The truth behind the Queen's historic handshake Martin McGuinness

It was the handshake widely seen as the defining moment that symbolised decades of bloody conflict being put to one side in a joint bid for a peaceful future.

When the Queen shook hands with former IRA commander Martin McGuinness at the Lyric Theatre in Belfast in 2012, it highlighted how a conflict that cost the lives of thousands of soldiers and civilians – including that of the Queen’s cousin – was at an end.

The meeting came 14 years after the Irish Republican Army ended its war against British rule in the province.

McGuinness shook the gloved hand of a grinning queen in a meeting that lasted a little more than 10 minutes – but made headlines the world over the next day.

The pair shook hands a second time as she left the theatre, this time in front of television cameras, but unlike other guests chose not to bow his head.

The Gueen’s bright green outfit appeared to have been chosen with Ireland’s national colours in mind, and McGuinness wished her well in Irish, saying “Slan agus beannacht”, which means “Goodbye and God speed”.

Now a new book, ‘Queen of the World,’ gives further details about the meeting itself, and what the Queen really felt about it.

According to the author Robert Hardman, the Monarch’s thoughts about the meeting have been disclosed by David Cameron, who was Prime Minister at the time.

Mr Cameron said he had told the Queen that her meeting with the late Mr McGuinness, then Northern Ireland’s deputy first minister, had been a great milestone of modern diplomacy.

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Mr Cameron is reported to have told Hardman: ‘I think it was the most transformative bit of diplomacy I have seen.

‘It was amazing.’

The Queen’s apparent response, described by Hardman as a ‘modest, no-nonsense approach,’ was: ‘What was I meant to do?

‘Of course I shook his hand.

‘It would be awkward not to.’

Mr Cameron added: ‘She was, as ever, not sure what all the fuss was about.’

Prince Philip’s uncle and Prince Charles’ beloved “mentor,” Lord Mountbatten, was assassinated by an IRA bomb, on board a boat, during a family fishing trip, in 1979.