In light of last week’s death of Queen Elizabeth II, Art’s History will be occasionally featuring various speeches Her Majesty delivered in Canada over the decades. Today, for example, we are recalling the future Queen’s first-ever trip to Canada. She and Prince Philip undertook a multi-week tour of Canada in the fall of 1951. One of my favourite speeches from that tour took place before an audience of school kids and dignitaries gathered in Windsor, Ontario.
You can read the address below:
Princess Elizabeth
I think you all know that another Windsor far away from here is my home. I spent many happy years of my childhood at Windsor on the River Thames in England, and so it gives me special pleasure to be able to speak to you children whose homes are here in Windsor on the banks of another fine river.
These two Windsors are far apart, but they are close in spirit and understanding. And this friendship is more than just a few words.
A few years ago, the river Thames overflowed its banks and many in Windsor were flooded from their homes and lost their possessions.
Their kinsmen in your Windsor in Ontario at once came to their aid and sent clothes and money to help them rebuild their lives. The Windsor in England that is my home will always remember that act of generosity and friendship.
The mayor (Arthur J. Reaume) has told me that you are all going to be given a holiday tomorrow to mark this visit of my husband and myself, and tomorrow when we are many miles away, we will think of you enjoying it.
We give you now best wishes for your happiness today and always in this great country of Canada.
Arthur Milnes is an accomplished public historian and award-winning journalist. He was research assistant on The Rt. Hon. Brian Mulroney’s best-selling Memoirs and also served as a speechwriter to then-Prime Minister Stephen Harper and as a Fellow of the Queen’s Centre for the Study of Democracy under the leadership of Tom Axworthy. A resident of Kingston, Ontario, Milnes serves as the in-house historian at the 175 year-old Frontenac Club Hotel.
The mayor (Arthur J. Reaume) has told me that you are all going to be given a holiday tomorrow to mark this visit of my husband and myself, and tomorrow when we are many miles away, we will think of you enjoying it.
We give you now best wishes for your happiness today and always in this great country of Canada.
Arthur Milnes is an accomplished public historian and award-winning journalist. He was research assistant on The Rt. Hon. Brian Mulroney’s best-selling Memoirs and also served as a speechwriter to then-Prime Minister Stephen Harper and as a Fellow of the Queen’s Centre for the Study of Democracy under the leadership of Tom Axworthy. A resident of Kingston, Ontario, Milnes serves as the in-house historian at the 175 year-old Frontenac Club Hotel.Arthur Milnes is an accomplished public historian and award-winning journalist. He was research assistant on The Rt. Hon. Brian Mulroney’s best-selling Memoirs and also served as a speechwriter to then-Prime Minister Stephen Harper and as a Fellow of the Queen’s Centre for the Study of Democracy under the leadership of Tom Axworthy. A resident of Kingston, Ontario, Milnes serves as the in-house historian at the 175 year-old Frontenac Club Hotel.