Burnham Townswomen's Guild celebrates the coronation

It was a trip down memory lane for the Burnham Townswomen’s Guild on Tuesday (May 9) when they celebrated the coronation with an afternoon tea.

Pooling their culinary talents together, members served-up homemade lemon, fruit and sponge cakes and delicately flavoured sandwiches, including coronation chicken.

Before the tea was served, visiting speaker Richard Poad, chairman of Maidenhead Heritage Centre, shared photos and stories from the centre’s ‘Royal visits to Maidenhead’ archive.

The late Queen Elizabeth II and other members of the family have been to the area many times and members shared moments of when they had met her Majesty locally, as well as the late Prince Philip, Prince Edward and Princess Anne, the patron of the national Townswomen’s Guild.  

Around 40 members of the Burnham branch attended the afternoon tea, many of whom remember the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II.

They discussed and compared the differences in things like dress and length of ceremony between the 1953 event and King Charles III’s crowning on May 6.

His Majesty was last welcomed to Burnham by a former headteacher of Lent Rise School. The then Prince of Wales promised he would visit one day and she held him to it, after the school received an ‘Outstanding’ rating from Ofsted in 2002.

Richard showed photos of that visit and Louise Dance, chairwoman of the Burnham Townswomen’s Guild, then recalled to the group her time with King Charles III when he visited a national singing competition her school choir performed in many years ago when she taught at The Priory School.

The Burnham Townswomen’s Guild, which recently celebrated its 90th anniversary, is one of the largest branches of the organisation that has its roots in the women's suffrage movement. 

They meet monthly for a variety of talks and activities on the second Tuesday of every month in the Huntercombe Room of Burnham Park Hall. 

Yesterday it was decorated with red, white and blue bouquets and union bunting and each guest, which included leaders from the local Women’s Institute and the area representative from the Federation of Townswomen’s Guild, were presented with a handmade magnet commemorating the coronation.

Guests also signed a specially made card of attendance, which will go down in the group’s archives to mark the day in Burnham Townswomen’s Guild’s history.