Her Majesty’s youth was cut short in 1952 when her father’s death made her Head of State of the United Kingdom and Commonwealth when she was just 25. By the time of her coronation she was married with two children and had seen service in the Second World War as a driver and engineer. She also had years before she vowed to dedicate her life to duty, having known her fate since the age of 11. Almost all her life until her coronation had been spent in Britain. She had left her homeland only a few times, on a handful of the royal visits that would occupy so much of her time in the years to come. The cameras followed the queen throughout her youth. Although she was not pictured anywhere near as often as one would expect a young royal to be today, there is no shortage of photographs to document the early years of the monarch who so many living today knew only as an old woman. Scroll through the images below to see the Queen in her early years before she took the throne. The Queen Mother (then Duchess of York) with her husband King George VI (then Duke of York) and their daughter Queen Elizabeth II (then Princess) at her christening in May 1926 (PA) Princess Elizabeth’s christening team. From left, back row: Duke of Connaught, King George V, Duke of York and Earl Strathmore. Front row: Lady Elphinstone, Queen Mary, The Duchess of York with Princess Elizabeth, the Countess of Strathmore and Princess Mary (PA) A Cecil Beaton portrait of Princess Elizabeth at Buckingham Palace aged 19 in 1946 (PA) Aged two, Princess Elizabeth waves to the crowds as she arrives back at Piccadilly in 1928 (PA) A teenage Princess Elizabeth plays ‘Prince Salvador’ in the Christmas production of ‘Sleeping Beauty’ at Windsor Castle in December 1942 (Getty) Princess Elizabeth meets Jan Smuts, Prime Minister of South Africa, while touring the country with her parents and sister (PA) Princess Elizabeth and a Highland Regiment drummer during a visit to Scotland in 1929 (PA) Princess Elizabeth holding a corgi, aged 24 in 1950 (PA) At the age of six, Princess Elizabeth rides a tricycle in the park (PA) Princess Elizabeth (centre) at an Auxiliary Territorial Service course at Camberley in Surrey in early 1945 (PA) Princess Elizabeth, seven, with two-year-old Princess Margaret (PA) A teenage Princess Elizabeth at Sandringham with one of the horses (AFP/Getty) Princess Elizabeth in 1949, as Colonel of the Grenadier Guards, sits atop Winston, a police horse, in the forecourt of Buckingham Palace, during the Trooping for the Color in celebration of King George VI’s 53rd birthday (PA) From left: Queen Elizabeth (later Queen Mother), Princess Elizabeth, Princess Margaret and King George VI after his coronation, on the balcony of Buckingham Palace, London in May 1937 (PA) A wartime photo of Princess Elizabeth (right) and Princess Margaret after their ‘Children’s Hour’ broadcast from Buckingham Palace in October 1940 (PA) The bridesmaids at the wedding of the Honorable Patricia Mountbatten and Lord Brabourne. From left: The Honorable Patricia Mountbatten, sister of the bride, Princess Alexandra of Kent, Princess Elizabeth and Princess Margaret at Romsey Abbey (PA) A special 21st birthday photo of Princess Elizabeth casually posing during a visit to Natal National Park in South Africa (PA) In July 1947, Princess Elizabeth’s engagement to Lieutenant Philip Mountbatten is announced and the couple are pictured together at Buckingham Palace (PA) Princess Elizabeth and Prince Philip on their wedding day, 20 November 1947, in London (Central Press/AFP/Getty) Princess Elizabeth and Prince Philip with the Viscount and Lady Alexander at a Canadian dinner in Ottawa (PA) Princess Elizabeth with her two children, Princess Anne and Prince Charles in September 1950 (PA)
