DEAD ROYALTIES

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 79, Issue 278, 24 November 1936, Page 7

DEAD ROYALTIES

REBURIAL IN GREECE CROWDS PAY HOMAGE ATHENS, Nov. 22. Weeping crowds knelt in the streets as the coffins containing the bodies of Queen Sophia, King Constantine, and Queen Olgo borne on gun-carriages, followed by King George, statesmen, and Court officials, passed to the Cathedral and thence after the service to the King’s summer residence at Dekelia Tatoi, where they were reburied in the Royal cemetery. It is estimated that 1,000,000 people witnessed the lying-in-state since Tuesday. An Athens message on November 17 stated: Stirring scenes marked the return of the bodies of King Constantine, Queen Sophia, and Queen Olga on arrival at Salamis on the cruiser, which was greeted with the Royal salute of 21 guns. The bodies were transferred to a destroyer on which King George and members of the Royal Family, weeping, were taken to Piraeus, where they were met by clouds of incense rising from altars erected on the quayside, and from thence travelled to Athens by train. The coflins, on gun carriages, were drawn by sailors through the streets draped with mourning, packed with peasants, and are now lying in the Cathedral. They will be reburied with State honours on November 22. The remains of King Constantine of Greece and Queen Sofia and Queen Olga were exhumed from their vaults in the Russian Church at Florence, and are being reinterred on the Royal estate at Athens.