Day of mourning in P.E.I. marks funeral for Queen Elizabeth II
CHARLOTTETOWN, P.E.I. — Shortly after Diana, Princess of Wales died in 1997, Lindsay Gallant visited London. She noticed the tributes to Diana, together with tons of of bouquets of flowers.
So, when the Queen died final week on Sept. 8, Gallant needed to do one thing to mark the event. The evening of her demise, Gallant introduced sunflowers to Fanningbank, the residence for the Queen’s consultant in P.E.I.
And the following week, when a e book of condolence was arrange at Fanningbank for the general public to signal, Gallant returned along with her two kids, Arden and Jack. The household needed to specific their respect indirectly, Gallant advised SaltWire in a Sept. 16 interview outdoors the residence.
“We thought, ‘Nicely, we have to go to Authorities Home, then, and produce the flowers. So, all of us got here as a household that evening after supper. Simply appeared a becoming method for our household to mark the event.”
Gallant was stunned, and but not stunned, when she heard in regards to the Queen’s demise.
“I believe we had been all hoping she would make it to 100,” she mentioned.
With P.E.I. declaring a statutory vacation for the day of mourning on Monday, Sept. 19, Gallant and her children deliberate to take the time to observe the televised state funeral.
“It appears like we’re actually witnessing historical past being made, and we’ve studied a good quantity of British historical past as a household and Canadian historical past,” Gallant mentioned, noting she homeschools her children and has been taking the accession as a chance to teach and be taught with them.
A part of historical past
Velda Paynter, an Island lady now residing in Ontario, is aware of about being part of royal historical past in P.E.I. Paynter was six years previous when the Queen made her final go to to P.E.I. in 1973, and Paynter obtained the chance to current flowers to the Queen, she mentioned in a Sept. 16 SaltWire interview.
Paynter was truly on the way in which dwelling from a three-year hospital keep for polio, when certainly one of her medical doctors requested her to offer the flowers, she mentioned.
Being so younger and simply returning to well being on the time, Paynter doesn’t keep in mind a lot of the assembly as we speak. Her late mom, although, a lifelong royal watcher, has crammed her in on particulars over time, she mentioned.
“I wore a yellow gown, and the Queen ended up being wearing yellow as properly.”
This newspaper reported on the Queen’s go to in 1973 and truly talked about Paynter, she mentioned.
“I wasn’t supposed to talk to the Prince (Philip). … And I walked over to him, and I had a little bit chat with him, and (The Guardian) mentioned, their remark was, they needed to coach me off the platform, as a result of I used to be so taken up with the Prince.”
That 1973 story included a photograph of Paynter, which her niece submitted to SaltWire on Sept. 15.
“I wore a yellow gown, and the Queen ended up being wearing yellow as properly.”
— Velda Paynter
Paynter’s mom, too, was very pleased with that image, Paynter mentioned.
“Each time somebody would come to the home … she needed to take that image out and present all people, ‘That is my daughter. She handed the flowers to the Queen.’”
Helen MacDonald has pictures from her instances assembly the Queen, too.
The Charlottetown resident was engaged — and later married — to the lieutenant-governor’s son when the Queen visited in 1959. As somebody who married right into a outstanding political household, MacDonald attended balls yearly. That’s the place she met the Queen in 1959 and once more in 1973, she mentioned in a Sept. 16 SaltWire interview.
“They had been simply extraordinarily beneficiant with invitations. You did not have to belong to a sure society or something. Typically it might be a 4-H Membership that might be invited.”
Like Gallant, MacDonald deliberate on watching the funeral on Monday, she mentioned.
“I can be listening to the early broadcast, like at 6:30 (a.m.) I believe it’s.”
Logan MacLean is a reporter with SaltWire Community in Charlottetown.
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