Queen Elizabeth and Susan.Photo: Lisa Sheridan/Hulton Archive/Getty
Princess Elizabeth and Prince Philip on their wedding day in 1947.PA Images via Getty
The Pembroke Welsh corgi then accompanied the couple on their honeymoon, where she was photographed playing outdoors with the newlyweds a few days after the wedding ceremony.
Susan, Prince Philip and Queen Elizabeth.Topical Press Agency/Hulton Archive/Getty
Queen Elizabethwasfamous for her corgisthroughout her reign, owning a long line of corgis anddorgis(corgis bred with dachshunds) descended from Susan…14 generations, in fact!
“A lot of people wonder why she chose the corgi breed,” Perry tells PEOPLE. “People who have corgis will tell you — they’re such amazing dogs, but not easy dogs. They’re very spirited — some of her corgis did get into scrapes; Susan did get in trouble a couple of times. Even for a very experienced dog handler like the Queen, corgis are not for novice dog owners. The fact that she loved them so much, I think it speaks to the fact that she wasn’t able to express her emotions and feelings.”
The Corgi and the Queen.Godwin Books
“She really used her dogs as an expression of herself. She couldn’t choose her life, but she could choose her companions,” Perry says. “The fact that these corgis are so spirited, so lively and so mischievous, I think in some way that was her way of expressing how she felt inside but wasn’t able to convey. She was so prim and proper and never put a foot wrong, did she? Yet these naughty dogs are doing all kinds of things that maybe she wished she could do.”
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Perry, who participated inQueen Elizabeth’s Platinum Jubilee Pageant in June andsaw the monarchas she stepped out on the Buckingham Palace balcony in one of her final public appearances, said she woke up at 2 a.m. to watch the Queen’s funeral in September, as she is based in California.
Caroline Perry.
The author said that when the monarch’s two corgis,Muick and Sandy, were spotted as Queen Elizabeth’s coffin arrived at Windsor Castle for the committal service, “that was the moment that broke us all.” (Although the Queen stopped breeding her corgis descendent from Susan in 2012 as she didn’t want to leave any behind, shereceived two puppiesin March 2021, not long beforePrince Philip’s death. After one of the dogs died just weeks later, Prince Andrewgifted his motherwith a new puppy on what would have been Philip’s 100th birthday.)
Queen Elizabeth"had overseen almost all aspects of her funeral before she passed, so she must have wanted the dogs to have been there at that exact moment," Perry adds.
Queen Elizabeth’s corgis at her funeral.GLYN KIRK/POOL/AFP via Getty
Perry hopes readers can relate to the “love story” betweenQueen Elizabethand her dogs.
“Even though none of us can relate to living in a palace and none of us can relate to being the Queen and reigning for 70 years, I hope in this book that everyone can relate to the fact that we all have that need for unconditional love, no matter where we live or who we’re related to,” she says. “That is very much what I wanted to come across in this book — that yes, there was immense privilege that came with being a princess and then the Queen, but there were also unique challenges that we can all relate to — to loneliness, to isolation, to fear. Just the human experience, isn’t it? I hope that people see the Queen in a different way and can maybe relate to her experiences a little bit more.”
Queen Elizabeth.UPI/Getty
source: people.com
