100 Years Ago

HM Queen Elizabeth II, 1926 -2022

It was with great sadness that we learned of the death of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II on 8th September 2022. At School, we commemorated her life through school assemblies and by opening a book of condolence. Here are some of the very many entries.

Her majesty dedicated over 70 years to the people of this country and the Commonwealth. Her death marks the end of a significant period of history which has given us an important opportunity to reflect on both her life and the changes this country and the world have seen since she became Queen in 1952.

We reflect on her life of service and the inspirational example of commitment and dedication that she provided to us all. May she rest in peace.

Margaret Carey (Central High, Class of 1952) Margaret writes of her memories from school days on the news of King George VI’s death in 1952.

Mid-afternoon on Thursday 8th September when the news broke of the death of our Queen, I expect almost everyone was immediately reminded of some event in her life, and for those people who had had the honour of actually meeting her – they would be remembering that occasion. My own thoughts went back to that day in February 1952 when we heard that her father, King George VI, had died.

I was in Upper Sixth at Central High, my final year, and we prefects were summoned to Miss Belton’s office. She told us that since there was a flagpole on the library roof she planned to fly a flag to mark the death of the King. She wanted some fairly athletic prefects to do this, so of course I was one of those willing volunteers. Access to the library roof was via one of the classrooms on the first floor – the one in the southwest corner with its main windows overlooking Eskdale Terrace and the RGS. This room also had a large sash window facing south, looking over the library and playground towards Hiley House.

Pushing up the bottom part of the window we climbed out on to the library roof to the flagpole. Miss Belton had checked the etiquette for flags – since the flag was not already flying, we had to raise it to full mast first and then lower to half-mast! To quote 007- ‘not a lot of people know that!’ – that’s a useless piece of knowledge which has been in my brain for 70 years.

On Proclamation Day, when the Queen was proclaimed our new monarch, we had to climb out and raise the flag to full mast then the following day, climb out again and bring it back down to half-mast. Finally, the day after the King’s funeral we climbed out once more to remove the flag. (I often wonder if it ever flew again?)

I was glad to learn from Mr Tippett that the new school does not have a flagpole, so at least he would not have Health and Safety breathing down his neck – they did not exist in 1952!