King George VI and Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon were married on April 26, 1923, at Westminster Abbey, starting a 29-year partnership that ended with the King’s death on February 6, 1952.
At the time of their wedding, the King was known as Prince Albert, Duke of York. He had courted Elizabeth for more than two years, persevering through two rejected proposals before she finally accepted his third.
Their lives changed permanently in 1936 when his older brother, King Edward VIII, abdicated the throne. Albert reluctantly became monarch as King George VI, and Elizabeth became his Queen consort. Together, they became powerful symbols of British resolve, famously refusing to leave London during the heavy bombings of World War II.
The heavy pressures of the war, combined with severe smoking-related illnesses and lung cancer, severely damaged the King’s health in his later years. On the morning of February 6, 1952, King George VI was found dead in his bed at Sandringham House. He had passed away peacefully in his sleep from a coronary thrombosis at the age of 56. His eldest daughter immediately succeeded him, becoming Queen Elizabeth II.
His widow, who then took the title Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother, survived him by half a century. On March 30, 2002, she passed away peacefully in her sleep at the Royal Lodge in Windsor at the remarkable age of 101. Today, they are buried alongside each other in the King George VI Memorial Chapel at St George’s Chapel, Windsor Castle.
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