Scotland's Queen

In her life and her death, Elizabeth II's affinity for the Scots shone through.

Death is an end and a beginning.

The body is finite but the soul is everlasting and between the two lies memory. The words spoken, the deeds done, the good and evil rendered unto others. The scraps of a life, physical and intangible, left behind in its wake. Memory is neither finite nor everlasting. It endures as long as it is passed on but in doing so it changes, gets shaded here and coloured there. 

Memories of the Queen will not fade in our lifetimes. They will be handed down to children and grandchildren and though in time they will transmute, lingering on some aspects of her life while others are neglected, the legacy of Elizabeth II will live on through the generations. Not simply because she was Queen but because of the sort of queen she was. 

Those fortunate enough to have lived during her reign know why, even if we are all still struggling for the words to describe what she meant to us. For many, she was the very definition of Britain, a woman of reserve and duty yet one capable of great humour and kindness. 

She was Britain’s granny, a source of wisdom and common sense, a no-nonsense believer in hard work and a warm-hearted practitioner of love and compassion. She reminded us of our own family matriarchs, women of her generation and sense of right and wrong, and made us recall how they led their households with similar personal qualities and moral values. 

Her death has been felt keenly in Scotland and the outpourings north of the border, the sheer intensity of the grief, has caught some by surprise. After all, the Scots tend to be more reticent when it comes to the royal family. Polling has shown more scepticism towards monarchy among Scottish voters than among their English counterparts. This doesn’t denote a hotbed of republicanism waiting to be unleashed. It probably has more to do with an innate Scottish suspicion of anything too grand or too emotional. We prefer respect to reverence. 

Yet the death of the Queen has jolted us because of our centrality to the story — to her story. Elizabeth II, simply Elizabeth to us, was the first monarch to die in Scotland since James V in 1542. As we have been hearing again in recent days, the Queen felt a deep affinity for Scotland. It is where, like Victoria before her, she found solace after the death of her beloved husband. It was on the Balmoral estate that, by all accounts, she felt most at peace, the land and the crisp air spiritual sustenance to a monarch who cherished the outdoors. She drew life from Scotland and it was Scotland that comforted her in death. 

In her passing, the Queen placed Scotland once again at the heart of British history. It meant that her eldest son became the first monarch to accede to the throne from Scottish soil in more than four centuries. Just two days before her death, her residency at Balmoral saw the Deeside castle supplant Buckingham Palace as the place where her 14th prime minister resigned and the 15th accepted an invitation to form a government in her name. In the space of 48 hours, both political and monarchical power changed hands in Britain and they did so in rural Aberdeenshire. 

It was Scotland where the TV crews descended, where the first mourners gathered, where the first flowers were lain. It was in Scotland where prayers were first offered for the repose of her soul, at St Giles’ High Kirk at Mercat Cross, just up the hill from Holyroodhouse. It was fitting that the Church of Scotland should be the first to receive her, for although Supreme Governor of the Church of England, she worshipped in Crathie Kirk while at Balmoral. Even in the exercise of her faith, she embodied the special place Scotland holds in British royal history. 

That unique relationship between Queen and one particular country was reflected when the Scottish Parliament gathered to lay a condolence motion in the presence of King Charles III and Queen Camilla. The words spoken were sincere and poignant and they captured how ordinary Scots and people farther afield felt about the Queen. Much of the credit goes to the Presiding Officer, Alison Johnstone. She has led Holyrood with sombre dignity in its mourning for the Queen and with warm generosity in its welcoming of the new King. I am not privy to her personal views about monarchy but her leadership over the past 11 days has been commendable. 

These scenes, and those at the lying-in-state at St Giles’, are the only answer needed to those who have chosen the Queen’s death as an opportunity to pronounce on Scotland’s future place in the United Kingdom. The possibility that the end of the second Elizabethan era could prompt the Scots to go independent has been speculated on more than once since September 8. The culprits have invariably been broadcasters and the talking heads they invite on to fill up air-time. 

Quite why anyone would think it appropriate, before the Queen had even been laid to rest, to postulate political fallout from her death is baffling. It is the wrong time and the wrong context, not to mention plain wrong in the assumptions and analysis being spouted. Live broadcasting is not easy and the temptation to fill time is mighty but it would be better to say nothing than to clog up our TV screens with assertion and inanity. 

For one thing, the SNP’s own independence prospectus in 2014 proposed to retain Her Majesty as the head of state and Queen of Scots. For another, try reading the national mood. This is not a moment for constitutional politics but for grieving and reflection. No one is thinking about referendums or campaigns or currency options, at least no one halfway normal. If Nicola Sturgeon can forgo talk of independence for a few days, broadcasters should be able to manage it too. 

While we all pay tribute to the Queen in our own ways, her demise and the enthronement of her son are about far loftier matters than mere politics. These are times in which history is being made. The longest reign of any British monarch has come to an end and a new era has begun. Ordinary British people and people from all over the world have queued day and night to pay their respects. 

The woman who led the Commonwealth with such elan that former French colonies are now joining up has entrusted her efforts to her son who will seek to build on his mother’s remarkable work. Across the globe, fulsome tributes have been paid in former colonies by prime ministers and presidents whose fathers and grandfathers fought against the British Crown. The republican president of France has penned remarks about the Queen so powerful and heartfelt they could have come from the most ardent British royalist. Politics is barely trivia at a time like this. 

If we must read any greater significance into these events, it should be how the manner of the Queen’s death and her son’s succession have inscribed Scotland even more deeply into the story of the Crown. Scotland is where the second Elizabethan age ended and where a new Carolean age began. It will form a cornerstone of Charles III’s reign, a place of fond sadness for the King and the rest of the royal family. It will forever be the place where Her Majesty’s subjects first said farewell and where His Majesty’s subjects first pledged their loyalty to him. 

Scotland, already integral to the monarchy, has only become more so. It is part of the body and soul of the British Crown. 

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Originally published in the Scottish Daily Mail on September 19, 2022.