- The chapel was bombed so that they had to make use of the Music Room on the Palace
- Princess Margaret had joked to pals that she was now ‘Charley’s Aunt’
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The future King Charles III was baptised Charles Philip Arthur George at Buckingham Palace on Wednesday December 15, 1948.
Buckingham Palace launched the infant’s names the earlier night and there was a lot remark within the newspapers concerning the uncommon selection of Charles as first title.
One of the infant’s godparents – Haakon VII, King of Norway had been born Prince Charles of Denmark – and it additionally little question appealed to the alpha male Prince Philip that Charles is previous English for a ‘free man’ in addition to French for ‘manly.’
(Aptly for each males, Philip is Greek for ‘horse-loving’)
The Royal Family pose for {a photograph} after the christening of Princess Elizabeth’s child son, Charles. The child’s grandfather, King George VI and nice grandmother, Queen Mary are current
The beginning certificates of Prince Charles, the Prince of Wales.
The King and Queen survey bomb harm, Buckingham Palace, London, WWII, 1940. King George VI and Queen Elizabeth wanting on the aftermath of a German bombing raid on 11 September 1940 which destroyed the palace chapel
Marion Crawford, often known as Crawfie, who was Princess Elizabeth and Princess Margaret’s nanny
Newspapers additionally identified that the long run king wouldn’t essentially reign as King Charles III, since his grandfather, George VI, had been born Prince Albert of York and King Edward VII had additionally been baptised Albert Edward.
Philip had registered his four-week-old son’s beginning on the morning of the christening. Mr John Stanley Clare, Registrar of Births at Caxton Hall, Westminster, travelled to the palace to enter the small print. He was accompanied by two girls officers from the Ministry of Food who handed the Duke and Princess Elizabeth a baby’s inexperienced ration guide.
The ceremony was held within the Music Room overlooking the palace gardens. The palace chapel, the place royal christenings, as much as and together with that of Princess Alexandra in 1937, have been usually held, had been destroyed by the Luftwaffe through the Blitz.
Marion Crawford, Elizabeth’s former governess, recalled ‘about thirty chairs were set out in rows as if in a chapel’.
She additionally observed the silver-gilt Lily Font had been despatched from Windsor Castle and ‘was decorated with white carnations and gardenias.’
The Music Room was later used for different royal baptisms together with these of Princess Anne’s son Peter Phillips and of Prince William who was christened there on the Queen Mother’s 82 birthday – 4 August 1982.
The royal social gathering sat on the entrance row. The child had eight ‘sponsors’ as godparents of royal infants have been termed.
They have been all royal relations: King George VI, (grandfather), Princess Margaret (aunt), Queen Mary (nice grandmother), the Dowager Marchioness of Milford Haven (Prince Philip’s grandmother), Lady Brabourne (Philip’s first cousin, later Countess Mountbatten of Burma, and the Hon David Bowes Lyon (the Queen Mother’s youthful brother).
Baby Charles had his first encounter with the British press on the photograph name within the White Drawing Room the place photographs and information reel footage documented the christening. Back row from the left: Patricia Knatchbull, Baroness Brabourne; Prince Philip; King George VI; David Bowes Lyon; Alexander Cambridge, 1st Earl of Athlone; Princess Margaret. Front row from the left: Princess Victoria of Hesse and by Rhine (additionally Marchioness of Milford Haven and Prince Philip’s grandmother); Princess Elizabeth with child Charles; Queen Mary
Queen Mary the Queen Mother holds her nice grandson Prince Charles after his christening at Buckingham Palace
The centre pages of the Daily Graphic have a good time the Christening
Prince Philip represented one other godparent, his uncle Prince George of Greece, and Queen Mary’s brother, the Earl of Athlone, stood in for the King of Norway.
Princess Margaret – who had jokingly advised pals that she was now ‘Charley’s Aunt’ – carried her nephew into the room and handing him to the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Geoffrey Fisher, whereas on the identical time asserting the names.
To Crawfie’s concern, the Archbishop ‘took the baby in the crook of his arm’ which she thought unsafe ‘as if the slightest movement would dislodge’ him.
Charles, she recalled ‘lay quiet as a mouse’ because the cleric ‘poured three very ample shellfulls of water over the baby’s head.’
Music was offered ten choristers from the Chapels Royal accompanied by their organist enjoying the French grand piano.
The small congregation and choir sand two hymns chosen by Princess Elizabeth: ‘Holy, Holy Holy’ and ‘O Worship The King.’
Crawfie was ‘a little concerned about Princess Elizabeth. She did not look very well. She was wearing a cherry-coloured coat and hat, but she seemed to me to be a little tired.’
It had clearly taken her some time to recuperate from the beginning and the night earlier than she was a notable absentee from the palace employees Christmas dance attended by her mom and sister within the state flats.
Elizabeth should even have been anxious about her father’s declining well being. King George had been identified with arteriosclerosis and was affected by cramps in his legs and ft.
His docs feared his poor circulation might result in gangrene and a attainable amputation.
Crawfie stated she was was ‘a little concerned about Princess Elizabeth. She did not look very well. She was wearing a cherry-coloured coat and hat, but she seemed to me to be a little tired.’ It had clearly taken her some time to recuperate from the beginning
Irene Podd placing the ending touches to the cake for the christening of Prince Charles, on the McVitie and Price works in Harlesden, London
Dr Geoffrey Fisher, the Archbishop of Canterbury in a 1954 portrait
Queen Elizabeth II (proper) is topped by Archbishop of Canterbury Dr Geoffrey Fisher
He rested his ft on a footstool through the half hour service however insisted on standing for the images.
Baby Charles had his first encounter with the British press on the photograph name within the White Drawing Room the place photographs and information reel footage documented the christening.
Such was the curiosity throughout the Atlantic for photos of the occasion that American media organisations chartered a 43-seater BOAC air liner at a price of £10,000, paid in {dollars}, to move the one-pound package deal of photographs to New York to catch the early editions of the night papers.