The Queen’s Christmas Message is a broadcast by Her Majesty to the nation – and the Commonwealth – at Christmastime.

The tradition began in 1932 with a Christmas radio broadcast by King George V. The queen’s grandfather was initially hesitant about using this new technology, but Sir John Reith, a founder of the BBC, reassured the king that it was reliable. Reith wanted the speech to inaugurate what was then “Empire Service”, now known as the BBC World Service.

King George V delivered the speech – written by poet Rudyard Kipling – from a small office at Sandringham, the Royal Family’s Norfolk estate. The King acknowledged the unity that this technology brought to the Empire: “I speak now from my home and from my heart to you all; to men and women so cut off by the snows, the desert, or the sea, that only voices out of the air can reach them.”

George’s eldest son, who became King Edward VIII, never delivered a Christmas speech. He abdicated in December 1936, just weeks before his first Christmas on the Throne.

George’s second son, who became King George VI, continued the tradition of royal Christmas broadcasts. The new king, affectionately known to his family as ‘Bertie’, made his first broadcast in December 1937. He thanked the public for their support during the first year of his reign.

It had been a tumultuous year. The extremely shy, quiet Bertie never thought that he would be king. Yet there he was, picking up where his elder brother left off as King-Emperor over a vast empire.

Bertie was fearful of having to deliver speeches, his stuttering often getting the better of him. Happily, with a lot of training over the years, the king became a calmer, more competent speaker whose stutter was greatly minimized.

The king gained much more confidence, which would be beneficial throughout the war years. His annual message of hope would be particularly poignant in the early months of the Second World War in 1939. It would be George’s most famous speech, made memorable by a poem which came at the end of the broadcast:

I feel that we may all find a message of encouragement in the lines which, in my closing words, I would like to say to you:

I said to the man who stood at the Gate of the Year,

“Give me a light that I may tread safely into the unknown.”

And he replied, “Go out into the darkness, and put your hand into the hand of God.

That shall be to you better than light, and safer than a known way.”

King George V had noted in the first Christmas message that the technology of radio was a powerful unifying force. It was a sentiment that would be carried into the reign of his granddaughter, Elizabeth II, who would embrace new mediums of communication via television and, eventually, the internet.

The Queen sat at the same desk and chair as her father and grandfather had used. People were awed by their lovely queen, and all across the globe they gathered around their televisions, as many still do today, and watched her speak to them.

Her hair is white now, and the lines of a lifetime of expression have gently creased her face, but Her Majesty’s message is still the same – peace and joy to all. Though not everyone is a Christian, Her Majesty extends the gentle kindness of her faith to all of her subjects equally.

Thank you to all for a wonderful year. See you in 2010!