With the King’s coronation coming up in a matter of weeks, l asked my loyal followers if they had memories of the late Queen’s anointing back in 1953 or – slightly less long ago – her visit to Bath in 1973 to mark One Thousand Years of Monarchy.
Apparently the first king of all England was crowned here – but more about that in my column for the forthcoming May edition of The Bath Magazine.
I wanted to begin with material supplied to me by a lady who would make Samuel Pepys proud.
Audrey Woods kept a daily diary for most of her life. She knows an awful lot about this city having been a Mayor’s Guide for 41 years and still volunteers in Bath Abbey. She was one of a favoured few to be elected a Mayor’s Citizen in 2014.
Audrey has supplied me with photographs of three pages of her diary for June 1953 when a young woman of 25 was crowned Queen of the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth realms. She was – as a teenager – there to witness an historic event.
Audrey told me:
“Personally, l feel the main difference between then and now was the anticipation after war and austerity. I think bread was still rationed – food rationing ended completely in 1954. Television was rare and made it all very exciting.”
Here are Audrey’s three diary pages.
