Death and the Jubilee

Начало книги

One nondescript room at the top of the War Office in London had become the nerve centre of the British Empire. It had two small windows that looked out over the rooftops of the capital, a threadbare carpet, a fading portrait of Queen Victoria over a mean fireplace, a battered desk and an ink-stained table.

But these cramped quarters were the focal point for one of the greatest movements of military personnel the world had ever seen. Tens of thousands of soldiers and cavalrymen were to sail across the globe on orders despatched from this bureaucratic command post.

This was the Planning Headquarters for the Jubilee Parade in honour of Victoria the Queen Empress on her Diamond Jubilee on 22nd June 1897, now a year and a quarter away. This was to be the grandest parade the world had ever seen, grander even than Roman triumphs through the eternal city two thousand years before. No captured chieftains or Oriental despots in chains were needed to adorn this procession. These were Victoria’s subjects, to be carried across the red-coloured map that marked the glory of her Empire. Hussars from Canada and carabiniers from Natal had to be transported, Hong Kong Chinese Police, Cypriot Zaptiehs, Dyak head-hunters from North Borneo, Malays and Hausas, Sinhalese and Maoris, Indian lancers and Cape Mounted Rifles, cavalrymen from New South Wales and Jamaicans resplendent in white gaiters. Fifty thousand troops were to march through London to a Service of Thanksgiving at St Paul’s, a splash, an explosion of colour on the dull grey buildings of the capital, a heady and intoxicating draught of romance for the million citizens expected to wonder at their passing.

Читать дальше →