainments that Henry V provided for Sigismund of Luxemburg at Windsor Castle in 1416 paid dividends, with Sigismund subsequently supporting Henry’s claim to the throne of France. It is unlikely that other state visits have yielded quite such a tangible bounty but their unseen benefits are inestimable.

  Once the invitation to a foreign head of state has been accepted, the Master of the Household’s Department, with over 250 employees the largest sector of the Royal Household, swings into action. The position of Master of the Household was first created in 1539 in a drive for efficiency. Like so many of the great offices of state it became a sinecure until the 1840s when Prince Albert purged the inefficient, wasteful and often fraudulent arrangements by which the royal palaces were run and reorganized them. The Master once more became an executive officer and was put in charge of the entire domestic establishment, masterminding his empire from offices on the first floor of the south wing of Buckingham Palace. Another sweeping reorganization in the 1980s brought further efficiencies and removed many of the old anachronisms: separate food preparation for royals and others, five different dining rooms according to staff grades and so on.

  The department today encompasses a bewildering array of specialist staff, many with wonderfully arcane titles derived from historic
precedents, amongst them the housekeepers and their staff of housemaids at the five royal residences; the Page of the Chambers responsible for all the pages; the Yeoman of the Royal Pantries in charge of all the plate, glass and china, some of which is literally priceless; the attendant under-butlers; the Palace Foreman who looks after a range of crafts skills; the French polisher, carpet planner, locksmith, fendersmith, gilders, cabinet makers and upholsterers; and the Royal Chef with his staff of sous-chefs, cooks and porters.

  The department organizes everything, from greeting and looking after the guests and members of the royal family, the guest lists and seating plans (confirmed by The Queen and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office) to checking dietary requirements. Before the Obama state visit the Foreign Office would have been in touch with the White House some six months in advance to check likes and dislikes. Much thought and care goes into the preparation, cooking and service of the meal on the day. However, although the footmen in tailcoats would be recognized by their Georgian forebears, their modern wireless earpieces would not.