Buckingham Palace’s announcement of 21 Armed Services’ roles mainly concern those regiments, corps and units formerly headed by Elizabeth II
Today’s announcement from Buckingham Palace of 21 new honorary appointments in the Armed Services for “working members” of the Royal family, chiefly concern those regiments, corps and units formerly headed by Elizabeth II. That said, some roles have been passed to other members of the Royal family by their present holder, the King, presumably to maintain tri-service balance.
Clearly, part of the much larger current review and redistribution of the late Queen’s patronages, which numbered at her death in excess of 600 organisations, these armed services patronages, for that is in effect what they are, have been much easier to deal with than those in the charity and other sectors, such as the patronage of Sunningdale Ladies Golf Club and the Royal Caledonian Curling Club.
However, the task cannot have been entirely easy – particularly when trying to make personal royal links to the units – by the absence from the working royal roster of the Sussexes, the Duke of York and his daughters. Add to that the increasing age and infirmity of the Duke of Kent and Princess Alexandra, who are both notably absent from the list. Indeed, it can’t be long before the Kents’ military roles come up for review and replacement, most notably the Duke’s Colonelcy of the Scots Guards, for which post the Duke of Edinburgh is the most likely candidate.
Some of the new appointments are obvious, others less so. The new Queen, who is not – unlike her late mother-in-law – particularly noted for her religiosity, surprisingly takes on only one new job to add to her existing three colonelcies. She has been made Patron of the Royal Army Chaplains’ Department. This is hardly an onerous task, since chaplains are distributed among the whole of the Army. Unless, of course, she is planning to meet all of them individually.