The Monarch looked particularly solemn when crowds performed a rendition of God Save the King. Charles’ wife the Queen Consort Camilla and Princess Kate looked on at the scene from the balcony of the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office.
In recent years, Charles had performed the role on behalf of the Queen as the Prince of Wales, but this year, as the two-minute silence began, he stood before the Cenotaph in his role as head of state.
His wreath was mounted on an arrangement of black leaves, as is traditional for the sovereign, with the ribbon bearing the King’s racing colours of scarlet, purple and gold. Its design is a tribute to the ones used by his late mother and grandfather George VI.
Other royals in attendance at the moving ceremony were the Countess of Wessex and the Duke and Duchess of Gloucester, who were seen on another balcony.
During the evening, BBC newsreader and host of the occasion, Huw Edwards, gave a moving speech about Her Majesty.
He said: “Service and duty are the watchwords of military life. They always have been. And no individual symbolized those watchwords more correctly, more completely than Her late Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces, patron of the Royal British Legion for a remarkable period spanning eight decades.”
