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Queen Elizabeth II

The Queen’s week in pictures

Queen Elizabeth II

The Queen marked the 68th anniversary of her accession this week. But while the day itself is always spent quietly and privately at Sandringham House, the place where her beloved father died on February 6th 1952, the royal diary is picking up pace. Elizabeth II, just days away from becoming the fourth longest reigning monarch in recorded history, carried out a series of engagements through the week while crowds turned out to mark the moment her record breaking rule began. Here’s a look at the Queen’s week, in pictures.

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At a time when the past was very much part of the present, it was perhaps appropriate that both the public engagements the Queen carried out around the time of the anniversary of her accession had links to her parents. On February 3rd 2020, Elizabeth II visited RAF Marnham in Norfolk which has a long association with her mother.

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The Queen toured the base, seeing the Integrated Training Centre where personnel acquire the skills to qualify as Lightning Plane pilots. There was also a demonstration of simulation based training which allows learning and development in airborne skills to take place on the ground.

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The Queen followed in the footsteps of her father, King George VI, later in the week when she re-opened the newly renovated Wolferton Pumping Station on the Sandringham Estate. George VI opened the station seventy two years earlier, on another chilly February day in 1948.

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His daughter and successor was given a demonstration of the redesigned pumping station which has been improved to make it more environmentally friendly. The Queen also tried her hand at starting the mechanisms which help the surrounding marshland to be drained and dried so that they can be used for farming.

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While the Queen stayed inside Sandringham on February 6th itself, large crowds gathered in London to watch a 41 gun salute in honour of the anniversary of her accession. The King’s Troop Royal Horse Artillery performed the tribute in Green Park while bells rang out at Westminster Abbey to mark the day.

The Queen is expected to return to London shortly as her Christmas stay at Sandringham comes to an end.

About author

Lydia Starbuck is Jubilee and Associate Editor at Royal Central and the main producer and presenter of the Royal Central Podcast and Royal Central Extra. Lydia is also a pen name of June Woolerton who is a journalist and writer with over twenty years experience in TV, radio, print and online. Her latest book, A History of British Royal Jubilees, is out now. Her new book, The Mysterious Death of Katherine Parr, will be published in March 2024. June is an award winning reporter, producer and editor. She's appeared on outlets including BBC 5 Live, BBC Radio Ulster and BBC Local Radio and has also helped set up a commercial radio station. June is also an accomplished writer with a wide range of material published online and in print. She is the author of two novels, published as e-books. She is also a marriage registrar and ceremony celebrant.