Doing her duty! Rod Stewart’s wife, Penny Lancaster, served as a member of the city of London police during Queen Elizabeth II’s funeral on Monday, September 19 — and she’s very thankful things went smoothly.
“With all that planning going ahead, you can never quite predict how the crowd is [going to] react and the dangers that might lay ahead,” Lancaster, 51, told Sky News following the service. “But we’ve had great training and preparation, and fortunately, everybody paid their respects in the proper manner and we didn’t have any incidents to speak of. So, I’m very grateful for that.”
The model revealed that Operation London Bridge — the official funeral plan for the late monarch — “went into action immediately” following her death on September 8 at the age of 96. The schedule, which includes the announcement of her death, the period of official mourning and the details of her state funeral, was created in the 1960s and revised various times before Her Majesty’s passing earlier this month.
The England native, who is a special constable for the London police since completing her training last year, shared that she is “very proud to be able to serve” during such a “historic moment” during an interview with Good Morning Britain last week.
“It was a great privilege to work at the Queen’s memorial service at St. Paul’s Cathedral on [September 9],” she said at the time. “I signed the oath of Office of Constable to Her Majesty the Queen just over a year ago, April last year, and just as the seamless tie between Her Majesty and King Charles III, my oath will now be with the King.”
She added, “It’s always an honor and a pleasure and they’re just a family like all other families, but they have this huge responsibility to be the head of state and to do the work that they do for the country of the Commonwealth. I’m just in absolute admiration of them.”
Monday’s state funeral began with a short procession to Westminster Abbey from Westminster Hall, where the royal matriarch had been lying in state since Wednesday, September 14. King Charles III, and his siblings — Princess Anne, Prince Andrew and Prince Edward – led the procession alongside three of the queen’s grandchildren: Prince William, Prince Harry and Peter Phillips.
After the service at Westminster Abbey, the royal family participated in a procession from the church to Wellington Arch, where the coffin was loaded into a hearse to be taken to Windsor Castle. The queen will be buried on the grounds at the King George VI Memorial Chapel alongside her late husband, Prince Philip, who died at age 99 in April 2021.
On Tuesday, September 13, Lancaster was seen patrolling in front of the queen’s coffin as the late sovereign was driven to Buckingham Palace, per photos obtained by the Daily Mail.
In June 2020, the Strictly Come Dancing alum explained during the Loose Women panel that she applied for the position after taking part in the reality TV program Famous and Fighting Crime, where she joined officers on the beat.
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“I never felt more comfortable in a position and I felt like this is where I was supposed to be,” she explained. “I had to sit exams, English and maths type of exams, and go for an interview with two officers. And then I did a fitness test, which was the bleep test which was pretty tricky, so I had to get fit for that and I passed.”
The Celebrity Masterchef alum has been married to the “Forever Young” singer, 77, since 2007. The twosome met after Lancaster was dared to ask for Stewart’s autograph at a concert and share two children, sons Alastair and Aiden, born in 2005 and 2011, respectively.
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