How Queen Elizabeth Appeared 'Vulnerable' at Her Coronation, According to One of Her Maids

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Few people have been firsthand witnesses to royal history for more than seven decades — Lady Anne Glenconner is one of them.

Chosen to be among the six maids of honor for the late Queen Elizabeth II's coronation in 1953, she's recalling that day as Britain looks ahead to King Charles's crowning ceremony in less than 100 days.

When the Queen — just 25 at the time — arrived in the Gold Coach, she appeared in complete control. "She was very, very calm," Lady Anne says. The Queen "didn't say anything to us" initially as they stepped into action. "We had the dress train rippling over our hands. And then she just turned around and she said, 'Ready, girls,' and off we went."

Lady Anne — whose second memoir, Whatever Next? Lessons from an Unexpected Life, comes out on Feb. 21 — says that Queen Elizabeth and her coronation attendants entered Westminster Abbey to "wonderful music," adding it felt "like a medieval tapestry with all the people of the Commonwealth dressed in their national dress and all the peers in their robes."

With a smile, she adds, "There was a heavy smell of mothballs because [the robes] hadn't been used since before the war."

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The Print Collector/Getty Queen Elizabeth and her maids of honor at her coronation

But the calm and collected monarch had been nervous about the television cameras in what were the early days of the medium.

"[Prime Minister Winston] Churchill had told her there were going to be cameras and everyone watching," Lady Anne recalls. "But she said, 'The cameras have got to be turned off when I'm anointed.' "

That was a sign of the Queen's reverence for the religious moment at the heart of the occasion. The fabulous coronation dress, jewels and regalia were removed, showing just a simple white gown.

"She was in this white linen dress. She looked so vulnerable and young — of course, she was very young. That was her as she gave her life to Great Britain and the Commonwealth," Lady Anne says.

There was a canopy built near the altar to hide her from the view of the TV cameras, and "it was really just the six of us and the bishops who actually saw her being anointed. That was such a moving moment."

Lady Anne Glenconner Lady Anne Glenconner

Lady Anne adds, "The thing that people forget is that the Queen had seen her father being crowned. That probably helped her because she was completely in control and calm — and that made us very, very calm too because we felt the same."

King Charles witnessed his mother's coronation as a 4-year-old prince.

"He was just above me — he was brought in for the crowning," Lady Anne explains. "We were standing below him, and he was up there with Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother. I could hear him talking, asking her what was what."

Universal History Archive/Universal Images Group via Getty The then Prince Charles at the Coronation in 1953

Glenconner, 90, who was a close confidante of Princess Margaret and her lady-in-waiting for three decades before her 2002 death, often sees King Charles when he stays at Sandringham House, located just eight miles from her home in Norfolk.

Lady Anne hasn't spoken to him about his own coronation coming up on May 6, but she stresses it will be smaller in feel than that of his mother's crowning — 2,000 guests in Westminster Abbey as opposed to 8,000 for Queen Elizabeth's coronation.

"I think a lot of the peers and others are going to have to ballot for the seats, so there'll be a lot of disappointed people," adds Lady Anne.

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"This one is going to be smaller. It's going to be more inclusive, I think with many more religions represented. That is going to play a big part," she says.