Visit of the King and Queen

Autumn 1915

Two long lines of chairs were arranged upon the lawn, beside the drive. Upon these were seated our folk in blue - first the exchanged prisoners from Germany, then the men from France and Flanders, then the Australasians, and finally the soldiers who have returned from the Dardanelles. The ranks of colour were vivid; whoever invented hospital blues, and added the finishing touch of the bright red scarf, must have planned for such a day of sunshine as this, and must have foreseen emerald green turf as a setting, with a foil of fine grey stone towering skyward.

Their Majesties' visit was as nearly a 'surprise' one as can be reasonably practicable. Except for the lining-up of the wearers-of-blue, no preparations had been made. Everywhere, in corridors and wards, the sisters, nurses, and orderlies went about their duties as usual. Only in the foreground of the Hospital were there any signs of expectation. "They are coming at eleven"; this was all we had been told. And sure enough, exactly at the hour, the great gates swung open, and a dark maroon-coloured car came gliding silently up the drive. The proverbial punctuality of Royalty was never better illustrated. As the King and Queen alighted, the school clock was striking. We, of the onlookers, saw the Royal party enter the building. There were introductions. Then they emerged and came down the drive to the extreme end of the blue ranks. And now began that always wonderful exhibition of the pains which royalty take over the task of personal interviewing. Slowly, very slowly, the King and Queen, accompanied by our C.O., the Matrons, and Sir Alfred Pearce Gould, advanced along the line, stopping to chat with the men who had fought and suffered capture and imprisonment. "Where were you wounded?" "What camp were you taken to?" "How did the Germans treat you?" "What is your regiment?" One heard the stream of questions, the shy replies, the pleasant encouragement; one noticed, too, the shrewd rapidity with which both the King and the Queen fastened on any point of unusual interest or understood some halting or obscure explanation.

One speaks of the King and Queen taking pains, on such an occasion. To a sympathetic onlooker it seems an obvious phrase, inasmuch as it is evident that Their Majesties must have many such functions to attend, and might justifiably tire of them. Yet the closest observer could not detect any artificiality, anything merely mechanical, in that lingering promenade down the Hospital front. The King and Queen did not hurry; they always had time for a talk and a jest. One watched their easy, good-natured progress, and the adjective 'painstaking' began to appear ungracious and unfair. For, indeed, the scene had its poignant undercurrent of emotion. The King and Queen stood for what those men in blue had defended; they were living symbols of the cause and country for which countless agonies had been endured and countless un-named deeds of gallantry performed. Scattered throughout the throng were men on crutches, men who will never walk again without aid; others had only one arm or only one eye; not Britishers only, but men from Australia, New Zealand, Canada, even dark-skinned men from India - all wounded for the sake of the mysterious something embodied in this lady and gentleman who, today, had come to converse with them; the something which we call the homeland and the Empire.

'Painstaking'? No, it was not quite the right adjective. Noblesse oblige. The King and Queen had come down to Wandsworth, really, to say just two words to each of those blue-clad men. And the words are, "Thank you."