The speech that made the Queen cry: How Princess Elizabeth’s famous 1947 broadcast where she made solemn vow was written by a journalist – before draft was misplaced in a Cape Town bar

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It was the speech that came to define the late Queen’s 70 years on the throne.

Speaking to the nation from Cape Town on her 21st birthday in 1947, Princess Elizabeth promised Britons that her ‘whole life whether it be long or short’ would be devoted to their service.

Royal writer Valentine Low revealed in his 2022 book Courtiers: The Hidden Power Behind the Throne that the future Queen was made so emotional by the stirring words that she cried.

Alan Lascelles, private secretary to her father King George VI, said to her in response: ‘Good, for if it makes you cry now, it will make 200million other people cry when you deliver it, and that is what we want.’

Incredibly, a draft of the speech was briefly lost in a bar in Cape Town the month before Elizabeth uttered the words.

When it was found, Lascelles wrote to Dermot Morrah, the journalist who wrote the speech, to tell him: ‘The missing letter has now turned up. The steward in the Protea diner had put it in the bar, among his bottles, little knowing that it was itself of premier cru.’

It was the speech that came to define the late Queen's 70 years on the throne. Speaking to the nation from Cape Town on her 21st birthday in 1947, Princess Elizabeth promised Britons that her 'whole life whether it be long or short' would be devoted to their service. Above: Elizabeth delivering her speech

It was the speech that came to define the late Queen’s 70 years on the throne. Speaking to the nation from Cape Town on her 21st birthday in 1947, Princess Elizabeth promised Britons that her ‘whole life whether it be long or short’ would be devoted to their service. Above: Elizabeth delivering her speech

Elizabeth made her speech during a six-month tour of South Africa. Above: The Princess inspects a guard of honour in the country during the trip

Elizabeth made her speech during a six-month tour of South Africa. Above: The Princess inspects a guard of honour in the country during the trip 

He went on to praise Morrah for the quality of the speech. Lascelles said: ‘I have been reading drafts for many years now, but I cannot recall one that has so completely satisfied me and left me feeling that no single word should be altered.

‘Moreover, dusty cynic though I am, it moved me greatly. It has the trumpet ring of the other Elizabeth’s Tilbury speech, combined with the immortal simplicity of Victoria’s “I will be good”.

Elizabeth spent six months in South Africa with her father, mother Queen Elizabeth and sister Princess Margaret.

The tour came just two years after the end of the Second World War, at a time when the British Empire was being dismantled.

Low reveals how, in describing the success of the tour, Lascelles wrote in his diary: ‘The most satisfactory feature of the whole visit is the remarkable development of Princess Elizabeth.

‘She has come on in the most surprising way, and all in the right direction.’

He added that she had a ‘good, healthy sense of fun’ but could also ‘tale on the old bores with much of her mother’s skill.’

Journalist Dermot Morrah wrote Princess Elizabeth's speech. King George VI's private secretary, Alan Lascelles, told him: 'I have been reading drafts for many years now, but I cannot recall one that has so completely satisfied me and left me feeling that no single word should be altered'

Journalist Dermot Morrah wrote Princess Elizabeth’s speech. King George VI’s private secretary, Alan Lascelles, told him: ‘I have been reading drafts for many years now, but I cannot recall one that has so completely satisfied me and left me feeling that no single word should be altered’

Princess Elizabeth sits in front of a BBC microphone as she delivers her speech to Britain and the Commonwealth from Government House in Cape Town

Princess Elizabeth sits in front of a BBC microphone as she delivers her speech to Britain and the Commonwealth from Government House in Cape Town

Morrah, who had previously penned speeches for George VI during the Second World War, also published a book about Elizabeth to mark her birthday.

Elizabeth began her birthday speech, which was delivered from Government House in Cape Town, by saying: ‘On my twenty-first birthday I welcome the opportunity to speak to all the peoples of the British Commonwealth and Empire, wherever they live, whatever race they come from, and whatever language they speak.

‘Let me begin by saying “thank you” to all the thousands of kind people who have sent me messages of good will. This is a happy day for me; but it is also one that brings serious thoughts, thoughts of life looming ahead with all its challenges and with all its opportunity.

‘At such a time it is a great help to know that there are multitudes of friends all round the world who are thinking of me and who wish me well. I am grateful and I am deeply moved.’

She went on to mention the five-year conflict with Nazi Germany, saying: ‘We must not be daunted by the anxieties and hardships that the war has left behind for every nation of our commonwealth.

‘We know that these things are the price we cheerfully undertook to pay for the high honour of standing alone, seven years ago, in defence of the liberty of the world.

Princess Elizabeth (right) with her sister Princess Margaret on the Royal Train in South Africa

Princess Elizabeth (right) with her sister Princess Margaret on the Royal Train in South Africa 

Princess Elizabeth and Princess Margaret in South Africa. Behind them is Group Captain Peter Townsend, then King George VI's equerry. He and Margaret became close on the trip. Their wish to marry was thwarted

Princess Elizabeth and Princess Margaret in South Africa. Behind them is Group Captain Peter Townsend, then King George VI’s equerry. He and Margaret became close on the trip. Their wish to marry was thwarted

‘Let us say with Rupert Brooke: “Now God be thanked who has matched us with this hour”.

But it was her prophetic concluding words that made the speech so historic.

Elizabeth said: ‘I declare before you all that my whole life whether it be long or short shall be devoted to your service and the service of our great imperial family to which we all belong.

‘But I shall not have strength to carry out this resolution alone unless you join in it with me, as I now invite you to do: I know that your support will be unfailingly given.

‘God help me to make good my vow, and God bless all of you who are willing to share in it.’

The full speech by Princess Elizabeth on her 21st birthday 

‘On my twenty-first birthday I welcome the opportunity to speak to all the peoples of the British Commonwealth and Empire, wherever they live, whatever race they come from, and whatever language they speak.

‘Let me begin by saying ‘thank you’ to all the thousands of kind people who have sent me messages of good will. This is a happy day for me; but it is also one that brings serious thoughts, thoughts of life looming ahead with all its challenges and with all its opportunity.

‘At such a time it is a great help to know that there are multitudes of friends all round the world who are thinking of me and who wish me well. I am grateful and I am deeply moved.

‘As I speak to you today from Cape Town I am six thousand miles from the country where I was born. But I am certainly not six thousand miles from home. Everywhere I have travelled in these lovely lands of South Africa and Rhodesia my parents, my sister and I have been taken to the heart of their people and made to feel that we are just as much at home here as if we had lived among them all our lives.

‘That is the great privilege belonging to our place in the world-wide commonwealth – that there are homes ready to welcome us in every continent of the earth. Before I am much older I hope I shall come to know many of them.

‘Although there is none of my father’s subjects from the oldest to the youngest whom I do not wish to greet, I am thinking especially today of all the young men and women who were born about the same time as myself and have grown up like me in terrible and glorious years of the second world war.

‘Will you, the youth of the British family of nations, let me speak on my birthday as your representative? Now that we are coming to manhood and womanhood it is surely a great joy to us all to think that we shall be able to take some of the burden off the shoulders of our elders who have fought and worked and suffered to protect our childhood.

‘We must not be daunted by the anxieties and hardships that the war has left behind for every nation of our commonwealth. We know that these things are the price we cheerfully undertook to pay for the high honour of standing alone, seven years ago, in defence of the liberty of the world. Let us say with Rupert Brooke: “Now God be thanked who has matched us with this hour”.

‘I am sure that you will see our difficulties, in the light that I see them, as the great opportunity for you and me. Most of you have read in the history books the proud saying of William Pitt that England had saved herself by her exertions and would save Europe by her example. But in our time we may say that the British Empire has saved the world first, and has now to save itself after the battle is won.

‘I think that is an even finer thing than was done in the days of Pitt; and it is for us, who have grown up in these years of danger and glory, to see that it is accomplished in the long years of peace that we all hope stretch ahead.

‘If we all go forward together with an unwavering faith, a high courage, and a quiet heart, we shall be able to make of this ancient commonwealth, which we all love so dearly, an even grander thing – more free, more prosperous, more happy and a more powerful influence for good in the world – than it has been in the greatest days of our forefathers.

‘To accomplish that we must give nothing less than the whole of ourselves. There is a motto which has been borne by many of my ancestors – a noble motto, “I serve”. Those words were an inspiration to many bygone heirs to the Throne when they made their knightly dedication as they came to manhood. I cannot do quite as they did.

‘But through the inventions of science I can do what was not possible for any of them. I can make my solemn act of dedication with a whole Empire listening. I should like to make that dedication now. It is very simple.

‘I declare before you all that my whole life whether it be long or short shall be devoted to your service and the service of our great imperial family to which we all belong.

‘But I shall not have strength to carry out this resolution alone unless you join in it with me, as I now invite you to do: I know that your support will be unfailingly given. God help me to make good my vow, and God bless all of you who are willing to share in it.’

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