Thousands of miles away in Kenya, her eldest daughter Princess Elizabeth also spent a beautiful day filming rhinos, pink fish, baboons and a herd of elephants with a pink-painted hand-held film camera rolling in the dust.
But the next day, February. 6, after Elizabeth became sovereign? The Queen would always mark this with a day of quiet reflection. This date is his beloved father, King George VIIt was found that the 56-year-old died in his sleep.
“That day, even 70 years later, I remember the death of my father King George VI, the beginning of my reign,” he wrote on his anniversary. statement in February.
Queen Elizabeth dead Thursday at the age of 96. He reigned for 70 years, longer than any other British monarch.
The story of the day and hour of Elizabeth’s accession to the throne has been told many times, but it remains a fascinating tale. It is history with echoes of Arthurian romance.
Elizabeth, 25, was sitting in a tree house in Kenya the morning her father died. from there he watched a herd of elephants led by matriarchs arrive at the watering hole.
“There is much speculation that Elizabeth was queen, at least because of the historical parallels,” he wrote. Sally Bedell Smith in the autobiography of the monarch. “This, no doubt, happened while he was in the top of an African fig tree. It drew a romantic line to the moment when, sitting by the oak tree at Hatfield House in 1558, he heard that the death of Elizabeth I’s sister, Queen Mary, meant that he was the monarch at the age of twenty-five.
For many months, King George—the 2010 Oscar-winning film known to today’s generation—overcame a debilitating stutter.The King’s Speech“- his health was deteriorating.
Rolf F. Barth of Ohio State University wrote in a journal: “King, a heavy smoker, underwent a total left pneumonectomy in September 1951 for what was euphemistically called ‘structural abnormalities’ in his left lung, but which was actually carcinoma.” “Reevaluation of pathologists” last year.
“His doctors hid this diagnosis from him, from the public and from the medical profession,” said co-author L. Maximilian Buja.
Too ill to travel, 56-year-old George commissions Elizabeth and her husband Philip to embark on a months-long tour of the Commonwealth in the twilight of the British Empire.
George saw off his daughter at London airport in January. 31, 1952. Newspapers reported that the king “looked good and cheerful.” One of his biographies would later suggest “haggard” as a better description. When he said goodbye to Elizabeth, the crowd cheered.
This would be the last time the two would see each other.
The young couple traveled to Kenya, where a BBC news report shows Elizabeth stepping off the BOAC Argonaut in a printed dress and Philip in a white navy uniform decorated with medals.
“When the royal couple stepped into the scorching sun of Nairobi, no one knew that the girl who arrived here as Princess Elizabeth would leave five days later as the queen,” reports the British broadcaster.
From the capital of Kenya, Elizabeth and Philip traveled three hours with a small entourage. Sagana Lodgea villa by the trout river was presented to them as a wedding gift from the Kenyan government.
“It was a dangerous time in the British colony. The Mau Mau campaign had just begun in the White Highlands,” the historian wrote Nicholas Best In the Observer. “The officials responsible for the Prince’s tour of Kenya, Australia and New Zealand failed to guarantee his safety while in Kenya. It was only fear of ridicule that prevented them from canceling the African leg of the trip.”
On February 5, the couple went into the forest, to the Treetops Hotel, a game-viewing lodge. Their three-bed cabin was reached by a rickety ladder and perched on the branches of an ancient fig tree, overlooking a waterhole and salt licks.
“The Treetops are old hat now, but in 1952 it was the only place like it in the world” Best wroteinvestigates the lodge’s founder, Eric Sherbrooke Walker, a colorful character, former trafficker and friend of the royal family.
Best told The Washington Post that Walker stationed local men at the edge of the forest to stop reporters, because he was concerned about Elizabeth’s privacy and also because the smell of more people would scare off the wildlife.
Naturalist and big game hunter Jim Corbett, who accompanied the pair, spent the darkest hours of the night at the lodge’s entrance with a shotgun to ward off curious leopards, he said.
On February 6, it took hours for news of the king’s death to reach rural Kenya due to distance and communication difficulties. The message was delivered to Philip’s private secretary and from Philip to his wife after returning to Sagana Lodge.
Without ceremony or even awareness, but in accordance with British tradition, Elizabeth became queen.
The newspaper’s front pages ran out “Long live Queen Elizabeth” and “Her Majesty goes home pale with grief.”
The new queen remained quiet except for a moment on the flight back to London. “The queen left after a while. When he returned, his face was fixed, but it was clear to other passengers that he had been in the toilet and had been crying for a long time,” Best wrote. guardian.
When the plane arrived, a black suit was quickly brought on board so that she could disembark in appropriate mourning.
The next day he read a proclamation announcing his reign:
“With the sudden death of my dear father, I have been called upon to assume the duties and responsibilities of sovereignty. My heart is so full that today I will tell you more than I will try to increase the happiness and prosperity of my peoples spread throughout the world, as I did during my father’s reign.
