Britons queue all night to see Queen Mother's coffin

3.00 pm

LONDON - Thousands of Britons queued through the night for a glimpse of the Queen Mother's coffin, lying in state under the silent protection of four royal guardsmen.

The mile-long line of well-wishers snaked along the banks of London's River Thames on Friday, and police said Westminster Hall, where the coffin remains until the funeral on Tuesday, would stay open until all mourners had filed past.

Officials were taken by surprise by the large number of people who wanted to say farewell to the Queen Mother, who was perhaps the most popular member of the royal family.

Westminster Hall, the grandiose medieval setting for the royal lying-in-state, would stay open all night to allow long queues of visitors to file slowly past the Queen Mother's coffin to pay their respects, officials said.

They had expected to close the hall to the public at 6:00pm (5.00 am NZT), but said they did not want to disappoint members of the public, who were moving past the coffin at the rate of 4000 an hour.

The queue to view the coffin, uniting pensioners, toddlers and tourists, was estimated to be tens of thousands strong.

Up to 400,000 people had earlier packed the route of a funeral procession to take the coffin to Westminster Hall, straining to see the coffin borne slowly on a horse-drawn gun carriage and accompanied by prominent royalty along with 1700 soldiers, sailors and airmen in ceremonial finery.

Her grandson, royal heir Prince Charles, appeared to be taking the Queen Mother's death hard. Eyewitnesses reported he brushed away a tear at one point in Friday's ceremonies.

Draped over the coffin was the Queen Mother's standard. On top of that rested her diamond-encrusted coronation crown.

"It's a shame this has to be for her death, but it's what she deserves. We put the P in pageantry," said Tim Aston, an electrician working on a building site overlooking the parade, the likes of which have not been seen since the death of Britain's wartime leader Winston Churchill in 1965.

On the coffin, draped in the Queen Mother's own standard, lay a white bouquet with the simple inscription "In Loving Memory". It was signed Lilibet, the Queen Mother's pet name for her daughter, Queen Elizabeth.

Just five years after following the coffin of their mother Princess Diana, the teenage princes William and Harry bowed their heads in grief, hands straight at their sides.

The royal family, accused of being cold and uncaring after Diana's death, turned out in force for the slow march: 14 members were led by the 80-year-old Prince Philip, the queen's husband.

Princess Anne, the Queen Mother's 51-year-old granddaughter, broke with royal protocol to join the procession -- normally public displays of regal mourning are for men only. She saluted her 101-year-old grandmother as the coffin was taken into Westminster Hall.

It was a day of double grief for Queen Elizabeth, who has in the past seven weeks lost her sister, Princess Margaret, younger by four years, and now her mother.

- REUTERS

Feature: The Queen Mother 1900-2002