Unhappy family? Observers noted Elizabeth’s concern for the newly widowed Duchess of Windsor at the Duke of Windsor’s funeral in June 1972.
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Happy family: Elizabeth and Philip with all four of their children at Balmoral the previous summer. From left: Anne, Charles, Edward, Andrew, Elizabeth and Philip.
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Elizabeth on duty, with President Gerald Ford and Betty Ford, at a banquet in Washington, D. C. in July 1976. ‘British royalty’, the New York Times told readers, ‘still has a fairytale glamor’.
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Elizabeth off duty, riding at Balmoral in September 1971, one of several images released to mark her Silver Wedding Anniversary the following year.
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A thoughtful Elizabeth with her second cousin once removed – and Philip’s uncle – Dickie Mountbatten, in July 1979, the month before Mountbatten’s assassination by the IRA.
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‘A love affair with the country’, according to Martin Charteris: Elizabeth in Silver Jubilee year, with the Lord Mayor of London after the Service of Thanksgiving at St Paul’s Cathedral, 7 June 1977.
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‘I survive by enjoying myself every moment of the day,’ Elizabeth is reported to have commented: above, on a walkabout in New Zealand, in the spring of 1977, wearing the Maori cloak first given to her in the 1950s; and, below, at the Epsom Derby, in 1978, with Lord Porchester, her racing manager from 1969.
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A lifelong bond: Elizabeth with her mother and sister, photographed by Norman Parkinson in 1980.
© Norman Parkinson Archive / Iconic Images.
With members of her immediate family, and children of her cousins, on the balcony at Buckingham Palace after Trooping the Colour, 15 June 1985. From left: Philip, Lord Frederick Windsor (Prince Michael of Kent’s son), Edward, Elizabeth, Anne, Charles (holding Harry), William, Diana, Lady Rose and Lady Davina Windsor (daughters of the Duke of Gloucester) and Anne’s daughter Zara Phillips.
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‘Truly in love from the very beginning’, according to Elizabeth’s cousin, Margaret Rhodes – as they remained: Elizabeth and Philip at the Royal Windsor Horse Show, 16 May 1982.
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Elizabeth’s relationship with her first female prime minister, Margaret Thatcher – seen here with US president, Ronald Reagan, in June 1984 – provoked widespread speculation. Elizabeth’s attachment to ‘things going on as they are, tolerance, good manners, Christian behaviour, doing the right thing’ was not always Thatcher’s first priority.
PA Photos / TopFoto.
Elizabeth admires some of the Terracotta Army soldiers at Qin Shi Huang’s Museum of the Terracotta Warriors and Horses, during a state visit to the People’s Republic of China, 1986.
Hulton Archive / Getty Images.
In her own words ‘a humbling experience’, Elizabeth’s Diamond Jubilee in 2012 included a pop concert in the gardens of Buckingham Palace. One performer acclaimed her as ‘a living testimony to the power of dedication, kindness, tolerance and loyalty’.
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In a marriage that lasted more than seventy-three years, until his death in April 2021, Philip proved, as Elizabeth called him, her ‘strength and stay’, ‘a constant strength and guide’.
Tim Graham / Getty Images.
In isolation at Windsor Castle during the pandemic, Elizabeth’s weekly audience with the prime minister, Boris Johnson, took place by telephone.
Kensington Palace / Getty Images.