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of the royal family who had so notably served in the armed forces regularly to spend
holidays in the South of Ireland. On the same day, 130 miles to the east, the IRA blew up
twenty British soldiers at Warrenpoint in County Down.) Mountbatten’s death touched
Elizabeth deeply and personally. She went down to Broadlands for the funeral, but once
again, in a matter which meant so much to her emotionally, could not bring herself to
express her feelings in letters of condolence to his daughters. For the family, their one
consolation was that Mountbatten had died instantly and dramatically before old age
could take its inevitable toll. Mountbatten had interfered ceaselessly but always with the
good of the family in view. There was now no one who could replace him as an adviser
outside the Palace who would tell the family what they might not want to hear. A vital
channel of communication between Elizabeth and her eldest son had disappeared.