His face etched with grief, former president George W Bush watched on Monday as his father’s flag-draped coffin was placed on the Lincoln catafalque to lie in state at the US Capitol in Washington.



The 43rd president, now a son in mourning, blinked hard as George HW Bush’s casket was carried into the Capitol rotunda at sunset by uniformed officers. His wife, Laura, kept her arm linked through his for most of the 40-minute ceremony.



Bush died last Friday at the age of 94. He was the longest-lived president in American history and the last of the second world war generation.



The Bush family gathered in the Capitol rotunda, overlooked by statues of Bush’s Republican contemporaries, Gerald Ford and Ronald Reagan, and surrounded by diplomats and members of Donald Trump’s administration, the US Congress, the military and the supreme court, including Justice Clarence Thomas, a controversial Bush nominee.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Mike Pence, George W Bush and Laura Bush watch as the casket of George HW Bush arrives to lie in state in the US Capitol. Photograph: Jonathan Ernst/Pool/EPA

Trump, whose populist, insult-laden brand of politics has inevitably drawn comparisons with the patrician Bush, who called for a “kinder, gentler” America, was not at the ceremony.

But he and first lady Melania Trump came to the Capitol later on Monday to pay tribute. They stood in front of the casket with their eyes closed for a few moments, before Trump saluted the casket.

Trump also plans to attend the funeral on Wednesday, a national day of mourning.

The presence of leading Democrats including Nancy Pelosi, who embraced George W Bush, Chuck Schumer and Cory Booker, and the Washington mayor, Muriel Bowser, ensured a bipartisan comity for a man whose death has prompted a temporary ceasefire in Washington’s politics of rancour and division.

But as the 1988 election campaign proved, Bush could take the gloves off when fighting for the conservative cause. The three speakers at Monday’s ceremony were all Republicans.

The Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell, recalled that Bush was just a teenager when he volunteered for military service and became the navy’s youngest aviator. He was only 20 in 1944 when his plane was hit on a bombing run but, through the fire and smoke, he stayed steady at the controls. “A steady hand, staying the course. That’s what George Bush gave us for decades.”

The House speaker, Paul Ryan, told the somber gathering under the Capitol dome: “Throughout his life of service, President Bush personified grace. His character was second to none.”

When Ryan spoke of an image of Bush as “a loving father” reaching out to hold his son’s hand at the National Cathedral after the 11 September 2001 terrorist attacks, George W Bush was moved to say “yes”.

The speaker added: “He showed us that how we live is as important as what we achieve. His life was a hymn of honour. His legacy is grace perfected. His memory will belong to glory.” George W Bush warmly shook the speaker’s hand as he went past to sit down.

Vice-President Mike Pence recalled entering politics at 29 and meeting Bush, who was then vice-president himself. “Then, as always, I was struck by his approachability,” Pence said. “There was a kindness about the man that was evident to everyone who ever met him. All his years in public service were characterised by kindness, modesty and patriotism.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Members of the public pay their respects in the US Capitol Rotunda. Photograph: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

Pence became emotional as he told how, in August this year, Bush had sent a handwritten letter to his own son after he made his first “tailhook landing” as a marine aviator on the USS George Herbert Walker Bush. “In that letter, President Bush wrote to my son in his words, ‘Congratulations on receiving your wings of gold. I know how proud you and your family are at this moment.’”

George W Bush smiled at Pence after his remarks but did not shake his hand as the vice-president sat down beside him. Leaders from both parties then laid wreaths beside the casket, which sits atop a catafalque first used for Abraham Lincoln’s 1865 funeral, before the rotunda was opened to the public until Wednesday.

The casket had arrived in Washington on Monday afternoon from Texas, aboard the US military plane known as Air Force One when the serving president is aboard, after a 21-gun salute.

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The crew, who flew the plane to Houston on Sunday, were tasked with carrying out “Special Air Mission 41”, the number a reference to Bush’s place in the roster of America’s presidents.

The casket was accompanied from Texas to Joint Base Andrews near the capital by George W Bush; his wife, Laura; and the younger George’s brother Neil and his family.

Trump has ordered the federal government closed on Wednesday for the national day of mourning. Flags on public buildings are flying at half-staff for 30 days.

Trump has not always uttered kind words about the Bush family. But he offered lavish praise after the former president’s death was announced.

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“He was just a high-quality man who truly loved his family,” Trump said on Saturday while in Argentina for the G20 summit. “One thing that came through loud and clear, he was very proud of his family and very much loved his family. So he was a terrific guy and he’ll be missed.”

Bush’s death reduces the ex-presidents’ club to four: Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, George W Bush and Barack Obama. He was denied a second term by Clinton, who would later become a close friend. Writing for the Washington Post on Saturday, Clinton declared of Bush: “I just loved him.”

Carter, at 94 the oldest living ex-president – born a few months after Bush – confirmed he would attend the Washington funeral. Clinton and Obama are also expected to be present.

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CNN reported on Monday that Trump would not speak at the funeral, but would meet Bush family members privately.

Bush’s body will then be returned to Houston. He will be buried – wearing socks featuring jets flying in formation – on Thursday at his family plot on the library grounds at Texas A&M University. His final resting place will be alongside Barbara Bush, his wife of 73 years, who died in April at the age of 92, and Robin Bush, the daughter they lost to leukemia in 1953 at age three.

On Sunday, a picture spread online of Bush’s service dog in front of his flag-draped casket. A Bush family spokesman, Jim McGrath, posted the picture of the yellow Labrador retriever named Sully with the caption: “Mission complete. #Remembering41.”