Clematis grower recalls visiting Queen at Balmoral

It was during Mr Evison’s appearances at the Chelsea Flower Show on his Guernsey Clematis stand that he most often encountered the late sovereign and he said she would often ask questions about the flowers.

‘[On the first occasion] I was presented to Her Majesty and the Duke of Edinburgh by the president of the Royal Horticultural Society and I spoke with both of them for some time about the clematis,’ he said.

‘I explained we had a clematis from New Zealand called Fosterii and that it was the male form. She asked why this was. I must have turned puce.’

But while the majority of his encounters with Her Majesty were at Chelsea, there were other times when he met her on different occasions, such as when he attended a special reception at Buckingham Palace, which he said was laid on for ‘Pioneers’ and to which he was invited for his work on breeding clematis.

‘Her Majesty didn’t think clematis could grow at Balmoral and I said I believed they would,’ he said.

This led to his going to Balmoral, where he joined the Queen in the garden to discuss the flowers.

‘We always talked clematis and I gave her a gift of a lot of them for Balmoral.’

Mr Evison was invited back to Balmoral in October this year and he said as far as he knows he will still be going. He last met the Queen in May this year, again at Chelsea, when Her Majesty attended on a buggy made by Bentley due to her being frail.

But Mr Evison said she seemed in good health: ‘I said to her I was delighted to see her looking so well.

‘I think I was incredibly fortunate – I knew who I call the “Royal Queen”, but I also had the great privilege of knowing a very warm lady who was just remarkable.’