Members of the Queen’s Guards march outside Buckingham Palace (Picture: Getty)

A former guard at Buckingham Palace has revealed he ‘nearly shot’ the Queen once, when she went for a late night walk around the palace grounds.

Her Majesty had gone for a stroll at around 3am as she couldn’t sleep, the unnamed soldier said.

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According to The Times’s diary column, he thought he he had come across an intruder and shouted: ‘Who’s that?’

To his surprise it was the Queen.


‘Bloody hell, Your Majesty, I nearly shot you’, the newspaper reported he blurted out.

She had a bout of insomnia (Picture: Getty)

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The Queen, who apparently likes to go for a stroll when she cannot sleep, was said to have responded: ‘That’s quite all right.



‘Next time I’ll ring through beforehand so you don’t have to shoot me.’

Buckingham Palace declined to comment.