Royals Pay Tribute To Diana

Queen Remembers Some Rocky Times

(CBS/AP)  London’s first monument to Princess Diana was dedicated Tuesday morning with her family and the royal family watching. CBS News Correspondent Mark Phillips reports from London’s Hyde Park for The Early Show.

On the face of this, this should have been a simple event, dedicating a memorial to a popular princess. But, of course, Diana’s life was more complicated than that. And so was the ceremony.

The queen, her husband Prince Philip and Diana's former husband, Prince Charles, joined with Diana's family to formally open the $6.5 million oval granite water feature in Hyde Park.

The queen used very kind words to describe her daughter-in-law, speaking of how she touched and changed people’s lives. The queen's speech is likely to be among the more examined royal proclamations of her reign.

Queen Elizabeth II acknowledged that Diana's death gripped the world's attention.

"Central to this remains the extraordinary effect Diana had on
those around her," the queen said.

"Her drive to empathize with those in difficulty, hardship or distress, her willingness to embrace a new cause, her shrewd ability to size up all those she met, allowed her not only to touch people's lives but to change them," she pointed out.

On a personal note, the queen remarked that Diana "made such an impact on our lives."

She even hinted at Diana's divorce from Prince Charles, reports CBS News Correspondent Steve Holt.

"Of course there were difficult times, but memories mellow with the passing of the years.

"I remember especially the happiness she gave to my two grandsons," the queen said, referring to Princes William and Harry, who also attended the ceremony.

As significantly, Diana's own family, the Spencers, was represented by her brother, Earl Spencer.

It’s a sign of how bad the blood has been between the two great households that the Spencers and Windsors haven’t been seen together since Diana's funeral seven years ago, when Early Spencer blasted the royal family in his eulogy.

The intention of the ceremony wasn’t just to inaugurate a memorial. It was to mend fences, to build bridges, to bury the hatchet.

Construction of the fountain, designed by American architect Karen Gustafson and built of 545 blocks of Cornish granite, was delayed by bureaucratic wrangling and arguments within the Memorial Fountain Committee headed by Diana's friend Rosa Monckton.

The Royal Parks and the Department for Culture, Media and Sport provided extra funds when the installation ran $1.1 million over budget.