Queen Camilla pays her personal poppy tribute to the fallen as Harry and Meghan meet soldiers in the US

It was a story about two Memories that were 5,000 miles – and a whole world – apart.

As the Queen braved the chill of a wet November day in London, Harry and Meghan paid their respects to war veterans in Californian style.

For Camilla, it was her annual pilgrimage to the Field of Remembrance at Westminster Abbey, where she paid a moving tribute to the country’s fallen.

Wearing a Rifles jacket by Fiona Clare with a short black cape by Amanda Wakeley, she placed a small wooden cross with her code and the words ‘In Remembrance’ amid a sea of ​​poppies.

Shortly before 11am, the Last Post was sounded by a Scots Guards bugler on the parapet of St Margaret’s Church, with Camilla bowing her head during a two-minute silence, broken by the tolling of Big Ben.

She then met the abbey staff and representatives from The Poppy Factory, which has organized the service since 1928.

Queen Camilla (pictured) placed a small wooden cross with her code and the words ‘In Remembrance’ amid a sea of ​​poppies

Camilla will attend Remembrance Day commemorations on Sunday. The Duke and Duchess of Sussex last attended events in London in 2019 before stepping back as working royals.

Since moving to the US, they have attended Veterans Day events at military bases across the United States.

Yesterday they met service members and their families at the opening of a new training center for veterans in San Diego.

Wearing poppies on their jackets – although that is not an American tradition – they met members of America’s elite Navy Seals as the ribbon was cut at the West Coast Warrior Fitness Facility, a 20,000-square-foot gym that will help veterans recover physically and mentally .

Harry and Meghan, who have highlighted the importance of mental health through their work at the Archewell Foundation and Invictus Games, were praised by former Seal Tony Duynstee, who said they had shown “courage” by “truly destigmatizing mental health issues for those who have experienced this’. military service’.

They had previously visited the US Marines Corp base Camp Pendleton, with details of the visit on their Archewell website – alongside moody black and white photos of Meghan in a £1,200 Carolina Herrera vest embroidered with poppies.

The website article described how the couple sat around a discussion table to learn about the work of Operation Bigs, a mentoring program that connects military children and families with others who have gone through similar experiences.

In 2020, a request by Harry, who made two frontline tours in Afghanistan, to lay a wreath at the Cenotaph in Whitehall was rejected by royal courtiers.

While Camilla was in Whitehall yesterday, the King visited the Central Synagogue in London to mark the 85th anniversary of Kristallnacht, when Nazis attacked Jewish homes, businesses and places of worship on the night of November 9, 1938.

When he met a group of Jewish refugees, who were among the 10,000 children who fled to Britain within weeks of the attacks, he told them: “You make me very proud.”

He added: “It’s truly remarkable how you’ve been able to get through it all. It seems like an important occasion… to keep memories alive.”

The King’s charities will be renamed to reflect his accession, Buckingham Palace has confirmed.

They will now be known as the King’s Foundation and the King’s Trust, meaning William or Harry are unlikely to take them over.