The death of King George VI

I remember it well, too. I was in my first year of senior school, so 11 years old. A girl I knew came in through the gate from the little road between two school buildings and she was crying. She told me the King had died, and I was utterly shocked, though I don’t think I cried. I thought the King was sort of immortal, and had no idea he was ill.

I was five and I remember us gathering round the radio at my grandparents house.

Gran told me to remember it would be God Save the Queen from then on as though it was the kind of thing a five year old uttered every day.

I was 3 when he died so have no memory of anyone but the Queen ?

My school was closed at midday; I went home for lunch as most of us did then and being six years old I looked forward to hearing 'Listen with Mother', but to my disgust it was replaced with sombre music and news bulletins. The following day I think I wore a black hair ribbon and many of the boys wore black armbands.

Yes, I remember. All the teachers were in tears.

Yes, as I said elsewhere, we saw the flag being lowered to half mast on the local church when we went out for a mid morning break. We were almost immediately rushed inside and told the news, but not sent home because many of the pupils were boarders. I don’t remember what we did for the rest of the day, but I remember that evening my grandmother telling me that it would be the 4th monarch she had lived under and she told what had happened when Queen Victoria, Edward V11, and George Vth died. She was to live for nearly 30 years of the Queen’s reign, and was a great Royalist.

I was 11 and in the last year of primary school. Our teacher told us to stand up before she told us the news of the King's death. Were we shocked? I can't remember. I'm sure my parents were, since the King and Queen had such meaning for them during the war. We didn't have TV in time for the funeral - that happened in Scotland about three weeks later - but as the senior class we were marshalled into the school hall where we listened to it on the wireless.

My late DH did, he was 7 yo. I was only 3 but remember the coronation a year later very well.

Yes, I was in first year at High Schol. All very sad and sombre.

I was eight and at Junior school. We were told in the afternoon and I remember running home to tell my mother. Of course she knew and had been listening to the wireless all day .

I was eight and remember being in the school playground at dinner time. Some children who lived close to the school went home for dinner and one came into the playground and said that the King was dead and everybody went very quiet. In the time leading up to the Coronation we were busy making decorations for the classrooms, I remember copying pictures of lions and unicorns onto shields. In the village where the school was situated there was to be a parade on Coronation day and our school had a float. The whole school had to vote for a Queen and two attendants and I was voted to be an attendant, I remember my mother had to make a dress for me. I hated the attention during the parade as I was very shy. My father was a police officer and was assigned to go down to London to help with crowd control, I remember it was pouring with rain and he got very wet. We watched the coronation ceremony on a neighbour’s television as we didn’t have one.

I was a small girl in the corner shop doing an errand, when it was announced on the small radio that the king had died, I ran home to tell my mum!

Yes quite clearly because I was 22 at the time and fostering three children apart from my 1 year old son and hubby.
We were still on rations then.

I was 7 years old nearly 8.I can remember a girl came into the school cloakroom and told us the King was dead.
This was when I realised everyone died as I had never heard of death till then.I remember asking my mother about what it means to die.She told me about going to sleep and not waking up again, but it only happens to older people you won't die for a long long time yet.Also if you are good you will go to heaven.
I can remember the photos in the newspapers of the lying in state and my grandmother making a comment about the soldiers' boots!

I remember it well,I was 4 and it came on the radio,my Mother was out the back talking to our neighbour and I ran out shouting “the Kings dead!”

I was 7 and don’t remember anything at all about the king or his death
I do remember going on a train to London the following year to the coronation and sitting on Dads shoulders at the side of the pavement and mum saying I can’t see anything there’s a blooming ( it might not have been blooming) policeman in my way I also remember coming home on the train and a man named Michael taught me how to draw boxes in perspective and pointed out a saddle back pig in the fields to me
I talked it over with dad when he was very elderly ( he had a good brain and memory up to the end) but he said he couldn’t remember doing that and there was no way we d have been able to afford going to London for the day !!!

I was seven or eight and went to a school that had all the pupils in one building. Unusually both juniors and seniors were called in to a whole school assembly mid morning and I can remember when it was announced that the King had died there was a sort of sigh/groan from all the seniors.
It was rhe first time I’d even heard that the king was ill.

I remember much more clearly being allowed to go to keep my best friend company as she and her parents watched the coronation of the Queen a couple of years later. Her parents were visiting their parents as they didn’t have television themselves. Like many my own parents didn’t buy a tiny black and white television until after the coronation.

I was at secondary school and remember someone running down the corridor( which was strictly against school rules), crying and saying that the King was dead.
I remember that there were no programmes on the radio, just sad, serious music.Of course most people didnt have television until the coronation.I saw the royal wedding as a film in the cinema and was taken to see the wedding dress at the elecricity board showrooms in Huddersfield. We did know quite a lot about the princesses as there were many books written about them.

I was also 11 years old. Remember my dad saying “he was a good old King”. Of course he wasn’t very old but he looked it at the time. We were all quite overwhelmed at school and aware of its significance.

I was 3 when It happened , my mum and dad had a TV , which was then rental ,and remember hearing somber classical music and nothing else on TV .
Everything I gather shops etc were shut as it was a state mourning not like today .
Mick

I was 3 and don't remember anything about the king dying but I do remember the Coronation. My mum had made me a white dress with red, white and blue buttons down the front and knitted me a red, white and blue striped cardigan. Luckily she only had one daughter!

I was 14, so remember it well. At school, we were having an English lesson when the headmistress walked in and whispered something in the teacher's ear. When she left, the teacher solemnly told us that the King had died. Some of us, including me, shed a few tears. We all went to the assembly hall where the headmistress gave a brief talk about the sadness of this historic occasion and then we were allowed to go home.
I was an avid radio listener back then and recall that it played just solemn music for a few days, can't remember how many.

I was 6, and my aunty met me out of school with the news that the King had died. Didn't mean a lot at the time, but was very excited when plans for the new Queen's coronation started to unfold.

I can't remember it at all but I do remember the coronation day because we waved at the queen as she travelled down the end of our street. I remember we had a little folding stool to sit on and I had a little flag. It was exciting because I got very few toys as a child.