Princess Elizabeth was just 13-years-old when war broke out between Britain and Germany in 1939 – but the future Queen still played an integral role in the war effort. While King George VI and Queen Elizabeth (later the Queen Mother) remained at Buckingham Palace, Elizabeth and Princess Margaret were moved out to Windsor Castle for their safety before the Blitz, remaining there until the armistice. “I regard it as a home in a way no other place can be,” she has subsequently admitted of the castle.
Famously, on 13 October 1940, Her Majesty gave her first morale-boosting public address from its drawing room as part of the BBC’s Children’s Hour, speaking directly to child evacuees: “My sister Margaret Rose and I feel so much for you as we know from experience what it means to be away from those we love most of all.” As the war progressed, she took on more and more duties, from championing the government’s Dig for Victory campaign by tending her own allotment to joining the Auxiliary Territorial Service, where she trained as both a driver and a mechanic.
When victory in Europe was finally declared in 1945, she stood with the royal family and Prime Minister Winston Churchill on the balcony of Buckingham Palace to greet the joyous public – before slipping away with Margaret and wandering in and amongst the crowds. “I remember lines of unknown people linking arms and walking down Whitehall, all of us just swept along on a tide of happiness and relief,” she recalled in an interview with Radio 4 in 1985. “I think it was one of the most memorable nights of my life.”
As the Queen addresses the nation from Windsor once again in honour of the 75th anniversary of VE Day, revisit 21 stunning photographs of Her Majesty during the war, below.