Royal grandsons to keep vigil

The Queen Mother's four grandsons - Charles, Andrew, Edward and David Linley - will mount a vigil at her coffin as she lies-in-state.

Andrew, Duke of York disclosed that the grandsons will pay the silent tribute to their grandmother in the medieval setting of Westminster Hall.

It is expected that the vigil, with the four Royals standing guard at each corner of the coffin, will take place on Monday, the eve of the Queen Mother's funeral.

The poignant ceremony will be reminiscent of the vigil mounted for George V in 1936, on the same spot in Westminster Hall, when his sons, Edward, Albert, Henry and George, stood solemnly at the late King's coffin.

Speaking after paying his respects at the Queen Mother's coffin, now resting in the Queen's Chapel at St James's Palace, the Duke of York said preparations for the vigil were under way.

"We each had an individual and unique relationship with our grandmother. She was very, very special indeed," he said.

"I think it's only right we should mark it in this way ... it has been done before."

In 1936, after George V's death, the new King Edward VIII, who later abdicated for the love of American divorcee Wallis Simpson, stood vigil with his brothers, Albert, Duke of York - later George VI - Henry, Duke of Gloucester and George, Duke of Kent.

At midnight on January 27 1936, the new King and his three brothers joined officers of the Household Brigade guarding the catafalque.

"We stood there for 20 minutes in the dim candlelight and the great silence," the King wrote.

"I felt close to my father and all that he had stood for."

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