UK's longest-serving monarch breathed her last at Balmoral Castle, her Scottish summer residence
Queen Elizabeth II, Britain's longest-reigning monarch and a
symbol of stability across much of a turbulent century, died Thursday. She was
96.
Buckingham Palace said she
died at Balmoral Castle, her summer residence in Scotland, where members of
the royal family had rushed to her side after her health took a turn for the
worse.
With the death of the queen, her 73-year-old son Charles
automatically becomes monarch, even though the coronation might not take place
for months. It is not known whether he will choose to call himself King Charles
III or some other name.
The BBC played the national anthem, "God Save the
Queen," over a portrait of her in full regalia as her death was announced,
and the flag over Buckingham Palace was lowered to half-staff as the second
Elizabethan age came to a close.
Robust health into 90s
The queen enjoyed robust health well into her 90s, although
she was seen using a cane in one appearance after the death of Philip, her
husband of 73 years, in April 2021. In October of that year, she was
hospitalized for a night in London for tests, and thereafter her public
appearances grew scarcer.
In 1947, almost five years before she ascended the throne,
the 21-year-old Elizabeth promised the people of Britain and the Commonwealth
that "my whole life, whether it be long or short, shall be devoted to your
service."
It was a promise she kept across more than seven decades.
The only monarch most Britons have ever known, Elizabeth
reigned for 70 years over a country that rebuilt from war and lost its empire;
joined the European Union and then left it; transformed from industrial
powerhouse to uncertain 21st century society. She endured through 15 prime
ministers, from Winston Churchill to Liz Truss, becoming an institution and an
icon -- a fixed point and a reassuring presence even for those who ignored or
loathed the monarchy.
Elizabeth Alexandra Mary Windsor was born in London on April
21, 1926, the first child of the Duke and Duchess of York. She was not born to
be queen -- her father's elder brother, Prince Edward, was destined to take the
crown, to be followed by any children he had.
But in 1936, when she was 10, Edward VIII abdicated to marry
twice-divorced American Wallis Simpson, and Elizabeth's father became King
George VI.
War-time life in shelters
Princess Margaret recalled asking her sister whether this
meant that Elizabeth would one day be queen. "'Yes, I suppose it
does,'" Margaret quoted Elizabeth as saying. "She didn't mention it
again."
Elizabeth was barely in her teens when Britain went to war
with Germany in 1939. Elizabeth and Margaret spent most of it at Windsor
Castle, spending many nights in an underground shelter as bombs fell.
In 1945, eager to do something for the war effort, the heir
to the throne joined the Auxiliary Territorial Service, where she
enthusiastically learned how to drive and service heavy vehicles.
On the night the war ended in Europe, May 8, 1945, she and
Margaret mingled, unrecognized, with celebrating crowds in London. She later
described it as "one of the most memorable nights of my life."
At Westminster Abbey in November 1947 she married Royal Navy
officer Philip Mountbatten, a prince of Greece and Denmark whom she had first
met in 1939 when she was 13 and he 18.
‘No apprenticeship’
Their first child, Prince Charles, was born on Nov. 14,
1948. He was followed by Princess Anne followed on Aug. 15, 1950, Prince Andrew
on Feb. 19, 1960, and Prince Edward on March 10, 1964. Besides those four
children, she is survived by eight grandchildren and 12 great-grandchildren.
In February 1952, George VI died in his sleep after years of
ill health at age 56. Elizabeth, visiting Kenya, was told that she was now
queen.
"In a way I didn't have an apprenticeship,"
Elizabeth reflected in a BBC documentary in 1992. "My father died much too
young, and so it was all a very sudden kind of taking on, and making the best
job you can."
Her coronation took place more than a year later at
Westminster Abbey, a spectacle viewed by millions through the still-new medium
of television.
Prime Minister Winston Churchill's first reaction to the
king's death was that the new queen was "only a child," but he was
won over within days and eventually became an ardent admirer.
‘Inquisitive and up to date’
Churchill was the first of 15 prime ministers in her reign.
The monarch held weekly meetings with them, and they generally found her
well-informed, inquisitive and up to date. The last premier she
administeredthe oath of office two days back was Liz Truss.
Her views in those private meetings became a subject of
intense speculation and fertile ground for dramatists like Peter Morgan, author
of the play "The Audience" and hit TV series "The Crown."
Those semi-fictionalized accounts were the product of an era of declining
deference and rising celebrity, when the royal family's troubles became public
property.
There were plenty of troubles. In Elizabeth's first years on
the throne, Princess Margaret provoked a national controversy through her
romance with a divorced man.
In what the queen called the "annus horribilis" of
1992, her daughter Princess Anne was divorced, Prince Charles and Princess
Diana separated, and so did Prince Andrew and his wife, Sarah. That was also
the year Windsor Castle was seriously damaged by fire.
The public split of Charles and Diana was followed by the
shock of her death in a Paris car crash in 1997. For once, the queen appeared
out of step amid unprecedented public mourning, failing to make a public show
of grief that was seen by many as unfeeling. After several days, she made a
televised address to the nation.
‘Stern gaze and kind smile’
The dent in her popularity was brief. She was by now a sort
of national grandmother, with a stern gaze and a kind smile.
She was arguably the most famous person in the world. But
her inner life and opinions remained mostly an enigma. The public saw only glimpses
of her personality -- her joy watching horse races at Royal Ascot, or her
pleasure in the companionship of her beloved Welsh Corgi dogs.
In 2015, she overtook her great-great-grandmother Queen
Victoria's reign of 63 years, seven months and two days to become the longest
serving monarch in British history, and she kept working into her 10th decade.
The loss of Philip at age 99 in 2021 was a heavy blow.
And the family troubles kept coming. Her son, Prince Andrew,
was entangled in the sordid tale of sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, an American
businessman who had been a friend. The queen's grandson Prince Harry walked
away from Britain and royal duties after marrying American actress Meghan
Markle in 2018.
As the queen entered her mid-90s, she had what the palace
called "mobility issues" and she appeared infrequently in public in
2022, the year of her Platinum Jubilee. In May, she asked Charles to stand in
for her at the State Opening of Parliament, one of the monarch's key
constitutional duties.
Parties and pageants
But she remained firmly in control of the monarchy as
Britain celebrated her Platinum Jubilee with days of parties and pageants in
June 2022. On Sept. 6, 2022, she presided at a ceremony at Balmoral Castle to
accept the resignation of Boris Johnson as prime minister and appoint Liz Truss
as his successor.
She remained at the center of public life to the end, not
least during the coronavirus pandemic. As Britons endured loss, isolation and
uncertainty, she made a rare video address in April 2020 that urged people to
stick together.
She summoned the spirit of World War II, that vital time in
her life, and the nation's, and echoed Vera Lynn's wartime anthem, "We'll
Meet Again."
"We should take comfort that while we may have more
still to endure, better days will return. We will be with our friends again. We
will be with our families again. We will meet again," she said.
(Text and
Truss's first address to nation as new UK prime minister
