Queen's joy in 'the only job which matters' - mummy, Grannie and Gan-Gan
ok.co.ukQueen Elizabeth II was the ultimate matriarch whose extended family meant the world to her.The first of her and Prince Philip’s four children, Charles, was born at Buckingham Palace in November 1948 when she was a 22-year-old princess and four years before she became Queen.
News of the prince’s birth was broken with a traditional notice pinned to the railings outside the palace, where waiting crowds burst into a rendition of For He’s A Jolly Good Fellow.The water in the Trafalgar Square fountains was dyed blue to celebrate his arrival.The princess appeared to adapt to motherhood quickly, although two weeks after her firstborn came along, she wrote in her diary, “I still find it hard to believe that I really have a baby of my own.” The couple’s daughter Princess Anne was born at Clarence House in August 1950, and Elizabeth wrote in a letter that Charles treated his new baby sister “with great care”.
After her ascension to the throne in 1952, the Queen was focused on establishing her legacy as monarch. It was another decade before Prince Andrew came into the world at Buckingham Palace in February 1960, with the Queen revealing to her private secretary Martin Charteris that she and Philip had been trying for another baby “for some time”.
As with all her children, maternity leave was out of the question, and within 48 hours of giving birth she was asking which official papers needed to be dealt with.The Queen’s fourth child, Prince Edward, was born at Buckingham Palace in March 1964, when she was nearly 38.
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