Queen Elizabeth II has reigned over the UK and the Commonwealth for almost seven decades,
but it turns out what happens when she sheds this mortal coil has been planned out in detail
going all the way back to shortly after she ascended the throne in the 1950s, with the
Queen herself planning some of the elements.
As you might imagine, the whole affair includes an amazing amount of pomp and circumstance,
though this was not always the case, or at least not nearly to the extent we see today
in various Royal ceremonies.
For example, going back to the funeral of King George IV it is noted in the book Royalty
Inc: Britain's Best Known Brand, “Dozens of pickpockets arrived in Windsor
and lifted watches and money from sightseers who had turned up to see if any celebrities
were attending.
The funeral itself, hurried through in St. George's Chapel at nine o'clock in the evening,
was largely undignified.
The congregation crowded in, jostling for the best seats, and then chatted noisily among
themselves.
'We never saw so motley, so rude, so ill-managed a body of persons,' The Time's' correspondent
reported...
At least the undertakers were not drunk, as they had been at the funeral of George's daughter
and heir, the Princess Charlotte who died in childbirth in 1817.”
As for his successor, William IV's, coronation, “William only reluctantly agreed to have
a ceremonial coronation and the money spent on the occasion was less than a fifth of that
expended on his brother's behalf ten years earlier...
Among the other changes to royal protocols, the new King opened the terraces at Windsor
Castle and the nearby great park to the public access and reduced the fleet of royal yachts.
All this, his lack of pomposity and his visceral dislike of foreigners, particularly the French,
tended to endear him to the populace....
When William IV himself died in June 1837, there was also a private funeral at Windsor
and, if not quite as undignified as George's had been, it was a perfunctory affair.”
The ultra elaborate more public ceremonies now associated with the monarchy wouldn't
begin in earnest until the late 19th century, in part because of public protest over not
being included in many of these events.
For example, there was significant backlash over the fact that the 1858 wedding of Princess
Victoria and Prince Friedrich Wilhelm had not been more public.
As noted in a contemporary report by the Daily Telegraph at the time, the people lamented
the "growing system of reserving the exclusive enjoyment of State ceremonials and spectacles
for particular classes."
In 1867, British journalist Walter Bagehot would postulate of all of this, "The more
democratic we get, the more we shall get to like state and show, which have ever pleased
the vulgar."
That said, initial efforts to improve things were apparently somewhat lackluster.
For example, the eventual Marquess of Salisbury, Lord Robert Cecil, after watching Queen Victoria
open parliament in 1860, stated: “Some nations have a gift for ceremonial.
No poverty of means of absence of splendour inhibits them from making any pageant in which
they take part both real and impressive...
In England the case is exactly the reverse.
We can afford to be more splendid than most nations; but some malignant spell broods over
all our most solemn ceremonials, and inserts into them some feature which makes them all
ridiculous.”
Nevertheless, by the time of Queen Victoria's death things had started to improve somewhat,
though this particular funeral ceremony too was almost made "ridiculous".
You see, while pulling the cart containing the queen's coffin up a steep hill, a harness
on one of the horses snapped, with the result being two of the other horses rearing back
and bucking.
The result of all of that, in turn, was the Queen's coffin coming extremely close to being
ejected from the carriage.
Had it done so, it would have gone careening down the steep hill, possibly ejecting the
Queen's body at some point...
As for her successor, Edward VII, he would double down on improving public ceremonies,
essentially turning every opportunity for pageantry into an elaborate affair and including
the public as much as possible.
Notably, upon his death in 1910, he had his body placed in a coffin at Westminster Hall
with over 400,000 people reportedly coming to see it, helping to popularly bolster the
old practice of certain members of the monarchy lying-in-state in the UK.
This all now brings us to the exact plan for what happens when Queen Elizabeth II dies.
Code-named Operation London Bridge, meetings have been held a few times per year in the
over six decades since the plan was originally created in order to tweak it as needed with
the times, with the overarching plan going over every possible contingency the architects
can think of.
Beyond logistical plans by the government, in more recent times, British news outlets
have also had in place pre-planned obituaries, with some TV outlets rumored to occasionally
rehearse the broadcasts they will give to announce the Queen's death, right down to
what they'll wear.
If you're wondering- a whole lot of black, including black ties for the men, extras of
which are actually kept on hand at the BBC just in case needed on short notice.
This reportedly became a thing after Peter Sissons of the BBC inadvisably wore a red
tie when announcing the Queen Mother's death.
Certain members of the general public did not react kindly to this.
(And if you're curious- see How Did the Practice of Do Wearing Black for Mourning Start?)
Moving back to the official side of things, to begin with, first, immediately upon her
death the Queen's private secretary, Edward Young, will send a coded message to the Prime
Minister, with the message originally "London Bridge is down".
However, given the whole point here of using such a coded message is to help reduce the
chance of premature leaks of the news of the Queen's death, it's possible the exact coded
phrase has been changed since that one was discovered.
(If you're curious, when King George VI died, the code was "Hyde Park Corner" and for the
death of the Queen Mother "Operation Tay Bridge" was used.)
From there various entities, such as the media, will be officially notified and the Radio
Alert Transmission System (RATS) will be activated announcing the death to the public.
That said, it's likely given social media is a thing that the news will leak much quicker
that way to the wider public.
This all essentially kicks off a 12 day sequence of events, outlined in the plan as D-day (the
day of the Queen's death), D+1, D+2, etc.
(Interestingly this is also exactly the reason the famed military operation now commonly
known as D-Day is called such- just standing for "Designated day", allowing for ease of
coordinating a sequence of events when the actual start date is unknown, or in some cases
where there is a desire for it to be kept as secret as possible.)
Perhaps the most noteworthy thing of all that will occur on D-day, beside the Queen's death,
is Prince Charles will assume the position of King, even though actually being sworn
in as King will not take place until the following morning.
As for the coronation ceremony, this can potentially take many months to finally take place.
For example, Queen Elizabeth II's own coronation after the death of King George VI on February
6, 1952, did not take place until almost a year and a half later, on June 2, 1953.
In this case, the decision to wait this lengthy period was made by Winston Churchill.
That said, there is some speculation that Charles' coronation will be relatively swift
in comparison in order to forestall any momentum building in public sentiment that may push
for an abolishment of the monarchy, especially given the relatively lesser popularity of
Prince Charles compared to the almost universally loved Queen he is replacing.
To help further forestall such from happening, steps have been actively taken in recent years
to try to bolster Charles' profile among his subjects.
It should also be noted here that Prince Charles may choose to not become known as "King Charles
III", as he is free to choose any of the names from his full name of Charles Philip Arthur
George.
From this, there is some speculation that he may wish to honor his grandfather King
George by taking the name King George VII or he may go with King Philip after his own
father.
In any event, after Charles takes the oath the day after the Queen's death, Parliament
will be called to session that same day (the evening following King Charles' oath) to swear
allegiance to him.
Likewise, police and military forces under his rule will also be called wherever they
are to swear their allegiance to their new King.
Also on that evening, the new King will address the nation for the first time in that role.
In her own such broadcast, Queen Elizabeth, among other things, swore "I declare before
you all that my whole life whether it be long or short shall be devoted to your service
and the service of our great imperial family to which we all belong."
This is a good thing as we've previously noted the monarch of the UK is for all intents and
purposes above the law in virtually every nation in the world, not just their own, for
reasons we describe in our article on whether the Queen could legally get away with murder.
On top of that, from a legal standpoint, their power in their own little empire is almost
absolute for a variety of reasons, though of course, Queen Elizabeth II at least has
very rarely used any of this authority.
But given this, as you might expect it's quite important that the person made monarch in
Britain is mentally stable and trustworthy as it would take a literal revolution or rebellion
to take such powers away from that person from a legal standpoint, assuming said British
monarch did not wish to have those powers taken.
This would also place the military, police, Parliament and others in the awkward position
of having to very publicly break their sworn oaths to said monarch to take their powers
away against their will.
Going back to the Queen, what exactly happens to her body directly after her death will
depend on where she is at the time, with Operation London Bridge attempting to plan for any contingencies.
For example, should she die in her frequent summer home at Balmoral Castle in Scotland
a special Scottish ceremony is planned before her body will be sent back to London.
In this case, along with appropriate preservation being done, her body will be placed in Holyroodhouse
in Edinburgh for a short time, and then her coffin carried to St. Giles's Cathedral where
a service will be held.
After this, the coffin will be put aboard the Royal Train at Edinburgh Waverley railway
station and then will make its way down to London where it will be ultimately placed
in Buckingham Palace.
Given mourners will likely throw flowers and other things at the train as it passes, plans
are in place to have another train follow behind shortly thereafter to clear the tracks
as needed before the tracks are put back in general use.
On the other hand, should she die abroad, a jet from the No. 32 Royal Squadron will
be dispatched with the Queen's coffin to collect her body.
(And if you're wondering, yes, such a coffin is already made and waiting in case of a Royal's
death- called the "first call coffin", kept by the Leverton & Sons royal undertakers for
when it's needed.)
Wherever it's coming from, the Queen's body will, as alluded to, make its way to the Throne
Room of Buckingham Palace and be held there for at time.
Four days after her death, her coffin will be placed in Westminster Hall, available for
public viewing almost 24 hours a day for four days.
Given approximately 200,000 people went to view the Queen Mother's coffin in 2002, it's
expected the number going to view Queen Elizabeth's coffin will be vastly more than this.
Finally, the night before the funeral takes place, special church services will be held
across the UK to commemorate the death of the head of the Church of England.
The funeral will then take place the following day, with said day being deemed a national
holiday.
On that day, the coffin will be carried from Westminster Hall to Westminster Abbey where
approximately 2,000 guests will be invited into the Abbey to witness the funeral directly,
with the service conducted by the Archbishop of Canterbury.
After that ceremony is over, the the Queen will likely be laid to rest in St George's
Chapel at Windsor Castle.
Finally, at some yet undetermined point after the mourning period, the coronation of the
new King will take place, which will also be a national holiday.
As for other logistics, with the change to the new King, various official things like
certain physical money, stamps, etc. will switch from Queen Elizabeth's visage to the
King's, and an awful lot of official documents and the like that formerly said "her" and
"Queen" will be switched to "him" and "King", such as the national anthem having the words
slightly altered to "God Save
the King".
Speaking of pomp and circumstance, if you’re wanting to look dapper at certain events,
Mack Weldon!!!
Bonus Fact: Along with being the only person in the UK
to not need a passport when traveling abroad, the Queen similarly doesn’t need a driver's
license to drive either.
This is because, like passports, driver's licenses are issued in her name.
So she's allowed to simply vouch for her own driving ability in person should she ever
be pulled over.
Now, you’d think given her status and wealth, the Queen would never drive anyway, but you’d
be wrong, though she did a few months back voluntarily cease driving on public roads
at the urging of her security team who worried about the elderly Queen's safety in driving
on public roads at her age.
But before that, it turns out the Queen loved driving and cars.
In fact, during WW2 the Queen (then a princess) badgered her father to let her do her part
for her country and subsequently ended up serving as a mechanic and driver with the
Women’s Auxiliary Territorial Service at the tender age of 18.
(She’d actually registered to serve at age 16 but King George wouldn’t allow it).
The Queen took her position incredibly seriously, becoming, by all accounts, a competent mechanic
and driver, trained to fix and drive a host of military and suburban vehicles.
Fast-forwarding a bit through history, a humourous story about the Queen's driving prowess comes
from 1998 when she was visited at her estate in Balmoral, Scotland by the then Crown Prince
of Saudi Arabia, Abdullah bin Abdulaziz Al Saud.
The story was later revealed to the world by one-time Saudi ambassador Sherard Cowper-Cole.
Knowing Abdullah’s stance on the rights of women and the fact that women are essentially
banned from driving in Saudi Arabia (there’s technically no law that says women can’t
drive, but licenses are only issued to men), the Queen, demonstrating quintessential British
passive aggressiveness, offered the Prince a tour of her palace grounds.
Dutifully, the Prince agreed and the pair headed outside where a large Land Rover bearing
the Royal insignia was parked.
After waiting for the Prince to climb into the passenger seat where he no doubt assumed
a chauffeur would drive the pair around, the Queen then nonchalantly climbed into the driver’s
seat and proceeded to drive the car, much to the Prince’s astonishment.
According to ambassador Sherard, the Prince was extremely nervous about this arrangement
from the start.
Things didn't get better for him.
The then 72 year old Queen, knowing that Abdullah had never been driven by a woman before and
no doubt observing his anxiety, decided to mess with him by purposely driving as fast
as possible on "the narrow Scottish estate roads".
As she sped along at break-neck speeds, the Crown Prince screamed at the Queen through
his interpreter to slow down and pay closer attention to her driving.
The Queen, ignoring his admonishments completely, continued pleasantly chatting away as if she
wasn't doing her best Fast and the Furious impression.
We can only imagine Abdullah's reaction if the Queen had mentioned to him that she never
got her driver's license...