A new royal biography has revealed the story inside the Queen’s final conversations with her nearest and dearest just days before her death.
Elizabeth II had been the only monarch most of the nation had known before her death on September 8, this year.
But in the days leading up to her death, she was described as being in ‘fantastic form’ even though she was said to have accepted her time was near with 'good grace'.
The Right Reverend Dr Iain Greenshields spent the Queen’s last weekend with her, dining on the Saturday evening, giving a sermon at church Sunday morning and having lunch together that day as well.
Alongside discussing the Queen’s childhood, her horses, church affairs and the war in Ukraine, Dr Greenshields was bowled over by how well Her Majesty was doing.
This all came after an extended period of health problems too, but the late Queen was far from done for the week, The Mail online reported.
A few days later on Tuesday September 6, she spoke to her favourite horse trainer, Clive Cox, as well as welcoming her 14th and 15th prime ministers to her residences.
In between that she also presented her outgoing Communications Secretary with an honour.
Mr Cox reportedly said that the pair talked about the prospects of one of the Queen’s horses, Love Affairs, who was up soon to race.
Former Prime Minister Boris Johnson described her as unable to have been more kind ‘more sympathetic or more personally encouraging’ when he visited to hand over the reigns of government to Liz Truss - who would soon hand them over to Rishi Sunak.
Wednesday 7 September was business as usual for the royal family as the newspapers carried pictures of the 96-year-old monarch looking frail but smiling during the meeting with the politicians.
Prince Charles has been in Lanarkshire and had a dinner to host, Edward and Sophie were at events as Princess Anne visited the Isle of Skye and Isle of Raasay.
But it was then rumours began to swirl about her health, and the next day the Queen would tragically die, surrounded by some of her loved ones.
On the day of her death, Buckingham Palace released a statement at 12:32pm saying that doctors were concerned for her health.
Hours before, at 6:48am, the Queen’s helicopter had left to pick up Prince Charles from Dumfries House where he had spent the night. Camila had spent the night at Birkhall, on Balmoral Estate, and was driven to join him.
Princess Anne was already by the Queen’s side, and would remain there until the end, as Andrew and Edward, his wife Sophie, and William and Harry were said to be on their way.
Sadly the ground would only arrive at Balmoral at 5:06pm, after the Queen had died.
But the determination and sense of duty she conducted her final days with, only reflected how she had spent her life, and especially the time since her husband of 73 years Prince Phillip passed away.
Following Phillip’s death she was reportedly determined to keep pace as best she could with royal duties and refused to give way to self pity.
During this time she enjoyed TV dramas like Line of Duty but disliked the constant ‘mumbling’ on it.
Throughout her life and this period especially, her Christian faith played a huge role for her and on her final weekend she told Dr Greenshields she had no regrets.
Love Affairs, the Queen’s beloved horse, comfortably won its race the week she died, the two o'clock at Goodwood.
