‘End of an era’ is a threadbare phrase worn thin by sports stars, passing fads and biscuits. But the death of Queen Elizabeth II after 70 years and 215 days on the throne is an event worthy to be called the end of an era.
The length of Elizabeth’s reign alone makes it significant, outstripping as it does any other British monarch and sweeping up so many historic moments. The first British Prime Minister she met with as Queen was Winston Churchill, who was born in 1874 and fought in the second Boer War while the last was Liz Truss, born in 1975 and who as Foreign Secretary has been wrestling with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Elizabeth II was queen as the Berlin Wall went up and came down. Her coronation was a pivotal moment for the new medium of television (the first time a TV audience outnumbered a radio audience in Britain) and her death was announced on Twitter.
She came to power in a golden moment, her coronation happening the day it was revealed Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay had become the first humans to stand on top of Mt Everest, the world’s tallest mountain. It was seized upon as a great omen for a second Elizabethan age. A sense that the British Empire was not yet done and that its far-flung members, represented by Hillary and Norgay, could help keep it alive.
In truth the sun had already almost set on the British Empire that at her birth included an estimated 600m people; managing the Crown’s role in a post-Empire age was one of her greatest challenges. She was queen of 32 countries through her reign, but that had shrunk to 15 at the time of her death this week. As a Christian she was in the majority at her coronation, but died a member of a much smaller minority faith.
Yet through all this monumental change, Elizabeth has earned a reputation for stability, duty and, above all, service.
Her death is a memorable moment, not because it is a shock or tragedy, but because of the sense that with her passing so much she and her generation stood for goes with her. Or has already gone.
The grief around the world in the past day has been more reflective than painful. It is a above all a shared moment not of shock, but of admiration.
Because at the end of this Elizabethan era it is what this pocket of human history stood for at its best – and those values that the Queen embodied – that we grieve more than an individual life, however well and nobly lived.
For me, the emotion since the Queen’s death has stemmed from her gritty and consistent devotion to service. It is a word little used or respected these days, but it sums up Queen Elizabeth at her best. She seemed to understand that it – not celebrity or wealth or power – lay at the heart of her role, something many of her wider family have failed to comprehend.
While she had the privilege few others have to enable that service, her commitment to that cause is an example to us all.
And that’s another seldom used word that King Charles III used in his impressive debut speech as king. Example. He spoke of his mama’s example to him and the world, of how she put the needs of others and her duties as monarch ahead of her own needs.
The stability that the Queen embodied often seemed quaint or boring, but in these days when democracy, free speech and steady transitions of governments look less secure than they have in my lifetime, we must learn to value them again. To heed her example.
These are values grounded in another century, handed down from times often looked back on in the worst possible light. But if we are to take anything of the Queen with us into the next era, wherever it may lead, that commitment to service and living a life as an example to others, would be for the good of us all.
In the remarkable speech she gave on her 21st birthday in 1947, the then-heir to the throne said:
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.
As Queen, she was as good as her word. Her service can be seen in the many millions raised by royal charities, by her constitutional care, her choices when to speak and when to be silent, her respect for cultural and religious diversity and her ability to bend to new social norms without breaking.
She committed in that speech to making the Commonwealth “more free, more prosperous, more happy and a more powerful influence for good in the world”. Those were noble goals then and still are today. She said to accomplish these things would take “nothing less than the whole of ourselves”. And it is that character and commitment that I think we grieve more than anything else today.
Charles’ speech promised a continuation of this commitment to service and I suspect, as I always have, that he will be a better monarch than many expect.
But in the coming days we are left to reflect on a rare life, in which nothing less than the whole of it was given over to service. That is an example all of us can treasure and take on in our own lives.