King Charles and Queen Camilla have presented two new Colours to the Grenadier Guards during a ceremony at Buckingham Palace today.
Camilla, 78, looked striking in a blue dress as she was flanked by two soldiers from the 1st Battalion in one photograph from today’s ceremony.
Members of the Grenadier Guards laid their rifles on the ground before giving three cheers for the King, who is Colonel-in-Chief, ahead of Trooping the Colour this weekend.
The soldiers from Britain’s most senior infantry regiments marched from Wellington Barracks in Westminster with their ‘Old Colours’ before arriving at Buckingham Palace.
In her role as Colonel of the Grenadier Guards, Her Majesty received a royal salute as the band played God Save the King, before she was joined by Charles.
The King and Queen were then invited to inspect the troops by the Regimental Lieutenant Colonel, Major General James Bowder, before the new Colours were laid on top and consecrated by the Chaplain-General.
The new Colours are set to be debuted on Saturday, during one of the biggest events on the royal calendar.
The service last happened in 2023, with Charles saying: ‘It is some eighty-five years since a King’s Colour has been presented and, on such a special occasion, I particularly wanted to express my heartfelt appreciation to each and every one of you, as representatives from the three Services, for your loyal service over the course of her remarkable reign, to The late Queen who, I know, held you all in such high regard.’
Camilla, 78, looked striking in a blue dress as she was flanked by two soldiers from the 1st Battalion in one photograph from today’s ceremony
The King during the event at Buckingham Palace today
Queen Camilla was appointed Colonel of the Grenadier Guards after disgraced former prince Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor returned the coveted military title to the late Queen in January 2022.
He was stripped of his honorary affiliations with the armed forces after calls from 150 veterans for the then-monarch to remove his eight British military appointments.
The role with one of the British Army’s oldest regiments was vacant until December that year when Queen Camilla took it on, three months after Elizabeth II’s death.
Andrew had held the appointment for just over four years, having taken it on from Prince Philip in December 2017.
Andrew has since moved out of Royal Lodge, where he lived with his ex-wife Sarah Ferguson, after the King stripped him of his royal titles following revelations about the pair’s relationship with billionaire paedophile Jeffrey Epstein.
The disgraced former duke was forced to give up Royal Lodge after an outcry when it emerged he had been paying a peppercorn rent for the property, before Andrew was arrested on suspicion of misconduct in public office on his 66th birthday in February.
Thames Valley Police continue to probe allegations that he passed sensitive information to Epstein during his time as trade envoy for the British government after Andrew was released under investigation.
Months later, his pariah status was confirmed when Andrew did not join the rest of the royal family for his nephew Peter Phillips’s ‘intimate’ Cotswolds wedding to NHS paediatric nurse Harriet Sperling.
While both his daughters, Princess Beatrice and Princess Eugenie, attended the nuptials at All Saints Church in Kemble, Gloucestershire, alongside their husbands, Edo Mapelli Mozzi and Jack Brooksbank respectively, Andrew and Fergie were nowhere to be seen.
ing Charles III inspected members of the Grenadier Guards ahead of Trooping the Colour on Saturday
In her role as Colonel of the Grenadier Guards, Her Majesty received a royal salute as the band played God Save the King, before she was joined by Charles
The York princesses were welcomed back into the royal fold over the weekend, with an expert telling the Daily Mail that the King is ‘reasserting his control’ to bring the family together after the Epstein scandal.
This despite the release of an ‘outrageous’ National Audit report which revealed Beatrice and her sister Princess Eugenie have never paid a penny in rent.
The pair perform no royal duties, have their own careers and high-flying husbands, yet have lived free of charge in exclusive palace properties for nearly two decades.
Royal author Phil Dampier told the Mail: ‘The King and Prince William have always been very fond of Beatrice and Eugenie and don’t blame them for the sins of their parents.
‘The way they were warmly greeted at Peter Phillips’s wedding shows they are still very much in the family fold and I’m sure they will still be invited to Sandringham at Christmas and other events.’
They will, however, remain absent from Trooping the Colour this weekend, when the royal family comes together to celebrate the King’s official birthday.
