Yemen Remembers Queen Elizabeth's Visit and a Lost Era of Hope
Just two years into her reign, a young Queen Elizabeth II and her husband the Duke of Edinburgh left the UK for her first and longest Commonwealth tour as monarch. It lasted from November 1953 until May 1954, covering 44,000 miles and stopping in the West Indies, Australasia, Asia and Africa.
Towards the end of her epic trip, the royal ship S.S. Gothic docked in Aden for a brief visit. South Yemen was a British protectorate at the time, with the northern part being an Imamate. By 1968, Yemen was free of colonial shackles and later formed into one republic.
Queen Elizabeth’s April 1954 visit saw the royal couple alight at Prince of Wales Pier where they were greeted by the Governor of Aden, Sir Tom Hickinbotham, and other British dignitaries. The pair travelled in an open-top car from the pier to an enclosure nearby where they watched a military parade featuring the RAF, Aden Protectorate Levies, Armed Police, Government Guards, Hadhrami Bedouin Legion, and Somaliland Scouts.
Speeches were made in Arabic and English, and the queen knighted Air Marshal Sir Claude Pelly Commander-in-Chief of the RAF in the Middle East, and Abu Bakr bin Sheikh Al Kaff for services to peace in Hadramaut. Sayyid Abu Bakr reportedly leant on a chair as his Muslim faith ruled out kneeling in front of the monarch. Thousands turned out to see Queen Elizabeth.