Secret the Queen could not share

Press, 30 July 1980, Page 10

Secret the Queen could not share

When doctors broke the news that her husband was dying of cancer, the Queen Mother’s reaction was characteristically selfless; no-one else must know — and certainly not the King himself. She lived alone with the tragic secret until the King finally died ... This is the last article in a threepart society GILLIAN FRANKS marking the 80th birthday of the Queen Mother on August 4. ?.

Only weeks later, she was back on parade, bidding good luck to the First Battalion of the Black Watch bound for the Korean War.

As part of her plan to reconstruct her life, the 52-year-old Queen Mother bought the gaunt Castle of Mey in her native Scotland. But if retirement was her aim, she was to be disappointed. Fresh crises in the Royal Family, needed all Elizabeth’s skill and experience. In the bleak winter of 1955, Princess Margaret decided to renounce the prospect of marrying her father’s divorced equerry, Group Captain Peter Townsend. Her mother had told her sorrowfully, but sternly, that it was her duty to end the romance.

The Queen Mother had been taught the unflinching path of duty by her husband and by Queen Mary.

Years later, the Queen Mother confided a

friend when discussing her attitude to the Townsend affair: “I couldn’t help it. I was brought up in the old school.”

Indeed, she has always faced facts with down-to-earth commonsense. When a few years ago, she was shown some birthday photographs which had been tactfully touched up to make her look younger, she declared: “They are ridiculous. Take them again and this time leave some lines in ”

The Queen Mother remained a figure of stability and reassurance when Princess Margaret again needed emotional sanctuary at the time of the breakdown of her marriage to Lord Snowdon. A friend said: “The Queen Mother gave what Margaret most needed then — compassion and love.”

One setback did deeply, affect the Queen Mother.

Last summer she was enjoying a picnic lunch near Balmoral when she was brought the news of the murder by the Irish Republican Army of Earl Mountbatten, and members of his family. To counteract her grief she embarked on a programme of engagements heavier than those of all her family except the Queen. Tactful attempts to make her take things a little easier were invariably greeted with the comment: “But you have chosen the one thing I really enjoy doing.” The Queen Mother is

patron of, or closely associated with, over 300 organisations and takes an active interest in all of them. She still sometimes works ten or 12 hours a day, beginning early in the morning and finishing at midnight As she approaches 80, her family suggested that maybe she could cut down on some of her less important engagements, like those associated with gardens and gardening. The Queen Mother replied sharply: “As I am the only member of the family who knows anything about gardening, I think I had better continue, don’t you?” According to a friend, the secret of the Queen Mother’s amazingly youthful vitality is simple: “She loves her job. Official engagements are a continuing pleasure for hen She genuinely, enjoys getting to know people.” “She’s a very tough and determined lady. She has always known where her duty lay and nothing has ever deflected her from doing it. “But unlike Queen Mary, she’s never been stem or severe. She has a wonder ful sense of humour which has helped her over the difficult times. And there have been many Of them.” The Queen Mother is not given to introspection, but she once commented: “Life is a great adventure, you know.” /. , And, she added with a twinkle: “It’s also great fun.”