"When Her Majesty the Queen did me the signal honour of inviting me to write the official biography of the Queen Mother, I prostrated myself before her, promising faithfully to describe the incandescent light that had cast over the nation for more than a century. "Get up, you fawning toady," the Queen replied graciously. "Just ignore any controversy and you'll get your knighthood."
Britain was at a crossroads in 1900 and it was from this uncertainty that Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, the country's blessed saviour, would lead us through times of turmoil to the sunny uplands of today. She was born into Scotland's most noble family and much of her early life was blessedly free of any formal education, an attribute that would stand her in good stead in later life.
The first world war cast a shadow over her life, as her letters to Bunty Smith-Smythe-Smythson reveal. "It Really is So ghastly that the Aristocracy is getting slaughtered!!!" she wrote in 1915. Yet, setting aside her own pain, she lifted the morale of the troops by sending them stanzas that her great friend Ted Hughes later believed were worthy of a poet laureate: "Let's go and have Fun / Out in the Sun / By Killing the Hun / Even tho' I will marry One / Later."
Having done so much for the war effort, Elizabeth threw herself wholeheartedly into reviving the country's gaiety in peace by going to as many parties as possible, and her numinous beauty attracted many suitors, including Binky Farquarson-Cholmondeley and Tarka Otter. Her graceful refusal of these proposals caught the eye of Albert, Duke of York, and, after turning him down three times in case a better offer from his elder brother came along, they were married in 1923."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2009/sep/29/queen-mother-william-shawcrossA delightful read. Take time out and relax with a glass of Pimm's one of these long autumn evenings to really enjoy this article.
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