During a spring clean here at Bygones headquarters, we have uncovered a treasure trove of old black and white photographs, taken of Royal visits in and around Berkshire.

Dating back over six decades, the photos were taken on cumbersome plate cameras, using a negative measuring 5x4 inches and then printed directly on to photographic paper.

As was the norm in newspaper offices at the time, the information on the reverse of the prints is minimal, usually a one-line hand written scrawl.

Perhaps the most evocative photos included here in our special edition, are the visit to Reading’s Huntley and Palmers of HRH The Queen Mother, in November 1955.

A crowd of workers can bee seen cheering and clapping as she passed between the factory buildings, whilst another shows her watching a master cake decorator, piping icing into intricate shapes.

Another striking picture shows a visit that she undertook as the Queen in April 1948, to HMS Dauntless in Burghfield, the training centre for Royal Navy Wrens.

A post-war Royal visit undertaken by King George VI involved him taking the salute during a parade near Reading Town Hall, but it is the background detail which of interest.

Sharp-eyed Bygones readers may realise that this snap shows the ‘People’s Pantry’ WWII bomb damage to St Laurence’s Church, and the gaping hole left by the destruction opposite.

Young members of the crowd had scaled the walls to get a good vantage point, as a column of Wrens (almost certainly from Burghfield) pass by and salute his majesty.

The Duke of Edinburgh, who gained his pilots wings at White Waltham Airfield near Maidenhead, arrived in the Royal Flight’s Wessex helicopter during a visit to the Englefield Estate, Theale in 1955.

Whilst touring the area he is pictured chatting to members of the Benyon family and estate workers, who (for some unknown reason) all seem to be clutching clip boards.

Reading’s Palace Theatre hastily assembled a Royal Box in 1953, and this was used by the Duchess of Kent to enjoy a show.

The Mercury photographer managed to get a superb photo, which captured the orchestra and audience and many of the fine decorative elements to this long-lost town centre building.

The Palace Theatre, Cheapside, was demolished to make way for shops and offices in 1961, by which time the audiences for variety shows had declined, due to the influence of television on modern entertainment.

Princess Margaret appears in the last of our pictures in July 1951, when she visited the Mary Hare School in Newbury.

A guard of honour formed by Guides and Scouts, greeted the Princess, who had joined herself as a Brownie in 1937, she herself becoming President of the movement in 1965.