James Philip - Empire Day

The Queen simply was not made that way.

George was proud of her.

Of course, he was always proud of her but that morning, especially so after the trauma of yesterday. Because she was so naturally tactile it suddenly became a hundred times easier for him to forget that he was the King Emperor and behave like a normal human being. The old King had never picked up a child in his life; not even one of his own. The very thought would have horrified the old curmudgeon and given half his doddering old courtiers a nervous breakdown!

As for King George’s mother. Goodness, once she had squeezed out sufficient ‘spares’ to preserve the royal line she had washed her hands of her offspring until they were toileted, well-mannered, presentable in public and more or less educated.

Tactile had been a swear word in the Royal palaces of England for a generation until Eleanor had come upon the scene, first as HRH, the Duchess of Windsor in a small way, and then as Queen Consort, in a way that had made her the nation’s and the Empire’s Queen Mother almost overnight.

The King had taken the son of a maimed dockyard worker in his arms, Eleanor had embraced the boy’s mother, sat awhile with her holding her hand.

How on earth could people be so solicitous about us at such a dreadful time?

There were still people in England, within the Royal Household, the establishment and the Government, who disapproved of his and Eleanor’s ‘way of monarchy’. The diehards still imagined that in this modern, technological age when the globe was connected by radio and television, in which the gathering cry for self-determination and a loosening of the shackles of empires was daily shaping social and political changes unimagined only twenty years ago, that the Monarchy could somehow remain the unchanging, rigid monolith that it had been for centuries.

An enormous crowd had gathered on Gravesend Pier by the time the Royal Party returned to board the Cassandra.

“Don’t let go of my hand, my dear,” Eleanor murmured as they stepped out of the Rolls-Royce. She had dried up her tears on the short ride from the hospital. “I must look red-eyed and blotchy,” she sighed.

“Not a bit of it, my love!”

They went straight to the barrier where behind a line of infantrymen – regulars not militiamen – a throng of cheering men, women and children had awaited, patiently for a glimpse of the royal couple, possibly for many hours.

“Why, thank you for coming out to see us,” Eleanor beamed at the sea of faces.

The King doffed his cap to the crowd.

Henrietta De L’Isle had scurried across the pier, heedless of her own dignity, and virtually on hands and knees planted a single microphone on a stand before the King and Queen.

Goodness , Eleanor thought, that girl thinks of everything!

“The Queen and I,” the King declared, “have had the honour of visiting a number of the men, women and children so grievously injured in yesterday’s outrage in Brooklyn, and sadly, the opportunity to give what little comfort we might to those whose loved ones have perished, or for whom there must be little hope of recovery. As always, we were humbled by the fortitude, courage and pluck of everybody we encountered.”

At a squeeze of his hand he surrendered the microphone to his wife.

“We cannot praise the tireless work of the dedicated doctors and nurses at the Flatbush Royal Military Hospital enough. Tragically, it is only at the worst of times that one becomes aware of the very best in us all. I could not help but weep, neither of us could, meeting so many good people laid low through no fault of their own, and yet so bravely confronting things…”

Eleanor’s voice failed her. She lowered her head for a moment, sniffed back a flood of tears. Overhead two aircraft circled like distracting, angrily buzzing bees as she re-composed herself.

“It is at times like this, on days like this that I and my husband are reminded that we are honoured and privileged to be your King and Queen, and we are reminded that the only reason that we are here today is to serve you! ”

The King drew his wife’s hand to his side and she moved close.

Spontaneously, he planted a pecking kiss on her cheek, and in a similar moment of abandon she kissed him back.

“God save you all!” King George declared.

The Royal Standard broke from the port halyard of the destroyer’s old-fashioned mainmast.

Onboard HMS Cassandra as the warship cast off and began to back away from the pier the King and Queen waved to the masses on the pier.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to get so emotional,” Eleanor said, smiling despite her roiling angst.

“You are their Queen, my love,” he husband reassured her. “You are their Queen and the Mother of the Empire. The world is changing and there are no rules in the King and Queen game anymore.”

She leaned against him as they smiled their fixedly regal smiles.

Henrietta De L’Isle and her two personal bodyguards had literally jumped onto the destroyer as she departed. Now the young woman approached her Sovereign.

She was a little breathless.

“I’m sorry, I should have had that microphone in place before your car arrived, sir.”

The King laughed.

“My dear, you are a marvel!”

“Oh,” Henrietta blushed and momentarily stared at her feet. “I, well… Thank you, sir…”

The King waved one last time and turned away from the pier, now some fifty to sixty yards away.

“We shall repair to the wardroom,” he commanded. “My wife and I need a stiff drink before we show our faces again!”

The original schedule for this day, Empire Day, had ordained that the King and Queen should attend morning service on the quarterdeck of the Lion, and partake of sherry and sweetmeats in the flagship’s wardroom preparatory to boarding the Cassandra shortly before eleven o’clock.

Thereupon, the Fleet Review would commence with the destroyer steaming slowly up and down the columns of ships anchored in the Lower and Upper Bays for well over two hours amidst the constant firing or royal salutes, the flying of thousands of flags, and the cheers of every ship’s company as it lined the rail.

These things almost always over ran; for one, both bays would be full of sailing craft and motor boats impeding Cassandra’s stately progress; and for two, it was a huge party and nobody worried overmuch if a party went on a little longer than the timespan mentioned on the original invitation!

Henrietta De L’Isle and the Queen disappeared briefly while the King chatted with the destroyer’s second-in-command – the Captain was making sure Cassandra did not run down any of the yachts cluttering Gravesend Bay – and Eleanor re-emerged with her face ‘restored’.

Word came from the bridge that ‘Cassandra will be on station in ten minutes’, and the Royal Party dutifully trekked up to the destroyer’s open compass platform.

Cassandra’s modern successors had enclosed bridges; marvellous for conning the ship in a North Atlantic blow but not so good for viewing and being viewed during the course of a Fleet Review.

The destroyer was making fifteen knots through the slight chop in the Lower Bay, hurrying to her start position abreast the starboard flank of HMS Lion by the appointed hour. The ship cleft through the sea with effortless ease, the roar of her engine room blowers like the purring of a mighty beast of prey.

Eleanor put a hand to her head, wondering if perhaps she ought to put her hat back on before her hair became totally windswept.

Soon Cassandra would sweep through the narrows – Hell’s Gate – into the Upper Bay, still rushing until she came abreast of the Tiger, the fourth ship in the 5th Battle Squadron ‘line’.