How Queen Elizabeth II became Queen

6th February 2022 marks 70 years that Queen Elizabeth II took the English throne but how did her journey to royal
ascension begin?
Born on 21 April 1926 in 17 Bruton Street in Mayfair, London, her father, Albert didn't expect him or his daughter to
become the reigning monarch, then 1936 happened. In that year King George V died and Elizabeth's uncle Edward
took the throne as King Edward VIII but he had to step down when he fell in love with a divorcée named Wallis
Simpson and back at that time up until the last few decades, a British royal couldn't marry a divorcée and have their
royal title too. Since Edward was childless, Albert had to ascend to the English throne as he was the spare heir his
father had. He took on the name King George VI and had a great bit of difficulty when it came to overcoming a
stammering problem he had. George was a shy and very sensitive man and with help of a test recording by a speech
therapist, George was able to handle his stammer problem and take the English throne. As Edward and Wallis never
had children, Elizabeth took the throne on 6 February 1952 when her father died of a blood clot in a blood vessel in his
heart (called a coronary thrombosis) at 7:30AM GMT at the age of 56.
Elizabeth (also known as Lilibet which is also the name of her great-granddaughter through her grandson Prince Harry)
found out that afternoon in Kenya through her husband Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh (who is the namesake for
the prince in Disney's adaption of Sleeping Beauty) told her at a fishing lodge that was 32km away from their hotel.
The first thing Elizabeth did as queen was that she did a long walk around the grounds as she came to terms with the
situation before opening letters to leaders to let them know that the rest of the trip was to be cancelled. She showed
no emotion and fully accepted her destiny. Despite a thunderstorm delaying the flight back, Elizabeth and Philip
returned as Queen and Prince Consort and Elizabeth was officially crowned in 1953 as per tradition of appropriate
time length between the death of the previous monarch and the coronation of the new one with Roald Dahl's
headmaster who was now the Archbishop of Canterbury, Geoffrey Fisher crowning her.

Also on this Day (6 February)