Then, to huge disappointment across the nation and, indeed, the Empire, it was officially announced on June 24th that the King had been taken ill with an inflamed abdominal cyst and had been operated on: the Coronation had been postponed.
Large delegations had arrived from abroad to take part in the formal proceedings and would now have to return home. In Britain there were many who had invested, and now stood to lose, significant amounts of money to rent sites along the processional route and to provide various services to the spectators. Later, very many cases would pass through the courts in pursuit of compensation for these losses.
In many towns and villages planned events were replaced or supplemented by hastily devised church services to pray for the King’s recovery, and much pragmatism deployed to adapt arrangements to the changed circumstances. In other cases planned local celebrations were postponed altogether, as was the case in Effingham. Below is Mr Blaxland’s log book entry on June 30th where he notes that all festivities had been postponed but the children had nevertheless been given “cake & oranges etc.”