Queen Elizabeth’s coffin arrived at Buckingham Palace on Tuesday evening, making its way through rainy London as crowds lined the route to see the hearse and bid her farewell.
People parked their cars along a normally busy road, got out and waved as the hearse, with lights inside illuminating the flag-draped coffin, entered London. In the city, people lined the road and held their phones aloft.
Thousands of people gathered outside the palace cheered and cheered as the hearse circled a roundabout in front of the Queen’s official residence and through the wrought iron gates. King Charles and other members of the royal family were waiting to greet the casket.
The coffin of the late monarch left her beloved Scotland, where 33,000 people passed it in silence during the 24 hours after it was brought to St. Giles of Edinburgh from his beloved summer retreat, Balmoral. The Queen died there on September 8 aged 96 after 70 years on the throne.
Charles had returned to London from Northern Ireland, where his visit sparked a rare moment of unity from politicians in a region with a contentious British-Irish identity that is deeply divided over the monarchy.
‘It’s a great shame’
The military C-17 Globemaster carrying the monarch’s casket landed at RAF Northolt, an air force base west of the city, about an hour after leaving Edinburgh. British Prime Minister Liz Truss, Defense Secretary Ben Wallace and a military honor guard were among those to greet the coffin at the base.
One of those who stood in the rain waiting for the hearse to pass, retired bus driver David Stringer, 82, recalled watching the Queen’s coronation on a film newsreel as a child.
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The Queen’s coffin draws massive crowds
Huge crowds lined the roadsides to watch the hearse carrying the Queen’s coffin as it made its way to Buckingham Palace in England.
“It’s a great shame,” he said. “I mean, I didn’t think about her every day, but I always knew she was there, and my life is ending now and her time is up.”
The coffin will be taken in a horse-drawn carriage on Wednesday to the Houses of Parliament to lie in state for four days before the funeral on Monday at Westminster Abbey.
“Scotland has said a sad but fond farewell to our Queen of Scots,” Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said. “We won’t see her like that again.”
The new king is making his own trip this week, visiting the four nations of the United Kingdom — England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland — in his first days on the throne.
‘God save the king!’
Earlier on Tuesday, hundreds of people lined the street leading to Hillsborough Castle near Belfast, the royal family’s official residence in Northern Ireland, in the latest show of affection following the Queen’s death. The area in front of the castle gates was covered with hundreds of floral tributes.
Charles and his wife, Camilla, the queen consort, got out of their car to wave to the crowd and sometimes used both hands to reach out to villagers, including schoolchildren in bright blue uniforms. Charles even stroked a corgi, famously his late mother’s favorite breed of dog, being held by a person, and some chanted “God save the king!”
“Today means a lot to me and my family. Just to be present in my hometown with my children to witness the arrival of the new king is a truly historic moment for all of us,” Hillsborough resident Robin Campbell said. while waiting for Charles. , which toured the four parts of the United Kingdom.
Queen Elizabeth’s coffin in the royal hearse is driven to Buckingham Palace in London on Tuesday. (Marco Bertorello/The Associated Press)
Although there was a warm welcome at Hillsborough, the British monarchy stirs mixed emotions in Northern Ireland, where there are two main communities: mostly Protestant unionists who see themselves as British and largely Roman Catholic nationalists who see themselves as Irish.
This division fueled three decades of violence known as “the Troubles” between paramilitary groups on both sides and UK security forces, in which 3,600 people were killed. The royal family was personally touched by the violence: Lord Louis Mountbatten, a cousin of the Queen and a much-loved mentor to Charles, was killed by an Irish Republican Army bomb in 1979.
A deep sectarian divide remains, a quarter of a century after the 1998 Northern Ireland peace deal.
For some Irish nationalists, the British monarch represents an oppressive foreign power. But others recognize the Queen’s role in forging peace. On a visit to Northern Ireland in 2012, he shook hands with Sinn Fein deputy leader Martin McGuinness, a former IRA commander, in a moment of previously unthinkable reconciliation.
Members of the public gather outside Hillsborough Castle in Belfast ahead of King Charles’ visit to Northern Ireland on Tuesday. (Paul Faith/AFP/Getty Images)
Alex Maskey, a Sinn Fein politician who is Speaker of the Northern Ireland Assembly, said the Queen had “demonstrated how individual acts of positive leadership can help break down barriers and foster reconciliation”.
In a sign of how far Northern Ireland has come on the road to peace, Sinn Fein representatives attended memorial services for the Queen and met the King on Tuesday.
Mr Maskey offered his condolences to the king at an event at Hillsborough Castle attended by leaders from all of Northern Ireland’s main political parties.
Charles replied that his mother “felt deeply, I know, the importance of the role she herself played in bringing together those whom history had separated and reaching out to make possible the healing of lingering wounds.”
He said he would build on his mother’s “shining example” and “seek the welfare of all Northern Irelanders”.
“He is not our king”
Still, not everyone welcomed the new King.
In Falls Road in Belfast, a nationalist stronghold, several walls are decorated with murals of Bobby Sands, an IRA member who died during a prison hunger strike in 1981, and others who died in the Troubles.
“No, he’s not our king. Bobby Sands was our king here,” Bobby Jones, 52, said. “The Queen never did anything for us. She never did. None of the royals do.”
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King Charles of Northern Ireland is committed to the Queen’s path of reconciliation
King Charles, on a visit to Hillsborough, Northern Ireland, recalled the historic divisions in the region and promised to “seek the welfare” of all its inhabitants.
Irish leaders attended a service of reflection at St Anne’s Cathedral in Belfast despite strained relations between Dublin and London over Brexit. Since the UK left the European Union in 2020, the UK and the EU have been sparring over trade rules for Northern Ireland, the only part of the UK that shares a border with a member of the bloc.
Earlier, the flag-draped oak coffin was brought from St. Giles of Edinburgh on the bagpipes. Crowds lining the Royal Mile through Edinburgh’s historic center erupted in applause as the coffin, accompanied by the Queen’s daughter Princess Anne, was driven into Edinburgh Airport.
“I was lucky enough to share the last 24 hours of my dear mother’s life,” Princess Anne said in a statement. “It has been an honor and a privilege to accompany her on her final journeys. To witness the love and respect shown by so many on these journeys has been both humbling and uplifting.”