| The Daily Crucible | Thursday, September 8, 2022
By Heritage Odih
Tearful faces were seen in and outside the gates of Buckingham Palace on Thursday as news spread of Queen Elizabeth II's death.
Crowd gather along the road leading to the palace gates — where a statement announcing her death was just posted, according to tradition even as the quiet singing of “God Save the Queen” rang has out across the gathered crowd.
Queen Elizabeth II, Britain’s longest-serving monarch, whose broadly popular seven-decade reign survived tectonic shifts in Britain’s post-imperial society and weathered successive challenges posed by the romantic choices, missteps and imbroglios of her descendants, died on Thursday at Balmoral Castle in Scotland, her summer retreat. She was 96.
The royal family announced her death online, saying she had “died peacefully.” The announcement did not specify a cause.
Her death elevated her eldest son, Charles, to the monarchy, as King Charles III. In a statement, he said:
“The death of my beloved Mother, Her Majesty the Queen, is a moment of the greatest sadness for me and all members of my family.
“We mourn profoundly the passing of a cherished Sovereign and a much-loved Mother. I know her loss will be deeply felt throughout the country, the Realms and the Commonwealth, and by countless people around the world.”
However, the United States President, Joe Biden has led international tributes in mourning the death of Queen Elizabeth II.
Biden in a statement said the Queen was a steadying presence and a source of comfort and pride for generations.
He said “Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II was more than a monarch. She defined an era. Today, the thoughts and prayers of people all across the United States are with the people of the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth in their grief.
“We send our deepest condolences to the Royal Family, who are not only mourning their Queen, but their dear mother, grandmother, and great-grandmother.
“Her legacy will loom large in the pages of British history, and in the story of our world.”
He added that Queen Elizabeth II was a stateswoman of unmatched dignity and constancy who deepened the bedrock Alliance between the United Kingdom and the United States.
“She helped make our relationship special. We were honored that she extended her hospitality to us in June 2021 during our first overseas trip as President and First Lady, where she charmed us with her wit, moved us with her kindness, and generously shared with us her wisdom.
“She helped Americans commemorate both the anniversary of the founding of Jamestown and the bicentennial of our independence. And she stood in solidarity with the United States during our darkest days after 9/11, when she poignantly reminded us that ‘Grief is the price we pay for love,” Biden added.
French President Emmanuel Macron had paid tribute to the late monarch, saying “Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II embodied the British nation’s continuity and unity for over 70 years.
“I remember her as a friend of France, a kind-hearted queen who has left a lasting impression on her country and her century.”
German Chancellor, Olaf Scholz described the Queen as a “role model and inspiration for millions”.
He praised her role in repairing relations between the UK and Germany after “the horrors of World War II.”
“She will be missed, not least her wonderful humour. from Olaf Scholz German Chancellor. She will be missed, not least her wonderful humour,” he said.
Also, Justin Trudeau, Canadian Prime Minister described the late monarch as one of his favourite people in the world.
He wrote: “She was a constant presence in our lives – and her service to Canadians will forever remain an important part of our country’s history. I will miss her so.”
Earlier Thursday, Buckingham Palace said that the queen had been placed under medical supervision and that her doctors were “concerned” about her health. She had remained at Balmoral for much of the summer. On Wednesday evening, she abruptly canceled a virtual meeting with members of her Privy Council after her doctors advised her to rest.
On Tuesday, she met with the incoming Conservative prime minister, Liz Truss — the 15th prime minister the queen dealt with during her reign — though in doing so, because of infirmity, she broke with longstanding tradition by receiving her at Balmoral rather than at Buckingham Palace.
Elizabeth’s long years as sovereign were a time of enormous upheaval, in which she sought to project and protect the royal family as a rare bastion of permanence in a world of shifting values.
At her coronation on June 2, 1953, a year after she acceded to the throne, she surveyed a realm emerging from an empire of such geographical reach that it was said the sun never set on it. But by the new century, as she navigated her advancing years with increasing frailty, the frontiers had shrunk back. As Britain prepared to leave the European Union in 2020, a clamor for independence in Scotland was rekindled, potentially threatening to narrow her horizons yet further.
Her coronation was the first royal event of its kind to be broadcast almost in full on television. But it was a token of the changes — and global fascination — that accompanied her time as queen that her reign became the subject of a Hollywood movie and a blockbuster series on Netflix, while her family’s travails offered voluminous grist to the heated mill of social media.
Just as telling in the chronicles of her rule, Britons’ unquestioning deference to the crown had been supplanted by a gamut of emotions ranging from loyal and often affectionate tolerance to unbridled hostility. The monarchy was forced, more than ever, to justify its existence in the face of often skeptical public attention and scrutiny.
Elizabeth, though, remained determinedly committed to the hallmark aloofness, formality and pageantry by which the monarchy has long sought to preserve the mystique that underpinned its existence and survival. Her courtly and reserved manner changed little.
As the coronavirus pandemic of 2020 spread to Britain, forcing people to suspend their normal lives and social ways, the queen left Buckingham Palace, in central London, for Windsor Castle, west of the capital, a move that recalled the decades she had spent inspiring genuine affection among many Britons.
It was to Windsor that she and her younger sister, Margaret, were sent to escape the threat of German bombing after the outbreak of World War II in 1939. It was from Windsor, too, that she made her first radio broadcast as a princess in 1940, age 14, ostensibly directed at British children who had been evacuated to North America, according to her biographer Ben Pimlott, but also intended to sway official thinking in Washington.
“My sister, Margaret Rose, and I feel so much for you, as we know from experience what it means to be away from those we love most of all,” Elizabeth said then.
In 2020, too, she sought to equate her plight with that of her subjects. “Many of us will need to find new ways of staying in touch with each other and making sure that loved ones are safe,” she said in a statement released after she and her husband, Prince Philip, arrived at Windsor. “I am certain that we are up to that challenge. You can be assured that my family and I stand ready to play our part.”
On April 5, 2020, in a televised address that evoked her 1940 broadcast, she urged her subjects to fight the virus with the same bulldog tenacity that wartime Britons had shown. It was only the fourth special broadcast of her monarchy outside of her scheduled TV appearances at Christmas.
“I hope in the years to come everyone will be able to take pride in how they responded to this challenge,” she said. “And those who come after us will say that the Britons of this generation were as strong as any.”
She added, “We should take comfort that while we may have more still to endure, better days will return. We will be with our friends again; we will be with our families again; we will meet again,” the last line a direct reference to a wartime song by Vera Lynn, “We’ll Meet Again.”
In 2017, Elizabeth celebrated the 70th anniversary of her marriage to Philip, whom she first met when he was a teenager in the 1930s. Until his death last April, Philip had settled into an unusual role, usually two steps behind his wife, providing her with stoic support, even if his occasional tactless comments hurt his image.
Additional report: The Guardian UK
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