Canada’s Coronation Girls revisit their life-changing royal journey | Canada Voices

I can’t claim to turn back time, but I did take a group of women on the cusp of 90 back to the year they turned 17.

As the director of the newly released documentary Coronation Girls, I made the case two years ago to fly a dozen of these remarkable women from Canada to London to revisit scenes from seven decades earlier.

In 1953, a group of girls was selected to witness an historic event: the coronation of Queen Elizabeth. Fifty young women from across Canada, many from rural communities, were flung together on a ship, the Empress of France, and set course from the Port of Montreal to Liverpool. It was a transatlantic odyssey that changed not only their views of the world, but of themselves.

The trip was an initiative by the Canadian Education Association, which issued a memorandum to deputy ministers of education stating: “We respectfully request your co-operation in the selection of a number of high school girls from your province to go on a tour of the United Kingdom, with all expenses paid in May and June of 1953.”

The seven-week journey, including uniforms, luggage, allowances and incidentals, was sponsored by Canadian businessman Garfield Weston, who was looking to expand his biscuit company in the U.K., which included the purchase of London’s fabled store on Piccadilly called Fortnum & Mason.

Mr. Weston wanted to deepen Canada’s relationship with the U.K. He’d cut a cheque to help with the replacement of war planes to support Britain’s war effort. He was a believer in the enduring power of friendship.

He hoped the “Weston Coronation Tour” would inspire the girls to go on and become great leaders. That, they did. Their roster includes a civil engineer, a climate activist, an adoption practitioner and a Harvard professor. But the trip in ‘53 also sparked something more profound between the girls. The beginning of deep and lasting bonds had formed aboard the Empress as they dodged icebergs to arrive in Liverpool.

By the time they reached London they’d become a roving band of sisters, and as they watched the young Princess Elizabeth ascend to the throne, they realized they were witnessing a girl not much older than themselves becoming queen. They were transfixed.

Their early adventure had special connections for me.

It made me think of my dad, who was a monarchist. His parents came to Canada from Newcastle-upon-Tyne, England. I was in grade school when he showed me a picture of the little parade he organized with children in his neighbourhood on V-E Day. He loved military marching bands and the choir of King’s College, Cambridge, especially the Lessons and Carols, which was mandatory programming at Christmas. He stood my brother and me, as kids, right at the gates of Buckingham Palace so that the band of the Coldstream Guards passed within feet of us during the Changing of the Guard.

The filming of Coronation Girls began over the summer of 2022, starting with development interviews with 12 of the “girls.”

Immediately, an electricity was under way with Carol Bowyer Shipley, our “lead girl” who’d come from the one-room schoolhouse town of Fort Whyte, Man. She’d kept extensive scrapbooks, which she’d put into careful order at 17, with news clippings and anecdotes.

For the most part the women were jovial about how their lives had gone. With all the ups and the downs, they pointed to friendship as this incorruptible force at the centre for getting through it all. They could be searingly frank about matters, once they felt comfortable, and intensely charming. Ms. Shipley and I had a connection that felt something like the circuitry between soulmates. She’s nearly 90 and I’m in my 50s, yet our spark was undeniable. I received an e-mail from her at one point with the subject line, “Idle thought.” “Do you realize the meaning of your last name, Arrowsmith, is ‘maker of arrows’ and mine, which is Bowyer, is ‘maker of bows’? What do you make of that?”

The more we could “flashback” during our sessions and get into the crackle of the sights, sounds and scents of what they’d experienced at 17, the better the film got. Together we were discovering they also had profound “what-ifs” they carried with them.

For Ms. Shipley, her great “what-if” involved an Irish student named “Doogie,” whom she met during a dance night at Riddel Hall, a dormitory in Belfast. After an evening of revelry, he came to the docks the next day to wave farewell as her ship sailed on. What direction life might have gone had she followed his wave?

They were also forming a profound connection with Princess Elizabeth, imagining themselves as her, and she as them, in this shared moment. Their energy was infectious, and I wondered how the film could adequately harness that component. I sat up in bed one night and realized the story was screaming for a special ending. I needed to make something happen that would measure up to what they experienced in 1953.

With that, I began drafting a letter to King Charles III while vacationing in Ontario’s Haliburton Highlands.

I didn’t want to start overthinking: How does one go about “writing” to the King? I simply knew the note had to be short and demonstrate my mastery of the story, conveying all at once the alchemy of friendship, joy and excitement I was experiencing with the women. I wrote a heartfelt summary of the project and concluded with: “It is my job, as you will understand, to make sure the audience feels the span of emotions we have felt during the production of these hopeful and energizing life stories – and to produce the remarkable ending the story is calling for.”

The next morning I checked my e-mail and woke the entire cottage, shouting: “His Majesty’s lead has responded!”

“Many thanks for your e-mail and proposal as below. What a charming story indeed …” As I read further, I could sense from the questions there was a genuine interest in my proposal for filming.

With the strength of the interviews, vast archival material and access to Buckingham Palace shaping up, I was feeling bullish on pitching Canadian broadcasters. But I was surprised when an initial round of pitches was met with muted enthusiasm. The best response was: Maybe come back to us in the spring. The worst was: Not the best fit for our programming needs.

A stark contrast to an opening salvo with American broadcast partners via the PBS affiliate WNED Buffalo: I got about a sentence into the pitch when programmer Kathryn Larsen cut me off. “Oh my gosh we love it. How can we help? And do you really think you’ll get inside the palace?”

It was early December and after months of intensive Zoom meetings with the King’s leads, I had negotiated a plan. We were going to be officially placed in the diary for 10 to 15 minutes. The production had achieved approvals for filming inside the palace – in audience with the King.

Each of the Coronation Girls flew into Toronto just ahead of the holiday bustle and we all clamoured aboard the overnight flight to London. This time, they’d taken on the journey at their own expense, and each brought along a travel companion.

Within hours of touching down at Heathrow, I needed to be in a suit and tie and over to Buckingham Palace. I would be scouting the proposed layout for filming a surprise scene where the King would emerge from a specific doorway during the women’s planned tour.

Just prior to sitting down, the King’s deputy lead grabbed my arm and told me to come with her. She whisked me through a maze of hallways before pausing at a doorway. “Go ahead, go in,” she said. As I entered the room I realized the outer doors opened onto the famous balcony where the Royal Family appears during coronations, jubilees and the annual Trooping the Colour. Through the curtains, I could see the top of the Queen Victoria Memorial at the roundabout.

During the meeting, the King’s head lead asked: “And the production has arranged for a medic to be on hand for the girls, has it?” I half-gasped, “Uh, no we hadn’t considered that.” Spiritedly, he made the point, “just in the event some of them are overwhelmed when ‘the boss’ drops in. It’s not a bad idea. We’ll take care of it. Not to worry.”

It was dusk as I was escorted out, through the main archway onto the amber gravel forecourt I’d stared across as a kid.

The next day started with a run up to Windsor Castle to visit the resting place of Queen Elizabeth II. The women were invited to attend Evensong at St. George’s Chapel.

The travel buses were proving a challenge. They didn’t have lifts so boarding and getting off the vehicles safely with walkers was taking at least half an hour on each end and required all-hands-on-deck.

The following day’s shoot was just down the street from the hotel. Our location was Fortnum & Mason, not just because of the Weston connection to the story but because I’d happened to notice in the months leading up that legendary British actor Richard E. Grant had released a perfume line at the store.

When I read more about it, it turned out Mr. Grant was fixated on scent memories as triggers for intense flashbacks to place and time. I sat up again in bed and said to myself, “You have to go for it.” I sent off another e-mail pitch where I was carried by the energy of the story, and “R.E.G.” agreed to participate.

He arrived that morning (his hair in blast-back mode) and swooshed into the room. Some recognized him and others had no idea who he was. Perfect for filming! He started by saying he’d been in lots of movies they might know, from Gosford Park to Downton Abbey. This was marked by much murmuring, followed by a long story from one of the women about gin and tonics, which Mr. Grant eventually interrupted with, “And are you drunk right now!?”

He was a sparkplug to the conversation and was able to draw out one of the central lines of the film when Ms. Shipley said, “When we are together we can go back to being 17 again.” This was the heart of the entire story – friendship as a form of time-travel.

As we prepared to leave the hotel for the palace I encountered a major glitch.

Security clearances for the palace are pass/fail and everything is done weeks in advance including for bus hires. Each vehicle’s registration number and the driver details are sent through well in advance. As bus No. 2 pulled in front of the hotel, I noticed the vehicle plates didn’t match what was on the document we’d provided the palace. It was a different bus.

A terrible sinking feeling hit me. I engaged the end-to-end encrypted mobile app that took me directly to the King’s deputy lead. (Later, I learned, she was seated at breakfast with the King as he was reviewing the biographies I’d written about each of the women.)

The King’s deputy lead picked up right away. “Doug, where are you now, what’s happening …” she was clipped but gentle.

I explained the problem with the second bus.

“Can you get to the main gate in 10 minutes? I will be there.”

I remember feeling a shiver of comfort; it was her tone of the words “I will be there.” I’d come to understand that dealing with the palace was very much “of the word” – words matter in this world. One’s word reflects one’s character and the palace has a keen eye for that.

Cleared, we drove through the archway into the inner courtyard. We’d arrived.

A short tour began with the Surveyor of the King’s Works of Art. Just as she escorted us into the Throne Room, the King’s lead leaned in and said we need to move along because tea was starting down in the Bow Room. Our brigade trundled back through the legendary pink-walled Picture Gallery, down the winding stairs past the Christmas tree and into the semi-circular, deep rose-coloured room where Queen Elizabeth laid in rest.

Tea and biscuits commenced. And at exactly 10:45 the far door opened and King Charles entered the room.

Gasps could be heard from the women as they recognized who it was. “Good Lord,” exclaimed Sheila Washburn, the civil engineer from St. Andrews by-the-Sea, N.B. “Do we stand?” asked Clarice Evans Siebens, a stage actor from Calgary. The women immediately got to their feet and prepared to receive the King.

What’s it like being feet away from King Charles III? It’s a funny kind of feeling you get when sign, signifier and symbol converge into one, captured most beautifully in Ms. Shipley’s line in the film: “He is a man, but he’s also the King.” The exchanges were heartfelt and humorous, and the King extended his visit with them for more than half an hour.

It was a quiet trip back from the palace on the bus. Everyone was internally processing what had just happened.

I know the women are deeply grateful for the experience. Nothing could outdo what they had experienced at 17, but meeting the King decades later suitably completed what Garfield Weston had started for them. It was a magnificent closing chapter to the story. This time they directly interacted with the monarch. As they placed their hands into the King’s that day, what they told me they felt more than anything was friendship.

A year later to the day the palace hosted a press screening of the completed film.

The screening was attended by every major outlet in the U.K., from the Telegraph to the BBC, to People Magazine, Channel 4 and the Times. The chair of Fortnum & Mason and Canada’s Deputy High Commissioner, Robert Fry, were also in attendance. It was thrilling to feel the support, and again witness the palace leads in action. The King’s head lead addressed the room with clear affection for the film, referencing my original letter to the palace and “this persistent Canadian who’d won us over.”

A note from Mr. Fry followed that night: “The film is exquisite and beautifully deals with so many important issues around Canada’s connections to the U.K., our shared history, people to people ties and life issues like aging.” The next day I was booked to return to Toronto, but I’d received another e-mail: “You’re Invited to Attend Christmas Carol Service at His Majesty’s Chapel Royal, St. James’s Palace.”

I changed my flight and booked an additional hotel. The next evening, I grabbed a quick pint at the Red Lion off Jermyn Street and stood in the gloaming, taking in the preholiday banter around me, then walked south to the end of St James’s Street onto Cleveland Row, arriving just ahead of the indicated time. Not a soul in sight, everything in darkness.

I waited it out a bit, wondering whether I’d gotten the dates wrong, when two guardsmen appeared and at the same time a tiny queue of about 10 people formed, all of whom seem to know each other and at that point I heard my name from across the street, “Is that Doug Arrowsmith I see over there?” The King’s head lead, disguised in a flat cap, was crossing the street to greet me.

Together we entered St. James’s Palace, no ID, no clearance process required, everybody knew each other. Into that little jewel of a chapel we went for carol service for 50.

I never sing at these things. But that night I did. And I thought of my dad.

Coronation Girls (a FeltFilm production) continues broadcasting across 280 PBS stations. Discussions for a Canadian release are continuing. Douglas Arrowsmith is a Canadian producer and director. He has a PhD in social & political thought from York University.