CORGI’S DEATH ‘LAST LINK’ FOR QUEEN
The Queen has lost a treasured link to her teenage years with the death of her last purebred corgi, Willow.
The dog had been suffering from a cancerrelated illness and was put down at Windsor Castle last Sunday, just days before the Queen’s 92nd birthday on Saturday.
In the dog’s final days, the Queen, who was reportedly hit “extremely hard” by the death, was still feeding and exercising Willow, to no avail.
Willow was one of more than 30 corgis the Queen has owned since 1945 and the last survivor of the Pembrokeshire Welsh corgis she’s bred since the Second World War.
The death comes a year and a half after Holly, another of the Queen’s corgis, passed away. Both dogs were featured in a James Bond sketch during the opening of the London Olympics in 2012.
Willow, who was 14, was of the 14th generation and descended from the Queen’s first dog, Susan. Her Majesty received Susan as an 18th birthday present, when she was still Princess Elizabeth.
A Buckingham Palace source told the Daily Mail: “She has mourned every one of her corgis over the years, but she has been more upset about Willow’s death than any of them.
“It is probably because Willow was the last link to her parents and a pastime that goes back to her own childhood.
“It really does feel like the end of an era.”
“For many, many years she bred and raised corgis and to think that the last one has now gone is something of a milestone.”
The Queen’s love affair with corgis dates to 1933, when her father, King George VI, introduced a pup named Dookie into the Royal Family.
“My corgis are family,” the Queen has said, and she has worked to build that family since the 1950s when she personally oversaw a corgi breeding program on the grounds of Windsor Castle.
In 2015, however, it was revealed that the Queen stopped breeding corgis to prevent leaving any of them behind after her death and because she was concerned that having young pups at her feet would cause a tripping hazard. She is now left with two dogs — Vulcan and Candy — informally known as “dorgis,” a crossbreed between a dachshund and a corgi.
It is understood that Willow will be buried at Windsor Castle with a headstone that reads “A faithful companion to the Queen.”