From the archives: How Queen Elizabeth II celebrated her 21st birthday morning in Cape Town in 1947
A look from the Cape Argus archives: Ahead of the State Funeral Service of Queen Elizabeth II, which is expected to be one of the biggest gatherings of royalty and politicians hosted in the UK for decades, the Cape Argus retrieved articles from the archives detailing the visit of the royal family back in 1947.
The article below was published on the front page of the Cape Argus, dated Cape Town, Monday, April 21, 1947.
(Note: The author of the original article is only referred to as “The Argus Special Correspondent” on the article.)
Princess Elizabeth Celebrates Her Majority
FLOWERS, PRESENTS AND SHOWER OF MESSAGES
The Argus Special Correspondent
PRINCESS ELIZABETH spent a great part of this, her 21st birthday morning, opening and reading the hundreds of congratulatory cables and telegrams which descended upon Government House from all parts of the world.
From princes and statesmen they came, and from less exalted people, down to the station masters of the humblest of the hundred and one little towns visited by the Royal Family on their great and just completed African tour.
Between while, the Princess left her study to marvel at the wealth and variety of Cape flowers which rapidly transformed most of the public and private rooms at Government House into fairylands of sweet-smelling colour.
The personal gifts from the King, the Queen and Princess Margaret were presented to Princess Elizabeth in the Queen’s room before breakfast. The nature of these gifts is, by custom, not made public.
It can be revealed, however, that the Royal Household, which term embraces all those who work for the King and Queen together with the staff of the Duke and Duchess of Gloucester, the Duchess of Kent and the Princess Royal – in fact, all those who serve members of the Royal Family at all the royal residents, down to the under-valets and the gillies at Balmoral - combined to give the Heiress Presumptive a birthday present.
This took the shape of a magnificent diamond brooch, which was handed to the Princess to-day by the two senior members of the household - the Right Hon. Sir Alan Lascelles KCB KCVO CMG, private secretary to the King, and the Lady Harlech, one of the ladies-in-waiting to the Queen.
GRENADIER GUARDS
Another gift was a diamond brooch in the shape of the Grenadier Guards badge - a grenade from the regiment of which Princess Elizabeth is honorary colonel.
Members of the Diplomatic Corps of London gave her a pair of diamond earrings.
The Union Government’s gifts of 21 perfectly-matched diamonds for a birthday necklace will be made by the Prime Minister, General Smuts, at tonight’s ball at the Government House.
MR CHURCHILL
Interviewed by a representative of The Argus to-day: Captain Lewis Ritchie, the King’s Press secretary. Said that “everybody in the world” dispatched cables and telegrams of congratulations to the Princess.
He mentioned the names among others, of Mr Winston Churchill and of the Viceroy of India, the Governors-General of Australia and Canada, the Governor of Northern Ireland, the Archbishops of Canterbury and York and the Lord Mayors of all the principal cities in the United Kingdom.
A great flood of telegrams came from all parts of the Union, and the Rhodesias and they included messages from the mayors and station-staffs of practically all the towns and villages visited on the recent tour, from ex-servicemen’s organisations, post offices and the masters of the merchant ships now in Union ports.
“VOLKSPELERS”
Among the telegrams, the Princess was particularly pleased to receive was one from the “Volkspelers,” Standerton. She remembered them giving a spirited rendering of a Voortrekker dance which delighted both Princesses at the time.
Other messages of congratulations came from the Aga Khan, the commander-in-chief, South Atlantic Station, his “opposite numbers” in the East and West Indies and on the North American and China stations, General T Holcomb, the United States Minister in this country, and scores of others.
One gift which gave Princess Elizabeth special pleasure was a floral representation of the Grenadier Guards’ grenade badge. It was present to her on behalf of the press and publicity correspondents who travelled round with the royal party.
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