The announcements were clear: the queue to see the Queen lying in state had reached capacity and was being paused for six hours.
The message went out over the public address system at train stations across the capital, on official government Twitter accounts and across the media shortly before 10am on Friday.
There was just one problem: the queue carried on. And on. In fact, just after 5pm on Friday the government announced that the wait time was over 24 hours, and warned that “overnight temperatures will be cold”.
Earlier in Southwark Park, the designated end of the five-mile queue to see Elizabeth II’s coffin in Westminster Hall, an electronic sign saying people should “not attempt to join until it resumes” was blithely being ignored.
“So we can go in then?” one rule-abiding man asked two security guards standing beside the sign, who were ushering a steady flow of people through.
“Yep,” they smiled, showing him the way towards the bandstand where the queue snaked back and forth between railings.
The gates to the western entrance to the park had been closed at 12.05pm, to the consternation of those hoping to join it, only to be reopened again 13 minutes later when officials realised people were ignoring instructions to disperse and queueing on the road anyway.
Charlie Cummins, 64, was the first to be turned away. An online languages teacher who was visiting the UK from Brazil, he said: “If I’d known it was closing I wouldn’t have gone to Sainsbury’s. I really wish I hadn’t now.”
Less than a quarter of an hour later, the gates were open again and Cummins was in. “Having told us to hang fire for four hours, some people left to hang fire. I’m glad I stayed,” he said.
Chan Bisessar, 76, a retired mental health nurse, was not put off by the announcements. She had travelled from Norbury in south London with her partner, Raj Paramal, 75, whom she met working at the Priory in the 1990s. “In Clapham Junction they did say that the queue was closed but we didn’t pay too much attention to it,” she said.
Wearing a Rotary Club scarf bearing the flags of the Commonwealth, she said she had come to the UK from what was then British Guiana in 1965 and had always been a fan of the Queen. “Given the service she has done, I thought it was very little to ask to pay my respects,” she said.
Confusion reigned as public announcements on the underground said the queue would be closed but streams of people continued to be allowed in.
The Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport said in a tweet at 9.50am: “Southwark Park has reached capacity. Entry will be paused for at least 6 hours. We are sorry for any inconvenience. Please do not attempt to join the queue until it reopens.”
Those wanting to see the Queen were told not to attempt to join the queue until 4pm at the earliest. The decision raised the prospect of people forming a queue to join the queue.
HER MAJESTY THE QUEEN'S LYING-IN-STATE QUEUE UPDATE, 09:50 AM, 16 Sept
— Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (@DCMS) September 16, 2022
Southwark Park has reached capacity. Entry will be paused for at least 6 hours. We are sorry for any inconvenience.
Please do not attempt to join the queue until it re-opens.
Check back for further updates pic.twitter.com/XMpyhOrme7
Janice Newman, 70, a crown court usher from Stockwell, was another undeterred by the official position. “At Tower Hill they said they were stopping people but they’re obviously not,” she said. “I came all this way so I thought I’d just go and see what happens.”
She had a shopping bag with sandwiches and a small amount to drink for the 14-hour wait ahead. “I don’t want to drink too much, I’m worried about the toilet,” she said, laughing.
A spokesperson for DCMS could not initially elaborate on how the government had decided that Southwark Park would be the point at which the queue reached capacity.
Kelly Farias, 37, was among the last to make it in just after midday before the gates were closed for the first time.
Farias, who is 32 weeks pregnant, was prepared to endure the long wait having made it through. “I thought we wouldn’t get in,” she said, eager to keep walking and not lose her spot. “I’m here with my mum who really loves the Queen.”
There are likely to be disruptions to the flow of people going through Westminster Hall on Friday and Saturday evenings when members of the royal family will stand vigil.
