What were you doing when the Princess Elizabeth became Queen.

Yes, I think it was Sopers, it was about 50 years ago Whitewave. The car was a silvery blue and lovely to drive!

The Coronation was the year after, 1953.

X post, tanith

I don’t remember anything about the death of the King and the Queen’s accession, but I recall lots about the Coronation and the preparations for it. I expect there will be a thread about that in June.

henetha

I know South Brent quite well, WW2, and lived there for a while in the early 90's. It's fascinating to find old newspapers and read all the old news. I think the Western Morning News is still going strong, not sure, I must google it.
Mum and I used to get a bus from Torquay to Plymouth quite often while I was growing up, as she had become friendly with the solicitor who had organised my adoption. He lived at Turnchapel and I can remember the 'flying boats' landing on Plymouth Sound and taxi-ing over to RAF Mountbatten.
I was very often travel sick on the bus, usual by the time it stopped at South Brent! So many memories of those days.
How amazing to run a youth club from your loft!

? it wasn’t from our loft, but a building next to The London Inn on the Plymouth road, which we named The Loft. I think it’s been turned into housing now.

henetha we lived in Clobells opposite the big house.

I was nearly 5 on coronation day and vaguely remember a bit if a street party where I ran in a race. From a photo it looked like I was in second place, a feat never to be repeated.

Nothing. My parents had got as far as courting, though. ?

It may well have been the day, I have been told it was in February 1952, when my father went to the Maternity Hospital to drop of a bottle of my mother's milk for me (born prematurely on the 26th November, 1951,) and discovered that the staff were giving the milk to other children who they deemed more likely to reach a normal birth weight than me.

Although normally a taciturn Scot, he lost his temper completely and picked me up and made for the door, saying he would take me home where I would be properly looked after.

Told he couldn't just do that, he replied that as a doctor and more importantly my father, he was actually the only person who had the authority to say where I should be and how I should be treated, and marched out.

I don't know how he drove home with a baby and no carry-cot, or if I was wearing hospital gown, nappy and shawl or my own.

I imagine he wrapped me in his coat, laid me on the front seat, where he could grab me at need, and put his medical case up as a barrier.

Too late to ask him now.

I was 12 and getting ready for school, mum was wiping her eyes on her pinny and saying " poor thing, he wasn't very strong ".

I was six years old, and both my younger sister and I were in bed with chicken pox, when my DM told us the news that the King had died.

I'll join the golden oldies too (please). We were all called to assembly in secondary school and had the situation explained in detail. So glad I enjoyed both history and current affairs.

I was a 4 week old baby en route to start a new life with my parents in Nairobi

My mum was still a teenager.
My mother and father had not met.
My father was heading into the Navy
So I was not actually on the horizon .

Elizabeth, our Queen is all I have known.
A monumental shift when she passes.

I was 3, so have no recollection at all.

I do remember the fancy dress Coronation Party thrown for the local children in one of the army huts. I was Hip Hip Hurrah and my sister was the Prince of Hearts (don't ask why, I've no idea what my mum was thinking and she's long gone so can't ask her).

Was it around June time, the coronation? Because I recall being convinced that the party was for my birthday

What a lovely thread, and so interesting to hear about everyone's memories. I don't have any as I was just a couple of months old, so I don't remember having a king rather than a queen. I have still described myself as a Georgian rather than an Elizabethan when pulling rank over younger people though!

I was at school taking my 11 plus exam. As we came out of the hall, someone ran up and announced ‘Kings Dead’. We all thought it was our headmaster Mr King!

I have still described myself as a Georgian rather than an Elizabethan when pulling rank over younger people though!

My Dad was a Victorian.

Well, there you go, Callistemon21 - your Dad wins the competition! I don't suppose anyone can remeber someone who can trump that, after all.

Yes, the Coronation was 2nd June 1953.

I suppose June was chosen because the weather may be better.

Wheniwasyourage

Well, there you go, Callistemon21 - your Dad wins the competition! I don't suppose anyone can remeber someone who can trump that, after all.

Born in the 1800s too!

I wasn’t even the apple of my daddies eye then ???.

If you mean what was I doing when George VI died, I was aged six, at Primary school, and we were given the afternoon off. I was looking forward to Listen with Mother, but there were no programmes on the radio, only sombre music and news bulletins.
We had our 12 inch screen television for the Coronation the next year and the neighbours came in, exactly like 'Behind the scenes at the Museum.; I am pretty sure I wore my angora bolero and strappy silver sandals. We had bunting outside and an enormous Union Flag.

I don't remember the accession but I remember the coronation. There was a party in our street and someone had hired a freezer for ice cream. My very first taste of ice cream at 4 years old and they must have set the freezer too low because the ice cream was so cold it burned! I still have the Union Jack that my parents pinned to the fence.

I wasn't born ,but clearing out MIL's house last month theres a coronation mug for her fathers coronation and a newspaper from the day WW11 was announced .We handed then into a local school ,loads od Charles and DI tat ,we binned it .Nothing with Lizzies coronation on it .I imagine my FIL wouldn't have been happy about a woman on the throne ,he was a tory voter who left when Thatcher was leader for the same reason.