Offaly-based amateur photographer shares remarkable pictures taken of queen 26 years ago

A TULLAMORE-based amateur photographer has shared pictures she took of the late Queen Elizabeth II 26 years ago in Warsaw.

Malgorzata Marszalek, who is a native of the Polish capital, has been living in Tullamore for the last five years but on March 25, 1996, when she was 29, she was delighted to get close enough to the Queen to photograph the monarch during an official visit to Poland.

“As soon as I read in the newspaper about her visit to Warsaw, I immediately decided that I had to see her,” said Malgorzata.

“Queen Elizabeth walked around the Old Town in Warsaw. Everywhere where it would be possible to see the Queen crowds of people lined up.

“Then she was 70 years old but she still looked beautiful and that is how I remember her forever.”

She said she even once considered sending the photographs to the Queen but was concerned they would not be good enough.

Malgorzata is an active and award winning member of the Tullamore Camera Club (see below a picture she took in Claddagh, Galway) and she says the camera she was using back in 1996 was “not of good quality” but she added: “I am happy that I have one and only unique photos of the Queen Elizabeth in my archive. It is a great memento and memory of the great woman for me.”

Malgorzata is a member of the large Polish community which has settled in Ireland since Poland joined the European Union.

She has two sisters who were born in Warsaw and they moved to Ireland before her, in 2004, and one now lives in Tullamore and the other in Athlone.

“My family in Ireland is very big, 19 people with children,” she said.

She is happy to be living in Ireland.

“It is said that a person's heart is where he lives. And that's true, my heart is in Ireland now. I love the sea and mountains and I have it all here,” she said.

She has travelled extensively, taking trips to Achill Island, Kilkee, the Cliffs of Moher, Waterford, Carlow, Westport, Limerick, Tralee, Killarney National Park, the Giants Causeway, Howth, Greystones and to her favourite cliff walk in Bray.

“And of course many times in Galway and Dublin.”