Portrait that shows how far a teenage girl had come
ITWAS almost the final chapter in Princess Elizabeth’s wartime evolution, which was charted from the various pictures of her taken during the wartime period.
She had begun the war as a quiet, shy 13-year-old dressed like her little sister Margaret in sensible coats and berets with knee socks and flat shoes.
BYVE night, as shown in a portrait taken by Cecil Beaton at Buckingham Palace weeks before, she was a beautiful woman, deeply in love with her war hero beau Prince Philip.
The Prince was on HMS Whelp off Sumatra providing cover for raids on Japan’s oil fields. Several times his sharp eyes saved downed airmen from the shark-infested Indian Ocean as he skippered rescue boats to pluck them from the water under enemy fire.
He might have been absent onve night but a portrait of Philip took pride of place in Elizabeth’s bedroom.
‘The war shaped the way she thinks’
One veteran courtier said: “She grew up during the war in so many ways. Not only from childhood to become a self-assured woman who knew what she wanted, but she also learned a lot about the craft of kingship from her father, her mother, and most from ordinary people.”
During her time as ATS Second Subaltern 230973 Elizabeth Windsor she underwent the same training as everyone else, wore the same uniform and shared the same hardships.
Now 75 years later, the Queen will step into her father’s shoes one more time as she speaks to the nation at the same time on the same date as King George declared the end of the war.
Unlike 1945, however, the world’s new enemy Covid-19 means there will be no crowds and no wild celebrations in the street. Instead the Queen will lead the nation as a poignant reminder of what Britain can bear and what it can achieve.
One long-serving courtier said:
“The war made her. It shaped the way she thinks and the way she has carried out her duty.”