CHARLES was just four when he looked on in wide-eyed wonder as his mother, Elizabeth, was crowned in 1953.
Our picture shows him on June 2 in Westminster Abbey with the Queen’s younger sister, Princess Margaret, and the Queen Mother — who appears to be having a grand-motherly word.
Charles has been crowned King, but how did things look in 1953 when his mother was being made Queen?
Charles, pictured, on June 2 1953 in Westminster Abbey with the Queen’s younger sister, Princess Margaret, and the Queen Mother
What change seven decades has seen, as we compare and contrast 1953 and 2023
Fast-forward 70 years to King Charles’s crowning and his nine-year-old grandson Prince George, resplendent in red, was a Page of Honor processing behind His Majesty’s robe and holding his robe.
Two young boys, worlds apart.
So here we look at how life looked then and now.
The average house price in 1953 was £2,006, now it is £290,000, and back in the day a pint was just 10p whereas now you can expect to pay about 40 times that.
The day Elizabeth was crowned, more than 8,250 guests crammed into the Abbey — nearly four times the more modest guest list of Charles, drawn up with an eye to the current cost-of-living crisis.
During the week of the Queen’s coronation, her horse Aureole nearly won the Epsom Derby — finishing second. Soon after Charles was crowned, he had two horses in action, at Newmarket and Goodwood, but neither romped home to win.
On the eve of Elizabeth’s Coronation she received word Edmund Hillary and Sherpa Tenzing had on May 29 become the first climbers to scale Everest. Yesterday Charles was toasted from the same mountain by a double-amputee veteran of the Afghan war climbing it after taking inspiration from Hillary and Tenzing.
Fast-forward 70 years to King Charles’s crowning yesterday and his nine-year-old grandson Prince George, resplendent in red
But while Elizabeth became Queen near the end of Empire, that is now gone and the future of the Commonwealth that replaced it is uncertain — a poll last week found nearly half of those realms would vote to be republics if they could.
Watching history unfold
By Professor Kate Williams
HISTORY unfolded before our eyes yesterday in a ceremony full of centuries-old rituals.
Westminster Abbey has borne witness to Coronations dating back as far as 1066.
There were modern twists this time but ancient ceremony was embroidered beautifully into the two-hour service.
It was a shorter Coronation than Charles attended for his mother as a four-year-old in 1953. But the spectacle lacked nothing. Charles was the 40th monarch to be crowned here — and the first with his spouse, since 1937. And while steeped in pomp and pageantry, it moved with the times.
Seventy years since Queen Elizabeth’s crowning, there was going to be change. Britain was in post-war depression then. The Queen embodied hope — her dress covered in flowers.
At 9.45pm she appeared on the Palace balcony. Lights danced down The Mall, illuminating Admiralty Arch and turning Trafalgar Square’s fountains silver. It was televised too — astonishing modernisation.
Charles made changes, and there were different faith roles. But it is hard to say if it was enough. His reign will begin with challenges, amid Republican movements and a possible fragmenting of the Commonwealth. The younger generation are questioning the monarchy’s value for money.
But yesterday the future was there to see and Prince William and son George took starring roles. George’s Coronation, in maybe 50 or so years, will look very different.
