Eskişehir, Türkiye, Monday 31 October 2022

I have been a James Bond fan ever since I could watch a movie or read a book.

The first James Bond novel (Casino Royale) of the 14 Ian Fleming works came out in 1953.

The first James Bond film (Dr. No) of the 27 films produced came out in 1962.

Of the 27 films, there is a scene in the 6th film (On Her Majesty’s Secret Service) that recently reverberates in my mind.

On Her Majesty’s Secret Service is a 1969 spy film and the 6th in the James Bond series produced by Eon Productions.

It is based on the 1963 novel by Ian Fleming.

Following Sean Connery’s decision to retire from the role after You Only Live Twice, Eon Productions selected George Lazenby, a model with no prior acting credits, to play the part of James Bond.

During the making of the film, Lazenby announced that he would play the role of Bond only once.

James Bond saves a woman on the beach from committing suicide by drowning.

Later he meets her again in a casino.

The woman, Contessa Teresa “Tracy” di Vicenzo (Diana Rigg), invites Bond to her hotel room to thank him, but when Bond arrives he is attacked by an unidentified man.

After subduing the man, Bond returns to his own room and finds Tracy there.

She claims she was unaware of the attacker’s presence.

The next morning, Bond is kidnapped by several men, including the one he fought, who take him to meet Marc-Ange Draco, the head of the European crime syndicate Union Corse.

Draco reveals that Tracy is his only daughter and tells Bond of her troubled past, offering Bond one million pounds if he will marry her.

Bond refuses, but agrees to continue romancing Tracy if Draco helps him track down Ernst Stavro Blofeld, the head of SPECTRE.

Upon returning to London, M relieves Bond of his mission to assassinate Blofeld.

Furious, Bond dictates a letter of resignation to Moneypenny, which she alters into a request for leave.

Moneypenny: That was a quick conference. How do you expect a girl to keep herself alluring….?

Bond: Take a memo, please, Moneypenny.

Moneypenny: Ready, James.

Bond: Sir, I have the honour to request you will accept my resignation effective forthwith.

Moneypenny: Resignation from what?

Bond: Her Majesty’s Secret Service, and kindly present it to that monument in there.

Bond marches out of Moneypenny‘s office and into his own office.

He removes his suit jacket.

We see his shoulder holster, which he removes.

He grabs a suitcase from the floor, places it on his desk and begins to clean out his desk.

From the middle drawer of his desk, he removes, gazing at each with bittersweet nostalgia, the knife holster of Honeychile Ryder (Dr. No), the garroting watch of Red Grant (From Russia with Love) and a diving knife from the Thunderball mission.

He grabs a silver metal flask, sits down heavily in his desk chair, and finds himself looking at his reflection in a wall portrait of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II in her Coronation robes.

Bond raises his flask in salute and wistfully says:

“Sorry, Ma’am.”

Elizabeth II (née Elizabeth Alexandra Mary Windsor) (1926 – 2022) was Queen of the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth realms from 1952 until her death in 2022.

She was Queen Regnant of 32 sovereign states during her lifetime and 15 at the time of her death.

Her reign of 70 years and 214 days was the longest of any British monarch and the longest verified reign of any female monarch in history.

Princess Elizabeth was born at 02:40 (Greenwich Meridian Time) on 21 April 1926, during the reign of her paternal grandfather, King George V.

Her father, Prince Albert, Duke of York (later King George VI), was the second son of the King.

Her mother, Elizabeth, Duchess of York (later Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother), was the youngest daughter of Scottish aristocrat Claude Bowes-Lyon, 14th Earl of Strathmore and Kinghorne.

Princess Elizabeth was delivered by Caesarean section at 17 Bruton Street in Mayfair, which was her grandfather Lord Strathmore’s London home.

She was baptised in the private chapel of Buckingham Palace on 29 May. 

Above: Prince Albert and Duchess Elizabeth with baby Elizabeth, 1926

She was named Elizabeth after her mother, Alexandra after her paternal great-grandmother who had died six months earlier, and Mary after her paternal grandmother. 

Called “Lilibet” by her close family, based on what she called herself at first, she was cherished by her grandfather George V, whom she affectionately called “Grandpa England“, and her regular visits during his serious illness in 1929 were credited in the popular press and by later biographers with raising his spirits and aiding his recovery.

Elizabeth’s only sibling, Princess Margaret, was born in 1930.

The two princesses were educated at home under the supervision of their mother and their governess, Marion Crawford. 

Lessons concentrated on history, language, literature, and music.

Crawford published a biography of Elizabeth and Margaret’s childhood years entitled The Little Princesses in 1950, much to the dismay of the Royal Family.

The book describes Elizabeth’s love of horses and dogs, her orderliness, and her attitude of responsibility.

Others echoed such observations: 

Winston Churchill described Elizabeth when she was two as “a character.

She has an air of authority and reflectiveness astonishing in an infant.” 

Her cousin Margaret Rhodes described her as “a jolly little girl, but fundamentally sensible and well-behaved“.

During her grandfather’s reign, Elizabeth was third in the line of succession to the British throne, behind her uncle Edward and her father.

Although her birth generated public interest, she was not expected to become Queen, as Edward was still young and likely to marry and have children of his own, who would precede Elizabeth in the line of succession.

When her grandfather died in 1936 and her uncle succeeded as Edward VIII, she became second in line to the throne, after her father.

Later that year, Edward abdicated, after his proposed marriage to divorced socialite Wallis Simpson provoked a constitutional crisis.

Consequently, Elizabeth’s father became King, taking the regnal name George VI.

Since Elizabeth had no brothers, she became heir presumptive.

If her parents had subsequently borne a son, he would have been heir apparent and above her in the line of succession, which was determined by the male preference primogeniture in effect at the time.

Elizabeth received private tuition in constitutional history from Henry Marten, Vice-Provost, of Eton College and learned French from a succession of native-speaking governesses.

A Girl Guides company, the 1st Buckingham Palace Company, was formed specifically so she could socialise with girls her own age.

Later, she was enrolled as a Sea Ranger.

Elizabeth met her future husband, Prince Philip of Greece and Denmark, in 1934 and again in 1937.

They were second cousins once removed through King Christian IX of Denmark and third cousins through Queen Victoria.

After meeting for the third time at the Royal Naval College in Dartmouth in July 1939, Elizabeth — though only 13 years old — said she fell in love with Philip, who was 18.

They began to exchange letters.

In 1939, Elizabeth’s parents toured Canada and the United States.

(The 1939 royal tour of Canada by King George VI and Queen Elizabeth was undertaken in the build-up to World War II as a way to emphasise the links between Britain and the Dominion of Canada.

The royal tour lasted from 17 May to 15 June, covering every Canadian province, the Dominion of Newfoundland, and a few days in the United States.

This tour demonstrated and cemented Canada’s allegiance to the Crown and its status as the senior dominion of the British Empire.

There had been previous royal tours in Canada, but this was unprecedented, both due to the fact that it was the first visit of North America by the reigning monarch as well as in its scope.

The tour was an enormous event, attracting huge crowds at each new city.

The King and Queen arrived by ship in Québec City and travelled west by rail, accompanied throughout their journey by Canadian Prime Minister Mackenzie King.

The party visited most of the major cities, finally arriving in Vancouver.

Then they travelled through the United States.

The tour ended with a visit to the Maritimes and Newfoundland, departing from Halifax.

It was the first visit by a reigning monarch of Canada and also the first time a Canadian monarch had set foot in the United States.

This tour marked the first time that the sovereign’s official Canadian birthday was marked with the monarch himself present in the country.

The occasion was marked on Parliament Hill with a celebration and a Trooping of the Colour.)

Above: A depiction of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth unveiling the National War Memorial in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, 20 May 1939

As in 1927, when they had toured Australia and New Zealand, Elizabeth remained in Britain, since her father thought she was too young to undertake public tours.

(In 1926, Prince Albert (later George VI) and wife Elizabeth had their first child, Princess Elizabeth, who would later become Queen Elizabeth II.

The following year they undertook a Royal Tour without the baby.

Duchess Elizabeth was, in her own words, “very miserable at leaving the baby“.

Their journey by sea took them via Jamaica, the Panama Canal and the Pacific.

Elizabeth fretted constantly over her baby back in Britain, but their journey was a public relations success.

In New Zealand, the royals enjoyed the local fishing in the Bay of Islands accompanied by Australian sports fisherman Harry Andreas.

When they sailed into Sydney Harbour on HMS Renown, they attracted Australia’s first gathering of more than one million people.

The principal duty of the Prince on this visit was to open the provisional Parliament House in Canberra, on 9 May 1927.

They spent 12 days in New South Wales, seven in Queensland, four in Tasmania, eleven in Victoria, six in South Australia, six in Western Australia and three in the Australian Capital Territory, with the remaining ten for travelling and recreation.

According to a report by the Director-General of the Royal Visit, Cyril Brudenell White, “the Royal Visitors had expressed the wish that when travelling through Australia they might have opportunities of seeing and of being seen by, the greatest number of the general public.

They especially desired to meet returned soldiers, new settlers and school children.”)

She “looked tearful” as her parents departed.

They corresponded regularly.

She and her parents made the first royal transatlantic telephone call on 18 May 1927.

In September 1939, Britain entered the Second World War. 

It was suggested that Princesses Elizabeth and Princess Margaret should be evacuated to Canada to avoid the frequent aerial bombings of London by the Luftwaffe.

(Germany began aerial bombing of British cities immediately after the British declaration of war on Germany in September 1939. 

After the Fall of France (10 May – 25 June 1940), the Luftwaffe redirected its full attention to the United Kingdom.

The scale of the attack increased greatly in July 1940, with 258 civilians killed, and again in August with 1,075 dead.

During the night of 25 August, British bombers raided targets in and around Greater Berlin for the first time, in response to the misdirected bombing of Oxford Street and the West End by the Luftwaffe while it was bombing the London docks.

On 4 September 1940, Hitler, frustrated by the RAF’s superiority over the Luftwaffe and enraged by its bombing of German cities, decided to retaliate by bombing London and other cities in the UK. 

On 7 September, the Luftwaffe began massed attacks on London.

The bombing campaign was known in the UK as “the Blitz“, and ran from September 1940 through to May 1941.

The Coventry Blitz and the Belfast Blitz were two of the heaviest of all bombings by the Luftwaffe, killing 568–1,000 civilians of Coventry, killing over 1,100 civilians in Belfast, and destroying much of both city centres.)

Evacuation was rejected by their mother, who declared:

“The children won’t go without me.

I won’t leave without the King.

And the King will never leave.” 

Thus throughout the Second World War the Queen and her children shared the dangers and difficulties of the rest of the nation.

She was in Buckingham Palace when it was bombed in September 1940.

She and the King visited badly damaged areas throughout the country after the air-raids, and toured Britain visiting hospitals, factories and troops.

The princesses stayed at Balmoral Castle, Scotland, until Christmas 1939, when they moved to Sandringham House, Norfolk.

From February to May 1940, they lived at Royal Lodge, Windsor, until moving to Windsor Castle, where they lived for most of the next five years.

At Windsor, the princesses staged pantomimes at Christmas in aid of the Queen’s Wool Fund, which bought yarn to knit into military garments.

In 1940, the 14-year-old Elizabeth made her first radio broadcast during the BBC’s Children’s Hour (1922 – 1964), addressing other children who had been evacuated from the cities.

She stated:

“We are trying to do all we can to help our gallant sailors, soldiers, and airmen, and we are trying, too, to bear our own share of the danger and sadness of war.

We know, every one of us, that in the end all will be well.“

In 1943, Elizabeth undertook her first solo public appearance on a visit to the Grenadier Guards, of which she had been appointed Colonel the previous year.

As she approached her 18th birthday, Parliament changed the law so she could act as one of five Counsellors of State in the event of her father’s incapacity or absence abroad, such as his visit to Italy in July 1944. 

In February 1945, she was appointed an honorary Second Subaltern in the Auxiliary Territorial Service with the service number #230873.

She trained and worked as a driver and mechanic and was given the rank of honorary Junior Commander (female equivalent of Captain at the time) five months later.

At the end of the war in Europe, on Victory in Europe (V-E) Day, Elizabeth and Margaret mingled incognito with the celebrating crowds in the streets of London.

Elizabeth later said in a rare interview:

“We asked my parents if we could go out and see for ourselves.

I remember we were terrified of being recognized.

I remember lines of unknown people linking arms and walking down Whitehall, all of us just swept along on a tide of happiness and relief.“

During the War, plans were drawn up to quell Welsh nationalism by affiliating Elizabeth more closely with Wales.

Proposals, such as appointing her Constable of Caernarfon Castle or a patron of Urdd Gobaith Cymru (the Welsh League of Youth), were abandoned for several reasons, including fear of associating Elizabeth with conscientious objectors in the Urdd at a time when Britain was at war.

Welsh politicians suggested she be made Princess of Wales on her 18th birthday. 

Home Secretary Herbert Morrison supported the idea, but the King rejected it because he felt such a title belonged solely to the wife of a Prince of Wales.

The Prince of Wales had always been the heir apparent.

In 1946, she was inducted into the Gorsedd of Bards at the National Eisteddfod of Wales.

Princess Elizabeth went on her first overseas tour in 1947, accompanying her parents through southern Africa.

During the tour, in a broadcast to the British Commonwealth on her 21st birthday, she made the following pledge:

“I declare before you all that my 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.“

She was 21 when her engagement to Prince Philip was officially announced on 9 July 1947.

The engagement attracted some controversy.

Philip had no financial standing, was foreign-born (though a British subject who had served in the Royal Navy throughout the Second World War).

He had sisters who had married German noblemen with Nazi links.

Princess Sophie of Greece and Denmark married (1930) Prince Christoph of Hesse (1901 – 1943) and (1946) Prince Georg of Hannover (1915 – 2004).

Close to the Nazi circles, in which her husband and several of her in-laws were involved from 1930, Sophie joined the Nationalist Socialist Women’s League in 1938.

Deceived by Adolf Hitler, whom she saw as a modest and charming man, the Princess became close to Emmy Sonnemann (1893 – 1973), who became her friend and later married Luftwaffe Commander-in-Chief Hermann Göring (1893 – 1946) in April 1935.

Attached to Nazism, Sophie and her in-laws therefore served as unofficial intermediaries between Nazi Germany and the European dynasties to which they were related.

Under these conditions, the social status of Christoph and Sophie continued to improve.

They moved into a large house located in Dahlem (Berlin) in 1936.

The outbreak of the Second World War, however, forced the couple to separate.

An SS (Schutzstaffel, a Nazi paramilitary group) officer since 1932, Christoph joined the Luftwaffe, which led him to various European theaters of operation.

For her part, Sophie moved with her children to her mother-in-law Princess Margaret of Prussia, at Friedrichshof Castle in Kronberg im Taunus.

The Führer‘s growing distrust of the German aristocracy (from 1942) and the 1943 betrayal (the Armistice of Cassibile between Italy and the Allies) of King Victor Emmanuel III of Italy (1869 – 1947) led the Nazi regime to turn against the House of Hesse-Kassel. 

Princess Mafalda, daughter of the Italian monarch and sister-in-law of Sophie, was thus imprisoned in Buchenwald, where she was seriously wounded and died shortly after.

Her husband, Philipp, Landgrave of Hesse, was confined in Flossenbürg until the victory of the Allies.

At the same time, Christoph was found dead in mysterious circumstances, leaving Sophie almost alone with her four children and a fifth one under way as well as the four children of Philipp and Mafalda.

The tragic events made Sophie realize the true nature of Hitler’s regime and turn against Nazism.

Marion Crawford wrote:

“Some of the King’s advisors did not think Philip good enough for Elizabeth.

He was a prince without a home or kingdom.

Some of the papers played long and loud tunes on the string of Philip’s foreign origin.“

Later biographies reported that Elizabeth’s mother had reservations about the union initially, and teased Philip as “the Hun“. 

In later life, however, she told the biographer Tim Heald (1944 – 2016) that Philip was “an English gentleman“.

Before the marriage, Philip renounced his Greek and Danish titles, officially converted from Greek Orthodoxy to Anglicanism, and adopted the style Lieutenant Philip Mountbatten, taking the surname of his mother’s British family.

Shortly before the wedding, he was created Duke of Edinburgh and granted the style His Royal Highness.

Elizabeth and Philip were married on 20 November 1947 at Westminster Abbey.

They received 2,500 wedding gifts from around the world.

Elizabeth required ration coupons to buy the material for her gown, because Britain had not yet completely recovered from the devastation of the war.

In post-war Britain, it was not acceptable for Philip’s German relations, including his three surviving sisters, to be invited to the wedding.

Neither was an invitation extended to the Duke of Windsor, formerly King Edward VIII.

(After his abdication, Edward was created Duke of Windsor.

He married Simpson in France on 3 June 1937, after her second divorce became final.

Later that year, the couple toured Nazi Germany, which fed rumours that he was a Nazi sympathizer.

He appeared to have been sympathetic to Germany in this period and, that September, announced his intention to travel privately to Germany to tour factories.

His interests, officially into researching the social and economic conditions of the working classes, were against the backdrop of looming war in Europe.

The Duke’s supporters saw him as a potential peacemaker between Britain and Germany, but the British government refused to sanction such a role, opposed the tour and suspected that the Nazis would use the Duke’s presence for propaganda.

Windsor was keen for his wife, who had been rejected by the British establishment, to experience a state visit as his consort.

He promised the government to keep a low profile.

The tour went ahead between 12 and 23 October 1937.

The Duke and the Duchess, who were officially invited to the country by the German Labour Front, were chaperoned for much of their visit by its leader, Robert Ley.

The couple visited factories, many of which were producing material for the rearmament effort.

The Duke inspected German troops.

The Windsors were greeted by the British national anthem and Nazi salutes.

They dined with high-ranking Nazis.

They had tea with Adolf Hitler in Berchtesgaden.

The Duke had a long private conversation with Hitler, but it is uncertain what they discussed, as the minutes of their meeting were lost during the war.

The Duchess took afternoon tea with Hitler’s deputy, Rudolf Hess.

Hitler was sympathetic to the Windsors and treated the Duchess like royalty.

The British government was unable to affect the course of events and forbade its diplomatic staff in Germany from having any high-level interaction with the Windsors.

British popular opinion of the tour was muted.

Most people viewed it as in poor taste and disrupting the first year of George’s reign.

The tour of Germany was intended to have been followed by one of the United States, but Nazi repression of working-class activists in Germany led to a wave of disapproval for the Windsors in the American labour movement, which led to the US visit being cancelled.

Modern historians tend to consider the 1937 tour as a reflection of both the Duke’s lack of judgment and his disregard for the advice that he received.)

Elizabeth gave birth to her first child, Charles, on 14 November 1948.

One month earlier, the King had issued letters patent allowing her children to use the style and title of a royal prince or princess, to which they otherwise would not have been entitled as their father was no longer a royal prince.

A second child, Princess Anne, was born on 15 August 1950.

Following their wedding, the couple leased Windlesham Moor, near Windsor Castle, until July 1949, when they took up residence at Clarence House in London.

At various times between 1949 and 1951, the Duke of Edinburgh was stationed in the British Crown Colony of Malta as a serving Royal Navy officer.

He and Elizabeth lived intermittently in Malta for several months at a time in the hamlet of Gwardamanga, at Villa Guardamangia, the rented home of Philip’s uncle, Lord Mountbatten.

George VI’s health declined during 1951.

Elizabeth frequently stood in for him at public events.

When she toured Canada and visited President Harry S. Truman in Washington, DC, in October 1951, her private secretary, Martin Charteris, carried a draft accession declaration in case of the King’s death while she was on tour.

In early 1952, Elizabeth and Philip set out for a tour of Australia and New Zealand by way of the British colony of Kenya.

On 6 February 1952, they had just returned to their Kenyan home, Sagana Lodge, after a night spent at Treetops Hotel, when word arrived of the death of George VI and Elizabeth’s consequent accession to the throne with immediate effect.

Philip broke the news to the new Queen.

For Her Majesty, 6 February would be a muted anniversary, a day of quiet reflection.

Because for a Princess to become Queen, a King must die.

The date when her beloved father, King George VI passed away, asleep in his bedroom on the ground floor of Sandringham Estate.

Above: Sandringham House, Norfolk, England

“It is a day that, even after 70 years, I still remember as much for the death of my father, King George VI, as for the start of my reign.“, she wrote in an anniversary statement in February 2022.

The story of the day and hour of Elizabeth’s accession to the throne has been told many times, but it remains a captivating tale.

It is history with echoes of Arthurian romance.

Above: Depiction of King Arthur (late 5th century – early 6th century), the “Christian Heroes Tapestry” in The Cloisters, New York

On the morning of her father’s death, 25-year-old Elizabeth was perched in a treehouse in Kenya, from which she had watched a herd of elephants led by matriarchs come to a watering hole.

“There has been much speculation, not least because of historical parallels, about when precisely Elizabeth became Queen.“, wrote Sally Bedell Smith, in her biography of the monarch.

“It undoubtedly happened when she was atop the African fig tree, which draws a romantic line to the moment in 1558 when Elizabeth I, seated next to an oak tree at Hatfield House, heard that the death of her sister, Queen Mary, meant she was the monarch, also at age 25.“

Above: The Old Palace at Hatfield House in Hertfordshire, England, where Elizabeth I lived during Mary’s reign (1553 – 1558)

For many months, King George had been in declining health.

“The King, a heavy smoker, underwent a left total pneumonectomy in September 1951 for what euphemistically was called “structural abnormalities” of his left lung, but what in reality was a carcinoma.“, wrote Rolf F. Barth of Ohio State University in a “pathologists’ reassessment” last year.

“His physicians withheld this diagnosis from him, the public, and the medical profession.“, Barth and co-author L. Maximillian Buja wrote.

Too ill to travel, 56-year-old George tasked Elizabeth and her husband, Philip, with undertaking a months-long of the Commonwealth, in what was then the twilight of the British Empire.

George saw his daughter off at London Airport on 31 January 1952.

Newspapers said the King looked “well and cheerful“.

One of his biographers would later suggest “haggard” as a better description.

The crowd let out a cheer as he waved goodbye to Elizabeth.

It would be the last time the two saw each other.

Above: King George Vi (left) and Princess Elizabeth (centre), London Airport, 31 January 1952

The young couple travelled to Kenya, where a BBC newsreel shows Elizabeth in a print dress and Philip in white naval uniform, bedecked in medals, emerging from the BOAC Argonaut plane.

From the Kenyan capital, the two, accompanied by a small entourage, travelled three hours to Sagana Lodge, a villa alongside a trout stream, presented to them as a wedding gift from the Kenyan state.

Above: Sagana Lodge, Kiganjo, Kenya

“It was a dangerous time in the British colony.

The Mau Mau campaign had just broken out across the White Highlands.“, wrote historian Nicholas Best in the Observer.

Above: British historian Nicholas Best

(The Mau Mau rebellion (1952–1960), also known as the Mau Mau uprising, Mau Mau revolt or Kenya Emergency, was a war in the British Kenya colony (1920–1963) between the Kenya Land and Freedom Army (KLFA), also known as the Mau Mau, and the British authorities.

The armed rebellion of the Mau Mau was the culminating response to colonial rule. 

Although there had been previous instances of violent resistance to colonialism, the Mau Mau revolt was the most prolonged and violent anti-colonial warfare in the British Kenya colony.

From the start, the land was the primary British interest in Kenya, which had “some of the richest agricultural soils in the world, mostly in districts where the elevation and climate make it possible for Europeans to reside permanently.”

Though declared a colony in 1920, the formal British colonial presence in Kenya began with a proclamation on 1 July 1895, in which Kenya was claimed as a British protectorate.

Even before 1895, however, Britain’s presence in Kenya was marked by dispossession and violence. 

Opposition to British imperialism had existed from the start of British occupation.)

Above: Troops of the King’s African Rifles carry supplies while on watch for Mau Mau fighters

“The officials responsible for the Princess’ tour of Kenya, Australia and New Zealand felt unable to guarantee her safety while she was in Kenya.

It was only fear of ridicule that stopped them cancelling the African leg of the trip.”

Above: Coat of arms of Kenya

On 5 February, the couple travelled into the forest, to Treetops Hotel, a game-viewing lodge.

Their three-bed cabin was reached by a rickety ladder and built into the branches of an ancient fig tree, overlooking a waterhole and salt lick.

Above: Treetops Hotel, Nyeri, Aberdare National Park, Kenya

That afternoon and evening, Elizabeth saw and filmed with her handheld movie camera rhinos, warthogs, baboons and a herd of elephants.

“Look, Philip, they’re pink!“

Elizabeth told her husband, according to Smith’s account.

The elephants had been rolling in red dust.

That same day, King George had been shooting hares at Sandringham Estate back in England.

“The King, a great shot, was on top of his form.“, his neighbour Lord Fermoy told a newspaper.

George dined with his wife and younger daughter, Princess Margaret, before retiring to his bedroom at 2230 hours, 5 February 1952.

The Birmingham Gazette reported that the King died in his sleep sometime in the early morning hours of 6 February, after “a perfectly happy day“.

He was discovered by his valet at 7:30 am.

The news was conveyed to Buckingham Palace by telephone, using the code “Hyde Park Corner” to avoid alerting switchboard operators to the news.

The news was not broken to the wider world until 11:15 am when BBC newsreader John Snagge read the words “It is with the greatest sorrow that we make the following announcement...” on the radio.

The news was repeated every 15 minutes for seven occasions, before the broadcast went silent for five hours.

Above: John Snagge (1904 – 1996)

As a mark of respect the Great Tom bell at St. Paul’s Cathedral was tolled every minute for two hours, as well as the bells at Westminster Abbey.

Above: St. Paul’s Cathedral, London, England

The Sebastopol bell, a Crimean War trophy at Windsor Castle that is rung only upon a royal death, was tolled 56 times, once for each year of George VI’s life, between 1:27 and 2:22 pm.

Newspapers later described the cause of death as “a blood clot in his heart“.

Above: Windsor Castle, Windsor, England

Because of the distance and difficulty of communications, it took hours for the news to reach rural Kenya.

The message was relayed to Philip’s private secretary, and from Philip to his wife when they had returned to Sagana Lodge.

Without ceremony or even awareness, but in accordance with British tradition, Elizabeth had become Queen.

The newspaper front pages rang out, “Long Live Queen Elizabeth“, while noting “Her Majesty, pale with grief, leaves by air for home.“

There was a proclamation of the accession at St. James’ Palace in London that day, signed by 150 members of the Privy Council.

Above: Proclamation Gallery, St. James’ Palace, London, England, used after the death of a reigning monarch, to declare the new monarch

More than a year later, on 2 June 1953, the coronation of Elizabeth II took place in Westminster Abbey, a much more joyous, public, televised occasion, watched by millions.

She chose to retain Elizabeth as her regnal name.

Thus she was called Elizabeth II, which offended many Scots, as she was the first Elizabeth to rule in Scotland.

She was proclaimed Queen throughout her realms.

The royal party hastily returned to the United Kingdom.

Elizabeth and Philip moved into Buckingham Palace.

With Elizabeth’s accession, it seemed probable that the Royal House would bear the Duke of Edinburgh’s name, in line with the custom of a wife taking her husband’s surname on marriage.

Lord Mountbatten advocated the name House of Mountbatten.

Philip suggested House of Edinburgh, after his ducal title.

The British Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, and Elizabeth’s grandmother Queen Mary favoured the retention of the House of Windsor, so Elizabeth issued a declaration on 9 April 1952 that Windsor would continue to be the name of the royal house.

Philip complained:

“I am the only man in the country not allowed to give his name to his own children.“

In 1960, the surname Mountbatten-Windsor was adopted for Philip and Elizabeth’s male-line descendants who do not carry royal titles.

Amid preparations for the coronation, Princess Margaret told her sister she wished to marry Peter Townsend, a divorcé 16 years Margaret’s senior with two sons from his previous marriage.

Elizabeth asked them to wait for a year.

In the words of her private secretary:

“The Queen was naturally sympathetic towards the Princess, but I think she thought — she hoped — given time, the affair would peter out.” 

Senior politicians were against the match.

The Church of England did not permit remarriage after divorce.

If Margaret had contracted a civil marriage, she would have been expected to renounce her right of succession.

Margaret decided to abandon her plans with Townsend.

Despite the death of Queen Mary on 24 March 1953, the Coronation went ahead as planned on 2 June, as Mary had requested before she died.

The coronation ceremony in Westminster Abbey, with the exception of the anointing and communion, was televised for the first time. 

On Elizabeth’s instruction, her coronation gown was embroidered with the floral emblems of Commonwealth countries.

From Elizabeth’s birth onwards, the British Empire continued its transformation into the Commonwealth of Nations.

By the time of her accession in 1952, her role as head of multiple independent states was already established.

In 1953, Elizabeth and her husband embarked on a seven-month round-the-world tour, visiting 13 countries and covering more than 40,000 miles (64,000 km) by land, sea and air. 

She became the first reigning monarch of Australia and New Zealand to visit those nations. 

During the tour, crowds were immense.

Three-quarters of the population of Australia were estimated to have seen her.

Throughout her reign, Elizabeth made hundreds of state visits to other countries and tours of the Commonwealth.

She was the most widely travelled head of state.

In 1956, the British and French Prime Ministers, Sir Anthony Eden (1897 – 1977) and Guy Mollet (1905 – 1975), discussed the possibility of France joining the Commonwealth.

The proposal was never accepted.

The following year, France signed the Treaty of Rome, which established the European Economic Community (EEC), the precursor to the European Union (EU).

In November 1956, Britain and France invaded Egypt in an ultimately unsuccessful attempt to capture the Suez Canal.

Lord Mountbatten said Elizabeth was opposed to the invasion, though Eden denied it.

Eden resigned two months later.

The Suez Crisis, or the Second Arab–Israeli war, also called the Tripartite Aggression in the Arab world and the Sinai War in Israel, was an invasion of Egypt in late 1956 by Israel, followed by the UK and France.

The aims were to regain control of the Suez Canal for the Western powers and to remove Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser, who had just swiftly nationalized the foreign-owned Suez Canal Company, which administered the Canal. 

After the fighting had started, political pressure from the US, the Soviet Union (USSR) and the United Nations (UN) led to a withdrawal by the three invaders.

The episode humiliated the United Kingdom and France and strengthened Nasser.

On 26 July 1956, Nasser nationalized the Suez Canal Company, which prior to that was owned primarily by British and French shareholders.

On 29 October, Israel invaded the Egyptian Sinai.

Britain and France issued a joint ultimatum to cease fire, which was ignored.

On 5 November, Britain and France landed paratroopers along the Suez Canal.

Before the Egyptian forces were defeated, they had blocked the Canal to all shipping by sinking 40 ships in the Canal.

It later became clear that Israel, France and Britain had conspired to plan the invasion.

The three allies had attained a number of their military objectives, but the Canal was useless.

Heavy political pressure from the US and the USSR led to a withdrawal.

US President Dwight D. Eisenhower had strongly warned Britain not to invade.

He threatened serious damage to the British financial system by selling the US government’s pound sterling bonds.

Historians conclude the Crisis “signified the end of Great Britain’s role as one of the world’s major powers“.

The Suez Canal was closed from October 1956 until March 1957.

Israel fulfilled some of its objectives, such as attaining freedom of navigation through the Straits of Tiran, which Egypt had blocked to Israeli shipping since 1948.

As a result of the conflict, the United Nations created the UNEF Peacekeepers to police the Egyptian – Israeli border, British Prime Minister Anthony Eden resigned, Canadian External Affairs Minister Lester B. Pearson won the Nobel Peace Prize, and the USSR may have been emboldened to invade Hungary.

The absence of a formal mechanism within the Conservative Party for choosing a leader meant that, following Eden’s resignation, it fell to Elizabeth to decide whom to commission to form a government.

Elizabeth consulted the British Cabinet and Winston Churchill, resulting in Her Majesty appointing their recommended candidate: Harold Macmillan.

The Suez crisis and the choice of Eden’s successor led, in 1957, to the first major personal criticism of Elizabeth.

In a magazine, which he owned and edited, Lord Altrincham accused her of being “out of touch“.

Altrincham was denounced by public figures and slapped by a member of the public appalled by his comments.

Six years later, in 1963, Macmillan resigned and advised Elizabeth to appoint the Earl of Home as the Prime Minister, advice she followed.

Elizabeth again came under criticism for appointing the Prime Minister on the advice of a small number of ministers or a single minister.

In 1965, the Conservatives adopted a formal mechanism for electing a leader, thus relieving the Queen of her involvement.

In 1957, Elizabeth made a state visit to the US, where she addressed the UN General Assembly on behalf of the Commonwealth.

On the same tour, she opened the 23rd Canadian Parliament, becoming the first monarch of Canada to open a parliamentary session.

Two years later, solely in her capacity as Queen of Canada, she revisited the US and toured Canada.

In 1961, she toured Cyprus, India, Pakistan, Nepal and Iran.

On a visit to Ghana the same year, she dismissed fears for her safety, even though her host, President Kwame Nkrumah, who had replaced her as head of state, was a target for assassins.

Harold Macmillan wrote:

“The Queen has been absolutely determined all through.

She is impatient of the attitude towards her to treat her as a film star.

She has indeed the heart and stomach of a man.

She loves her duty and means to be a Queen.“

Before her tour through parts of Québec in 1964, the press reported extremists within the Québec separatist movement were plotting Elizabeth’s assassination.

No attempt was made, but a riot did break out while she was in Québec City.

Elizabeth’s “calmness and courage in the face of the violence” was noted.

Elizabeth gave birth to her third child, Prince Andrew, on 19 February 1960, which was the first birth to a reigning British monarch since 1857.

Her fourth child, Prince Edward, was born on 10 March 1964.

In addition to performing traditional ceremonies, Elizabeth also instituted new practices.

Her first royal walkabout, meeting ordinary members of the public, took place during a tour of Australia and New Zealand in 1970.

The 1960s and 1970s saw an acceleration in the decolonization of Africa and the Caribbean.

More than 20 countries gained independence from Britain as part of a planned transition to self-government.

In 1965, however, the Rhodesian Prime Minister, Ian Smith, in opposition to moves towards majority rule, unilaterally declared independence, while expressing “loyalty and devotion” to Elizabeth, declaring her “Queen of Rhodesia”.

Although Elizabeth formally dismissed him, and the international community applied sanctions against Rhodesia, his regime survived for over a decade.

As Britain’s ties to its former empire weakened, the British government sought entry to the European Community, a goal it achieved in 1973.

Elizabeth toured Yugoslavia in October 1972, becoming the first British monarch to visit a Communist country.

She was received at the airport by President Josip Broz Tito.

A crowd of thousands greeted her in Belgrade.

Above: Flag of Yugoslavia (1946 – 1992)

In February 1974, the British Prime Minister, Edward Heath, advised Elizabeth to call a general election in the middle of her tour of the Austronesian Pacific Rim, requiring her to fly back to Britain. 

The election resulted in a hung parliament.

Heath’s Conservatives were not the largest party, but could stay in office if they formed a coalition with the Liberals.

When discussions on forming a coalition foundered, Heath resigned as Prime Minister.

Above: Edward Heath (1916 – 2005) (UK Prime Minister: 1970 – 1974)

Elizabeth asked the Leader of the Opposition, Labour’s Harold Wilson, to form a government.

A year later, at the height of the 1975 Australian constitutional crisis, the Australian Prime Minister, Gough Whitlam, was dismissed from his post by Governor-General Sir John Kerr, after the Opposition-controlled Senate rejected Whitlam’s budget proposals.

As Whitlam had a majority in the House of Representatives, Speaker Gordon Scholes appealed to Elizabeth to reverse Kerr’s decision.

She declined, saying she would not interfere in decisions reserved by the Constitution of Australia for the Governor-General.

The crisis fuelled Australian republicanism.

In 1977, Elizabeth marked the Silver Jubilee of her accession.

Parties and events took place throughout the Commonwealth, many coinciding with her associated national and Commonwealth tours.

The celebrations re-affirmed Elizabeth’s popularity, despite virtually coincident negative press coverage of Princess Margaret’s separation from her husband, Lord Snowdon. 

In 1978, Elizabeth endured a state visit to the United Kingdom by Romania’s Communist leader, Nicolae Ceausescu and his wife Elena, though privately she thought they had “blood on their hands“.

The following year brought two blows:

One was the unmasking of Anthony Blunt, former Surveyor of the Queen’s Pictures, as a Communist spy.

The other was the assassination of her relative and in-law Lord Mountbatten by the Provisional Irish Republican Army.

According to Paul Martin Sr., by the end of the 1970s Elizabeth was worried the Crown “had little meaning” for Pierre Trudeau, the Canadian Prime Minister.

Elizabeth found Trudeau “rather disappointing“.

Trudeau’s supposed republicanism seemed to be confirmed by his antics, such as sliding down banisters at Buckingham Palace and pirouetting behind Elizabeth’s back in 1977, and the removal of various Canadian royal symbols during his term of office.

In 1980, Canadian politicians sent to London to discuss the patriation of the Canadian Constitution found Elizabeth “better informed than any of the British politicians or bureaucrats“.

She was particularly interested after the failure of Bill C-60, which would have affected her role as head of state.

During the 1981 Trooping the Colour ceremony, six weeks before the wedding of Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer, six shots were fired at Elizabeth from close range as she rode down The Mall, London, on her horse, Burmese.

Police later discovered the shots were blanks.

The 17-year-old assailant, Marcus Sarjeant, was sentenced to five years in prison and released after three.

Elizabeth’s composure and skill in controlling her mount were widely praised.

That October, Elizabeth was the subject of another attack while on a visit to Dunedin, New Zealand. 

Christopher John Lewis, who was 17 years old, fired a shot with a .22 rifle from the fifth floor of a building overlooking the parade, but missed.

Lewis was arrested, but never charged with attempted murder or treason.

He was sentenced to three years in jail for unlawful possession and discharge of a firearm.

Two years into his sentence, he attempted to escape a psychiatric hospital with the intention of assassinating Charles, who was visiting the country with Diana and their son Prince William.

From April to September 1982, Elizabeth’s son, Prince Andrew, served with British forces in the Falkland War, for which she reportedly felt anxiety and pride.

The Falklands War (Spanish: Guerra de las Malvinas) was a ten-week undeclared war between Argentina and the UK in 1982 over two British dependent territories in the South Atlantic: the Falkland Islands and its territorial dependency, South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands.

The conflict began on 2 April, when Argentina invaded and occupied the Falkland Islands, followed by the invasion of South Georgia the next day.

On 5 April, the British government dispatched a naval task force to engage the Argentine Navy and Air Force before making an amphibious assault on the islands.

The conflict lasted 74 days and ended with an Argentine surrender on 14 June, returning the islands to British control.

In total, 649 Argentine military personnel, 255 British military personnel, and three Falkland Islanders died during the hostilities.

The conflict was a major episode in the protracted dispute over the territories’ sovereignty.

Argentina asserted (and maintains) that the islands are Argentine territory.

The Argentine government thus characterised its military action as the reclamation of its own territory.

The British government regarded the action as an invasion of a territory that had been a Crown colony since 1841.

Falkland Islanders, who have inhabited the islands since the early 19th century, are predominantly descendants of British settlers, and strongly favour British sovereignty.

Neither state officially declared war, although both governments declared the islands a war zone.

The conflict has had a strong effect in both countries and has been the subject of various books, articles, films and songs.

Patriotic sentiment ran high in Argentina, but the unfavourable outcome prompted large protests against the ruling military government, hastening its downfall and the democratization of the country.

In the United Kingdom, the Conservative government, bolstered by the successful outcome, was re-elected with an increased majority the following year.

The cultural and political effect of the conflict has been less in the UK than in Argentina, where it has remained a common topic for discussion.

Diplomatic relations between the UK and Argentina were restored in 1989 following a meeting in Madrid, at which the two governments issued a joint statement.

No change in either country’s position regarding the sovereignty of the Falkland Islands was made explicit.

In 1994, Argentina adopted a new Constitution, which declared the Falkland Islands as part of one of its provinces by law.

However, the islands continue to operate as a self-governing British Overseas Territory.

On 9 July 1982, Her Majesty awoke in her bedroom at Buckingham Palace to find an intruder, Michael Fagan, in the room with her.

In a serious lapse of security, assistance only arrived after two calls to the Palace police switchboard. 

After hosting US President Ronald Reagan at Windsor Castle in 1982 and visiting his California ranch in 1983, Elizabeth was angered when his administration ordered the invasion of Grenada, one of her Caribbean realms, without informing her.

(The US invasion of Grenada began at dawn on 25 October 1983.

The US and a coalition of six Caribbean nations invaded the island nation of Grenada, 100 miles (160 km) north of Venezuela.

Codenamed Operation Urgent Fury by the US military, it resulted in military occupation within a few days.

It was triggered by the strife within the People’s Revolutionary Government which resulted in the house arrest and execution of the previous leader and second Prime Minister of Grenada Maurice Bishop and the establishment of the Revolutionary Military Council with Hudson Austin as Chairman.

The invasion resulted in the appointment of an interim government, followed by elections in 1984.

The Reagan administration in the US launched a military intervention following receipt of a formal appeal for help from the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States.

In addition, the Governor General of Grenada Paul Scoon secretly signaled he would also support outside intervention, but he put off signing a letter of invitation until 26 October.

Reagan also acted due to “concerns over the 600 US medical students on the island” and fears of a repeat of the Iran hostage crisis.

(On 4 November 1979, 52 US diplomats and citizens were held hostage after a group of militarized Iranian college students belonging to the Muslim Student Followers of the Imam’s Line, who supported the Iranian Revolution, took over the US Embassy in Tehran and took them as hostages.

A diplomatic standoff ensued.

The hostages were held for 444 days, being released on 20 January 1981.)

The invasion was criticized by many countries.

British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher privately disapproved of the mission and the lack of notice that she received, but she publicly supported it.

The UN General Assembly condemned it as “a flagrant violation of international law” on 2 November 1983 by a vote of 108 to 9.)

Intense media interest in the opinions and private lives of the Royal Family during the 1980s led to a series of sensational stories in the press, pioneered by The Sun tabloid. 

As Kelvin MacKenzie, editor of The Sun, told his staff:

“Give me a Sunday for Monday splash on the Royals.

Don’t worry if it’s not true — so long as there’s not too much of a fuss about it afterwards.“

Newspaper editor Donald Trelford wrote in The Observer of 21 September 1986:

“The royal soap opera has now reached such a pitch of public interest that the boundary between fact and fiction has been lost sight of.

It is not just that some papers don’t check their facts or accept denials:

They don’t care if the stories are true or not.“

It was reported, most notably in The Sunday Times of 20 July 1986, that Elizabeth was worried that Margaret Thatcher’s economic policies fostered social divisions and was alarmed by high unemployment, a series of riots, the violence of a miners’ strike, and Thatcher’s refusal to apply sanctions against the apartheid regime in South Africa.

(In April and July 1981, there were riots in several cities and towns in England.

The riots mainly involved black British youth clashing with police.

They were caused by tension between black people and the police, especially perceived racist discrimination against black people through increased use of stop-and-search.

They were also fuelled by inner city deprivation.

The most serious riots were the April Brixton riots in London, followed in July by the Toxteth riots in Liverpool, the Handsworth riots in Birmingham, the Chapeltown riots in Leeds, and the Moss Side riots in Manchester.

There were also a series of less serious riots in other towns and cities.)

The miners’ strike of 1984 – 1985 was a major industrial action within the British coal industry in an attempt to prevent colliery closures.

It was led by Arthur Scargill of the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) against the National Coal Board (NCB), a government agency.

Opposition to the strike was led by the Conservative government of Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, who wanted to reduce the power of the trade unions.

The NUM was divided over the action and many mineworkers, especially in the Midlands, worked through the dispute.

Few major trade unions supported the NUM, primarily because of the absence of a vote at national level.

Violent confrontations between picketers and police characterised the year-long strike, which ended in a decisive victory for the Conservative government and allowed the closure of most of Britain’s collieries.

Many observers regard the strike as “the most bitter industrial dispute in British history.”

The number of person-days of work lost to the strike was over 26 million, making it the largest since the 1926 general strike.

The journalist Seumas Milne said of the strike:

“It has no real parallel – in size, duration and impact – anywhere in the world“.

In 1983, Britain had 174 working pits, all of which had closed by the end of 2015.

Poverty increased in former coal mining areas.)

(Apartheid (“separateness“) was a system of institutionalised racial segregation that existed in South Africa and Namibia from 1948 to the early 1990s.

Apartheid was characterized by an authoritarian political culture, which ensured that South Africa was dominated politically, socially, and economically by the nation’s minority white population.

According to this system of social stratification, white citizens had the highest status.

The economic legacy and social effects of apartheid continue to the present day.)

Thatcher reputedly said Elizabeth would vote for the Social Democratic Party — Thatcher’s political opponents.

Thatcher’s biographer, John Campbell, claimed:

“The report was a piece of journalistic mischief-making“.

 

Reports of acrimony between them were exaggerated.

Elizabeth gave two honours — the Order of Merit and the Order of the Garter — to Thatcher after her replacement as Prime Minister by John Major.

Brian Mulroney, Canadian Prime Minister between 1984 and 1993, said Elizabeth was a “behind the scenes force” in ending apartheid.

In 1986, Elizabeth paid a six-day state visit to the People’s Republic of China, becoming the first British monarch to visit the country.

The tour included the Forbidden City, the Great Wall of China, and the Terracotta Warriors.

At a state banquet, Elizabeth joked about the first British emissary to China being lost at sea with Queen Elizabeth I’s letter to the Wanli Emperor, and remarked:

“Fortunately postal services have improved since 1602.“

Elizabeth’s visit also signified the acceptance of both countries that sovereignty over Hong Kong would be transferred from the UK to China in 1997.

By the end of the 1980s, Elizabeth had become the target of satire.

The involvement of younger members of the Royal Family in the charity game show It’s a Royal Knockout in 1987 was ridiculed.

In Canada, Elizabeth publicly supported politically divisive constitutional amendments, prompting criticism from opponents of the proposed changes.

(The Meech Lake Accord (Accord du Lac Meech) was a series of proposed amendments to the Constitution of Canada negotiated in 1987 by Prime Minister Brian Mulroney and all 10 Canadian provincial premiers.

It was intended to persuade the government of Québec to symbolically endorse the 1982 constitutional amendments by providing for some decentralization of the Canadian federation.

The proposed amendments were initially popular and backed by nearly all political leaders.

However, former Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, feminist activists, and Indigenous groups raised concerns about the lack of citizen involvement in the Accord’s drafting and its future effects on Canadian federalism.

Support for the Accord began to decline.

Changes in government in New Brunswick, Manitoba and Newfoundland brought ministries to power that declined to accept the Accord.

Further negotiations were conducted but tension increased between Québec and the predominantly English-speaking provinces.

A dramatic final meeting among First Ministers a month before the Accord’s constitutionally-mandated ratification deadline seemed to show renewed agreement on a second series of amendments that would address the concerns raised in the intervening debates.

Despite this, the original Accord would not gain acceptance in the Manitoba or Newfoundland Legislatures in time for ratification.

Failure to pass the Accord greatly increased tensions between Québec and the remainder of the country.

The Québec sovereignty movement gained renewed support for a time.)

The same year, the elected Fijian government was deposed in a military coup.

As monarch of Fiji, Elizabeth supported the attempts of Governor General Ratu Sir Penaia Ganilau to assert executive power and negotiate a settlement.

Coup leader Sitiveni Rabuka deposed Ganilau and declared Fiji a republic.

In the wake of coalition victory in the Gulf War, Elizabeth became the first British monarch to address a joint meeting of the US Congress in May 1991.

(The Gulf War (1990 – 1991) was an armed campaign waged by a 35-country military coalition in response to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait.

Spearheaded by the US, the coalition’s efforts against Iraq were carried out in two key phases:

• Operation Desert Shield, which marked the military buildup from August 1990 to January 1991
• Operation Desert Storm, which began with the aerial bombing campaign against Iraq on 17 January 1991 and came to a close with the American-led liberation of Kuwait on 28 February 1991.)

On 24 November 1992, in a speech to mark the Ruby Jubilee of her accession to the throne, Elizabeth called 1992 her annus horribilis (“horrible year“).

Above: The Queen in Ottawa in 1992 to celebrate the 125th anniversary of Canada and her 40th year on the throne

Republican feeling in Britain had risen because of press estimates of Elizabeth’s private wealth — contradicted by the Palace —and reports of affairs and strained marriages among her extended family.

(Elizabeth’s personal wealth was the subject of speculation for many years.

In 1971, Jock Colville (1915 – 1987), her former private secretary and a director of her bank, Coutts, estimated her wealth at £2 million (equivalent to about £30 million in 2021).

In 1993, Buckingham Palace called estimates of £100 million “grossly overstated“.

In 2002, she inherited an estate worth an estimated £70 million from her mother. 

The Sunday Times Rich List 2020 estimated her personal wealth at £350 million, making her the 372nd richest person in the UK.

She was number one on the list when it began in 1989, with a reported wealth of £5.2 billion (approximately £13.8 billion in today’s value), which included state assets that were not hers personally.

The Royal Collection, which includes thousands of historic works of art and the Crown Jewels, was not owned personally but was described as being held in trust by Elizabeth for her successors and the nation, as were her official residences, such as Buckingham Palace and Windsor Castle, and the Duchy of Lancaster, a property portfolio valued at £472 million in 2015.

Above: The Queen’s Gallery, Buckingham Palace

Above: St Edward’s Crown, the centrepiece of the Crown Jewels of the United Kingdom

Above: Duchy of Lancaster headquarters office in Lancaster Place, London

The Paradise Papers, leaked in 2017, show that the Duchy of Lancaster held investments in the British tax havens of the Cayman Islands and Bermuda.

(The Paradise Papers are a set of over 13.4 million confidential electronic documents relating to offshore investments that were leaked to the German reporters Frederik Obermaier and Bastian Obermayer, from the newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung.

 

The newspaper shared them with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) and a network of more than 380 journalists.

Some of the details were made public on 5 November 2017.

Stories are still being released.

Above: ICIJ logo

The documents originate from the legal firm, the corporate services providers Estera and Asiaciti Trust, and business registries in 19 tax jurisdictions.

They contain the names of more than 120,000 people and companies.

The released information resulted in scandal, litigation, and loss of position for some of the named, as well as litigation against the media and journalists who published the papers.)

Above: Countries implicated in the Paradise Papers

Sandringham House in Norfolk and Balmoral Castle in Aberdeenshire were personally owned by Elizabeth.

The Crown Estate — with holdings of £14.3 billion in 2019 — is held in trust and could not be sold or owned by her in a personal capacity.)

Above: Prince Philip and Queen Elizabeth II in Brühl, Germany, 19 October 1992

(Republicanism in the United Kingdom is the political movement that seeks to replace the UK’s monarchy with a republic.

Supporters of the movement, called republicans, support alternative forms of governance to a monarchy, such as an elected head of state.

As of 2022, none of the three major British political parties — the Labour Party, the Conservative Party and the Liberal Democrats — have an official policy of republicanism.

However, there are a number of individual politicians who favour abolition of the monarchy.

It is rare for a high-profile British politician to identify with republicanism, even among those who campaigned for a republic earlier in their careers.

The largest lobby group in favour of republicanism in the United Kingdom is the Republic campaign group, founded in 1983.

The group has benefited from occasional negative publicity about the Royal Family.

Republic reported a large rise in membership following the wedding of then-Prince Charles and Camilla Parker-Bowles.

Above: King Charles III and Camilla Parker Bowles

Republic has lobbied on changes to the parliamentary oath of allegiance, royal finances and changes to the Freedom of Information Act relating to the monarchy, none of which have produced any change.

However, Republic has been invited to Parliament to talk as witnesses on certain issues related to the monarchy such as conduct of the honours system in the UK.

In 2009, Republic made news by reporting Prince Charles’s architecture charity to the Charity Commission, claiming that the Prince was effectively using the organisation as a private lobbying firm (the Commission declined to take the matter further).

Republic has previously broken stories about royals using the Freedom of Information Act.

The public debate around republicanism has centred around the core republican argument that a republic is more democratic and compatible with the notion of popular sovereignty.

The advocacy group Republic argues:

The monarchy is not only an unaccountable and expensive institution, unrepresentative of modern Britain, it also gives politicians almost limitless power.

It does this is in a variety of ways:

• Royal prerogative: Royal powers that allow the Prime Minister to declare war or sign treaties (amongst other things) without a vote in Parliament.
• The Privy Council: A body of advisors to the monarch, now mostly made up of senior politicians, which can enact legislation without a vote in Parliament.
• The Crown-in-Parliament: The principle, which came about when Parliament removed much of the monarch’s power, by which Parliament can pass any law it likes – meaning our liberties can never be guaranteed.

Republicans argue that monarchy devalues a parliamentary system insofar monarchical prerogative powers can be used to circumvent normal democratic process with no accountability, and such processes are more desirable than not for any given nation-state.

It is further argued that monarchy contradicts democracy insofar it denies the people a basic right:

Republicans believe that it should be a fundamental right of the people of any nation to elect their head of state and for every citizen to be eligible to hold that office.

It is argued such a head of state is more accountable to the people, and that such accountability to the people creates a better nation.

Republicans assert that hereditary monarchy is unfair and elitist.

They claim that in a modern and democratic society no one should be expected to defer to another simply because of their birth. It is argued that the way citizens are expected to address members, however junior, of the Royal Family is part of an attempt to keep subjects “in their place“.

Such a system, they assert, does not make for a society which is at ease with itself, and it encourages attitudes which are more suited to a bygone age of imperialism than to a “modern nation“.

Some claim that maintaining a privileged Royal Family diminishes a society and encourages a feeling of dependency in many people who should instead have confidence in themselves and their fellow citizens.

Further, republicans argue that “the people“, not the members of one family, should be sovereign.

The order of succession in a monarchy specifies a person who will become head of state, regardless of qualifications.

The highest titular office in the land is not open to “free and fair competition“.

Although monarchists argue that the position of Prime Minister, the title with real power, is something anyone can aspire to become, the executive and symbolically powerful position of Head of State is not.

Further, republicans argue that members of the Royal Family bolster their position with unearned symbols of achievement.

Examples in the UK include Elizabeth II’s honorary military positions as Colonel-in-Chief, irrespective of her military experience.

Above: Queen Elizabeth II riding to trooping the colour for the last time in July 1986.

The Queen rode the same horse, ‘Burmese‘, originally presented by the Canadian government, from 1969 to 1986.

With Charles, Prince of Wales, on the white horse to the left, and Philip, Duke of Edinburgh on the bay horse behind the Queen.

There is debate over the roles which the members of the monarchy have played in the military:

Many doubt that members of the Royal Family have served on the front line on the same basis as other members of the Armed Forces.

Examples here include Prince Andrew, whose presence during the Falklands War was later criticized by the commander of the British Naval Force who stated that “special measures” had to be taken to ensure that the prince did not lose his life.

It is seen to some as more of a PR exercise than military service.

Above: Prince Andrew during the Falklands War

On 2 April 1982, Argentina invaded the Falkland Islands.

Invincible was one of the two operational aircraft carriers available at the time, and, as such, was to play a major role in the Royal Navy task force assembled to sail south to retake the Islands.

Andrew’s place on board and the possibility of the Queen’s son being killed in action made the British government apprehensive, and the cabinet desired that Prince Andrew be moved to a desk job for the duration of the conflict.

The Queen, though, insisted that her son be allowed to remain with his ship.

Prince Andrew remained on board Invincible to serve as a Sea King helicopter co-pilot, flying on missions that included anti-submarine warfare and anti-surface warfare, Exocet missile decoy, casualty evacuation, transport, and search and air rescue.

He witnessed the Argentinian attack on the SS Atlantic Conveyor.

At the end of the war, Invincible returned to Portsmouth, where Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip joined other families of the crew in welcoming the vessel home.

The Argentine military government reportedly planned, but did not attempt, to assassinate Andrew on Mustique (a small private island of St. Vincent and the Grenadines) in July 1982.

Though he had brief assignments to HMS Illustrious, RNAS Culdrose and the Joint Services School of Intelligence, Prince Andrew remained with Invincible until 1983.

Above: The HMS Invincible

Commander Nigel Ward’s memoir, Sea Harrier Over the Falklands, described Prince Andrew as “an excellent pilot and a very promising officer.”)

Some critics have argued that the monarchy of the United Kingdom is incompatible with the multiracial and multicultural British society of the 21st century.

The campaigner Peter Tatchell argues that the institution of the British monarchy is unintentionally a racist institution due to a non-white person being unable to become head of state for the foreseeable future.

Thus, a monarchy would not be able to provide the same levels of opportunity as a republic in regards to enabling British citizens irrespective of their background to become the UK head of state.

Above: British human rights campaigner Peter Tatchell

Kehinde Andrews argues that the British monarchy is irreparably racist.

It is, in Andrews’ view, an institution intimately linked to the colonial past, and is therefore “one of the most powerful symbols of Whiteness and colonial nostalgia“.

He considers the popularity of the monarchy to be a barrier to white Britons confronting their imperialist past.

He also argues that the marriage into the Royal Family of the biracial Meghan Markle, and the racist reaction to it in the British press, does not represent a reflection of the diversity of modern Britain, and is “perfectly explicable in terms of the racist status quo“.

Above: Birmingham University Professor Kehinde Andrews

The Church of England is an established church and the British Sovereign is the titular Supreme Governor.

The Church is tax exempt and provides the House of Lords in Parliament with 26 unelected bishops as its representatives.

On the royal coat of arms is the motto in French: Dieu et mon droit (God and my right).

The movement to end the Church of England’s status as the state church of the United Kingdom is known as disestablishmentarianism.

A country which does not have a state religion is known as a secular state.

Above: Royal Coat of Arms of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland

Republicans argue that a hereditary system condemns each heir to the throne to an abnormal childhood.

This was historically the reason why the anarchist William Godwin opposed the monarchy. 

Above: English writer William Godwin (1756 – 1836)

Johann Hari has written a book God Save the Queen? in which he argues that every member of the royal family has suffered psychologically from the system of monarchy.

Republicans argue that monarchs are not impartial, but harbour their own opinions, motives, and wish to protect their interests.

Republicans claim that monarchs are not accountable.

As an example, republicans argue that Prince Charles spoke and acted in ways that were widely interpreted as taking a political stance, citing his refusal to attend, in protest of China’s dealings with Tibet, a state dinner hosted by the Queen for the Chinese head of state, his strong stance on genetically modified (GM) food, and the contents of the Black Spider Memos, which were released following freedom of information litigation, regarding how people achieve their positions.

Above: Flag of Tibet

(The “black spider” memos are letters and memorandums written by Charles III, during his tenure as Prince of Wales, to British government ministers and politicians over several years.

As the modern British monarch remains politically neutral by convention, the letters were controversial because of Charles’ then-position as eldest child of the British monarch Queen Elizabeth II and heir apparent to the British throne.

The letters were sent by Charles in a private capacity, but concerns have been raised that they may represent the exercise of undue influence over British government ministers.

Issues about which Charles has expressed public views include farming, genetic modification, global warming, social deprivation, planning and architecture.

This led the press to label Charles as a “meddling prince“.

The content of the “black spider” letters, named after Charles’ distinctive handwriting, was known only anecdotally and from memoirs and leaks, until 13 May 2015 when the Information Tribunal ordered the release of most of the correspondence.)

Above: King Charles III

Republicans claim that the total costs to taxpayers including hidden elements (e.g., the Royal Protection security bill and lost rental income from palaces and state-owned land) of the monarchy are £345 million per annum.

The Daily Telegraph claims the monarchy costs each adult in the UK around 62p a year.

Republicans also argue that the Royal finances, which are exempt from the Freedom of Information Act, are shrouded in secrecy and should be subject to greater scrutiny.

Although monarchists argue that this does not take into account the “hereditary revenues” which generated £190.8 million for the treasury in 2007–2008, the advocacy group Republic assert that the Crown Estate, from which these revenues are derived, is national and State property, and that the monarch cannot surrender what they have never owned. 

The monarchy is estimated to cost British taxpayers £202.4 million, when costs such as security are included, making it the most expensive monarchy in Europe and 112 times more expensive than the Presidency of the Republic of Ireland.

Above: Flag of the President of Ireland

Republicans argue that the monarchy is to be considered embarrassing:

As a concept it is archaic, too reminiscent of medieval feudalism, with a history linked to colonialism and slavery, and whilst the UK has a hereditary head of state it cannot claim to be a modern nation.

It is argued that the monarchy with its vast wealth and luxurious assets (such as Charles III having 12 homes, including a palace, castles and estates) is not in touch with the lives of its everyday people, such as those suffering from the UK cost of living crisis.

Above: Clarence House, Charles’s official residence as Prince of Wales from 2003 to 2022

(The UK cost of living crisis is an ongoing event starting in 2021, in which prices for many essential goods in the UK began increasing faster than household incomes, resulting in a fall in real incomes.

This was caused in part by a rise in inflation in the UK, as well as the economic impact of foreign issues (such as the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine).

The UK’s cost of living is the most affected of advanced economies.

While everyone in the UK is affected by rising prices, it most substantially affects low income people.

The British government has responded in various ways, such as by making provision for a £650 grant for households in receipt of means-tested benefits, including Universal Credit.)

Above: Logo of street newspaper The Big Issue

The institution of monarchy exemplifies and pushes the myth that some people are superior to others due to genetics and ancestry.

Above: DNA structure

The core anti-republican defense is that there is nothing in a republic that is inherently more democratic compared to a constitutional monarchy when both forms of government are based on parliamentarianism and constitutionalism, and that traditional institutions have confirmed the citizens as sovereign beings.

Opponents of the republican movement argue that the current system is still democratic as the Government and MPs of Parliament are elected by universal suffrage and as the Crown acts only on the advice of the Parliament, the people still hold power. 

Monarchy only refers to how the head of state is chosen and not how the Government is chosen.

Monarchists argue that a constitutional monarch with limited powers and non-partisan nature can provide a focus for national unity, national awards and honours, national institutions, and allegiance, as opposed to a President affiliated to a political party.

Above: US President Joe Biden

British political scientist Vernon Bogdanor justifies monarchy on the grounds that it provides for a nonpartisan head of state, separate from the head of government, and thus ensures that the highest representative of the country, at home and internationally, does not represent a particular political party, but all people.

Above: Vernon Bogdanor

According to Bogdanor, monarchies can play a helpful unifying role in a multinational state, noting that:

“In Belgium, it is sometimes said that the King is the only Belgian, everyone else being either Flemish or Walloon.“

Above: King Philippe of Belgium

The British sovereign can belong to all of the UK’s constituent countries (England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland), without belonging to any particular one of them.

Above: Flag of the United Kingdom

British-American libertarian writer Matthew Feeney argues that European constitutional monarchies “have managed for the most part to avoid extreme politics” — specifically fascism, communism, and military dictatorship — “in part because monarchies provide a check on the wills of populist politicians” by representing entrenched customs and traditions.

Feeny notes that:

“European monarchies – such as the Danish, Belgian, Swedish, Dutch, Norwegian, and British – have ruled over countries that are among the most stable, prosperous, and free in the world.“

Above: Matthew Feeney

Earlier, in 1956, Iain Moncreiffe and Don Pottinger made a similar argument, writing that:

“Such countries achieve a national stability of special value in times of extremist party strife – because the monarch has never been elected.

Nobody has ever had to take sides to vote for or against him, and so the constitutional monarch provides a symbol of unity above and outside politics.“

Some argue that if there were a republic, the costs incurred in regards to the duties of the head of state would remain more or less the same.

This includes the upkeep and conservation of the royal palaces and buildings which would still have to be paid for as they belong to the nation as a whole rather than the monarch personally.

On top of that, the head of state would require a salary and security, state visits, banquets and ceremonial duties would still go ahead.

In 2009, the monarchy claimed to be costing each person an estimated 69 pence a year (not including “a hefty security bill“).

However, the figure of 69p per person has been criticized for having been calculated by dividing the overall figure by approximately 60 million people, rather than by the number of British taxpayers.

Some people point out that a republican government under the Commonwealth of England and then the Commonwealth of England, Scotland and Ireland has already been tried when Oliver Cromwell installed it on 30 January 1649.

Yet by February 1657 some people argued that Cromwell should assume the Crown as it would stabilise the Constitution, limit his powers and restore precedent.

He declined and within three years of his death the Commonwealth had lost support and the monarchy was restored.

Above: Oliver Cromwell (1599 – 1658)

Later, during the Glorious Revolution of 1688 caused partially by disillusionment with the absolutist rule of James II/VII, Parliament and others, such as John Locke argued that James had broken “the original contract” with the state.

Above: James II (1633 – 1701) (King: 1685 – 1688)

Far from pressing for a republic, which had been experienced within living memory, they instead argued that the best form of government was a constitutional monarchy with explicitly circumscribed powers.)

Above: English philosopher John Locke (1632 – 1704)

In March, her second son, Prince Andrew, separated from his wife, Sarah. 

Above: Prince Andrew and Sarah Ferguson, Wedding day, 23 July 1986

Mauritius removed Elizabeth as head of state.

Above: Flag of Mauritius

Her daughter, Princess Anne, divorced Captain Mark Phillips in April.

Above: Wedding of Princess Anne and Mark Phillips, 14 November 1973

Angry demonstrators in Dresden threw eggs at Elizabeth during a state visit to Germany in October.

Above: Eggs near the Royal car.

The remains of an egg lies splattered on the ground as it was thrown at Queen Elizabeth II as she arrived with the Duke of Edinburgh at the Kreuzkirche in Dresden, Germany, for a service of reconciliation. 

Above: Aftermath of the Allied bombing of Dresden, Germany, 13 – 15 February 1945

A large fire broke out at Windsor Castle, one of her official residences, in November.

Above: Windsor Castle fire, 20 November 1992

The monarchy came under increased criticism and public scrutiny.

In an unusually personal speech, Elizabeth said that any institution must expect criticism, but suggested it might be done with “a touch of humour, gentleness and understanding“.

Above: Royal cypher of Queen Elizabeth II

Two days later, British Prime Minister John Major announced plans to reform the royal finances, drawn up the previous year, including Elizabeth paying income tax from 1993 onwards, and a reduction in the civil list.

Above: Personal flag of Queen Elizabeth II

In December, Prince Charles and his wife, Diana, formally separated.

Above: Wedding day of Diana Spencer and Prince Charles, 29 July 1981

At the end of the year, Elizabeth sued The Sun newspaper for breach of copyright when it published the text of her annual Christmas message two days before it was broadcast.

The newspaper was forced to pay her legal fees and donated £200,000 to charity.

Above: Her Majesty’s Christmas Message, 25 December 1992

Elizabeth’s solicitors had taken successful action against The Sun five years earlier for breach of copyright after it published a photograph of her daughter-in-law the Duchess of York and her granddaughter Princess Beatrice.

Above: Sarah Ferguson, the Duchess of York and baby Princess Beatrice, 1988

In January 1994, Elizabeth broke the scaphoid bone in her left wrist as the horse she was riding at Sandringham House tripped and fell.

In October 1994, she became the first reigning British monarch to set foot on Russian soil. 

Above: Flag of Russia

In October 1995, Elizabeth was tricked into a hoax call by Montreal radio host Pierre Brassard impersonating Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chrétien.

Above: Pierre Brassard

Elizabeth, who believed that she was speaking to Chrétien, said she supported Canadian unity and would try to influence Québec’s referendum on proposals to break away from Canada.

Above: Jean Chrétien (Prime Minister of Canada: 1993 – 2003)

In the year that followed, public revelations on the state of Charles and Diana’s marriage continued.

Elizabeth wrote to Charles and Diana at the end of December 1995, suggesting that a divorce would be advisable.

In August 1997, a year after the divorce, Diana was killed in a car crash in Paris.

Above: Pont de l’Alma Tunnel east entrance, Paris, France, 1998, the site of the crash

Elizabeth was on holiday with her extended family at Balmoral.

Diana’s two sons, Prince William and Prince Harry, wanted to attend church, so Elizabeth and Philip took them that morning.

Above: Prince William and Prince Harry, 1997

Afterwards, for five days the royal couple shielded their grandsons from the intense press interest by keeping them at Balmoral where they could grieve in private, but the Royal Family’s silence and seclusion, and the failure to fly a flag at half-mast over Buckingham Palace, caused public dismay.

Pressured by the hostile reaction, Elizabeth agreed to return to London and address the nation in a live TV broadcast on 5 September, the day before Diana’s funeral. 

In the broadcast, she expressed admiration for Diana and her feelings “as a grandmother” for the two princes.

As a result, much of the public hostility evaporated.

Above: Queen Elizabeth II address Diana’s death, 5 September 1997

In October 1997, Elizabeth and Philip made a state visit to India, which included a controversial visit to the site of the Jallianwala Bagh massacre to pay her respects.

Protesters chanted “Killer Queen, go back“.

There were demands for her to apologise for the action of British troops 78 years earlier.

(The Jallianwala Bagh massacre, also known as the Amritsar massacre, took place on 13 April 1919.

A large peaceful crowd had gathered at the Jallianwala Bagh Garden in Amritsar, Punjab, India, to protest against the Rowlatt Act (extending the emergency measures of preventive indefinite detention, imprisonment without trial and judicial review) and arrest of pro-independence activists.

In response to the public gathering, Brigadier General R.E.H. Dyer (1864 – 1927) surrounded the protesters with his Gurkha, Baloch, Rajput and Sikh from 2-9th Gurkhas, the 54th Sikhs and the 59th Sind Rifles of the British Indian Army.

The Jallianwala Bagh could only be exited on one side, as its other three sides were enclosed by buildings.

After blocking the exit with his troops, he ordered them to shoot at the crowd, continuing to fire even as the protesters tried to flee.

The troops kept on firing until their ammunition was exhausted. 

Estimates of those killed vary between 379 and 1500+ people.

Over 1,200 other people were injured of whom 192 were seriously injured. 

Above: Reginald Dyer

Responses polarised both the British and Indian peoples.

Anglo-Indian author Rudyard Kipling declared at the time that Dyer “did his duty as he saw it“. 

Above: Rudyard Kipling (1865 – 1936)

This incident shocked Rabindranath Tagore, the first Indian Nobel laureate, to such an extent that he renounced his knighthood.

Above: Rabindranath Tagore (1861 – 1941)

The massacre caused a re-evaluation by the British Army of its military role against civilians to “minimal force whenever possible“, although later British actions have led historians to comment that the new policy could be put aside. 

The army was retrained and developed less violent tactics for crowd control.

The level of casual brutality, and lack of any accountability, stunned the entire nation, resulting in a wrenching loss of faith of the general Indian public in the intentions of the United Kingdom.

The attack was condemned by the Secretary of State for War, Winston Churchill, as “unutterably monstrous“.

Above: Winston Churchill, 1918

In the UK House of Commons debate on 8 July 1920, MPs voted 247 to 37 against Dyer.

The ineffective inquiry, together with the initial accolades for Dyer, fuelled great widespread anger against the British among the Indian populace.

Some historians consider the episode a decisive step towards the end of British rule in India.

Britain has never formally apologised for the massacre but expressed “deep regret” in 2019.)

Above: Mural depicting the 1919 Amritsar massacre

At the memorial in the park, she and Philip paid their respects by laying a wreath and stood for a 30‑second moment of silence.

As a result, much of the fury among the public softened.

The protests were called off.

Above: Flag of India

That November, Elizabeth and her husband held a reception at Banqueting House to mark their golden wedding anniversary.

Elizabeth made a speech and praised Philip for his role as a consort, referring to him as “my strength and stay“.

Above: Banqueting Hall, Whitehall, London, England

In 1999, as part of the process of devolution (granting a greater level of self-government) within the UK, Elizabeth formally opened newly established legislatures for Wales and Scotland: the National Assembly for Wales at Cardiff in May and the Scottish Parliament at Edinburgh in July.

Above: Senedd Building (Welsh Parliament), Cardiff, Wales

Above: Public entrance, Scottish Parliament Building, Edinburgh, Scotland

On the eve of the new millennium, Elizabeth and Philip boarded a vessel from Southwark, bound for the Millennium Dome.

Above: Millennium Dome, London, England

Before passing under Tower Bridge, Elizabeth lit the National Millennium Beacon in the Pool of London using a laser torch.

Shortly before midnight, she officially opened the Dome.

Above: Tower Bridge, London, England

Above: Thames River Pool of London map, 1905

During the singing of Auld Land Syne, Elizabeth held hands with Philip and British Prime Minister Tony Blair.

Above: Tony Blair (UK Prime Minister: 1997 – 2007)

In 2002, Elizabeth marked her Golden Jubilee, the 50th anniversary of her accession.

Her sister and mother died in February and March respectively.

The media speculated on whether the Jubilee would be a success or a failure.

Above: Queen’s Golden Jubilee celebrated, Stafford, England

She again undertook an extensive tour of her realms, beginning in Jamaica in February, where she called the farewell banquet “memorable” after a power cut plunged the King’s House, the official residence of the Governor General, into darkness.

Above: King’s House, Kingston, Jamaica

As in 1977, there were street parties and commemorative events, and monuments were named to honour the occasion.

One million people attended each day of the three-day main Jubilee celebration in London. 

The enthusiasm shown for Elizabeth by the public was greater than many journalists had anticipated.

In 2003, Elizabeth sued the Daily Mirror for breach of confidence and obtained an injunction which prevented the outlet from publishing information gathered by a reporter who posed as a footman at Buckingham Palace.

The newspaper also paid £25,000 towards her legal costs.

Though generally healthy throughout her life, in 2003 Elizabeth had keyhole surgery on both knees.

In October 2006, she missed the opening of the new Emirates Stadium because of a strained back muscle that had been troubling her since the summer.

Above: Emirates Stadium, London, England, home of Arsenal Football Club

In May 2007, citing unnamed sources, the Daily Telegraph reported that Elizabeth was “exasperated and frustrated” by the policies of Tony Blair, that she was concerned the British Armed Forces were overstretched in Iraq and Afghanistan, and that she had raised concerns over rural and countryside issues with Blair.

She was, however, said to admire Blair’s efforts to achieve peace in Northern Ireland. 

Above: Badge of the British Ministry of Defence

She became the first British monarch to celebrate a diamond wedding anniversary in November 2007.

Above: Royal family members turned out for the wedding anniversary dinner at Clarence House, November 2007

On 20 March 2008, at the Church of Ireland St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Armagh, Elizabeth attended the first Maundy (the day before Good Friday) service held outside England and Wales.

Above: St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Armagh, Ireland

Elizabeth addressed the UN General Assembly for a second time in 2010, again in her capacity as Queen of all Commonwealth realms and Head of the Commonwealth.

The UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon, introduced her as “an anchor for our age“.

Above: Ban Ki-moon (UN Secretary-General: 2007 – 2016)

During her visit to New York, which followed a tour of Canada, she officially opened a memorial garden for British victims of the September 11 attacks.

Above: New York City, 9 September 2001

Elizabeth’s 11-day visit to Australia in October 2011 was her 16th visit to the country since 1954.

Above: Her Majesty visits Brisbane, Australia, 24 October 2011

By invitation of the Irish President, Mary McAleese, she made the first state visit to the Republic of Ireland by a British monarch in May 2011.

Above: Mary McAleese (President of Ireland: 1997 – 2011)

Elizabeth’s 2012 Diamond Jubilee marked 60 years on the throne.

Celebrations were held throughout her realms, the wider Commonwealth, and beyond.

She and her husband undertook an extensive tour of the United Kingdom, while her children and grandchildren embarked on royal tours of other Commonwealth states on her behalf.

On 4 June, Jubilee beacons were lit around the world.

Above: Diamond Jubilee display, Chelsea Flower Show, 2012

In November, Elizabeth and her husband celebrated their blue sapphire wedding anniversary (65th).

Above: Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, 2012

On 18 December, she became the first British sovereign to attend a peacetime Cabinet meeting since George III in 1781.

Above: George III (1738 – 1820) (King: 1760 – 1820)

Elizabeth, who opened the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montréal, also opened the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, making her the first head of state to open two Olympic Games in two countries.

 

For the London Olympics, she played herself in a short film as part of the opening ceremony, alongside Daniel Craig as James Bond.

Above: Daniel Craig and Her Majesty

On 4 April 2013, she received an honorary British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) award for her patronage of the film industry and was called “the most memorable Bond girl yet” at the award ceremony.

On 3 March 2013, Elizabeth stayed overnight at King Edward VII Hospital as a precaution after developing symptoms of gastroenteritis.

Above: Sister Agnes Building, King Edward VII Hospital, London, England

A week later, she signed the new Charter of the Commonwealth –  a charter setting out the values of the Commonwealth of Nations as well as the commitment of its 54 member states to equal rights, democracy, international peace and security, tolerance, respect and understanding, freedom of expression, separation of powers, rule of law, good governance, sustainable development, protecting the environment, access to health, education, food and shelter, gender equality, importance of young people in the Commonwealth, recognition of the needs of the small states, recognition of the needs of the vulnerable states, and lastly, the role of civil society.

Because of her age and the need for her to limit travelling, in 2013 she chose not to attend the biennial Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting for the first time in 40 years.

She was represented at the summit in Sri Lanka by Prince Charles.

On 20 April 2018, the Commonwealth heads of government announced that she would be succeeded by Charles as Head of the Commonwealth, which she stated was her “sincere wish“.

She underwent cataract surgery in May 2018.

In March 2019, she gave up driving on public roads, largely as a consequence of a car crash involving her husband two months earlier.

Elizabeth surpassed her great-great-grandmother, Queen Victoria, to become the longest-lived British monarch on 21 December 2007, and the longest-reigning British monarch and longest-reigning Queen Regnant and female head of state in the world on 9 September 2015.

Above: Opening the Borders Railway on the day she became the longest-reigning British monarch, 2015.

In her speech, she said she had never aspired to achieve that milestone.

She became the oldest current monarch after King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia died on 23 January 2015.

Above: King Abdullah bin Abdul al-Saud (1924 – 2015)

She later became the longest-reigning current monarch and the longest-serving current head of state following the death of King Blumibol of Thailand on 13 October 2016, and the oldest current head of state on the resignation of Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe on 21 November 2017.

Above: Bhumibol Adulyadej (1927 – 2016)

Above: Robert Mugabe (1924 – 2019) 

On 6 February 2017, she became the first British monarch to commemorate a sapphire jubilee.

Above: A special crown shaped garden sculpture created to commemorate the Sapphire Jubilee of the Queen at Havering Town Hall, Romford, England 

On 20 November, she was the first British monarch to celebrate a platinum wedding anniversary.

Philip had retired from his official duties as the Queen’s consort in August 2017.

Above: Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, 2017

On 19 March 2020, as the COVID-19 pandemic hit the UK, Elizabeth moved to Windsor Castle and sequestered there as a precaution.

Public engagements were cancelled and Windsor Castle followed a strict sanitary protocol nicknamed “HMS Bubble“.

On 5 April, in a televised broadcast watched by an estimated 24 million viewers in the UK, she asked people to:

“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.“

On 8 May, the 75th anniversary of VE Day, in a television broadcast at 9 pm — the exact time at which her father George VI had broadcast to the nation on the same day in 1945 — she asked people to:

“Never give up, never despair“.

Above: Winston Churchill waves to crowds in Whitehall in London as they celebrate VE Day, 8 May 1945. 

From the the balcony of the Ministry of Health, Prime Minister Winston Churchill gives his famous ‘V for Victory‘ sign to crowds in Whitehall on the day he broadcast to the nation that the war with Germany had been won, 8 May 1945 (VE Day)

In October, she visited the UK’s Defence Science and Technology Laboratory in Wiltshire, her first public engagement since the start of the pandemic.

On 4 November, she appeared masked for the first time in public, during a private pilgrimage to the Tomb of the Unknown Warrior at Westminster Abbey, to mark the centenary of his burial.

In 2021, she received her first and second COVID-19 vaccinations in January and April respectively.

Prince Philip died on 9 April 2021, after 73 years of marriage, making Elizabeth the first British monarch to reign as a widow or widower since Queen Victoria.

She was reportedly at her husband’s bedside when he died.

She remarked in private that his death had “left a huge void“.

Due to the COVID-19 restrictions in place in England at the time, Elizabeth sat alone at Philip’s funeral service, which evoked sympathy from people around the world.

Above: Her Majesty at the funeral of Prince Philip, 17 April 2021

In her Christmas broadcast that year, she paid a personal tribute to her “beloved Philip“, saying:

“That mischievous, inquiring twinkle was as bright at the end as when I first set eyes on him.”

Above: Her Majesty’s Christmas Message, 25 December 2021

Despite the pandemic, Elizabeth attended the 2021 State Opening of Parliament in May and the 47th G7 Summit in June.

Above: The 67th (and final) State Opening carried out by the Queen

Above: G7 leaders family photo on Friday 11 June 2021, at the Carbis Bay Hotel and Estate in St. Ives, Cornwall, England

On 5 July, the 73rd anniversary of the founding of the UK’s National Health Service (NHS), she announced that the NHS will be awarded the George Cross to “recognise all NHS staff, past and present, across all disciplines and all four nations“.

In October 2021, she began using a walking stick during public engagements for the first time since her operation in 2004.

Following an overnight stay in hospital on 20 October, her previously scheduled visits to Northern Ireland, the COP26 Summit in Glasgow and the 2021 National Service of Remembrance were cancelled on health grounds.

Every morning Robert Finch woke up thinking about a lapel pin: a small silver badge bearing the emblem of the Canadian Platinum Jubilee.

As head of the Monarchist League of Canada, Finch was charged with distributing this pin to anyone who wanted one.

It turned out that many Canadians did.

“We have been absolutely taken aback and overwhelmed with requests for these things.“, Finch said.

“We have handed out tens of thousands of them.

We have run out.

We are scrambling.“

Above: Emblem of the Monarchist League of Canada

Canadians were ready to party: to plant trees, to drink tea, to hold parades and tattoos.

“The Queen is absolutely admired here.

Even republicans would probably say they like her.”, Finch said.

“We have just been amazed from two years of dismal and depressing lockdowns.

Now we face a world of economic and geopolitical challenges.

If there is a way to celebrate, let’s do it.“

Above: Robert Finch

This enthusiasm set Canada apart among the Commonwealth realms of the Americas.

Nearly everywhere else, feelings for the Crown are lukewarm, if they exist at all.

“For Victoria’s Golden Jubilee and for her 60th, there was a lot of fanfare.“, said Peter Espeut (69), Dean of Studies at a seminary school in Kingston and a longtime columnist for the Jamaican newspaper the Gleaner.

This time, however, “there is nothing” in the way of events, Espeut said.

“Nothing from the Governor General, who is the Queen’s representative.“

“There is a vague sentiment now towards republicanism” in Jamaica, only checked by a dearth of trust in the government, Espeut said.

Above: Flag of Jamaica

“As long as Elizabeth is on the Throne, everything will be fine, but once she dies, if Charles ascends the Throne, that is where the antipathy will increase because Charles is quite a character.”

Above: Patrick Allen, Governor General of Jamaica

Philip Murphy, Director of History and Policy at the Institute of Historical Research in London, said that attitudes to the Monarchy in the Caribbean had changed considerably since the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee in 2012.

“As late as 2018, the joke was that the Caribbean leaders came up with a lot of talk about moving to a republic but never do anything about it.

But since Barbados became a republic, it has given a huge momentum to the republican movement across the region.“

Above: Flag of Barbados

Natasha Lightfoot is a historian at Columbia University with family ties to Antigua.

Above: Coat of arms of Columbia University, New York City

She said the growing campaign for reparations for slavery had “created a groundswell” that may have bolstered a tendency to associate the Royal Family “with ill-gotten wealth” at a time when the economy of the region has suffered badly from years of catastrophic storms and the pandemic.

Above: Flag of Antigua and Barbuda

Diana, Princess of Wales, a regular visitor to Antigua, “was the Royal who got the most love“, Lightfoot said.

There is even a beach named after her.

“Now the Monarchy looks out of touch.“

Above: Princess Diana Beach, Barbuda / Princess Diana

Henry Charles Usher, a minister in the Belize government whose portfolio includes constitutional and political reform, said that although “there is still an affection for the Royal Family“, the government would not be holding any events to mark the Jubilee.

Usher oversaw a Commission that asked Belizeans how they feel “about becoming a republic, about removing the Sovereign as head of state.”

Usher said:

“Some difficult choices have to be made.“

Above: Flag of Belize

In some nations, there was more indifference than hostility.

“We are more concerned with local and regional politics, probably even more with US politics because that is where we get our television from.“, Nigel Mathlin, founder of the news site NOW Grenada, said.

Above: Flag of Grenada

On St. Kits and Nevis, Cameron Gill, a senior lecturer at Clarence Fitzroy Bryant College, said most people were focused on forthcoming elections, but even without that:

“With the current discussions of reparations, I don’t think the government would really want to be putting on Jubilee activities.“

Above: Flag of St. Kitts and Nevis

Gill said the Duke of Sussex was probably the most popular member of the Royal Family there.

“I remember a few years ago he visited St. Kitts and Nevis.

I was teaching in a secondary school and the students were extremely excited.“

Harry is “married to a mixed race woman, he speaks very openly about his mental health issues, he is someone who has served in a dangerous military campaign.“, Gill said.

Gill felt that:

“The separation between him and the Royal Family may be a missed opportunity.“

Above: The Duchess and Duke of Sussex

In Australia and New Zealand, there was little evidence of enthusiasm for the Jubilee.

In both countries, republican leaders believed that when the Prince of Wales would accede to the Throne, it would set off a wave of support to end constitutional ties with Britain.

“There is no doubt we will get a surge of momentum from the moment when Prince Charles takes the Throne.“, Peter FitzSimmons, the former rugby international who is head of the Australian Republic Movement, said.

“We are already getting a certain surge because every time Prince Charles pops up in her place, it is an indication that her reign is getting into deeper and deeper twilight.“

In Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands, two of the other Pacific nations were the Queen is head of state, support for – or at least acceptance of – the Monarchy remains high.

Above: Flag of Papua New Guinea

Above: Flag of the Solomon Islands

However, in the tiny state of Tuvalu, the government has begun a review of its Constitution, including whether the Queen should remain as sovereign.

Above: Flag of Tuvalu

Michael Kabuni, a political science lecturer attached to the University of Papua New Guinea, said his nation avoided the negative effects of British colonialism and instead holds Australia more responsible for past injustices suffered in colonial administrations.

“When you look at Papua New Guinea’s history, there is nothing to cause hate for the Queen of England.“, Kabuni said.

“So whenever there is a Royal visiting Papua New Guinea, they put up a show.

That does not mean that there is popular support for the Monarchy, it just means that people generally don’t mind or don’t care.”

Sorry, ma’am.

Above: Logo of the University of Papua New Guinea

Elizabeth’s Platinum Jubilee began on 6 February 2022, marking 70 years since she acceded to the throne on her father’s death.

Above: Drone light show at Buckingham Palace, 5 June 2022

On the eve of the date, she held a reception at Sandringham House for pensioners, local Women’s Institute members and charity volunteers.

In her Accession Day message, Elizabeth renewed her commitment to a lifetime of public service, which she had originally made in 1947.

Above: Her Majesty, Accession Day, 6 February 2022

Later that month, Elizabeth had “mild cold-like symptoms” and tested positive for COVID-19, along with some staff and family members.

She cancelled two virtual audiences on 22 February, but held a phone conversation with British Prime Minister Boris Johnson the following day amid a crisis on the Russo-Ukrainian border, following which she made a donation to the Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC) Ukraine Humanitarian Appeal.

Above: Boris Johnson (UK Prime Minister: 2019 – 2022)

Above: An unclassified United States intelligence document handout on Russian military movement near the Ukrainian border, obtained by the Washington Post which states:

“The unclassified US intelligence document obtained by the Post, which includes satellite photos, shows Russian forces massing in four locations.

Currently, 50 battlefield tactical groups are deployed, along with ‘newly arrived’ tanks and artillery, according to the document.

While Ukrainian assessments have said Russia has approximately 94,000 troops near the border, the US map puts the number at 70,000 — but it predicts a buildup to as many as 175,000.”

On 28 February, she was reported to have recovered and spent time with her family at Frogmore.

Above: Watercolour of Frogmore House, Home Park, Windsor, Berkshire, England

On 7 March, Elizabeth met Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau at Windsor Castle, in her first in-person engagement since her COVID diagnosis.

Above: Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau

She later remarked that COVID infection “leaves one very tired and exhausted.

It’s not a nice result.“

Elizabeth was present at the Service of Thanksgiving for Prince Philip at Westminster Abbey on 29 March, but was unable to attend the annual Commonwealth Day service that month or the Royal Maundy service in April.

Above: Flags of Commonwealth Day

She missed the State Opening of Parliament in May for the first time in 59 years.

(She did not attend in 1959 and 1963 as she was pregnant with Prince Andrew and Prince Edward, respectively.)

In her absence, Parliament was opened by the Prince of Wales and the Duke of Cambridge as counsellors of state.

Above: Westminster Palace, London, England

During the Platinum Jubilee celebrations, Elizabeth was largely confined to balcony appearances, and missed the National Service of Thanksgiving.

Above: St. Paul’s Cathedral, London, England

For the Jubilee Concert, she took part in a sketch with Paddington Bear, that opened the event outside Buckingham Palace.

Above: Her Majesty and Paddington Bear

On 13 June 2022, she became the second-longest reigning monarch in history among those whose exact dates of reign are known, with 70 years, 127 days reigned — surpassing King Bhumibol Adulyadej of Thailand.

Above: Flag of Thailand

On 6 September 2022, she appointed her 15th British Prime Minister, Liz Truss, at Balmoral Castle in Scotland.

This marked the only time she did not receive a new Prime Minister at Buckingham Palace during her reign.

No other British reign had seen so many Prime Ministers.

Above: Liz Truss (UK Prime Minister: 6 September – 25 October 2022)

Elizabeth never planned to abdicate, though she took on fewer public engagements as she grew older and Prince Charles took on more of her duties. 

The Queen told Canadian Governor General Adrienne Clarkson in a meeting in 2002 that she would never abdicate, saying:

“It is not our tradition.

Although, I suppose if I became completely gaga, one would have to do something.” 

Above: Adrienne Clarkson (Governor General of Canada: 1999 – 2005)

In June 2022, Elizabeth met the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, who “came away thinking there is someone who has no fear of death, has hope in the future, knows the rock on which she stands and that gives her strength.”

Above: Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby

On 8 September 2022, Buckingham Palace released a statement which read:

“Following further evaluation this morning, the Queen’s doctors are concerned for Her Majesty’s health and have recommended she remain under medical supervision.

The Queen remains comfortable and at Balmoral.“

Elizabeth’s immediate family rushed to Balmoral to be by her side.

Above: Balmoral Castle, Ballater, Scotland

She died “peacefully” at 15:10 at the age of 96, with two of her children, King Charles III and Princess Anne by her side.

Her death was announced to the public three hours after her death, at 18:30, setting in motion Operation London Bridge and, because she died in Scotland, Operation Unicorn.

Elizabeth was the first monarch to die in Scotland since James V in 1542.

Above: James V of Scotland (1512 – 1542) (King: 1513 – 1542)

Her cause of death was recorded as “old age“.

Above: Procession from Buckingham Palace to Westminster Hall for the Lying-in-State of Elizabeth II, 14 September 2022

On 12 September, Elizabeth’s coffin was carried up the Royal Mile in a procession to St. Giles’ Cathedral, where the Crown of Scotland was placed on it. 

Her coffin lay at rest at the Cathedral for 24 hours, guarded by the Royal Chamber of Archers, during which around 33,000 people filed past the coffin.

It was taken by air to London on 13 September.

Above: St. Giles’ Cathedral, Royal Mile, Edinburgh, Scotland

On 14 September, her coffin was taken in a military procession from Buckingham Palace to Westminster Hall, where Elizabeth lay in state for four days.

Above: Elizabeth II lying-in-state at Westminster Hall, 18 September 2022

The coffin was guarded by members of both the Sovereign’s Bodyguard and the Household Division.

An estimated 250,000 members of the public filed past the coffin, as did politicians and other public figures.

Above: Map showing the countries from which at least one representative attended the funeral

Above: The funeral procession for Queen Elizabeth II departed from Westminster Abbey, 19 September 2022

The coffin was placed on a gun carriage, which was towed by 142 members of the Royal Navy through the streets of central London.

The coffin was taken to Wellington Arch through central London ahead of the journey to Windsor for the burial.

On 16 September, Elizabeth’s children held a vigil around her coffin.

The next day her eight grandchildren did the same.

Elizabeth’s state funeral was held at Westminster Abbey on 19 September, which marked the first time that a monarch’s funeral service had been held at the Abbey since George II in 1760. 

Above: George II (1683 – 1760) (King: 1727 – 1760)

More than a million people lined the streets of central London.

Above: Tributes left by people in The Mall, London

Above: Gate in front of the Queen’s Sandringham Residence in Norfolk, England, 14 September 2022

The day was declared a holiday in several Commonwealth countries.

In Windsor, a final procession involving 1,000 military personnel took place which was witnessed by 97,000 people.

Elizabeth’s fell pony and two royal corgis stood at the side of the procession.

After a Committal Service at St. George’s Chapel, Windsor Castle, Elizabeth was interred with her husband Philip in the King George VI Memorial Chapel later the same day in a private ceremony attended by her closest family members.

Above: Tomb of the King George VI Memorial Chapel, Windsor Castle

Charles III is now King of the United Kingdom and 14 other Commonwealth realms. 

He was the longest-serving heir apparent and the oldest person to accede to the British throne, at the age of 73, following the death of his mother, Elizabeth II, on 8 September 2022.

On 10 September 2022, Charles was publicly proclaimed King of the United Kingdom by the Accession Council.

The ceremony was televised for the first time. 

Attendees included Queen Camilla, Prince William, British Prime Minister Liz Truss, and her predecessors John Major, Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, David Cameron, Theresa May and Boris Johnson. 

Charles was also proclaimed King of each of his other realms by the relevant privy or executive council.

The coronation of Charles III and Camilla is due to take place on 6 May 2023 at Westminster Abbey.

Above: King Charles III walking in Elizabeth II’s funeral cortège

The Queen is dead in Buckingham Palace.

A beloved grandmother of old friends is buried in Perth.

So, my current musings about death are not unnatural.

Elizabeth died surrounded by family.

Nana died surrounded by family.

But what of those for whom family is not a comfort, those who cannot return from injury interchanged?

It is rumoured that Ambrose Bierce went to Mexico seeking death.

Above: American writer Ambrose Bierce (1842 – 1914?)

In Graham Greene’s The Quiet American, cynical foreign correspondent Fowler goes to Vietnam seeking death.

Is that a better demise, a more fitting finale?

To die on one’s feet rather to live on one’s knees?

Above: Emiliano Zapata

If I follow my father’s side of my heritage I may live long.

If I follow my mother’s example, my days are past numbered.

Nothing is certain, nothing can be calculated.

One rarely can choose the manner in which they pass on.

I have often joked that I want to pass my centennial mark and be found on a South Pacific beach with a Pina Colada in my left hand and a beautiful woman on my right, and leave this world with a smile upon my face.

Above: Pina colada cocktail

A fate preferred over an end helpless in a nursing home lacking mobility and possibly mental lucidity.

To die a Spartan’s death, teeth gritted, screaming at Death;

“Take me.

If you can.“

Above: King Leonidas (Gerard Butler), 300 (2006 film)

This is why disease depresses me, discouraging the determined defiance, weakening the resolve, diminishing dignity.

Fate is a bastard.

Undeserved, unwanted, unforeseen, and usually unpleasant.

Let women die blanketed by love.

Let men grapple with death, allowing it no easy conquest, and its inevitable victory a hollow Pyrrhic one.

“If we are victorious in one more battle with the Romans, we shall be utterly ruined.” (Plutarch)

Above: Greek historian Plutarch of Chaeronea (46 – 119)

The Queen is dead.

Even royality is not immune.

I cannot say that I feel much of anything about her demise, even if she was Canada’s head of state.

I never met her.

I have seen her only through the filter of video media.

I cannot honestly think of one significant act she did that wasn’t merely symbolic to me.

Certainly the known loss of anyone’s life diminishes us, but royalty is as far removed from my life as hunger and poverty are from theirs.

I neither reject the Monarchy nor embrace republicanism, but I tend to prefer exceptionalism as the result of merit rather than through heredity or cronyism.

I sympathise with the family for their loss, for they knew Elizabeth as a person.

I bear no ill feelings toward the ascension of Charles as King.

I do know that taxpayers will foot the bill for a funeral and a coronation in the very near future.

Commonwealth nations will scramble to change currency and postage.

And somehow my personal life as it was during her days will not change now that she is off her dais.

The monarchy lacks significance to me, save as a symbol of tradition.

But with the potential to affect millions the true effect that the Monarchy has on the lives of the common community is as negible as an apple blossom falling upon a still pond.

The barest of ripples.

But the farce will be played out.

Officials will officiate, speeches will be made, prayers and sympathies extended to the family in the manner of a massacre’s victims.

And after the dust has settled, her memory will be a footnote in fields of data and stacks of books in the world’s library of misremembered historical moments.

She will be remembered for her long reign.

That she rarely embarrassed herself or her dominions.

Above: Elizabeth II, Queensland, Australia, 1970

The problem I have with royalty is not that they are (arguably) my betters, but that they generally seek neither to better themselves nor the world that surrounds them.

A mere pittance of a donation compared to one’s wealth does not make a rich man become a saint.

Respect should be earned, not an automatic given.

(The evocation of presidents also seems appropriate here.)

Above: Donald Trump (US President: 2017 – 2021)

The Queen is dead.

All that she was is gone.

But who was she?

I may never really know.

A death is sad, but the impact a life has is more significant.

A functioning society requires cooperation.

A person’s reputation is a signal.

In our evolutionary past, a person’s reputation was directly related to their achievements or their power.

Since the beginning of recorded history, there has remained an indissoluble bond between fame and achivement or power.

Aristotle, Sappho, Augustine, Beethoven, Newton, Darwin, Marie Curie, Einstein – all of them acquired fame by virtue of their competence.

Above: Bust of Greek philosopher Aristotle (384 – 322 BCE)

Above: Painting of Greek poetess Sappho (630 – 570 BCE)

Above: Christian philosopher Augustine of Hippo (354 – 430)

Above: German musician Ludwig von Beethoven (1770 – 1827)

Above: English scientist Isaac Newton (1642 – 1727)

Above: English scientist Charles Darwin (1809 – 1892)

Above: Polish-French scientist Marie Curie (1867 – 1934)

Above: German scientist Albert Einstein (1879 – 1955)

Emperors, kings and popes acquired fame through their power.

Above: Bust of Holy Roman Emperor Charlemagne (747 – 814)

Above: English King Henry VIII (1491 – 1547)

Above: Fresco of Pope Innocent III (1160 – 1216)

Marcus Aurelius managed both.

Above: Roman philosopher Emperor Marcus Aurelius (121 – 180)

With the advent of the news, we suddenly found ourselves with celebrities: people famous for reasons utterly irrelevant to society and our own lives.

These days, the media bestows the rank of celebrity for such trivial reasons that it undermines the relationship between fame and achievement.

A celebrity is a celebrity because they are a celebrity.

How they became a celebrity is soon forgotten and plays no role in the media circus.

Journalists report on the celebrity because they are a celebrity.

It is virtually impossible to name someone who became famous before the advent of the news media whose fame was not based on competence or power.

Because the media focuses on celebrities, most folks only have achievements to offer.

Therefore most of us hold no interest for the media.

The news has severed the bond between fame and accomplishment.

Above: Paris Hilton – famous for being famous

Everyone operates within a hierarchy.

The news makes the already rather brutal natural hierarchy even more brutal by reporting disproportionately on the beautiful and the successful.

The media functions like a magnifying glass.

We compare ourselves to people who have absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with us.

As a result, we feel smaller than we actually are.

Of course, this could be rationally countered.

But we do not do that.

We make life harder for ourselves than it already is.

High time to opt out of our absurd race to achieve status.

News stories are predominantly concerned with things you cannot change.

Hardly anything one hears on the news is anything we can change.

The daily litany of things we cannot change makes us passive.

The news wears us down until we are miserable hopeless pessimists.

Of course, we want to help.

Of course, we want to intervene and make the world a slightly better place.

But our time is already at its limit.

When we encounter information without us having the possibility of acting upon it, we gradually assume the role of a victim.

Our impulse to take action fades.

We become passive, helpless.

Once the news has made us passive, we tend to behave passively towards our family and our jobs – precisely where we do have room for manoeuvres.

When we tune into the news, we are constantly confronted with unresolved problems.

The narrative does not inspire much hope that they will ever be solved.

It is no surprise that we feel depressed when we consume the news, which confronts us with problems that are mostly impossible to solve.

Some things are in our control and other not.

It is idiotic to dwell on things we cannot control.

Nearly everything we hear on the news is outside our sphere of influence.

So, we can safely disregard it.

Accept that you might not understand the world.

You will be more modest when it comes to your knowledge, more cautious, more considered, and you won’t fall victim to overconfidence.

“Nobody knows what is happening.

The newspapers only pretend as though they do from day to day.” (Max Frisch)

Current events cast a shadow on understanding.

Take stock of your anxieities, write them down one by one, and then decide if you have the power or the opportunity to do anything about these issues or not.

There are things you can influence and things that you cannot.

There is no point in getting worked up about things you cannot change.

The world is in a complex dynamic process of chaos.

Cause and effect don’t hang together in a linear fashion.

In almost all cases, the interplay of hundreds or even thousands of causes lead to a particular event.

Yet this event is often attributed to to only a few causes.

News has to be extremely short even as it tells a story.

This can only be done through a brutal process of simplification.

No matter what happened it will only ever be attributed to one or two causes.

Nothing will be said of the dozens of other causes, the interplay between them or the retroactive effects playing out between the event and its causes.

We are given the illusion that the world is simpler and more explicable than it actually is.

Above: Max Frisch (1911 – 1991)

I do not want to consider whether a nation should have a monarch or not.

I am powerless to affect the destiny of my nation whether I am ruled by a regent or a republic.

I do not want to compare my life to that of Her Majesty.

Elizabeth had a remarkable life, if for no other reason she was a Queen who reigned a very long time.

But such wealth that was hers is neither attainable nor enviable by most of us.

Such power that was hers resulted in a life where she and her family were continuously under public scrutiny.

There is a serenity in invisibility.

And despite the capsule autobiography I have provided here, it is truly difficult to discern the distinction between her fame and any actual thing she actually accomplished.

Do I mourn the loss of Her Majesty?

No.

I never met her nor was there ever a moment when either she or I sought to know the other.

Should we be saddened by her demise?

Of course, every death, whether we have known the dead or not, diminishes us.

But much like James Bond in the introduction that began this post I go on with my life.

I have never been on Her Majesty’s service in any capacity.

Therefore I will not mourn whom I have never known.

Sorry, ma’am.

Sources: Wikipedia / Google / On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969 film) / “Queen Elizabeth II: Her life before she took the Crown“, 9 September 2022, http://www.bbc.com / William Booth, “The day Elizabeth II became Queen in a treehouse in Kenya“, The Washington Post, 6 February 2022 / Rolf Dobelli, Stop Reading the News / Will Pavia, Bernard Lagan and Valentine Low, “Canada is ready for Jubilee party…but other nations aren’t so keen”, The Times, 21 May 2022