The Duchess of Kent’s coffin has been taken to Westminster Cathedral ahead of her funeral on Tuesday.
In keeping with Catholic tradition, the coffin was transported from Kensington Palace into the cathedral on Monday for a series of private funeral rites attended by the duchess’s immediate family, including the Duke of Kent’s siblings, Prince Michael of Kent and Princess Alexandra.
Among the planned rites due to be undertaken by Bishop James Curry, auxiliary bishop of Westminster and titular bishop of Ramsbury, are a Vigil for the Deceased, a Rite of Reception – which usually involves the coffin being sprinkled with holy water – and evening prayers known as Vespers.
The coffin was taken in the royal hearse to the place of worship, the largest Roman Catholic church in England and Wales.
It was carried inside by members of the Royal Dragoon Guards, whose regiment the duchess served as deputy colonel-in-chief since its inception in 1992.
The coffin was draped with the royal standard, which had a white ermine border signifying she was the spouse of a prince, and there was a large floral display on top of the standard.
Members of her immediate family, including her widower, the Duke of Kent and their daughter Lady Helen Taylor, watched from the cathedral steps as the soldiers slowly carried the coffin.
It will rest overnight in the Chapel of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
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The King and Queen will join other senior royals for Tuesday’s requiem mass, the first Catholic funeral service held for a member of the Royal Family in modern British history.
Katharine, the wife of the late Queen Elizabeth II’s cousin, the Duke of Kent, died peacefully at home, surrounded by her family, on the evening of 4 September, aged 92.
She was the first member of the Royal Family to convert to the Roman Catholic faith for more than 300 years when she did so in 1994.
A devout follower, it was her wish to have her funeral at Westminster Cathedral.
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Hers will be the first royal funeral at the cathedral, in Victoria, central London, since its construction in 1903.
The King, the Supreme Governor of the Church of England, will not be the first UK monarch to have attended a Catholic funeral, as Queen Elizabeth II attended the Catholic state funeral of King Baudouin of the Belgians, at St Michael’s Cathedral in Brussels, in August 1993.
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Charles, when Prince of Wales, went to Pope John Paul II’s funeral, representing his mother, the late Queen, in 2005, while his son William attended Pope Francis’s funeral mass earlier this year.
