King Charles has enough experience of giving speeches by now to have fine-tuned the elements needed - including a sprinkling of humour. He didn't overdo it when he gave a speech to the US Congress on 28th April and in amongst his powerful reflections about the current state of the world and UK/US relations, he also mentioned a strange royal tradition.
I'd totally forgotten this was a thing and to many people it could sound like an exaggeration or a myth, but King Charles confirmed that a "hostage" is still taken when he addresses Parliament.
"As you may know, when I address my own Parliament at Westminster, we still follow an age-old tradition and take a member of Parliament 'hostage', holding him or her at Buckingham Palace until I am safely returned," he told the room of US politicians.
The King explained that "these days" they look after this royal "guest" well, saying that they "often do not want to leave". He even jokingly asked the Speaker of the House "if there were any volunteers for that role here today?"
As with many unique royal customs, this one goes back hundreds of years to the reign of Charles I. He was famously executed in 1649 during the English Civil War and before this his relationship with his Parliament was tense - hence the hostage to ensure his own safety.
Nowadays the royal hostage-taking is purely symbolic. The person is usually the Vice-Chamberlain of the Household, who is a Member of Parliament whose office makes them a member of the Royal Household too. They stay at Buckingham Palace until the ruling King or Queen returns after the State Opening of Parliament.
According to the UK Parliament website, this isn’t the only tradition started in the reign of Charles I that endures. Before the monarch arrives, the Yeomen of the Guard (ceremonial royal bodyguards) search the cellars of the Palace of Westminster for explosives.
It commemorates Guy Fawkes and his fellow Catholic conspirators’ plot in 1605 to blow up Charles I’s Protestant father King James I and the Houses of Parliament. The last State Opening of Parliament was in 2024.
King Charles has only attended two as monarch but has been at plenty more to support Queen Elizabeth when he was Prince of Wales. His speech to Congress shows he’s definitely inherited his late mother’s way with words and ability to convey a powerful message in a short period of time.
He referenced her in the address and noted we’re living in an era "that is, in many ways, more volatile and more dangerous than the world to which [Queen Elizabeth] spoke, in this Chamber, in 1991."
"From the bitter divisions of 250 years ago, we forged a friendship that has grown into one of the most consequential Alliances in human history," the King later remarked. "I pray with all my heart that our Alliance will continue to defend our shared values, with our partners in Europe and the Commonwealth, and across the world, and that we ignore the clarion calls to become ever more inward-looking."
