Queen Elizabeth II, the monarch who brought stability to a changing nation

 LONDON — Four times before she took the throne as Queen Elizabeth II, she made a pledge. 

" I declare before you that my whole life, whether it be long or short, shall be devoted to your service, and the service of our great Homeric family to which we all belong," the 21- time-old Elizabeth Alexandra Mary also said. 

That decades-long reign of service ended Thursday, when Queen Elizabeth II failed at her Balmoral estate in Scotland, at age 96. 

For 70 times, she served as the indigenous monarch of the United Kingdom, the longest rule in British history. 

It also comes at a time when theU.K. is transitioning from a deeply controversial high minister, Boris Johnson, to a new bone

Liz Truss, who just took over the job this week. The country faces soaring affectation and the challenge of the biggest war in Europe since 1945. 

Elizabeth was born into an conglomerate on which the sun noway set and was the country's last major figure with a connection to World War II, a searing, eventually triumphant experience that, for some, continues to define the nation. On V- E Day in 1945, Elizabeth, also 19, described slipping out of Buckingham Palace to join the triumphant crowds. 

Latterly, Elizabeth watched as Britain lost utmost of its colonies and important of its power. There were numerous particular lows, including the divorces of three of her four children; the death of her former son- in- law Diana; and a coitus reproach involving her son Prince Andrew. Late in her reign, her grandson Prince Harry left the family and England to settle in California with his American woman

Through the ups and campo of her term, her hard work and life won her deep admiration across the United Kingdom. 

Born Elizabeth Alexandra Mary Windsor in London in 1926, her ascent to the throne was an accident of history. In 1936, her uncle, King Edward VIII renounced to marry Wallis Simpson, a separated American woman. Elizabeth's shy, stammering father assumed the throne as George VI, placing her coming in line. 

In 1947, at age 21, she married Prince Philip of Greece and Denmark, a dashing nonmilitary officer and distant kinsman with whom she would fallen in love in her early teens. 

While traveling in Kenya five times latterly, Elizabeth entered grim news from home that her father, who suffered from heart complaint and cancer, had failed in his sleep. A time latterly, her lavish coronation in Westminster Abbey drew a global television followership. 

Elizabeth made a glamorous youthful queen in the argentine, postwar times but also a remote bone

sometimes, she appeared to drop her guard and allowed television cameras into her home. She spoke of her grasp of the pungency of royal life and how youngish family members chafed under its strictures. 

still, which people do not veritably much," she said with a laugh," If you live this kind of life. I find that is one of the sad effects, that people do not take on jobs for life, they try different effects all the time." 

Given the nature of her job, Elizabeth said she knew exactly what she'd be doing in the coming two months or indeed the coming time. 

" I suppose this is what the youngish members( of the royal family) find delicate, is the regimented side of it," she added. 

Difficulties involving youngish royals led to some of the most painful ages of the queen's life. 

" In the words of one of my further sympathetic reporters, it has turned out to be an' annus horribilis,'" the queen said. 

" I suppose the queen really felt deeply wounded by the lack of success of her family," says Sarah Bradford, the author of several lives of Elizabeth." She just felt lowered and conceivably she felt shamefaced about it." 

Diana had lately disassociated Prince Charles, but remained for numerous a sympathetic figure. 

rather of returning to London to lead her people in mourning, the queen remained in her castle in Balmoral, assuring her grandchildren, Diana's sons, tycoons William and Harry. numerous Britons were furious and saw the queen as out of touch and uncaring. 

" The week before Diana's burial was presumably the low point of the queen's life," Bradford says," because for the first time in her life, she was actually really blamed, deeply blamed." 

Bowing to public pressure, the queen returned to London and ultimately responded to what she called" the extraordinary and moving response to( Diana's) death." 

The queen was known for her love of nags and her hand corgis. As befitting her part as indigenous monarch, she kept any political opinions private. She also remained largely opaque to the public. Some royal spectators said that mystique led some Britons to fill in the blanks and see themselves in her. 

Elizabeth had a sense of humor about her fame and position. She loved to dinner guests with a story about meeting two American excursionists near her Scottish estate who failed to fete her. When they asked where she lived, she responded London and added she had a vacation home on the other side of the hills, Balmoral Castle. 

also one of the trampers asked if she had ever met the queen. Elizabeth said she had not, but said her sentry, Richard Griffin, who was accompanying her, met the queen regularly. 

When asked what the queen was like, Griffin said she could be dyspeptic, but had a lovely sense of humor. The sightseer asked for a picture with Griffin, which the queen took. also she posed with the sightseer. 

" I'd love to be a cover on the wall when he shows those prints to musketeers in America," said the queen subsequently, according to Griffin. 

The queen served as public dame, furnishing comfort and stimulant. 

During the coronavirus epidemic, she made a rare public speech that illustrated the unique part she played in the United Kingdom. The queen comforted the British people and emphasized the country's traditional values. 

" Together we're diving this complaint, and I want to assure you that if we remain united and bent , also we will overcome it," she said from Windsor Castle." I hope in the times to come, everyone will be suitable to take pride in how they responded to this challenge. And those who come after us will say the Britons of this generation were as strong as any. The attributes of tone- discipline, of quiet good- humored resoluteness and of fellow feeling still characterize this country." 

Still recent times brought fresh family fermentation and heads that undermined the monarchy, including allegations that a 17- time-old girl was constrained into having coitus with Prince Andrew, which he denied in an interview with the BBC. 

In 2021, Prince Harry and his woman

Meghan, the Duchess of Sussex, said they'd encountered racism within the royal family. In an interview with Oprah Winfrey, Meghan, who's biracial, said there had been demarcation toward their son, Archie. She said there had been" enterprises and exchanges about how dark his skin might be when he is born." 

In a statement, Buckingham Palace called the claims" concerning" and said the family would address them intimately. 

About a month latterly, Prince Philip, whom the queen had called" my strength and stay," failed at age 99 after further than seven decades of marriage. 

With the queen's end, her son Charles becomes king. 

The queen was tremendously popular, indeed among Britons who were not fond of the monarchy. Charles, still, is not. pates this time showed that only about one- third of the public then wants him as king. numerous people remain unhappy with Charles because of how he handled his first marriage. 

" The heritage of the whole Diana catastrophe — it does go veritably deep," said Max Hastings, the former editor of Britain's The Daily Telegraph and the Evening Standard." The image that Diana passed onto the world about the Prince of Wales isn't a veritably seductive image. It was an image of a veritably selfish, quirky, weird man." 

Royal watchers say that Charles's lack of fissionability and connection to numerous British people poses a serious challenge to the monarchy as it moves forward. 

Elizabeth came queen when Winston Churchill was Britain's high minister and Harry Truman wasU.S. chairman. She worked with 15 British high ministers and has met 13 of the last 14 American chairpersons. 

Queen Elizabeth is the only monarch the vast maturity of Britons have ever known. Bradford believes history will rank her among the nation's great rulers, alongside Queen Elizabeth I and Queen Victoria. 

" I suppose the queen's heritage will be holding the whole thing together, through bad and good, connecting with the world," Bradford says." I suppose she will be seen as regardful, good at her job and tone- immolating in numerous ways." 

A quarter- century after assuming the throne, Queen Elizabeth II epitomized her part and her relationship with her subjects" When I was 21, I pledged my life to the service of our people," she said." Although that oath was made in my salad days when I was green in judgment, I don't lament nor repudiate one word of it."