Remembering a Royal tour of Orkney

The Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh visited Orkney on 12 August 1960, an event covered by around 70 reporters from national newspapers and the BBC.

The Queen and Duke sailed through Scapa Flow to Stromness aboard the Royal Yacht Britannia, accompanied by Prince Charles and Princess Anne, then aged 11 and 10.

Ahead of the visit, the Orcadian reported that the Royal children would not be involved in official events, but would ‘enjoy a picnic in some away-from-it-all spot’. This turned out to be the uninhabited Holm of Houton. The children had ‘slipped ashore’ as Britannia made her way towards Stromness and had a ‘wonderful time picnicking and hunting for buried treasure’.

The Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh spent more than 10 hours in Orkney, visiting Skara Brae before moving on to Kirkwall and then travelling to Stronsay and Westray.

In Stromness, the Lord Lieutenant, Colonel Robert Scarth, presented the coxswains of the Longhope and Stromness lifeboats, Dan Kirkpatrick and John Adam, to the Queen and the Duke, who then inspected the crews.

A crowd of 5,000 greeted the Royal Couple in Kirkwall. After a tour of St Magnus Cathedral, they were greeted by an ‘ovation from the huge crowd – the biggest ever seen in Broad Street’. Lunch followed at the Kirkwall Hotel, where 47 guests joined Queen and Prince Phillip.  They then travelled by Royal Barge from the Corn Slip in Kirkwall Harbour to go aboard Britannia, which was at anchor in Kirkwall Bay, along with an escorting frigate, HMS Duncan.

Planes carrying the press circled overhead as the Kirkwall City Pipe Band played Will ye no’ come back again – echoing, the Orcadian reported, the ‘sentiment of all of Orkney’.

Britannia headed for Stronsay, where the Royal couple visited a local shop in Whitehall run by John and Patricia Dennison, buying a 11d packet of oatcakes and a 10d packet of Orkney tablet, before inspecting the island’s lifeboat and crew.

The final leg of their tour took them to Westray aboard Britannia, where the Duke drove the Queen in the island’s new 12-seat school bus from the pier to the school in Pierowall. Here the Queen was presented with a bouquet and a handbag.

With their day in Orkney at an end, the Royal party returned to Britannia which steamed from Westray for Aberdeen.

The following week the Orcadian headlines read: What a Glorious 12th it was! and Queen and Duke’s Triumphal Tour of Orkney

The paper reported that when she stepped ashore, the Queen was wearing a turquoise blue coat and Robin Hood hat, with white shoes, black shoes and black handbag. The Duke wore a short-length raincoat with tartan lining over a grey lounge suit and a brown hat.

“Everywhere the Royal couple went they received a warm welcome. The cheering was restrained but none-the-less sincere, and the hundreds of flag-waving children brought smiles of delight to the Queen and the Duke.

“The Royal tour went with a swing from start to finish, despite a heavy shower of rain just as the Queen stepped ashore at the South Pier in Stromness, where the presentations had to be a little hastier than they would have been.

“The car journey from Stromness to Kirkwall was more like a triumphal procession. At every road end there were flags and bunting lashed to the stone fences and the Royal party slowed down continually to wave to the little waiting groups.

“In Kirkwall, the flags and bunting were out in profusion and never has the town seemed more gay and colourful, the scene of pageantry outside the Cathedral and later at the harbour front being one of the highlights of the tour.”

After their visit to the Dennison’s grocery store in Stronsay, the Queen and the Duke were presented to the coxswain of the local lifeboat, James Stout. They then spent a considerable time on board, talking to the crew. “The lifeboat had never looked more sparkling, despite having gone to the aid of a fishing boat in difficulties off Eday just a day or two before.”

At the pier, 300 people waved as the Queen and the Duke embarked by Royal Barge before Britannia – with the Stronsay Lifeboat standing by - set a course for the final port of call on their tour of Orkney.

The Royal couple stepped ashore at Gill Pier in Westray using specially built wooden steps, complete with red carpet.

“The Duke soon had his eye on the bright red glittering school bus standing nearby – a Morris van BS 5933. ‘Is this what I have to drive,’ he asked the driver, David Hume, who was standing beside it. The Queen got into the front passenger seat and the rest of the entourage piled into the back. The Duke looked at the controls for a few seconds and the gear positions were pointed out to him by Mr Hume.

“The engine started and off they went rather tentatively at first and then, after a slight crashing of the first gear change, with more confidence.”

The Queen remarked on the beauty of the bay as they headed for the school where ‘it looked as if the whole island had turned out and there were waving flags and hearty cheers’. Westray’s gift to the Queen was presented. It was ‘truly and island gift for it was a sealskin handbag’. They then toured the school, newly redesigned and remodelled and the ‘last word in educational architecture’.

On a beautiful summer’s evening, as a combined choir from the island’s churches sang ‘God be with you till we meet again’ the Royal party crowded once more aboard the school bus and ‘the Duke stepped on the accelerator and remarked that he had had a bit of trouble finding one of the gears’.

At Gill Pier, the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh headed down the specially built steps to the Royal Barge, the ‘engines gave a discreet mutter and the Royal visit to Orkney was over’.

It was reported later that at the end of their tour of the islands, the Queen told the Lord Lieutenant: “We’ve had a wonderful day.”