AND QUEEN'S BIRTHDAY PARADE 2000
The ships were collected densely together in berths along Front Street, in Hamilton. A number of events and activities were planned locally to commemorate the event, but-presumably by co-incidence- the most notable was the simultaneous occurence of the annual Queen's Birthday Parade with the departure of the fleet.
The Queen's Birthday is not actually officially celebrated on the date of her birth (), but on the 21st May.
Many of the ships had already left their berths to assemble for their procession out of the Great Sound when naval and military squads began to assemble for their own procession along Front Street. Numbers of vessels remained on the wharf, however, and the parade was framed by these and watched by their crews, which looked down on the assembled audience of dignitaries, visitors and residents.
Although the day began with a grim, overcast demeanour, by the time the troops marched off the sun had begun to show its face and the procession of the tall Ships along the North Shore was lit to advantage.
The Queen's Birthday Parade
This begins with the marching on of the sailors and troops. Normally, a detachment has in past always been provided by a Royal Naval vessel (rather than by the HM Naval Base on Ireland, HMS Malabar).
As this is the senior service, it will be noted that they always march at the head of parades. At the Rememberance Day parade, the RN detachment always takes its position at the right, front of the assembled units-the senior position. On the narrow confines of Front Street that sort of two-dimensional placement is not possible andd they take the right of the line.
This writer, oddly, cannot remember if a RN detachment was actually present this year. It has been the practice of the navy to ensure a vessel, and its detachment, are always present for certain parades, but this may not have been possible in 2000. HMS Malabar closed in 1995, ending two-hundred years of permanent naval establishment here, and leaving only the Sea Cadet Corp to represent the White Ensign.
The Bermuda Regiment really run this parade, though. All the participants are rehearsed for it under thee regiment's RSM, and the Colour Party of the regiment takes central place, facing the Corporation of Hamilton's flagpole, and the dais holding the dignitaries.
At the start of the parade the national flag (the Union Jack-not the red ensign with the distinguishing arms of the colony,) is flying from the Front Street flagpole, as it normally does.
On the arrival of the Governor, however, it is lowered and replaced with his standard (the Union Jack, with the distinguishing arms of the colony on a white centre).
This in turn is removed and replaced with the Queen's Standard to give indication of her symbolic presence (she's not been actually present for a Birthday Parade, yet).
At the parades end, this order is reversed, to leave the Union Jack.
Photographs
Click on thumbnails for larger views. Photographs are arranged in chronological order. A page of Black and White images will be added.
