Queen Elizabeth might have exhibited a calming sense of composure throughout her reign, but there was one event when she gave the public a rare glimpse at her emotional side. On December 11, 1997, Her Majesty's beloved royal yacht, Britannia, was officially decommissioned, and both the Queen Elizabeth and Princess Anne couldn't hide their tears.
The late Queen spent priceless private time aboard Britannia with her young family when it launched in 1953, adding grandkids to join in the fun along the way. The yacht served as a home away from home to the royals for 40 years, traveling more than a million nautical miles around the world during royal tours, family holidays and honeymoons.
It played host to Princess Diana and Princess Charles on their ill-fated 1981 honeymoon, as well as Princess Anne and her first husband, Captain Mark Phillips, in 1973, and the then-Duke and Duchess of York in 1986.
With so many memories tied up in Britannia, the decision to take the yacht out of service was an especially emotional one—and a decision that the late Queen is said to have "privately opposed."
Although the news that Britannia would be decommissioned due to rising maintenance costs was announced in 1994, it was Prime Minister Tony Blair who announced that the royal yacht would not replaced after he was elected in 1997. During the decommissioning ceremony, Queen Elizabeth famously wept, marking one of the only times she ever cried in public during her 70 years on the throne.
Princess Anne was also seen wiping away tears as she attended the ceremony alongside her parents and siblings.
In royal biographer Valentine Low's book Power and the Palace (via the Daily Mail), he details how Blair once told him that he regretted his decision to let go of the yacht. Low once had tea with Blair aboard Britannia after the decision had been made, but before the yacht was officially decommissioned, and the former prime minister said he realized his error in judgement.
"I didn't want to get rid of it," he told Low. "After we'd agreed to get rid of it, I actually went on it, and I remember, as I stepped on, thinking, 'That was such a mistake to have done that.'" Blair added, "I think if it had happened five years into my time, I would have just said 'no.''
