Queen video-calls great-grandson Archie with Harry and Meghan to wish her happy birthday
21 April 2020, 20:15
The Queen has video-chatted with her great-grandson Archie Mountbatten-Windsor to celebrate her 94th birthday.
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex are currently thousands of miles away from the Monarch as they quarantine in their new home of Los Angeles.
The couple moved there with baby Archie last month, after quitting their lives as senior royals in a move to become financially independent.
Harry and Meghan spoke with the Queen from her royal residence of Windsor Castle, away from her family, while the country remains on lockdown.
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Archie, who turns one in a fortnight, joined them to mark the special occasion.
With the Sussexes eight hours behind because of the time difference, they contacted the Queen later in the day.
Earlier, the royal family shared touching private family footage of the Queen as a carefree young princess to mark the monarch's birthday.
Behind-the-scenes archive film from the Royal Collection Trust shows Princess Elizabeth playing with a pram as a toddler, as a happy young girl on a seesaw, and skipping and jumping around a garden with her younger sister, Princess Margaret.
It also shows her delight as she sits on a horse, and she is seen dancing on a yacht with Margaret, in matching outfits, as they learn dance steps from their mother, Queen Elizabeth.
The royal family's Twitter account said: "To those of you also celebrating your birthdays today at home, with or without your loved ones - we send you many happy returns."
It thanked the public for its birthday messages and wished the Queen a happy birthday.
The Queen is with her husband of 72 years, the Duke of Edinburgh, at Windsor with a reduced household for their protection.
Like the rest of the nation, the royals are staying away from one another as they follow the social distancing rules amid the coronavirus pandemic.
Other family members will have also telephoned and video-called the Queen privately to deliver their birthday messages.
The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge are at Anmer Hall in Norfolk with their children, Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis.
Their Kensington Palace social media accounts shared birthday congratulations for William's grandmother.
They wished the monarch a happy birthday alongside a picture of William and Kate showing the Queen around the duchess's garden at the Chelsea Flower Show last year.
The Prince of Wales and the Duchess of Cornwall's Twitter account also sent birthday wishes, with a collection of touching archive photos of Charles and his mother.
Royal Family shares private family footage of Queen Elizabeth as a young Princess for her 94th birthday
Charles, who has recovered from the Covid-19 illness, is at Birkhall in Aberdeenshire, Scotland, with Camilla.
The Princess Royal, the Duke of York and the Earl of Wessex are all in their own separate homes around the country.
The bells of Westminster Abbey - the church where the Queen was married and crowned - stayed silent on her birthday for the first time in more than a decade, and there were no gun salutes in central London, at the Queen's request, for what was believed to be the first time.
