Ben Lowry: Huge crowds gather in Windsor to see monarch complete last leg of her final journey

It is a ruler straight driveway that runs through Windsor Great Park and all the way to the castle where Queen Elizabeth II was buried last evening.

Like the Prince of Wales Avenue that runs uphill to the front doors of Stormont in east Belfast, the final section of the Windsor route – the part along which the Queen’s hearse travelled – is a path of about a mile to the entry gates of the castle.

And as you can see the throng is 20 people deep, perhaps more, as it was for the entirety of the procession on the long walk – which if you do crude calculations based on the space that was filled suggests a total crowd of perhaps 100,000 mourners.

Since the Queen’s coffin left Balmoral on Sunday September 11 towards Edinburgh, there has been much talk of the long-reigning sovereign embarking on her final journey.

The journey to Windsor yesterday afternoon was the last leg of that journey, and people flocked to roadsides to witness it.

The 23-mile distance from Westminster Abbey through west London to Windsor was lined with people the whole way, a journey that has few modern precedents (the hearse carrying Diana, Princess of Wales from her own funeral at Westminster Abbey 25 years ago to her resting place at Althrop was an 80-mile journey).

At Windsor itself, that ancient heart of the modern royalty (the first fort was built by William the Conqueror within years of his 1066 Norman invasion), the public was streaming off trains for the occasion by 9am, a full seven hours before the committal service in St George’s chapel.

They walked past grand buildings, bedecked with Union Flags, to find a good vantage point to see this closing of a chapter in modern British history.

The Queen was reportedly not overly keen on living in her main residence, Buckingham Palace, and was known to have a fondness instead for her Balmoral estate in Scotland and also for Windsor Castle.

This is where in 2020 the monarch chose to spend lockdown, in isolation with her beloved Prince Philip.

The fire that broke out in the castle in 1992 was a key feature of what she referred to as her annus horriblis (her daughter Anne divorced that year, Prince Andrew and Sarah Ferguson separated, and there were ongoing revelations over the unhappy marriage of the then heir Prince Charles to Pricess Diana).

The fire was not only a traumatic episode in itself, it led to further discomfort for the Queen when a public outcry over the cost of the repairs resulted in a rare moment of unpopularity for the monarch, and triggered her decision to pay taxes voluntarily from which she was exempt.

There was not even a trace of that bruising time yesterday, when the outpouring of grief and affection that has been the hallmark of the days since her death on September 8 reached its climax at Windsor.

After the hearse had travelled through the castle gates, and up to the steps of the chapel, the bearing party lifted the Queen’s coffin up towards the committal service.

The chapel is not as well known as some of England’s great churches, like the cathedrals of St Paul’s and Westminster, but it is in the popular consciousness even so, due to the weddings of Harry and Meghan in 2018, and the funeral service for the Duke of Edinburgh in 2021.

While that latter service was almost empty due to Covid limits, yesterday the chapel had 800 guests.

It was a more intimate guest list than earlier at the abbey, where world leaders paid their respects, and the mourners included people who are unknown to the public but were close to the Queen.

Like the earlier service, it was deeply traditional, including choral works and well known hymns such as ‘All My Hope in God is Founded’ by Herbert Howells.

In a striking moment, the symbols of monarchy, the Imperial State Crown, orb and sceptre were removed from the coffin, a reversal of the late Queen’s crowning ceremony in 1953.

Later, at 7.30pm the Queen was being buried in a private family ceremony, moved the short distance alongside the remains of Prince Philip from the royal vault in Windsor to the memorial chapel, within St George’s.