67 Fun Facts About Elizabeth II

Rather than a palace, Elizabeth's 1926 birthplace was a Mayfair town house belonging to whom?

Her mother's parents, the Earl and Countess of Strathmore, owned 17 Bruton Street; the baby was only third in line to the throne, and almost nobody expected her to reign.

What was Elizabeth's family nickname, based on what she called herself as a small child?

Lilibet was her own first attempt at saying Elizabeth, and it stuck in the family for life; in 2021 Prince Harry and Meghan gave the name to their daughter.

What did the young Elizabeth call her grandfather King George V?

Grandpa England was a stern king who doted on her, and in 1929 she was sent to the seaside to help him recover from a grave illness.

Whose 1936 abdication over Wallis Simpson made ten-year-old Elizabeth heir presumptive?

Her uncle Edward VIII reigned for less than eleven months; her shy, stammering father took the throne much against his will as George VI, which put Elizabeth next in line.

Henry Marten, who tutored the young Elizabeth in constitutional history, was Vice-Provost of which famous school?

Eton College saw Marten rise to Provost in 1945, the year George VI knighted him on the steps of the college chapel.

Who met a wartime call to send the princesses to safety in Canada by saying the King would never leave?

Their mother, Queen Elizabeth, put it in three steps: the girls would not go without her, she would not go without the King, and the King would never leave. They spent most of the war at Windsor Castle instead.

On which BBC programme did the 14-year-old Elizabeth make her first radio broadcast in 1940?

Children's Hour carried her message to boys and girls sent away from home by the war, and at the end her ten-year-old sister Margaret joined her at the microphone to say goodnight.

In 1945 Elizabeth trained as a driver and mechanic in which branch of the Army?

The Auxiliary Territorial Service took her on at 18 as a second subaltern; she learned to drive and to strip an engine, and within months had risen to junior commander, the equivalent of captain.

What did Elizabeth and Margaret do on VE Day in 1945?

Mingled incognito with the crowds in London: the sisters slipped out of the palace with a party of Guards officers, and Elizabeth pulled her uniform cap low, terrified, she later said, of being recognised.

What did Elizabeth pledge on her 21st birthday?

That her whole life would be devoted to service, "whether it be long or short", was her 1947 vow by radio from Cape Town; 75 years on, her Platinum Jubilee message renewed the pledge.

Thirteen-year-old Elizabeth said she fell in love with Philip in 1939 when he was a cadet at which college?

Dartmouth's Royal Naval College is where his uncle Lord Mountbatten had cadet Philip, 18, sent to entertain the visiting princesses; the pair began exchanging letters afterwards.

What did Elizabeth need in order to buy the material for her Norman Hartnell wedding gown in 1947?

Ration coupons paid for the gown in austerity Britain; hundreds of well-wishers posted her their own coupons, which had to be returned because passing them on was illegal.

What nickname did the Queen Mother reportedly give Philip when he was courting Elizabeth?

The Hun was her reported jibe at Philip's German ties: his sisters had married German noblemen with Nazi links, and Elizabeth's parents were at first reluctant about the match.

Where did Elizabeth and Philip live intermittently in 1949–51 while he served in the Royal Navy?

Malta let her live as an ordinary naval officer's wife at Villa Guardamangia, driving herself around the island; Malta's government bought the crumbling villa in 2019 to restore it.

Where was Elizabeth when her father died and she became queen on 6 February 1952?

Kenya was only a stop on a long Commonwealth tour; after her night at the Treetops game lodge, hunter Jim Corbett wrote that she climbed the tree a princess and came down a queen.

Why did the 'II' in Elizabeth's title offend some Scots?

She was the first Elizabeth to rule in Scotland, as Elizabeth I reigned only in England; in 1953 the prime minister told the Commons future monarchs should take whichever numeral was higher.

Which prime minister, with Queen Mary, pressed Elizabeth to keep the royal house's name as Windsor in 1952?

Winston Churchill and Queen Mary opposed a House of Mountbatten; Philip fumed that he was the only man in the country barred from giving his name to his children.

Which divorced group captain did Princess Margaret wish to marry in the 1950s?

Peter Townsend, her late father's equerry, was revealed as her suitor when reporters saw Margaret brush fluff from his jacket at the 1953 coronation; she publicly gave him up in 1955.

What was new about the coronation of 2 June 1953?

It was televised for the first time, over the objections of some palace advisers; 27 million Britons watched, many on sets bought or rented for the day.

About three-quarters of which country's people saw the queen in person on her 1954 tour?

Australia had about nine million people and an estimated three in four glimpsed her at least once; no reigning monarch had ever visited, and the country did not yet have television.

Whom did Elizabeth appoint prime minister in 1957 after Eden resigned, on Lords Salisbury and Kilmuir's advice?

Harold Macmillan emerged from soundings of the Cabinet, since the Conservatives had no leadership ballot until 1965; the same process embroiled her again in 1963, when Douglas-Home was preferred to Rab Butler.

Who called Elizabeth 'out of touch' in his magazine in 1957, and was slapped in the street for it?

Lord Altrincham, the historian John Grigg, was himself a Tory who had stood for Parliament as a Conservative; his article also likened her speaking style to that of "a priggish schoolgirl".

Which of Elizabeth's four children was the first born to a reigning British monarch in 103 years?

Andrew arrived in 1960, eight years into her reign, whereas Charles and Anne were born while she was still a princess; the last such birth had been Princess Beatrice's in 1857.

Which Rhodesian prime minister declared independence in 1965 with Elizabeth as queen?

Ian Smith still professed loyalty to the Queen while breaking with her government, and Rhodesia cut its last link with the Crown only in 1970, when it became a republic.

After which 1966 disaster did Elizabeth wait eight days before visiting, reportedly a lasting regret?

Aberfan lost 116 children and 28 adults when a colliery tip engulfed its school; her private secretary later said he had wrongly advised her to stay away until the first shock had passed.

Which was the first communist country Elizabeth visited, in October 1972?

Yugoslavia's President Tito met her at the airport himself and thousands thronged Belgrade's streets; no British monarch had visited a communist country before.

Which prime minister did Elizabeth's governor-general, Sir John Kerr, dismiss in 1975?

Gough Whitlam told the crowd, "Well may we say God save the Queen, because nothing will save the Governor-General"; he had been sacked to break a budget deadlock, which inflamed republican feeling for decades.

Which communist leader's 1978 state visit did Elizabeth endure, privately thinking he had blood on his hands?

Nicolae Ceaușescu received an honorary knighthood on the visit; she stripped him of it in December 1989, the month he was toppled and executed, and sent back the Romanian order he had given her.

Which Canadian prime minister pirouetted behind Elizabeth's back at Buckingham Palace in 1977?

Pierre Trudeau spun on his way in to a summit dinner; photographer Doug Ball later said the woman in his famous shot is Princess Margaret, with the Queen just out of frame.

What horse was Elizabeth riding when six blank shots were fired at her at Trooping the Colour in 1981?

Burmese was a black mare given to her by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in 1969, so a Canadian police horse carried the Queen at her birthday parade for eighteen consecutive years.

Which intruder climbed a drainpipe and reached Elizabeth's bedroom at Buckingham Palace in July 1982?

Michael Fagan's visit exposed a serious lapse: her two telephone calls for police brought nobody at first, and the home secretary, William Whitelaw, offered his resignation.

Which US military action of 1983 angered Elizabeth because she was not told in advance?

The invasion of Grenada hit a country where she was head of state, yet Washington consulted neither her nor her government; she had hosted President Reagan at Windsor only the year before.

On her 1986 state visit to China, Elizabeth joked that what had 'improved since 1602'?

Postal services was her banquet joke about an envoy lost at sea with Elizabeth I's letter to the emperor; she was the first British sovereign to set foot in China, not quite two years after the Hong Kong agreement.

Which former prime minister, rumoured to be at odds with Elizabeth, did she appoint to the Order of the Garter in 1995?

Margaret Thatcher's Garter was Elizabeth's own choice, since its knights are picked personally by the sovereign rather than on ministers' advice; she had already given her the Order of Merit, also in her gift.

Which royal first did Elizabeth achieve in May 1991?

She addressed a joint meeting of the US Congress weeks after the Gulf War; her father had visited the Capitol in 1939 without speaking, and her son Charles III followed her to the rostrum in 2026.

What Latin phrase did Elizabeth II use to describe 1992, the year of the Windsor fire?

Annus horribilis was borrowed, as she said, from "one of my more sympathetic correspondents": her former courtier Sir Edward Ford, who had hoped the fortieth year of her reign would be an annus mirabilis.

What did Elizabeth begin paying in 1993, after the Windsor Castle fire?

Income tax came after the public balked at paying for the repairs while she paid none; she agreed to pay from 1993, and Buckingham Palace opened to paying visitors to help fund them.

Why did Elizabeth's lawyers pursue The Sun in 1993?

It printed her Christmas message two days early, and her lawyers called that a breach of her copyright; the same argument had won a payout in 1988 over a leaked photo of baby Princess Beatrice.

In October 1995 a Montreal radio host tricked Elizabeth into a phone call by impersonating whom?

Canadian PM Jean Chrétien was voiced by hoaxer Pierre Brassard; in a 17-minute call she agreed to make a televised appeal for national unity before Quebec's independence referendum.

What did Elizabeth tell Charles and Diana by letter in December 1995?

That a divorce would be advisable was her written advice to each of them, sent weeks after Diana's Panorama interview; Charles agreed at once, and the marriage was formally ended in August 1996.

What omission at Buckingham Palace angered the public after Diana's death in 1997?

No flag flew at half-mast because protocol allowed only the Royal Standard, flown when she was in residence and never lowered since there is always a sovereign; she relented with a Union Jack at half-mast on the funeral day.

At the site of which massacre did Elizabeth lay a wreath during a controversial 1997 visit to India?

At Jallianwala Bagh she removed her shoes, laid a wreath of marigolds and stood silent for 30 seconds; the night before she had called the 1919 killings "a distressing example" of a difficult past, stopping short of an apology.

How did Elizabeth describe Philip at their golden wedding reception in 1997?

"My strength and stay" came straight after her admission that Philip "doesn't take easily to compliments"; she added that his family and country owed him a debt greater than he would ever claim.

What did Elizabeth use to light the National Millennium Beacon on the Thames on the eve of 2000?

A laser torch did the job from her boat in the Pool of London, just before it passed under Tower Bridge on the way to the Millennium Dome, which she opened shortly before midnight.

How did Elizabeth alter the changing of the guard after 9/11?

She had the American national anthem played two days after the attacks, a comfort to Americans stranded far from home; hundreds in a crowd of more than 3,000 at the gates sang along and others wept.

Which two relatives did Elizabeth lose within weeks in early 2002?

Her sister Margaret and her mother died seven weeks apart, in February aged 71 and in March aged 101; the Golden Jubilee that followed had been awaited nervously, yet the celebrations proved exuberant.

Elizabeth won a 2003 injunction against the Daily Mirror after its reporter posed as what?

A footman at Buckingham Palace was the cover Mirror reporter Ryan Parry used to work below stairs; the injunction barred any further stories, and the paper paid £25,000 towards her legal costs.

How did UN secretary-general Ban Ki-moon introduce Elizabeth to the General Assembly in 2010?

"An anchor for our age" was Ban's tribute to a speaker who had last addressed the Assembly in 1957, aged 31; she returned 53 years later to say she had seen great change, much of it for the better.

In May 2011 Elizabeth made the first state visit by a British monarch to which country?

The Republic of Ireland had seen no reigning British monarch since George V in 1911, before independence; she laid a wreath at Dublin's Garden of Remembrance, which honours those who fought British rule.

In December 2012 Elizabeth became the first sovereign since George III to do what?

She came to attend a peacetime Cabinet meeting as an observer in her Diamond Jubilee year, seated between David Cameron and William Hague; the same day part of Antarctica was named Queen Elizabeth Land.

Which two Olympics made Elizabeth the first head of state to open Games in two countries?

Montreal 1976 and London 2012 were the only Games she declared open herself; Philip opened Melbourne 1956 in her place, and her governor-general did the honours at Sydney 2000.

Which unprecedented anniversary did Elizabeth mark on 6 February 2017?

A sapphire jubilee (65 years) was a first for any British monarch, yet she held no celebration: 6 February is also the day her father died, and she spent it in quiet reflection at Sandringham.

What did Elizabeth, then 92, give up in March 2019?

Driving on public roads ended for her after Prince Philip, then 97, overturned his car beside the Sandringham estate that January and surrendered his licence three weeks later.

What was Elizabeth's pared-down household at Windsor Castle during the pandemic nicknamed?

HMS Bubble was the royal household's own name for the reduced staff; it reunited her with Philip, who since retiring in 2017 had mostly lived more than 100 miles away on the Sandringham estate.

In which church did Elizabeth sit alone at Philip's funeral in April 2021?

St George's Chapel, Windsor, held just 30 mourners under Covid rules, and households had to sit apart, so she sat by herself after 73 years of marriage.

On Christmas Day 2021, an intruder entered Windsor Castle's grounds carrying what weapon?

A crossbow, loaded with a bolt, was carried by a masked man who told the officer who stopped him that he was there to kill the Queen; in 2023 he pleaded guilty under the Treason Act 1842.

What did the queen open on a surprise visit to Paddington in May 2022?

That month she missed the State Opening of Parliament for the first time in 59 years.

Who was the 15th and last British prime minister Elizabeth appointed, on 6 September 2022?

Liz Truss was received at Balmoral, the only time in a 70-year reign that Elizabeth appointed a prime minister anywhere but Buckingham Palace; the Queen died there two days later.

Elizabeth said she would never abdicate, though 'one would have to do something' if she became completely what?

Gaga was her word to Adrienne Clarkson, who served as Canada's governor-general; "It is not our tradition," she said of abdication, and she held to it, reigning until her death at 96.

Elizabeth was the first monarch to die in Scotland since whom?

James V in 1542 died at Falkland Palace in Fife, weeks after his army's rout at Solway Moss and a week after the birth of his heir, Mary, Queen of Scots; 480 years later Elizabeth died at Balmoral.

What cause was recorded on Elizabeth's death certificate in 2022?

Old age was the cause given on the certificate, released three weeks later; it timed her death at 3.10pm, more than three hours before the public was told, and listed Princess Anne as the informant.

Elizabeth's funeral at Westminster Abbey was the first monarch's funeral service held there since whose?

George II's in 1760 was also the last burial of a monarch in the Abbey; by his wish the sides of his and Queen Caroline's coffins were removed so their remains could mingle.

What was the name of the first royal corgi, bought by Elizabeth's father in 1933?

Dookie's name played on the Duke of York, her father, who bought him after the princesses fell for the corgis kept by the Marquess of Bath's children; Susan, the first of her own, came in 1944.

Which pope first visited Elizabeth in Britain?

John Paul II came in 1982, and his host at Buckingham Palace was the Supreme Governor of the Church of England, a church born of the break with Rome.

What now-routine royal practice did Elizabeth introduce in 1970?

The walkabout was introduced, in the royal household's words, to let her meet a greater number of people, not simply officials and dignitaries; it became a fixture of royal visits.

Whom did Elizabeth mean when she told a Times journalist the 1984-85 miners' strike was 'all about one man'?

Arthur Scargill, the miners' leader, was her target; she said it to Paul Routledge while touring the offices of The Times, a rare glimpse of the political opinions she never voiced in public.

In October 1994, Elizabeth became the first reigning British monarch to set foot in which country?

Earlier that year she broke her left wrist when a horse she was riding at Sandringham tripped and fell.