10 Lesser Known Facts About Queen Elizabeth II

3. She Was Never Meant To Be Queen

AS400 DB/Corbis
AS400 DB/Corbis

The long history of the British monarchy is littered with people becoming ruler when they shouldn€™t have been. This was usually accomplished by murder or war however it was for a very different reason that Queen Elizabeth II became monarch.

Her uncle (Edward VIII) had been crowned King and it was expected that he would marry and the royal lineage would continue down his family line. However he fell in love with an American divorcee called Wallis Simpson who still had two living ex husbands. England was a very conservative country in the 1930€™s and for the King to marry such a wanton €˜hussy€™ would have caused great angst and probable uproar amongst his subjects (not to mention the Church of England (of which he was head).

However such was his affection for the woman, the King decided to abdicate in 1936, less than a year after his coronation This meant that her father became King George VI and she became first in line. Upon his death in 1952 Elizabeth became Queen.

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