Residents of Northern Ireland nursing home for ex-service people give their verdict on Queen’s funeral

I had the pleasure of Sheila’s company during the funeral, both of us in awe at the majesty of the occasion.

The 89-year-old, who was in the Ulster Defence Regiment for 10 years, said she was proud to have served Queen Elizabeth II.

“The Troubles were an awful time, but I look back at my time in the UDR with pride because we were saving lives,” she said.

Of the funeral she said: “It’s a magnificent spectacle.

“We’ll never see anything like this again – well, you might but I won’t.”

Sheila said she has been glued to television coverage of the Queen’s passing for more than a week, but that today’s funeral was by far the highlight.

She was in awe of the notes being hit by the young choirboys in Westminster Abbey though she wasn’t that fussed on the music being played on the organ as the Queen’s was carried out of the abbey – she felt it was too loud and jarred with the rest of the funeral proceedings.

But the procession more than made up for it, and Sheila, who lived in Canada for a time, particularly enjoyed seeing the Mounties on horseback.

The land where the Somme Nursing Home was built in 1994 is the site of the Ulster Volunteer Force hospital where casualties were cared for during the First World War. The care home’s residents are all ex-service people and their spouses.

Ken Morrice, who was in the RUC for 24 years, said: “The funeral was what I was expecting – the pomp and circumstance. She was a great lady who did a great service.

“The hymns might not have been my choice but it’s a family in mourning, they’ve chosen those hymns.

“I think there will be a sense of relief for everyone now the funeral is over.”

He added: “I was four when she took the throne, I’m 74 now. I remember being taken by my parents to see the Queen when she came here after her coronation (1953). We lived up at Mount Merrion, she came round the Rosetta Park area.”

Of King Charles III, Ken said: “I think he will be more than able to fill her shoes. I think he will be very well instructed, following his mother for such a long time.”

Ron Dowler, who is also 74, is a former RAF pilot. He felt the funeral lacked the personal touch: “It was a bit too military for me, too regimental. There was nothing personal at all.

“It’s been the same format for 80 years, it’s time they changed it a bit.”

Ron, who was in the air force for more than 30 years, considers himself lucky to be alive after a high speed crash.

He said: “I crashed on the May 1, 1984. I was doing an aerial display. I hit the ground at 280 miles an hour.

“Fortunately I survived that. I was unconscious for eight months and lost my memory of everything before that.”

Of the new King, Ron said: “I don’t think he’s going to be allowed to do what he wants. He’s going to have a very limited life.

“He likes to tell people what to do, they’ll want to watch that.”

Lady Moyra Moyola, wife of the late Lord Moyola, James Chicester-Clark, a former prime minister of Northern Ireland, watched the Queen’s funeral from her room in the Somme Nursing Home, recalling the days when she would have attended such occasions.

The 96-year-old particularly enjoyed watching the funeral procession: “It’s been such a spectacle. There’s no other country could do that.

“It’s extraordinary how the parade grew from quite a small beginning (at Westminster Abbey) to the size it is (along the Long Walk).”

Lady Moyola, whose father and grandfather were both Gurkhas, commented: “It amazes me that the men in the bearskin hats don’t walk into each other.

“Those bearskins come right down over their eyes. I always remember going to find my husband (an Irish Guard) on St Patrick’s Day at Windsor. I had to go round lifting these hats until I got the right man.”

Lady Moyola’s husband was a former UUP leader and PM of Northern Ireland from 1969 to 1971.

She recalled the Queen’s Silver Jubilee service which she attended with her husband in St Paul’s in 1977 when one of the guards fell over.

She said: “They were all pretty ancient. One of them, just a few feet in front of us suddenly keeled over – bang – he fell onto the floor. I thought, ‘I wonder what on earth they’re going to do now’.

“The arras, as they used to call them, the curtains, the tapestries that come down, hands appeared out from underneath that and they pulled him out backwards so all you could see was his boots disappearing behind the arras.”