Has our national mourning reaffirmed British values?

TOM UTLEY, in last Friday’s Mail, spoke for many, many people — certainly for me — in saying he had come to feel like a misfit in a Britain he didn’t recognise. But the country I knew and loved for over 70 years seems to have returned. After years of being told what we can and cannot say, think or do by nobodies, it’s as though Her Majesty, in death, has pulled a large ‘comfort blanket’ around us and we have dared to emerge and show what a great, caring nation we really are. We are united in our grief but also proud to show it.

I will remember the period between the Queen’s death and funeral as a time when we showed the naysayers that our history and heritage does mean something and we are not afraid to celebrate it after all. Perhaps this was the Queen’s last wonderful gift to us.

DIANE LODGE, Bridlington, E. Yorks. WHAT a marvellous piece by Tom Utley. He described the way I and others felt about our country before the Queen’s death. How sad, though, that it took this awful loss to restore our faith and pride in the virtues, history and traditions of Britain.

ANTONY DEAN, Keighley, W. Yorks.

TOM UTLEY’S words struck a chord with me, a grumpy 85-year-old who feels she no longer lives in the country she once loved. These past few days have changed all that. CAMILLA BOWDIDGE,

Ipswich, Suffolk. HOW Tom Utley’s article about feeling a misfit in today’s society resonated with me. Thank goodness for the silent, diverse and decent majority, who have been given a rare opportunity to express their appreciation of the values shown by the Queen’s service to the country and beyond.

JANE FASOULIOTIS, Selsey, W. Sussex.