Whitehall was left red-faced after Downing Street was compelled to issue an apology for a birthday telegram sent to the Queen Mother that breached royal protocol, according to newly released government papers.
The documents, opened at the National Archives in Kew, reveal that John Major’s private office was contacted directly by the Queen Mother’s private secretary after the greeting marking her 94th birthday in 1994 arrived bearing an incorrect form of address.
Captain Sir Alastair Aird telephoned Number 10 to demand an explanation for what was described as an “improperly addressed” message, prompting an internal investigation by the prime minister’s staff. The precise nature of the error, however, is not disclosed in the surviving files.
In a letter sent following the inquiry, Roderic Lyne of Mr Major’s private office issued a fulsome apology while firmly distancing Downing Street from responsibility for the lapse. The mistake, he suggested, had occurred during transmission rather than preparation.
“The message itself, as it left our hands, was entirely correct,” Lyne wrote. “However, in transmitting it, it appears that British Telecom most unfortunately addressed the telegram in the improper manner which you described.”
He added that staff in Number 10 were “sticklers for the correct form” and would not ordinarily commit such an error. With understated irony, Lyne floated a possible remedy to avoid similar embarrassments in future, observing that telegrams were “in any case going out of fashion”.
Despite the breach of protocol, the Queen Mother responded with customary courtesy. She later sent her own message to Mr Major and his wife, Norma, thanking them warmly for their good wishes.
“I was very touched by your kind message of good wishes on my birthday and send you both my warm thanks,” she wrote.
The Queen Mother died in 2002 at the age of 101. The files form part of a routine release of government records after 20 years, though material concerning the Royal Family is often withheld under the Public Records Act.
