Page 22 - Grenadier Guards News Today

As day turned to evening on the day Elizabeth II died, King Charles was calmly fielding and making calls while responding to a growing list of requests for a decision. One of the most urgent was a simple one: when to press the start button for London Bridge? In the finest military traditions, thousands of pages of careful planning still needed an official start time, to be known as D or D-Day.

They sat in silence around the table in the darkened room, hands touching, faces uplifted in the flickering candlelight - the Queen, Prince Philip and the Queen Mother.

Brigadier James Stopford was in the middle of his father-of-the-bride speech when his mobile phone alerted him to the news from home and he quickly jumped on a plane

The only rehearsal for Elizabeth II’s funeral was a “comedy of errors” in which a band went missing, the buses did not turn up, and a Gentleman at Arms was nearly crushed after turning the wrong way at Marble Arch, it has emerged.

MAIL ON SUNDAY EXCLUSIVE: The monarchs bearer party is, by long tradition, drawn from Queens Company, Grenadier Guards, which always maintains a designated team.

EDEN CONFIDENTIAL: His has been a wonderful, often charmed and fascinating life during which hes befriended everyone from Sir Mick Jagger and David Hockney.

Actor says ‘tradition is never an excuse for cruelty’ as he joins Peta to demand pelts of Canadian black bears are switched to fake fur

They have been used by the Army for more than 200 years but Fry says "tradition is never an excuse for cruelty" .

The actor said it was cruel to continue using the pelts for British royal events and called for fake alternatives to be used instead.

Stephen Fry has warned that “tradition is never an excuse for cruelty” amid calls to end the use of real fur for the bearskins worn by the King’s Guard.