It’s been over two years since Queen Elizabeth died peacefully aged 96. But she had an almost close brush with death 41 years earlier.
During the Trooping the Colour parade in June 1981, a teenager fired six blank shots at the Queen as she rode her horse down The Mall.
The incident made headlines around the world, with the Queen visibly shaken as her horse Burmese was spooked by the gunfire.
The would-be assassin, 17-year-old Marcus Sarjeant, had travelled to London for the parade with the intent to kill the Queen.
In the days leading up to the parade, he had sent a threatening letter to Buckingham Palace reading: ‘Your Majesty. Don’t go to the Trooping the Colour ceremony because there is an assassin setup to kill you, waiting just outside the palace.’
But the letter didn’t arrive until days after the parade, meaning the Queen was unaware of any threat when she mounted her horse that day.
Sarjeant had joined an anti-royalist movement in 1980 in Folkestone, Kent, and was unemployed and living with his mum when he travelled to London.
Armed with two blank-firing replica Colt Python revolvers, Sarjeant positioned himself near the junction between The Mall and Horseguards Road, then fired six blanks.
He was tackled to the ground by Lance Corporal Alec Galloway of the Scots Guards and disarmed.
There is an assassin setup to kill you, waiting just outside the palace.’
As he was being subdued, Sarjeant said: ‘I wanted to be famous. I wanted to be somebody.’
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He told police he was inspired by the assassination of John Lennon and the attempted murders of Ronald Reagan and Pope John Paul II in the same year.
Sarjeant was prosecuted under the Treason Act and pleaded guilty, before being sentenced to five years in prison on September 14, 1981.
He was released in October 1984, when he was 20. He changed his name and began a new life – but wrote to the Queen to apologise for the incident. Sarjeant didn’t receive a reply to his letter.
An apology that was never reciprocated
Before he was convicted, his grandmother Sylvia told the Mail: ‘I love the Royal Family – every one of them, especially the Queen and the Queen Mother, and I am heartbroken that my grandson should be charged with something like this.’
Queen Elizabeth was lucky that his gun was not loaded – but it’s not the first time she’s been at the centre of an assassination attempt.
In 1971, a log was placed on railroad tracks in hopes of de-railing the Queen’s train as she travelled through Australia. Luckily the conductor saw the log and stopped the train before disaster struck.
Months after the 1981 Trooping the Colour incident another 17-year-old shot at the queen when she was visiting New Zealand.
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