The Official Preparations for
Sir Winston Churchill’s Funeral

Correspondence to Mr. Anthony Montague-Browne (private secretary to Sir Winston Churchill) dated January 1958, confirmed the Queen had, some years earlier, approved the proposal that Sir Winston Churchill should have a full State Funeral.

Notes of 1959 confirmed the Earl Marshall of England, the Duke of Norfolk would co-ordinate the state funeral. There would be a lying-in-state on the fourth day after the death; the funeral service would take place in St. Paul’s on the eighth day. By March 1959 a detailed timetable was outlined, the arrangements entitled, ‘Operation Hope Not’.

By order of the Earl Marshall, the overall command of all Services on Parade was to be exercised by the General Officer Commanding London, Major General E.J.B. Nelson. A total of 7,083 officers and other ranks were involved in the Procession. The River Procession was to be under the Command of the River Superintendent and Harbourmaster, Port of London Authority, Mr. G.V. Parmiter.

Correspondence stressed the ‘circle of consultation’ be kept as small as possible. Those within the circle appreciated the responsibility and the honour; epitomising discretion and sensitivity throughout the co-ordination of this national event.

Had Sir Winston passed away abroad, every provision had been made to bring his body home with the utmost efficiency and diplomacy from any number of locations.

As late as 1964, the issue of lying-in-state and cremation or embalming had not been confirmed. In wills after 1959, Sir Winston had expressed a wish to be buried at Bladon. Prior to this time it had been his wish to be cremated and his ashes deposited at Chartwell. Apparently having the body embalmed did not sit well with the family. Could cremation occur considering the wishes of Sir Winston? Whilst there was no insuperable objection from the church, would a lying-in-state be the same?

Attention to detail shown throughout the preparations was outstanding. Whilst the Thames borne procession, solved some logistical problems and certainly was a fitting tribute for many reasons, it may not have been fully appreciated how changeable this section of the timetable was.

None of the knowing scribes who wrote so much about Sir Winston Churchill’s funeral observed how great a part was played by the tide. He had planned it all, they say, including the river passage from Tower Pier to Festival Pier, long before. But, unless we like to think that the great genius’s ghost was still at work, he could not have planned that, on the destined Saturday, it should be high water in King’s Reach at 1:00p.m. that day, January 30th: the river was full and the floating pontoons almost level with the banks. The Saturday before at that time, it would have been dead low water, and the Saturday after, not far from it. The funeral vessels would have had to pass between wide stretches of mud, making a very different picture. More important, the brows at the piers would have been at an angle impossible even for those gallant Guardsmen. This is not merely my private speculation. Long afterwards, at a chance encounter with the Duke of Norfolk, the Earl Marshal and brilliant master of the ceremonies, I put the point to him, and he confirmed my humble opinion. "The week before", he said, "we couldn’t have done it". Thus even the Thames, even the Moon, we may like to think, conspired together to give grace and good order to that great departure. A.P.Herbert, The Thames