70 years on: the making of Queen Elizabeth II

Princess Elizabeth was 25 when her father died. She was on the first leg of a Commonwealth tour and she spent the night of 5 February 1952 at Treetops Hotel, set in the branches of a large fig tree in Aberdare National Park in Kenya. ‘For the first time in the history of the world,’ wrote the British naturalist Jim Corbett, who was a guest at the hotel at the same time, ‘a young girl climbed into a tree one day a princess and, after having what she described as her most thrilling experience, she climbed down from the tree next day a Queen.’

As interest in Queen Elizabeth II redoubles in the months leading up to the Platinum Jubilee celebrations in June, it is worth reflecting upon the formative years which prepared her for the moment of her accession, 70 years ago this week.

There is a telling vignette from early 1937 recorded by a governor-general’s lady at Sandringham. Princess Elizabeth was then almost 11. Complimented on his daughters by Alice Duncan, the new King confided in her that, as far as he could tell, his children had never known a moment’s fear in their lives — ‘very different’, he added, ‘to ourselves’, meaning himself and his siblings.

This perhaps is the key. In contrast to generations of Hanoverian monarchs who felt an antipathy for their heirs, this was a loving and nurturing home environment which enabled King George VI and Queen Elizabeth to lead, as they wished, by example.

Until she turned 21, the chief influences in the present Queen’s life were therefore her parents; her grandmother, Queen Mary; her governess, Marion Crawford; and Henry Marten, the vice-provost of Eton.