LOYAL ADDRESS

On behalf of the people of West Sussex on the occasion of Her Majesty’s 90th birthday Your Majesty On behalf of the people of West Sussex it is my great privilege to send loyal greetings on the occasion of your 90th birthday. Our county has enjoyed a long tradition of welcoming reigning monarchs over the course of many centuries, a tradition Your Majesty has continued so extensively that we feel certain that your visits, both official and private, must have exceeded those of any previous royal forebear. SUSAN PYPER HM Lord- for West Sussex April 2016 1920s

The first reported occasion that Your Majesty visited the county was in 1929 when you spent two weeks by the seaside near Bognor, visiting your grandfather, King , at Craigweil House, where he was convalescing from his serious illness. You were just under three and a great tonic to both the King and Queen at this anxious time. Queen Mary wrote in her diary that she played in the garden with you ‘making sand pies’. To this day we remember this notable visit as its recuperative effects were so beneficial that your grandfather graciously conferred the royal suffix to Bognor – Bognor Regis.

Princess Elizabeth at Craigweil – a great tonic to the King and Queen

Making sand castles at Craigweil Fontwell Park, 1949 – Princess Elizabeth inspecting Monaveen after the race 1930s

Two years later, in 1931, Your Majesty Queen Mary. Photographs show you arriving returned to the county as a bridesmaid when well-wrapped up in a fur coat against the you were five, attending the wedding at blustery October weather! Balcombe of Lady May Cambridge, niece of 1940s

Your Majesty’s lifelong love of horses has racecourse the honour of being the first on brought you to West Sussex on many which your colours were carried to victory. occasions. Your first triumph was at Fontwell To this day, Monaveen is rated as one of the Park in 1949 when Monaveen, owned jointly best horses ever to run on this jump course. with your mother, Queen Elizabeth but ridden under your own colours, romped to victory by fifteen lengths in the Chichester Handicap Steeplechase, conferring on this Worthing, 1951 – the mayoral welcome

1950s

Three months later, in 1950, Your Majesty only with some difficulty that they were returned to the county to open the Manor persuaded to relinquish their grip’. A few Royal Industrial Estate in Crawley, a vital minutes later yet another bouquet found part of the newly-designated New Town. itself in the news, this time when pupils at Afterwards you planted a maple tree in a local school lined the route for the royal the town centre, the gift of the Canadian procession en route to meet the Mayor. government to commemorate the billeting of On police orders the girls were told not its troops here during the Second World War. to halt the progress of the royal car – the Your Majesty opened Courtlands Recovery timetable was to be strictly observed – but Hospital in Worthing and visited the on its approach, the head girl moved Mayor at the Town Hall in 1951. Two forward from the pavement. Seeing her unrehearsed moments caught the attention movement you graciously stopped the of the local press. Two mothers with their car and received the school’s bouquet, babies were presented at the hospital. Both much to the girls’ pleasure and no doubt babies grabbed at your bouquet and ‘it was a stern admonition from the police! In 1952, at Shipley, you attended the marriage cathedral to commemorate those who lost their lives of Peter Ashmore, Your Majesty’s in the Second World War and have no known grave. Extra , to Miss Patricia Buller, daughter of The euphoria throughout the city was overwhelming, Sir Henry Buller, a former Commander of the mayor saying it was the most wonderful day of Royal Yachts. In the same year Your Majesty visited their lives, so enjoyable that the day ‘went like an Glorious Goodwood – the first sovereign to do so for express train’. The following day Your Majesty visited nearly a quarter of a century – when your horse, Gay the King Edward vii Sanatorium at Midhurst in its Times, ridden by Gordon Richards and carrying the golden jubilee year, founded by Sir Ernest Cassel, royal colours, memorably made your first victory on grandfather of Countess Edwina Mountbatten. The this course. local press reported that you were particularly impressed by the art therapy classes devised to aid Throughout the 1950s, Your Majesty honoured patients in their recovery, pioneered at Midhurst by Goodwood and the Duke and Duchess of Richmond artist-broadcaster Adrian Hill. with your presence when you had the pleasure of seeing Landau win the Sussex Stakes in 1954, Goodwood House is proud to record that during Almeria, an outstanding filly, winning the Bentinck horse-racing week you held three Privy Council Stakes in 1957, and Above Suspicion winning the meetings in 1953, 1955 and 1957. Gordon Stakes in 1959. In 1958 Your Majesty reopened the greatly enlarged After the second day of Glorious Gatwick Airport, now the first airport in the Goodwood in 1952, Your Majesty These visits to Goodwood gave Your Majesty the world to combine air, mainline rail and trunk-road arrived in the coastal village of opportunity to visit Cowdray Park on a number of Felpham, to be welcomed at the occasions to watch hrh The Duke of Edinburgh play interchange facilities, before travelling to Crawley seaside residence of Lord Rupert for your second official visit to this developing New polo, and in 1955 to inspect the nearby Lavington Nevill, High Sheriff of Sussex. His son Town. Here you graciously opened the new Crawley Stud owned by Major and Mrs Reginald Macdonald- Guy was Your Majesty’s first godchild College of Further Education and then opened Buchanan. Queen’s Square at the heart of the new shopping During race week the following year, in 1956, Your precinct. After touring the New Town Your Majesty Majesty honoured the city of Chichester when you visited Ardingly College whose centenary was being attended the dedication of the Sailors’ Chapel in the celebrated that year.

Crawley, 1958 Crawley, 1958 1960s

It was during Goodwood Week that Your In 1969 when visiting Cowdray Park for the Majesty and hrh The Duke of Edinburgh polo Your Majesty was pleased to present honoured Chichester Festival Theatre with hrh The Duke of Edinburgh with the your presence: in 1962, the theatre’s opening Cowdray Gold Cup when his team, Windsor year, to see Laurence Olivier and Sybil Park, beat Pimms, the holders, 7–6 in the Thorndike in Uncle Vanya, and to see Olivier final. During the event, hrh fell from his and Derek Jacobi in Othello in 1964. In this pony, but the local newspaper reported year Your Majesty also visited nearby raf that he ‘was not injured and grinned Thorney Island to commemorate the 21st triumphantly when he received the coveted anniversary of Transport Command. trophy from the Queen’. Later that year Your Majesty paid a third visit to Crawley New Throughout the 1960s Your Majesty Town when you came to open Holy Trinity continued to make annual visits to School, Gossops Green, the first purpose- Goodwood, often staying as the guest of the built Church of England comprehensive Duke and Duchess of Norfolk at Arundel. school in the country. There were more royal victories in 1965 when Apprentice won the Goodwood Cup and Eucumbene the Strettington Stakes. Gaulois won the Goodwood Cup in 1966.

Chichester Festival Theatre, 1962 1970s

The 1970s saw further visits to Goodwood, with In 1978, accompanied by hrh The Duke of Edinburgh, Charlton winning the Predominate Stakes in 1970 Your Majesty paid your first official visit to the Royal and Westward Ho in the Stonehill Handicap in 1971. Military Police Corps in Chichester since becoming its Colonel-in-Chief the previous year. Your Majesty In 1973 Your Majesty opened the new medical observed various exercises and then took lunch in research institute at Midhurst, built in the grounds of the officers’ mess ‘dining on avocado pear stuffed King Edward v11 Hospital, of which Your Majesty was with prawns, roast lamb and “rmp pudding”, a bombe President. Your Majesty was met by the 16th Duke Alaska’. After lunch Your Majesty drove to Horsham of Norfolk, Lord-Lieutenant of Sussex, who was the to visit the school which bears your name, the Queen last holder of that office, the separate Lieutenancies Elizabeth II School, completed in Your Majesty’s of East and West Sussex being created in 1974. Silver Jubilee year in 1977, and also Forest Boys’ School, where you gave the school a personally signed Poor weather at the South of England Show in portrait of yourself which the school still treasures. 1974 did not prevent Your Majesty driving into the main arena in an open Victoria pulled by two Windsor greys, and presenting the supreme dairy award to Mrs J. McPhail of Coolham whose husband had won it with his prize Ayrshire cow.

Queen Elizabeth II School, Horsham, 1978 Royal Maundy Service, Chichester Cathedral, 1986

1980s

The Royal Maundy Service was held in Sussex for the first time in its history in 1986. Accompanied by hrh The Duke of Edinburgh, Your Majesty distributed Maundy coins in Chichester Cathedral to 60 men and 60 women, representing 60 years of Your Majesty’s life.

Two years later, in 1988, Your Majesty opened the new North Terminal at Gatwick Airport. It was a great day for Mr Freddie Pringle, who, with other employees, was invited to tea with Your Majesty. ‘I was with the builders in 1958, finishing off the new terminal when the Queen came to open it and soon after I joined the airport staff. Now, just a couple of weeks before I retire, the Queen came again, and I had tea with her.’ North Terminal, Gatwick Airport, 1988 1990s

In 1990 Your Majesty visited the Royal In 1999, Your Majesty visited Durrington Military Police Training Centre in High School, Worthing, which acted as Chichester where you saw the scene of a a venue to showcase everything positive simulated murder and were treated to a about West Sussex, and where a wide dramatic show of battle skills by the Redcaps’ range of representatives from the business mounted display team. The local newspaper and caring sectors had been invited. This reported that Your Majesty ‘looked warm visit marked the retirement of Your and colourful in a parma-violet coat and Majesty’s Lord-Lieutenant for West Sussex, suit, with a matching broad-brimmed velvet Major-General Sir Philip Ward, former hat. She was wearing the Corps’ brooch.’ Commandant of the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst. Your Majesty and hrh The Hundreds welcomed Your Majesty as you Duke of Edinburgh then went on to Burgess toured the King Edward vii Hospital at Hill where thousands lined the streets to Royal Military Police Training Centre, Chichester, 1990 Midhurst in 1991. ‘Nearly every corridor see Your Majesty when you opened The was lined by excited nurses and staff in Triangle Leisure and Conference Centre a state of starched perfection, proudly and the Town Council’s Help Point. prepared for the royal inspection.’

Burgess Hill, 1999 South of England Show, Ardingly, 2002

2000s

As Patron of the South of England Agricultural reported that ‘The streets of Horsham were packed Society, Your Majesty has visited the Society’s with well-wishers cheering Her Majesty throughout flagship summer show at Ardingly on several her day in the town. It was the culmination of an occasions, including in your Golden Jubilee year, extraordinarily exciting and creative period for 2002. The following year, in 2003, Your Majesty Horsham. The Queen seemed hugely impressed visited Christ’s Hospital, the famous Bluecoat school by everything she saw and everyone she met.’ near Horsham, of which Your Majesty has been Patron since 1953. The school was celebrating 450 Finally, in 2006, Your Majesty and hrh The Duke years of royal patronage since its foundation by of Edinburgh helped commemorate Crawley’s 60th King Edward vi in 1553. The headmaster, Dr Peter anniversary as a New Town when you returned once Southern, said ‘it was a great honour for Christ’s again. Hundreds of people were entertained by the Hospital to receive the Queen. The pupils, staff and Crawley Millennium Concert Band before Your trustees much enjoyed welcoming her and providing Majesty and hrh arrived amid glorious sunshine a glimpse of the very special opportunities given to to be met by civic leaders. Later Your Majesty and children from all walks of life at Christ’s Hospital.’ hrh drove the short distance to Crawley Mall shopping centre and then visited Thomas Bennett From here Your Majesty then visited Horsham Town Community College. His Royal Highness went Centre, 25 years since your last visit, to mark the on alone to visit Carey House sheltered-housing conclusion of the town’s redevelopment programme. project and Varian Medical Systems, one of the Gary Shipton, Editor-in-Chief of the County Times many high-tech firms that thrive in Crawley.

Christ’s Hospital and Horsham, 2003 Crawley, 2006 Dartmouth’s two-length victory at Goodwood, 2015 In ending this tribute to your long associations with our county it is fitting to record that Your Majesty’s lifelong love of horse racing has been marked by recent successes on our racecourses. Fontwell, scene of your first success in 1949, saw Barbers Shop win the Whitelaw Challenge Cup in 2012, yet another win for Barbers Shop at the Thoroughbred Show Horse Championships at Hickstead in 2013, and Dartmouth, the 9/4 favourite, out-manœuvring the field at Goodwood with an impressive two-length victory in 2015.

We are proud that Your Majesty has visited West Sussex so many times during the course of your long life and reign. On behalf of your 800,000 subjects in this very special county, it is my great pleasure to wish Your Majesty a very happy birthday.

SUSAN PYPER HM Lord-Lieutenant for West Sussex WS31453 APRIL 2016