Heartbreaking final photo of late Queen – released day before she died – laid bare true extent of her illness
There was nothing that the late Queen Elizabeth put above her royal duties and role as Head of State. As she got older, in the last few years of her life, her son Charles – then Prince of Wales – deputised for her more regularly, but there were some duties that were sacrosanct to the monarch, and she continued to take them on even in the very last days of her life.
One of these final moments conducting her duties also ended up being the last ever photograph released of the late Queen, and it laid bare the true extent of her ill-health to the public just days before she died at her Scottish residence of Balmoral. The photograph was taken when Queen Elizabeth met with Liz Truss on 6 September 2022, to invite her to form a new government after the former Prime Minister Boris Johnson had resigned. The pair met at Balmoral castle, where the late Queen was spending time, and photographer Jane Barlow for PA Media was in attendance to capture the moment. Little did the public know that within two days the Queen’s long reign would finally be over, as she passed away on 8 September 2022.
Queen Elizabeth II welcomes Liz Truss during an audience at Balmoral, Scotland ( Image: PA)
Barlow snapped a solo photograph of the late Queen, as well as images of the monarch greeting the new prime minister. Royal expert Gyles Brandreth wrote in his book Elizabeth: an Intimate Portrait – serialised in the Daily Mail ahead of its publication – about the final days of Queen Elizabeth’s life.
Describing the impact of the photographs released of Truss’s audience with Queen Elizabeth – and the visible frailty of the monarch, and dark bruises visible on her hand, the author claimed it finally revealed the extent of her deteriorating health. “Wednesday, September 7. Every newspaper is carrying pictures of the Queen at Balmoral yesterday. She appears old, yes — she is 96 — and frail. There is a dark bruise mark on the back of her right hand but she looks alert and very much alive. She is smiling, looking over the tops of her spectacles at the camera. There is a definite, mischievous twinkle in her eye.”
The photographer said the Queen was in “good spirits” but visibly frail ( Image: Getty Images)
The iconic photographs demonstrated that Queen Elizabeth’s personality and ill health will go down in the history books, and Barlow has said it was an “honour and a privilege” to be the one who captured some of her final moments. “I was there to photograph her meeting the new prime minister but for me, the best picture was the one of the Queen on her own. And it has obviously become more significant now,” the photographer said, per the BBC, adding that “I’ve had so many lovely comments about the picture.
“It’s a real privilege to be able to take that picture, an honour and a privilege. It’s like that for a lot of our job.” Barlow also revealed that before Truss arrived for the meeting, she chatted with the late Queen about the weather and that the monarch seemed in “good spirits” despite seeming “more frail” than she had earlier in the summer when she had taken some snaps of her previously.
