The queen’s discreet goodbye: Elizabeth II ‘slipped away’ painlessly in her sleep

Some news is so predictable that is can prove comforting rather than surprising. Many Britons sensed that the death of Queen Elizabeth II, on September 8, 2022, was as discreet and reserved as her seventy-year reign. " Very peaceful. In her sleep. Slipped away. Old age. She wouldn’t have been aware of anything. No pain,” wrote the monarch’s private secretary, Sir Edward Young, in a diary that is now part of the Royal Archives.

The text has been exclusively revealed by Robert Hardman, the Daily Mail’s royal correspondent and one of the few authors specialized in the British royal family who can be taken seriously, for the knowledge and rigor he has demonstrated over three decades. Hardman is a regular on every program the BBC dedicates to events and ceremonies surrounding the House of Windsor, and on January 18 will publish a book titled Charles III: New King, New Court. The Inside Story, an unauthorized biography of the king and an account of the first year of the new Carolingian era. The text includes the account of Elizabeth II’s death at Balmoral Castle in Scotland and the hours that followed. Some excerpts have already been published by the Daily Mail.

The book recounts how shortly after the Queen’s death, someone in her service handed over a red leather box (the dispatch boxes where official documents relating to the government or the British monarchy are deposited) found at the foot of the bed. It contained two letters. One to her son and heir, Charles, and another to her secretary, Sir Edward. The contents of neither letter are known, but their existence confirms that Elizabeth II was aware that she was entering her final hours. The box also contained the list of candidates for the Order of Merit for “exceptionally meritorious service” to the Commonwealth, the community of nations that emerged from the demise of the British Empire and to which the monarch devoted much of her reign.

“Even on her deathbed, there was work to be done. And do it she did,” writes a clearly devoted Hardman of the woman who defined post-World War II Britain.

Charles: “It’s me”

The book also contains details about the hours leading up to the mammoth operation, designed and rehearsed for years and christened Operation London Bridge, for the moment when Elizabeth II died. Charles had to hastily read the fragment of the plan that referred to his part in the protocol while in a helicopter transporting him to Balmoral. The death of the Queen, despite her deteriorating health at 96, was something so inconceivable that it was inevitably going to catch the world by surprise. Charles and his wife, Camilla, had spent an hour with the queen before leaving the castle. The news caught the future king picking mushrooms at his private residence.

Calling his son, Prince William, through the palace switchboard, Charles was unsure how to identify himself. Constitutionally, he was already the new king, but he could not yet announce it. “It’s me,” he told the operator, so that he would be put through to his first-born son. Prince Harry could not be reached, as he was flying from the United States to the U.K. on a commercial flight. Charles had spoken to him days before, asking him to travel to Balmoral. It was clear to all the royal family that they had to say goodbye personally to the person around whom their lives had revolved.

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