The dutiful Queen joined forces with her family to commemorate Commonwealth Day, but her poorly husband was definitely on her mind as she chose a brooch she wore on their honeymoon.
With Prince Philip recuperating in hospital after heart surgery, the monarch paid the poignant tribute in a BBC programme being screened at 5 pm today ahead of tomorrow’s Day.
It’s being described as a display of solidarity by senior members of the Royal Family, with Charles, Camilla, Kate, William and Sophie taking part, where they will showcase their life of public service, in contrast to the life Prince Harry and Meghan have chosen for themselves in California.
Late tonight, Harry and Meghan’s controversial interview with Oprah Winfrey will be shown in the US before ITV airs it at 9 pm tomorrow.
But the Queen seems to be brushing off any concerns about what her grandson and his wife may say by concentrating on the Duke of Edinburgh.
Her chrysanthemum brooch, made from sapphires and diamonds set in platinum, was seen on their honeymoon at Broadlands, Hants, in 1947. The Queen wore it again to mark their 60th and 73rd wedding anniversaries in 2007 and last November.
This time she matched it with a delphinium blue dress and jacket of silk and wool cloque by Angela Kelly.
Her Majesty, 94, was filmed against a backdrop of Commonwealth flags in St George’s Hall at Windsor Castle for the BBC show called A Celebration For Commonwealth Day.
It was recorded to replace the usual Commonwealth Day service at Westminster Abbey, which was cancelled because of COVID restrictions.
The annual service, the last royal appointment attended by Prince Harry and Meghan in March last year, is one of the most important in the royal calendar, highlighting the Queen’s dedication to the Commonwealth.
The association of 54 essentially former British Empire nations which has a combined population of 2.4 billion, and the Queen, as its head, hopes it will be her lasting legacy.
She’d given Harry and Meghan special responsibility to be her ambassadors, connecting and representing the 60 per cent of Commonwealth inhabitants who are aged under 30.
This year the Queen’s address will be an audio recording that has been embargoed until the programme airs.
Prince Charles has recorded a message in Westminster Abbey, in which he discusses the universal devastation caused by COVID.
He will say that the coronavirus pandemic has affected every country in the Commonwealth, viciously robbing innumerable people of their lives and livelihoods, disrupting our societies and denying us the human connections which we so greatly cherish.
As for Harry, he came from a fractured family and it destroyed him, and there’s no way he will do that to his own family, and all this turmoil directed at his wife will just make them stronger.
Harry isn’t a bad person, and whatever he wants to do is none of our business, and he and Meghan are the ones suffering from all the cruel comments. No family is perfect, and it’s even worse if you’re in the public eye because the public can be just as critical as the media.
And the Queen will carry on as usual, and rightly so, she has her husband to worry about, and the Royal Family, in general, have endured considerably bigger storms than this.
Harry and Meghan wanted financial independence, but there was a right way to go about it and a wrong way. Harry needs to remember that this isn’t just his former employer he’s upset, it’s his grandmother, and many people if they did similar would find it hard looking in their family’s eye after that.
Meghan might be able to hide forever in the US, but Harry will have to come back for visits at some point, and this is a car crash in the making, but the Royal Family will be just fine after it, they always are.
