The death of Queen Elizabeth II marks an epochal moment in modern British history. For multiple generations of millions of people around the world, she is the only monarch they have ever known – through seven decades of constant upheaval, she provided a source of stability and reassurance throughout Britain and the Commonwealth.
When she was born, Britain still had colonies in Africa and the Caribbean, the Cold War between the Soviet Union and the West was lingering icily, and the Korean War was raging. For years to come, people will always remember where they were when they heard the news.
Born on 21 April 1926 to the future King George VI and Queen Elizabeth (later the Queen Mother), the young woman affectionately known to her family as ‘Lilbet’ was initially third in the line of succession to the throne, but was moved up to second following the abdication of her uncle, King Edward VIII, in 1936. As the Second World War raged, the Princess was appointed colonel of the Grenadier Guards, and in February 1945, she joined the Auxiliary Territorial Service, where she trained as a driver and mechanic.
In the years after the war’s end, as her father’s health declined, Elizabeth regularly stood in for him at official events.
In 1947, she made her first overseas trip to Africa, where on her 21st birthday, she broadcast to the Commonwealth that her ‘whole life, whether it be long or short, shall be devoted to your service and the service of our great imperial family to which we all belong.’
In November that year, she married her husband of nearly 75 years, Prince Philip of Greece and Denmark – the two had first met in 1934. In the nearly seven-and-a-half decades they were married, the love that the two had for each other was apparent for all to see, and the Queen Mother affectionately remembered Philip as a proper ‘English gentleman.’
The couple’s first child, Prince Charles was born in 1948 and a daughter, Princess Anne, followed in 1950. (Two more sons, Andrew and Edward, followed in 1960 and 1964).
On 6 February 1952, the couple were touring Kenya when news reached them from London of the death of George VI from lung cancer – Elizabeth, just 26, was now Queen and Philip her consort. Fourteen months later, on 2 June 1953, her coronation ceremony at Westminster Abbey was viewed by approximately 277 million people worldwide – a phenomenal number for the time.
The ‘fairytale Queen’ came to the throne at a time of unprecedented uncertainty in British history; with the carnage of the Second World War in the past and nationalism sweeping the remaining colonies, a ‘new Elizabethan age’ seemed to herald the promise of at least some degree of domestic tranquillity.
This young monarch’s coronation, coinciding with a British-led expedition to conquer Mount Everest – signified, as one historian put it, ‘adulation unparalleled since the days of Louis XVI (of France).’
She became possibly the most-travelled monarch in history. She is believed to have travelled to 117 countries, and over one million miles.
Her most-visited country, with 27 visits, is Canada, which is also the only nation, apart from the UK, for whom she has made a state visit on behalf of. She has also visited Australia a staggering 16 times and New Zealand 10 times. Her coronation tour in 1953-4 covered 44,000 miles across Oceania, Asia, Africa and the West Indies.
In 1961, she made the first royal tour to India since it gained independence in 1947, marking a symbolic resolution between her country and the nation once considered ‘the jewel in the crown’ of its empire. In 1986, she became the first monarch to visit China, following agreement on the eventual handover of Hong Kong in 1997.
In October 1994, she also became the first British monarch to ever visit Russia, where she and Philip stayed in the Kremlin as guests of President Boris Yeltsin, before moving on to St Petersburg. As a spokesperson for Yeltsin said at the time, such an occasion would have been unthinkable in the days of the Soviet Union.
Another first came in 2011 with her historic visit to the Republic of Ireland, where she laid a wreath at the Garden of Remembrance for Irish nationalists, and made a widely-praised speech of reconciliation at Dublin Castle, where she greeted the ‘President and friends’ in Irish, which elicited visible – and delighted – surprise from Irish President Mary McAleese.
An astonishing fifteen Prime Ministers also served under the Queen during her extraordinary reign. Winston Churchill was serving his second term when she ascended the throne, and according to historians, was initially apprehensive that the young monarch would not be able to prove herself.
However, the relations between them quickly warmed, with the two sharing a love of horses and racing. Harold Wilson, elected in 1964, was the first Labour Prime Minister to serve under her, and rapidly became one of her favourite heads of government, who also encouraged her to drop some of the more archaic royal traditions that had been in place since the Victorian era.
Her relationship with Margaret Thatcher, the longest-serving PM of the twentieth century, was famously strained, as the Queen, while publicly impartial, was privately critical of the social implications of Thatcherism.
One former general also commented that instead of getting the Queen’s views, Thatcher often ended up lecturing her instead. She shared a similarly rocky relationship with Tony Blair, whose New Labour policies occasionally troubled her.
During their first meeting, the Queen reminded Blair of the fact that he was her 10th PM, while it is believed that he pressed the initially reluctant Royal Family to grant Princess Diana a state funeral.
More recently, Boris Johnson’s premiership had an uneven start, as he was accused of violating protocol by asking the Queen to suspend Parliament in a bid to rush through the Brexit Withdrawal Agreement. Regardless of any differences, nearly all Prime Ministers appreciated the indispensable advice she gave them.
The 1990s were difficult times for the Queen and her family. Following the fairytale weddings of Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer in 1981 and Prince Andrew and Sarah Ferguson in 1986, came a cascade of scandals and public criticism. She began to pay income tax for the first time, while the Royal Yacht Britannia was scrapped, with her being visibly distraught.
1992 – what the Queen called her annus horribilis – saw the separation of both Charles and Diana and Andrew and Sarah, while a fire destroyed much of the uninsured Windsor Castle. A similar wave of criticism was aimed at the family for their seeming indifference to Diana’s death in 1997, but the reproval died away after the Queen paid tribute to the Princess as an ‘exceptional and gifted human being.’
Despite later controversies, such as Prince Andrew’s involvement with Ghislane Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein, and the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s withdrawal from the monarchy, she remained an almost-universally beloved figure with her subjects.
In many national crises, her calm demeanour has served as a source of comfort for millions, if not billions, around the world. Two days after the 9/11 attacks, she also authorised the playing of ‘The Star-Spangled Banner’ at the Changing of the Guard.
Following the 7/7 bombings in London in July 2005, she was uncharacteristically direct, insisting that ‘those who perpetrate these brutal acts against innocent people should know that they will not change our way of life.’
Her annual Christmas broadcasts – which frequently topped the television ratings – were considered to encapsulate the national mood for the preceding year, frequently invoking the healing power of faith in times of trial, such as in 2001 and 2008 with the financial crisis that was then going on.
In 2020, she spoke of the ‘quiet, indomitable’ spirit of key workers who helped during the coronavirus pandemic. ‘Even on the darkest nights there is hope in the new dawn’, she declared – words appropriate for any crisis.
The Queen will also be remembered for her unique sense of humour. At the opening ceremony of the 2012 London Olympics, she memorably ‘skydived’ into the Olympic Stadium alongside then-James Bond actor Daniel Craig.
In a 2018 documentary, she joked to Sir David Attenborough that the sounds of helicopters buzzing overhead sounded like the arrival of Donald Trump or Barack Obama. Her self-deprecation has often been noted, such as in 2018 she thanked Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for making her ‘feel so old’ when he revealed that he was the 12th Canadian leader to serve under her.
More recently, she took time out of her Platinum Jubilee weekend to have ‘tea’ with Paddington Bear – where she revealed her love for the odd marmalade sandwich.
And now that is all gone. A reworked national anthem, new images on coins and banknotes – for a few days at least, the fabric of national life will freeze.
As the well-worn phrase goes, she meant many things to many people – such as visiting a school or hospital, or sending birthday greetings to a centenarian.
As has been pointed out, because of her, British royalty cemented its position and popularity in an era that could very easily have died out due to changing attitudes.
The people of the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth, to whom she meant so much, will hold her in everlasting remembrance.