Tuesday 20 September 2022 05:50 PM Queen's funeral: Historians slam royal biographer's comments about state ... trends now

Historians have hit back at the Royal expert who branded the Queen's funeral a 'façade' and claimed the Royal Family should 'atone' for slavery.

The historical experts said the comments were 'inappropriate' during the Queen's funeral and argued Britain had lead the world in many areas, including abolishing slavery. 

Royal biographer Clive Irving took aim at the monarchy at the moment the Queen's coffin was being taken to Windsor Castle on Monday in her emotional funeral procession as grief-stricken Britons came together to pay their respects.

The reporter, who questioned the longevity of the royal family in his 2021 book, The Last Queen, said the Crown was 'responsible' for the worst excesses of the British Empire.

He also blasted the new heir to the throne, Prince William, for his 'misjudged' tour of the Caribbean earlier this year, which was met with protests and demands for slavery reparations and a renewed debate about the legacy of the empire.  

Mr Irving also raised the case of the Royal Africa Company founded by Charles II in 1666 which he said 'concealed a very evil enterprise which was shipping slaves from Africa to the Caribbean colonies.' 

Historians have criticised Mr Irving's comments as inaccurate and 'misplaced' during the Queen's funeral.

Dr Zareer Masani, a historian and author, responded to Mr Irving's comments by saying: 'His comments are pretty old hat because these kinds of comments have been made about the monarchy for the last decade by Black Lives Matter and those sorts of groups. I don't see anything new.'

He also rejected Mr Irving's comments on Prince William and Princess Kate's trip to the Caribbean earlier this year, saying that they received a warm reception on their visit.

He said: 'There was one demonstration of a few hundred people which was given more prominence than it deserved but most people were very happy to turn out and welcome him. He quite rightly expressed regret about slavery but did not apologise.' 

Dr Masani added: 'I think the Empire was overall very positive for most parts of the world, there were mistakes and violence in pockets but on the whole it was a benevolent instituiton which gave most of the world foundations for modern nationhood and economy, and I don't think it has anything to apologise for.'

He also said that since the Queen passed away: 'I haven't seen many criticisms because I've been watching the state funeral which has been done with great precision and meticulous detail which I think the British do better than anyone else in the world.'

Cambridge Professor of history Robert Tombs also argued Mr Irving's comments were a narrow view of history.

He said: 'Leaving aside the question of appropriateness of such comments at the time of the funeral, they are based on a twisted reading of history. 

'Slavery has been a practically universal institution throughout history, and almost every state in the world shares responsibility. 

'If the British Crown was involved in the slave trade, like so many others, it was uniquely involved in stopping the slave trade and liberating slaves. 

'So by Mr Irving's logic "the institution, the Crown itself" must be given credit for suppressing the slave trade and leading the combat against slavery world wide.

One royal historian also pointed out that Britain had taken a leading role in abolishing in the slave trade.

The historian said: 'It has never been for the crown or the Royal Family to personal intervene or to make amends about unfortunate episodes in British history. 

'The British crown stand above politics and outside politics, both domestic and international. 

'These comments of Irving were misplace because this is a matter of government policy.'

They added: 'When we turn to the history of slavery and the Royal Africa Company, the Royal Africa Company did not enslave Africans, it bought those already enslaved by their fellow Africans.

'Yes it dealt in slaves, but the British in most cases did not send troops ashore to enslave Africans, they were enslaved by fellow Africans and sold to European traders.

'Slavery existed in Africa from the earliest times - ancient Egyptian, Greek and Roman societies were based on slavery. 

'Kings and tribal chieftains such as the King of Dahomey made their money out of enslaving fellow Africans, often from other tribes.

'It was not the Africans that abolished slavery it was the Europeans. Britain and Denmark were the first two countries to abolish slavery.

'The African chieftains were absolutely furious the Europeans would not by their slaves anymore.

'When Britain abolished slavery it did not just abolish it, it set up the West Africa Squadron which went to the Gold Coast to stop slavery. Thousands of British soldiers died of malaria trying to stop slavery.

'It did not just abolish slavery, it fought other countires like Portugal and France over it.

'African chieftains continued to enslave their fellow Africans to sell to European traders until colonisation.

'Colonialism brought education, health all sorts of things, but the main thing it did was stop slavery.

'And the colonies were set up in the name of Victoria, and it was those colonies which stopped slavery.

'So that’s the context Clive Irving has got wrong.'

Mr Irving made his comments speaking to MSNBC on the day of the Queen's funeral, arguing that the crown bore responsibility for crimes committed during the British Empire.

He said : 'A lot of this seems to be façade, it's almost like a Potemkin village exercise.

'There's all this regal display of something that, as one of your guests said earlier, nobody does it better than the British, but you always have to ask what lies behind the façade.

'In terms of the future of the monarchy, you can't separate the future of the monarchy from the future of the country, and therefore the condition of the country has to be taken into account when you think how Charles can handle this.'

Irving, who was also a key contributor to a documentary on Princess Margaret, said the monarchy needs to reckon with the history of the British Empire if it wants to succeed in the future.

He said: 'This legacy requires something that I haven't seen coming from the Windsor family at any stage in recent history which requires atonement. 

'It requires acknowledgment of the true cost to those colonies of slavery which began under Charles II in 1666 because he founded this thing with a very innocent title called the Royal Africa Company which actually concealed a very evil enterprise which was shipping slaves from Africa to the Caribbean colonies.

'About a quarter of those slaves died before they got there, chained below the decks, and that was subsequently succeeded by colonial societies leading right through to the 20th century in which the crown played the part of head of state.'

'So although you can't lay the cost of slavery, the human cost of it, terrible other costs of it, at the doors of the present monarchy or even the Queen, the institution, the crown itself is responsible, there's a continuity going right through to now.'

He then took aim at Prince William for his week-long tour of the Caribbean in March, which was overshadowed by demands for slavery reparations and the enduring anger over the Windrush scandal.

William and his wife Kate were met with protests across Belize, Jamaica, and the Bahamas.

Irving said: 'This situation was completely misjudged by Prince William when he went to the Caribbean earlier this year.

'I said he hadn't been properly briefed but I thought about that afterwards and I thought, how can a guy who had the education that William had, he had one of the best educations you can get, how can he not know about this.'

Upon his return to the UK William said he not only discovered more about the 'different issues that matter most to the people of the region but also how the past weighs heavily on the present'. 

The father of three's eight-day trip to the Caribbean with his wife Kate, 40, in March, was branded 'tone deaf' by critics who said there were moments smacking of 'colonialism.'

Antigua and Barbuda became the first to float plans to move toward becoming a republic after the Queen's death, with Prime Minister Gaston Browne telling media he hopes to hold a referendum on the issue within three years.

His counterpart in the Bahamas has signaled similar hopes, though without giving any timeline.

'For me, it is always on the table,' Prime Minister Phillip Davis said in comments reported by the Nassau Guardian newspaper the day after the Queen died. 'I will have to have a referendum and the Bahamian people will have to say to me, 'yes'.'

Jamaica, too, is considering 'moving on,' as Prime Minister Andrew Holness pointedly told the king's son Prince William during a disastrous tour of the Caribbean earlier this year.

They are following a path blazed by Barbados, once known as 'Little England' but whose ruling Labour Party last year used its majority to approve a constitutional amendment removing the Queen as head of state.

Irving is far from the only commentator to pour scorn over the mourning for the Queen which has seen Britain shrouded in grief for the past two weeks.

Trevor Noah took a brutal swipe at 'spoilt' King Charles III just days after the monarch acceded to the throne following the death of his mother.

The profane South African comedian made a tasteless remark about Charles in a ruthless diatribe to the guffawing audience on The Daily Show.

He aired widely shared footage of the King caught on camera becoming frustrated with a leaking pen as he said: 'Oh God, I hate this. I can't bear this bloody thing.'

Earlier the royal gestured furiously to one of his aides to remove a pot of ink.

Noah, 38, told his audience in the US how the clips during Charles' period of mourning show how he is not the right person for the monarchy.

He said: 'It's going to take a lot of work to shape the monarchy into something that everyone can get behind.

'But based on his first week in power, looks like King Charles isn't the guy to do it.'

The remarks are not the only ones from US media to spark fury in Britain, with the New York Times accused of a 'sneering attack' on the royals.

The paper said the Queen helped to 'obscure a bloody history of

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