The Spectator

Portrait of the week: Queen Elizabeth’s funeral, capped energy prices and uncapped bankers’ bonuses

issue 24 September 2022

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Queen Elizabeth was buried in St George’s Chapel, Windsor Castle, beside her husband and father, after a funeral at Westminster Abbey. In the ten days of mourning, six days were devoted to a lying-in-state at Westminster Hall, for which the public queued around the clock, often for more than five miles and ten hours. A livestream broadcast on television accustomed viewers to Gentlemen at Arms with swan-feather plumes and Yeomen of the Guard with ribboned hats guarding the catafalque. The public were courteous, silent and moved.

King Charles completed a tour to Edinburgh, Belfast and Cardiff during the days of mourning, making speeches, meeting crowds and speaking in Welsh. After the state funeral service at the Abbey he followed Queen Elizabeth’s coffin, drawn on the state gun-carriage by 142 sailors, in a procession a mile and a quarter long to the Wellington Arch, accompanied by his sister, the Princess Royal, and his brothers, the Duke of York and Earl of Wessex, and followed by his sons, the Prince of Wales and the Duke of Sussex.

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