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The body of Queen Elizabeth lay in state at Westminster Hall, in a coffin draped in the royal standard on which were placed the orb and sceptre, before her funeral in Westminster Abbey on 19 September, declared a bank holiday. She had died at Balmoral on the afternoon of 8 September, two days after appointing Liz Truss Prime Minister there. The new King took the name Charles III. In a televised address the next day, he said: ‘As the Queen herself did with such unswerving devotion, I too now solemnly pledge myself, throughout the remaining time God grants me, to uphold the constitutional principles at the heart of our nation.’ Of his wife Camilla he remarked with curious phraseology: ‘In recognition of her own loyal public service since our marriage 17 years ago, she becomes my Queen Consort.’ He spoke of his ‘responsibility towards the Church of England – the church in which my own faith is so deeply rooted’, and he created the Duke of Cambridge Prince of Wales. He concluded by addressing his mother: ‘May “flights of angels sing thee to thy rest”’, a quotation from Hamlet sung at the funeral of his late wife, Diana, Princess of Wales.
An Accession Council of great office-holders, such as the Lord Great Chamberlain, with the Lord Mayor of London and 200 of the 719 privy counsellors, witnessed the King signing an oath at St James’s Palace to preserve the Church of Scotland. Garter King of Arms proclaimed the King from the Accession Gallery. Parliament sat to make its condolences and to allow MPs to swear oaths to the King. Charles III addressed the Lords and Commons two days later in Westminster Hall, then flew to Scotland to do the same to members of its parliament.
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