‘The look she gave could have frozen fire’ – the question the Queen Mother banned people from asking

In yesterday’s excerpt from his biography of Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, Gareth Russell recalled how a woman better known for her love of horse racing and “drinky-poos” showed an iron will behind closed doors.

Adolf Hitler even called her “the most dangerous woman in Europe.”

Here, in the second and final installment, we reveal how the Queen Mother made an art of getting her own way, beating bad news and boring guests with an arsenal of cunning tactics.

(And even then, she didn’t feel sorry for Prince Andrew’s misbehavior.)

On 6 February 1952, Elizabeth was having morning tea in her bedroom when the King’s equerry arrived to inform her that she was a widow.

After seeing her husband’s body, Elizabeth ordered that someone keep watch all the time so that he “would not be left alone.” She went to the nursery to see their two grandchildren. “Don’t cry, Grandma,” comforted the three-year-old Prince Charles before being told his grandfather was gone.

There were several options for naming Elizabeth now that she was Queen Dowager. She felt that including the word “widow” in her new title would make her sound as old as God’s governess, so she rejected it.

The suggestion of ‘Queen Mother’, first used for Charles II’s mother in 1649, was offered and accepted. Elizabeth officially became Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother. Her critics speculated that Grinners – their nickname for her – had managed to score a title that saw her dubbed Queen twice as often as anyone else.

Elizabeth had no inclination to marry again. As much as she had loved her husband, she enjoyed her independence so much that when she woke up every morning her favorite thought was, “And what would Elizabeth like to do today?”

“She loves all homosexuals,” concluded Sir Isaiah Berlin, who was a professor at Oxford until 1967, when homosexuality was partially decriminalized.

Many on the right opposed the bill change, with a politician urging the Queen Mother to send a “moral message” to the nation by firing homosexuals on her staff.

She replied that if she did, she would eventually have to go self-service.

While staying with his grandmother, Prince Andrew annoyed a member of the Queen Mother’s stable staff until the young man, nearly the Prince’s age, lost his temper and punched the Prince, sending him into a heap of dung.

Andrew shouted that he would tell his grandmother about this. The next day, seeing the Queen Mother walking with her corgis, the boy went to her to confess and offer her his resignation.

After hearing him, the Queen Mother waved her hand dismissively. ‘You shouldn’t worry about it. I’m pretty sure Prince Andrew deserved it.’

As she dined with friends in old age, the conversation turned into a persistent rumor that has long divided historians: After the death of her first husband, Prince Albert in 1861, Queen Victoria had gone into a long period of mourning. Years later, she recovered through her friendship with a ghillie named John Brown.

It was rumored that the queen and the ghillie were not just friends but lovers, while others went further and said they had secretly married.

The latter theory of a second marriage has long been dismissed as nonsense. However, Elizabeth cheerfully revealed that she was sure it was true because, when she was queen, she had found documents in Balmoral proving it.

A guest asked her what she had done with this piece of historic gold. Apparently, her eyes “twinkled in a steely way” when she replied, “I burned the documents.”

In the 1990s, a sotto voice of “Oh God, not this again…” often came from the Queen Mother when she saw another headline about her grandchildren or their husbands.

She didn’t like all these family matters being brought up in conversation and had several tactics to kill the subject.

It was a bummer for the staff, as one equerry overheard when asked if she’d seen Prince Charles’ tell-all interview with Jonathan Dimbleby, which had aired the night before.

“The look she gave me could have frozen the fire,” he recalls. A second later, she smiled coolly to tell him very firmly, “Some things are better left undiscussed.”

However, when a guest brought up the latest royal scandal, the Queen Mother opted for alcohol and flattery, choosing a subject she knew would interest the questioner, no matter how blunting she personally found it, and subtly gesturing to a footman as she asked, “Let’s have another drink, I long to hear about X.”

“Have I died again?” was the wryly amused question from the Queen Mother whenever a news outlet misreported news of her departure.

Fake broadcasts were practiced at the BBC in preparation for the inevitable day, and members of her household regularly attended meetings to coordinate her state funeral.

Guessing where they were, the Queen Mother got a kick out of asking them what they had been up to that day and then looking at their hibiscus-tinged embarrassment.

Toward the end of her life, she said to Billy Tallon, the footman known as ‘Backstairs Billy’ who had been with her for half a century, ‘We’re two old treasures, aren’t we, William? But we had fun.’

• Adapted from Do Let’s Have Another Drink: The Singular Wit and Double Measures of Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother by Gareth Russell, published by HarperCollins, for £20. To order a copy for £18, visit mailshop.co.uk /books or call before 7 May 020 3176 2937. Free UK delivery on orders over £25