In Memoriam - An appreciation of The Queen’s role as Visitor to the Royal College of Physicians
The relationship between the monarch of the day and the RCP, first established in 1518, has been an underpinning feature of the college for over 500 years. Since Henry VIII, each successive monarch has been a ‘Visitor’ to the RCP – a role similar to that of Patron but with earlier historic origins. Here we explain the genesis of the relationship and pay tribute to Her Majesty The Queen’s role as our Visitor during her reign.
The Royal College of Physicians was established when the personal physician to King Henry VIII, Thomas Linacre, and a group of fellow doctors, petitioned the King to allow them to establish a college for physicians. They wanted to introduce standards for medical practice (or ‘physic’ as it was known at the time) and practitioners. The Royal Charter granted by Henry in 1518 and the subsequent Act of Parliament in 1523 enabled the then College of Physicians to grant licences for practice and to punish those practising without a licence or engaging in fraud or malpractice.
Over the subsequent 500 years, many college presidents have also been the personal physician to the reigning monarch, and latterly taking the position of head of the Royal Medical Household, a role that was created in 1973. The role is usually held by a gastroenterologist. Notably, four of the six heads since its creation have had strong links with the RCP:
Sir Richard ‘Dick’ Bayliss, who held several RCP roles including vice-president
Sir John Batten, various roles including senior censor and academic vice-president
Sir Anthony Dawson, various roles including treasurer 1985-1991
Sir Richard Thompson, treasurer 2003-10, president 2010-2014
In her role as ‘Visitor’ to the Royal College of Physicians, Her Majesty The Queen visited the RCP three times – for the opening of the new headquarters building in 1964, the opening of the medical precinct in 1986 and the RCP’s 500th anniversary in 2018.
1964
Her Majesty The Queen officially opened the RCP’s new headquarters in Regent’s Park on 5 November 1964. She was met by the president Sir Charles Dodds and introduced to the other officers, resplendent in academic dress. This momentous occasion is fortuitously described graphically in various journals including our own, the New England Journal of Medicine1 and The African Journal of Medicine!2 Fortuitously, as the only known film is the black and white ITV News coverage of the event, which is around a minute long.
Fellows, members and guests with their wives (and the occasional husband, given the overwhelming ratio of men to women physicians at that time) gathered in various rooms to watch the opening ceremony on colour closed-circuit television, no doubt a novelty at the time given that television wasn’t broadcast in colour until BBC2’s coverage of Wimbledon from 1 July 1967. The RCP’s Harveian Librarian Sir Charles Newman acted as warm-up man for the main event, showing images of previous buildings and significant books from the RCP collection on this ‘TV’.
Her Majesty arrived at 3.00pm, and having met the main officers of the college, ascended the stairs to the Dorchester Library. Following a short speech from the president, Her Majesty gave an address – her wry sense of humour came to the fore when she suggested that the aforementioned Thomas Linacre might have found his Royal patient Henry VIII ‘a little difficult’ and that it might have been a good idea to share his care with other physicians! She also remarked that she was the daughter of an Honorary Fellow and a wife of one. This was not unusual - in the RCP’s later history many members of the Royal family, not just the monarch, have been gifted honorary fellow status. Currently King Charles III, The Princess Royal and Princess Alexandra are honorary fellows of the RCP.
Her Majesty then formally opened the building and moved from the Dorchester Library to the Censors Room for afternoon tea. She was presented with a beautiful and appropriate gift to mark the occasion - a mini silver Caduceus the size of a fountain pen, Caduceus being the symbol of medicine, represented by two snakes entwined around a (sometimes winged) staff.
1986
Her Majesty The Queen next visited the RCP in 1986, this time to open the Medical Precinct around 11 St Andrews Place. The Medical Precinct comprises the RCP main building and all the houses fronting onto the Place. Conceived in the late 1970s, the RCP decided to develop and equip the houses, most of which were in a state of dilapidation, into offices and rooms suitable for the RCP’s faculties and medical specialty societies to move into. Thanks to the then treasurer Dr Nigel Compston and many generous donors, the RCP was able to purchase the leases on the buildings and restore them to use.
The official opening of the Precinct took place on Wednesday 11 June 1986 from 3.30 pm. The event appeared to be an altogether more jolly affair, with a tea tent set up in the garden and the Territorial Band of the Royal Army Medical Corps playing the national anthem on arrival and a selection of music throughout the visit, including a special fanfare called ‘St Andrews Place’. There was a marked sea-change in presentation from the 1964 event, as this time most of the officers who met The Queen were accompanied by their wives (there were no female officers at the time), and senior staff from the RCP and other organisations, the architect (later Sir) Denys Lasdun, the builders and engineers were also invited to meet Her Majesty. There is a very detailed programme of the event and from this we learn that The Queen was introduced to over 100 people during the 90-minute visit, which also included the planting of a lime tree (since removed).
In addition to the RCP’s own officers, Her Majesty met officers and staff from all the organisations taking up the opportunity to have an office in the Precinct, including the Faculty of Public Heath and the then British Paediatric Association which later became the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health.
Also sandwiched into the visit was a presentation of the work of the RCP’s then Research Unit -topics included ‘The Female Life Span’, the more niche ‘Rubella Vaccine in Bulgaria’ and another described as ‘The Dragon Foal (A fertile mule has been found in Hunan Province, China, which has confounded the cytogenetists)’… What Her Majesty made of the latter was never revealed.
The Queen gave a short speech in which she described the precinct as ‘almost a medical university’ and unveil the plaque on the side of the wall. She was presented with a bouquet of flowers by 4-year-old Polly Compston, granddaughter of the aforementioned Nigel, and whose father is the eminent neurologist Alastair Compston.
After 10-15 minutes for tea she was whisked away by the president to see some illustrated panels on the RCP’s history and sign the Visitor’s Book. The gift this time was a ‘glass paperweight with the Royal cypher on the top, the College Arms on the bottom, with a representation of St Andrews Place on the sides.’
2018
The visit to commemorate the 500th anniversary of the founding of the RCP was yet another step-change in proceedings, with much more diverse and varied groups of people meeting Her Majesty during her visit. Apart from the welcoming party of senior officers (without wives, husbands and partners!), those meeting The Queen were chosen at random from six categories of people connected to the RCP – regional advisors, junior doctors, staff and so on. In addition to the more democratic nature of the visit, all the staff and officers not chosen to meet her personally in the six groups were able to gather on the second floor balcony and watch the whole visit for the first time as it all took place within the Lasdun Hall.
Carefully choreographed as all Royal visits are, this one was the first to involve a media scrum, with the Queen’s press secretary and the RCP’s head of strategic communications ‘guiding’ a group of Fleet Street’s finest into one corner then another to get the best shots of the event without intrusion onto Her Majesty’s personal space. Legendary photographer Arthur Edwards (78), The Sun’s Royal photographer since 1977 also attended and was treated like Royalty himself! Hard to imagine now, but it was also the first visit post-internet, so no sooner had it finished than the reports were up live on the Royal-obsessed Daily Express and Daily Mail websites, with detailed descriptions of Her Majesty’s outfit and quotes from RCP president Professor (and later Dame) Jane Dacre.3, 4
Her Majesty was shown some historical items from our collection and the exhibition Ceaseless Motion: William Harvey's Experiments In Circulation, then guided to a podium in the Lasdun Hall where president Jane Dacre gave an address, followed by Her Majesty. She was then presented with a copy of the new RCP centenary charter.
Following the departure of Her Majesty, RCP staff and officers were treated to refreshments including an enormous cake ceremonially cut by then RCP treasurer Professor Chuka Nwokolo.
The lasting memory of the event was the image of Her Majesty standing next to the portrait of her predecessor Henry VIII on an easel next to her on the podium, illustrating perfectly the importance and continuity of our relationship with the monarch of the day.
RCP editor
1 https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJM196412312712709
2 https://journals.co.za/doi/pdf/10.10520/AJA00089176_6741
3 https://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-5412571/The-Queen-visits-Royal-College-Physicians.html