The Conversion of ‘Amazing Grace’ Writer John Newton, March 10, 1748

n his later years as the pastor at Olney church, John Newton said, “Let me not fail to praise that grace that could pardon such sins as mine”. A former slave trader and a cruel reprobate, the redeemed man who authored the beloved hymn, ‘Amazing Grace’, became an epitome of the principle Jesus taught us in Luke 7:47, that “those who have been forgiven much, love much”.

John Newton (1725-1807), memorialized in a stained glass window in the church he pastored: St. Peter and Paul Church, Olney, Buckinghamshire, England

Newton’s story is a familiar one for the time. After the death of his mother, he was sent to sea at age eleven, being apprenticed on one of his father’s ships. At sea Newton spent his young life in the isolated, vast and often cruel world of maritime trade. There, by his own admission, he learned and practiced every form of profane conduct. At eighteen he was unwillingly pressed into service in the Royal Navy and after attempting to desert, he was arrested, flogged, and relieved of his post. He was then transferred to a merchant vessel headed for Africa where his fortunes plummeted even further. Falling out with the trader who was transporting him, Newton became enslaved himself, becoming the tormented plaything of the trader’s African wife and as he himself wrote “a servant of slaves in Africa.”

A cutaway model of a 1700s slaving ship in the Middle Passage, much like what John Newton would have been aboard

Tensions aboard ships often ran high, with crowded conditions and unscrupulous sailors

He escaped this predicament by joining the crew of a slave ship where his physical condition improved but his conscience decayed yet more. Thus, barely twenty years of age, Newton was witness and perpetrator in man-stealing and the callous transportation of human souls from Africa across the ocean to English colonies in the Caribbean and North America. His family and friends back home were grieved by his behavior and his life—once dedicated to the principles of Christ in childhood—that was now given over to impulse and ambition. Newton later wrote:

Bringing a new load on board a slave ship

“The troubles and miseries . . . were my own. I brought them upon myself by forsaking [God’s] good and pleasant paths and choosing the way of transgressors which I found very hard; they led to slavery, contempt, famine and despair.”

Sketch of the layout of a French slave ship of Newton’s era, the Marie Séraphique

He became so depressed at such work that he thought to end his life, but the memory of his mother’s teachings and love for a sweetheart back home restrained him; he would later find such restraint a mercy intended to save his life for better work.

Leaving Africa on a work trip aboard a slave ship bound for the American colonies, Newton found a copy of Thomas à Kempis’ The Imitation of Christ and, to pass the time, began to read it with indifference until he was startled at the thought of, “What if these things should be true?” That was the evening of March 9, 1748. In the early dawn of the next morning on the 10th, a vicious gale struck his ship. Newton writes:

A 1441 edition of Thomas à Kempis’ The Imitation of Christ, originally written in Latin

“I went to bed in my usual indifference, but was awakened by a violent sea which broke on us. Much of it came down below and filled the cabin where I lay. This alarm was followed by a cry that the ship was going down. We had immediate recourse to the pumps, but the water increased against all our efforts, Almost every passing wave broke over my head. I expected that every time the vessel descended into the sea, she would rise no more. I dreaded death now, and my heart foreboded the worst, if the Scriptures which, I had long since opposed, were true. . . I cried to the Lord for mercy but was instantly struck with what mercy can there be for me? The ship’s chief blasphemer, the loudest swearer, the man who mocked the Lord’s existence. What mercy can there be for me?”

An English ship is overcome by a storm

To the shock of this seasoned man of the sea, Newton’s vessel—or what remained of it—remained afloat. They landed in Ireland and there he went to the nearest church and “engaged to be the Lord’s forever, and only His.” As many Christians can attest, while the soul’s quickening may occur in a dramatic fashion, one’s return to Christ can be a slow and meandering process of trial and repentance. Newton’s was the same, for after this fateful saving of his life he began to read the New Testament, to pray and refrain from profanity, but continued on in his employment as a slave trader. He later wrote:

“How faint and wavering were my first returns to Thee! What a poor creature I am in myself, incapable of standing a single hour without continual fresh supplies of strength and grace from the fountain-head.”

The village of Olney, Buckinghamshire, England on the bank of the River Great Ouse, with the spire of St. Peter and Paul Church where Newton pastored

Newton would return home and go on to marry the love of his life, Mary Catlett, and together they grew in love for the word of God, a love that he said came to perpetually inflame his heart. It also brought him to despise his mode of employment, although most of the people in England—sheltered from witnessing its cruel mechanics—saw the slave trade as a very legitimate and rewarding business. Newton prayed for the Lord to provide a different path for him to support his family and the Lord answered, in a fashion as peculiar as it was irreversible. He suffered a stroke while waiting on the fitting of one of his ships for another voyage to Africa, and the complications from it led to his resigning from the trade for good.

A page from Olney Hymns—published in 1779—showing ‘Amazing Grace’

The church and churchyard of St. Peter and Paul Church, Olney, Buckinghamshire, England

Amidst the peace prescribed for a complete convalescence, Newton felt himself called to the vocation that had once been his heart’s greatest desire as a boy at his mother’s knee—to become a preacher of the good news of Christ and Christ crucified for sinners. Thus the reprobate became a pastor, and he who had once hunted flesh for sale became a seeker of souls for salvation. God blessed Newton with a growing congregation, talent for writing many religious works, friends such as William Cowper who aided him in the writing of hymns for their services, and a reach far beyond the little hamlet of Olney where he ministered.

William Cowper (1731-1800)—friend, parishioner, and fellow hymn-writer with Newton

The vicarage at Olney, where the Newton family lived

In 1780 John Newton was called to become minister at St. Mary Woolnoth in London. “London is the last situation I should have chosen for myself,” Newton said, yet he courageously took on his place there in one of the most debauched cities of its time. Here Newton was sought out by an old acquaintance: the very young, dazzlingly-gifted, freshly-minted Member of Parliament, William Wilberforce. Newton had been Wilberforce’s pastor back in Olney when he was a boy and now, as Newton had experienced himself, Wilberforce was enduring a torturously slow drawing near to Christ after having abandoned the faith in his teen years. “I trust God is with me,” Wilberforce wrote to Newton after they reconnected, “but He must ever keep beside me, for I fall the moment I am left to myself.”

William Wilberforce (1759-1833)

The exterior of St. Mary Woolnoth in London

The interior of St. Mary Woolnoth in London

Under Newton’s mentorship—one that lasted for the next twenty-two years, only ending with Newton’s death—Wilberforce became a born-again believer and in due time the slave trade’s greatest opponent. Together these two men, along with a devout cohort of admirable comrades, labored for decades to end not only the slave trade—for which they are so rightly remembered—but the moral decay of their fellow Englishmen. A truly Christian country, they argued, would not be so callous to the commands of Christ as to commit such atrocities as occurred every day on slave ships and in city slums. Their aim was not only the abolition of slavery but of godlessness in all its forms.

Newton in his older years as a minister

The official medallion of the British Anti-Slavery Society, designed by Josiah Wedgwood, 1795

John Newton was granted the grace to live long enough to see the year 1807, when William Wilberforce’s now almost ancient bill to end the slave trade was passed by a strong majority into English law. As of May 1807, the trade was made illegal throughout the British Empire and in December of the same year, Newton went to be with his Lord. When the College of New Jersey (Princeton) sent word that they had given Newton an honorary Doctor of Divinity for his religious work, he commented that “the dreary coast of Africa had been his university” and that he would never accept any diploma “except from the poor blacks.” Newton remained amazed until his last days at what God had done for him by chasing after him when he had wandered so far from what was right. He wrote,

“I can see no reason why the Lord singled me out for mercy . . . unless it was to show, by one astonishing instance, that with Him ‘nothing is impossible’.”

A scene at the port in Hull, Yorkshire, England (birthplace of William Wilberforce) where the Wilberforce monument dominates the landscape

In his sermons Newton was want to pause and utter, as if moved by sudden adoration, “Jesus Christ is precious.”

In his epitaph, Newton summed up his life in these words:

“John Newton, once an infidel and libertine, a servant of slaves in Africa, was, by the rich mercy of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, preserved, restored, pardoned, and appointed to preach the faith he had long labored to destroy.”

Tomb of John Newton and his wife, Mary, in the churchyard of his early pastorate, St. Peter and Paul Church, Olney, Buckinghamshire, England

Image Credits: 1 Stained glass memorial (wikipedia.org) 2 Cutaway model of a slaver (wikipedia.org) 3 Tensions in the hold (wikipedia.org) 4 Loading a ship (wikipedia.org) 5 Layout of a slaver (wikipedia.org) 6 The Imitation of Christ (wikipedia.org) 7 Shipwreck (wikipedia.org) 8 River and church, Olney (wikipedia.org) 9 ‘Amazing Grace’ (wikipedia.org) 10 Church of Sts. Mary and John (wikipedia.org) 11 William Cowper (wikipedia.org) 12 Olney vicarage (wikipedia.org) 13 William Wilberforce (wikipedia.org) 14 Church of St. Mary Woolnoth, exterior (wikipedia.org) 15 Church of St. Mary Woolnoth, interior (wikipedia.org) 16 Minister Newton (wikipedia.org) 17 Abolition medallion (wikipedia.org) 18 Wilberforce Monument (wikipedia.org) 19 Newton tomb (wikipedia.org)

Bathild of Chelles—Evangelist to the French—Is Crowned Queen, March 2, 649

idnapped, crowned and credited with helping to reestablish Christianity in the region of France after the fall of the Roman Empire, Bathild of Chelles’ life rivals that of her great-great-great-grandson Charlemagne in its effect on western culture. Ages before France developed enlightened notions of propping up liberty, egality and fraternity as gods of the state, Bathild of Chelles enriched the country by her example of those Christian disciplines of justice, mercy and humility which bring prosperity and order to the darkest of regions.

Map of the Merovingian kingdoms at their height, c. 481–751

France—or “The Kingdom of the Franks” and its scattered Frankish and Celtic tribes, as it was then comprised of—was a barbaric place in the 600s. The ruling dynasty were the Merovingians, once generals in the Roman armies of occupation. Since the fall of the Empire, they capitalized on the newly-formed power vacuum left, and filled it themselves. By 509 the Merovingians had united all the Franks and northern Gallo-Romans under their rule, defeated the Visigoths (507) and the Burgundians (534), and also extended their rule into parts of modern-day Germany. Their realm was broad, feared and deeply pagan until the conversion of one their kings, a man named Clovis, who was led to Christ by his wife, Clothild, in the 480s.

The baptism of King Clovis I from The Great Chronicles of France, c. 1375-1380

And artist’s fanciful portrayl of King Clovis I (c. 466-511) being pointed heavenward by his Christian wife, Queen Clothild (c. 474-545)

Despite these earlier influences of Christianity, the various Frankish kingdoms under the rule of the Merovingians retained much of their pagan ways, or returned to them fully for lack of shepherding and devotion. They continued their entrenched folkways of abortion, slavery, murder and piracy despite the nominal presence of a corrupt Catholic clergy.

Sainte Bathilde sold in Erchinoal—an 18th Century interpretation of Bathilde being sold into slavery, having been captured by Frankish slave traders

As a young Anglo-Saxon girl living in Christian England, Bathild became the victim of these Frankish pirates, being stolen and carried off by them across the channel and sold into slavery in France. The narrative of her life—written shortly after her death by nuns who knew her personally in her later life at the convent of Chelles—write that, because of her beauty and education, she was bought on the mainland by a man named Erchinoald. By the good will of Providence, Erchinoald was majordomo of the palace, holding the responsibility of administrator for much of the kingdom. Erchinoald soon elevated Bathild to a position of his housekeeper and cupbearer, a station in which she was noted for retaining her humility, even making a queer habit of washing the feet of her master’s guests. Smitten by such beauty coupled with capability, Erchinoald set his heart on marrying her, but rather than wed a pagan lord, Bathild is said to have hid herself in a pile of rags while being searched for to be brought to him.

Clovis II (633 – 657) became king of the Franks in Neustria and Burgundy at the age of 6, after the death of his father, Dagobert I in 639

While we have such specific detail of her avoidance in marrying one of her captors, we have no such insight into how she came to be wed shortly after to the king himself. Whether the Frankish King of Neustria—yet another Clovis—noticed her before in the palace while she served his deputy, or whether she appealed to him after fleeing the deputy’s proposal, we do not know. Whatever the case, she escaped marriage from one pagan only to enter into it with another of higher standing. An eighth century history of Frankia describes Clovis II as a most repugnant mate, lecherous, debauched and a drunk—a heavy price for the crown placed on Bathild’s head in 649.

Another 18th Century engraving on the life of Bathild: King Clovis II buys Bathilde to make her the Queen of the Franks

She bore the king three living sons, all raised by her in the way of the Gospel and all made kings over their pagan father’s land by the merciful will of God in due time. Upon the death of her husband in 657, Bathild was elevated even further by becoming regent of the nation, her son and heir, Clothar, being too young to rule in his own right at the time. Her biographer paints a picture of an active and involved regent: she prohibited the practice of simony (paying for church office), suppressed the widespread practice of infanticide, and donated large amounts of money and land to the poor and to the church. Bathild banned the sale of Christian slaves, both to “outsiders” and within the borders of the Frankish kingdom, ordering in addition that “many captives should be ransomed, paying the price herself”. This effectively blocked the slave trade, of which she herself had been a victim.

Bathilde, widow of Clovis II, returns freedom to young slaves, engraved in 1814

The dormitory at Chelles Abbey—the Abbey itself was destroyed in 1796 during the French Revolution

Bathild made herself the patron of the monasteries under her domain—including that at Chelles—which served as both church and school to the general populace. Controversially she also began personally appointing ecclesiastical leaders to oversee these establishments, individuals often chosen from amongst her close circle of friends at court. This was understandable, as these were Christian men she could trust to practice orthodox behavior and steward their communities with probity. Its affect, however, was an extreme centralization of power vested in the monarchy and an invasion of its reach into the church and all kingdom affairs. She lost a son to this endeavor, murdered by a disgruntled bishop.

Ruins of The Old Watermill of Chelles, Seine-et-Marne, France

It was an amalgamation of power in the crown such as the tyrannical kings before her could never achieve—and this was bemoaned by the aristocracy of the time who preferred a loose confederacy of nations, ruled by themselves under the king, rather than the rigidly unified kingdom that Bathild began to coalesce. What glories and accomplishments that future, fully-centralized kingdom of France would go on to achieve for Europe and the cause of Christendom could not have been dreamt of at the time by her detractors.

An aged Queen Bathild with her three kingly sons

Upon resigning from the regency, Bathild retired to the monastery at Chelles, not without protest by her people who wished her to continue her administrations and moderations between the various warring factions in the kingdom. Some even suggest she was forcibly shunted off to the convent by political factions rather than seeking it out herself. Either way, we know she took her well-earned rest there at the convent she built after many delays, having in her time as regent completely institutionalized Christianity in both the ecclesiastical and domestic spheres by example and will. Her biographers repeatedly compare her storied life to that of the Biblical Queen Esther, and not without good reason.

Memorial statue of Queen Bathild (c. 626-680), in the Jardin du Luxembourg, Paris

Bathild lived at Chelles for many years, where the nuns protected her from intrusions by the public, and she in turn served alongside them, even in the most menial of tasks. She remained a diplomatic link between France and England even in this secluded place, fostering good relations between the two Christian kingdoms. Indeed, many early evangelists to Anglo-Saxon England, such as Hilda of Whitby, came from Queen Bathild’s Abbey at Chelles.

Image Credits: 1 John Bunyan (wikipedia.org) 2 Bunyan Day Celebration (wikipedia.org) 3 Window Detail (wikipedia.org) 4 Pilgrim’s Progress from Ligonier (wikipedia.org) 5 Wax Figure (wikipedia.org) 6 Stained Glass (wikipedia.org) 7 Evangelist (wikipedia.org) 8 Reading (wikipedia.org) 9 Ill-favored Ones (wikipedia.org) 10 Crossing the River (wikipedia.org) 11 Four Villains (wikipedia.org) 12 Map (wikipedia.org) 13 Bronze Doors (wikipedia.org) 14 “And I saw in a dream…”

The Pilgrim’s Progress Is First Published,
February 18, 1678

“Read anything of [Bunyan’s] and you will see that it is almost like reading the Bible itself. He had read it till his whole being was saturated with Scripture; and, though his writings are charmingly full of poetry, yet he cannot give us his Pilgrim’s Progress without continually making us feel and say, ‘Why, this man is a living Bible!’”—C. H. Spurgeon

ngland has long dominated the literary arena of the west. Even on a global scale the nation can boast a long list of prolific and enduring classics that accrue interest and income to this very day. Among these giants one might think of Shakespeare, of Milton or Dickens, but there is one humble author and his work who has outsold them all over the centuries since his publication—John Bunyan and his Pilgrim’s Progress. Second only to the Bible, Pilgrim’s Progress was the most-read and best-beloved book during the first three hundred years of American colonial and national life—an allegory that surpassed all other art forms to touch lives all across a spectrum of ages and affluence, and forever permeate Christian culture with its iconic characters and enduring parables.

John Bunyan (1628-1688)

Unveiling of a John Bunyan Memorial during the Bunyan Celebration of June 10, 1874—engraving published in the Illustrated London News ten days later

From the saga’s opening line—“As I walked through the wilderness of this world…”—there is in the book an immediate and profound recognition of our strangeness in this transient life, reflective of its Puritan writer and evocative of the Biblical destiny to be strangers in a strange land. The lot of Bunyan’s main character—Christian, as he is aptly named—is not to passively await a homecoming but rather to run a race to its harrowing finish, to fight a constant battle that ends only in his literal death, to journey tenaciously toward a completeness we will not fully achieve this side of The Celestial City.

Detail of a commemorative stained glass window, showing John Bunyan
seeing a vision of Pilgrim’s Progress

Written by Bunyan during his twelve-year imprisonment for preaching without a license in churches that did not conform to Anglican supremacy and liturgy, Pilgrim’s Progress is a masterpiece, poignantly personal in its observations of the Christian life and struggle.

The cover art of a stunning 1891 facsimile edition of Pilgrim’s Progress, published by friend of Landmark Events Pastor Mark Liddle, and available through Ligonier Ministries

Initially Bunyan set out to write it as a simple explanation of how the Christian life is like a long pilgrimage, in which one’s initial salvation from the burden of sin and hell does not bring immediate or permanent peace in this life. Yet he kept coming up with more and more illustrations, inspired by his own protracted conversion and perhaps by those of the other Christians sharing his prison cell at the time.

A wax portrayal of John Bunyan writing Pilgrim’s Progress while in Bedford Jail

The ‘Bunyan Stained Glass Window’ in Tyndale Baptist Church, Bristol, England

He imagined the inclination to doubt as a formidable castle, despondency to be a quagmire, despair to be a cruel and tormenting jailer, and the appeals of this world to be like a raucous fair—each temptation so harmlessly (it seems at first) turned to by the pilgrim, only to barely make it out of them with his life, the key to freedom being always in Christian’s pocket—that is, prayer—though often forgotten entirely in the anguish of the trial itself.

Evangelist pointing out the Wicket Gate, from which point Christian must set out on his journey

Christian hearing the tales of saints gone before during a time of rest and refreshing at The Palace Beautiful

Some “Ill-favored ones”

Christian and Hopeful cross the River in their final push to the Celestial City

The inhospitable locales in Bunyan’s tale were populated by a variety of carefully drawn villains such as Obstinate, Pliable, Mr. Worldly-Wiseman, Atheist and Faint-Heart. Despite the fact that Christian was helped from time to time by a whole host of heroic characters—such as Evangelist, Faithful, Goodwill, Hopeful, Knowledge, Watchful, Sincere, and Little-Faith—the hapless pilgrim had to struggle through one difficulty or distraction after another, and often alone. Again and again he was forced to decide between compromise or faithfulness, between accommodation with the world or holy perseverance.

Four villains Christian meets along his way to the Celestial City: Pride, Arrogancy, Self-Conceit and Worldly-glory

Through all these dangers, toils and snares, he comes at last—as all good literature brings us—to a happy ending, one singularly Christian in its conclusion being the ending of his mortal life and the beginning of an eternal one. As Augustus M. Toplady wrote, the book describes “every stage of a Christian’s experience, from conversion to glorification”.

A map of Christian’s journey from the City of Destruction to the Celestial City, as published in an 1821 edition

Written in Bunyan’s own common, self-taught, coarsely-pattered prose—a far cry from the polite literary convention of the seventeenth century—the book was immediately embraced by the average reader, and almost as quickly by academics who acclaimed it as a triumph of literary inspiration. Even those Christians who chafed a bit at Bunyan’s staunch Puritan theology, readily identified with his beautifully-realized vision of life in this fallen world and the Christian’s call to action in it. Even John Owens, the great and elevated Puritan scholar who possessed the privilege of having the King’s ear, praised Bunyan’s work and contributed to its publication.

In the guise of an adventure story, Pilgrim’s Progress is a penetrating portrayal of the universal human experience, and it remains a cherished Christian classic because of that. As the literary critic Roger Sharrock said, “A seventeenth-century Calvinist sat down to write a tract and produced a folk epic of the universal religious imagination instead.”

A set of copper and bronze doors from Bunyan Meeting Church, Bedford, England, showing scenes from Pilgrim’s Progress in each panel

An artist’s whimsical engraving of John Bunyan dozing off at his desk and dreaming of what would become Pilgrim’s Progress

Image Credits: 1 John Bunyan (wikipedia.org) 2 Bunyan Day Celebration (wikipedia.org) 3 Window Detail (wikipedia.org) 4 Pilgrim’s Progress from Ligonier (wikipedia.org) 5 Wax Figure (wikipedia.org) 6 Stained Glass (wikipedia.org) 7 Evangelist (wikipedia.org) 8 Reading (wikipedia.org) 9 Ill-favored Ones (wikipedia.org) 10 Crossing the River (wikipedia.org) 11 Four Villains (wikipedia.org) 12 Map (wikipedia.org) 13 Bronze Doors (wikipedia.org) 14 “And I saw in a dream…”

Elizabeth Windsor Becomes Queen Elizabeth II, February 6, 1952

oets, populaces and historians all have remained captivated by the ancient paradox of monarchy, of privilege burdened with duty, of symbolic might above judicial power, of a “Divine” inheritance over an elected figurehead.

Official coronation portrait of Queen Elizabeth II of England (1926-2022)—per her request, her coronation gown was embroidered with the floral emblems of all the nations over which she reigned

Some amongst these have suggested that monarchy is an obsolete institution in our modern age. That too, is an ancient fascination—the idea of abolishing it for good. What replaces it is the question, one that as Americans we feel we have in many ways solved, our system being based on the Biblical concepts of checks and balances. The judges of old whom God appointed before His people begged for a king that they might be like other nations. Yet while we have a revolving figurehead of executive power, in England there has been one dominant personality who, for over half a century, steadfastly represented the old ideals of devotion, duty and decorum in such rapidly degrading times.

Elizabeth in 1933

Elizabeth Windsor was England to many of us for all of our lives. Criticized at times as outdated, as slow to respond in a crisis, as emotionless and demure to a fault, she kept and represented in her reign all the steady and restrained attributes so offensive to a reactionary world. Combined, it is essential to note, she did with unflinching grit, devout faith and a quiet capacity for diplomacy.

King George VI (1895-1952)

Her inheritance of the throne being indeed hereditary, Elizabeth’s reign began with a deep personal tragedy—the death of her beloved father, King George VI (known to close friends as Bertie). A man of rare ability who was admired by his nation, his wife and his two daughters, he was an anomaly of familial success in monarchy. He inherited the throne from his brother, Edward VIII, who infamously gave up his duty as king to marry a three-time American divorcée, thus burdening his younger brother George with a role he was neither born nor prepared for, yet embraced with grace and fortitude. It was George VI who steered England through the Second World War, not as a distant monarch but as a man who walked the streets of bombed-out London again and again to minister to his people.

King Edward VIII and Wallis Simpson, 1936

The Queen and Princess Elizabeth (far right) speak with paratroopers as they prepare for D-Day, May 19, 1944

Heir to such a legacy of sacrifice and humble leadership, when her time came to step into the role, Elizabeth Windsor lived her life as a paragon of the old ideal. Even before the crown passed to her she served her country during WWII in the army as a mechanic for the Auxiliary Territory Service, and gave her famed Commonwealth Speech on her 21st birthday in which she pledged herself to the course she would then maintain for a reign of 70 years.

Princess Elizabeth in the Auxiliary Territorial Service, April 1945

She was, in fact, representing her ailing father on a tour of Kenya—accompanied by her husband, the future Prince Phillip, then titled the Duke of Edinburgh—when she received the news that the king had died. Gone in his sleep, after a battle with lung cancer, the crown was now passed to his twenty-five-year-old daughter. Her tour was immediately abandoned, a black dress procured so that her first public appearance en route to the airport might be in proper mourning garb, and her ruling name settled upon—she chose to continue on as Elizabeth.

Engagement portrait of Princess Elizabeth and Philip Mountbatten, September 18, 1947

A formal wedding portrait of Princess Elizabeth and Lieutenant Philip Mountbatten with members of the royal family, November 21, 1947

Upon arriving in England, she was received by the man who had been her father’s friend and comrade during Britain’s darkest hour, newly re-elected Prime Minister Winston Churchill. At a spry 77 years of age, he was back in power and took to guiding the young Queen in her duties with fatherly investment. Himself experiencing a second showing of faith by the people who had re-elected him, Churchill went on to polish his already dazzling legacy of exceptional oratory with a most honoring eulogy given for the late king, one that memorialized him fittingly and looked forward to the young queen’s reign with a hope she would go on to prove well-placed.

Prime Minister Winston Churchill (center)—an ever-present influence during both King Edward’s reign as well as the early days of Queen Elizabeth’s—with The King, Queen, and Princesses Elizabeth (left) and Margaret (right), on the balcony of Buckingham Palace, May 8, 1945

Winston Churchill making an “eve of poll” tour and speech, February 23, 1949

“When the death of the King was announced to us yesterday morning there struck a deep and solemn note in our lives which, as it resounded far and wide, stilled the clatter and traffic of twentieth-century life in many lands, and made countless millions of human beings pause and look around them. A new sense of values took, for the time being, possession of human minds, and mortal existence presented itself to so many at the same moment in its serenity and in its sorrow, in its splendour and in its pain, in its fortitude and in its suffering.

King George VI and his wife, Queen Elizabeth, 1939

The King was greatly loved by all his peoples. He was respected as a man and as a prince far beyond the many realms over which he reigned. The simple dignity of his life, his manly virtues, his sense of duty—alike as a ruler and a servant of the vast spheres and communities for which he bore responsibility—his gay charm and happy nature, his example as a husband and a father in his own family circle, his courage in peace or war—all these were aspects of his character which won the glint of admiration, now here, now there, from the innumerable eyes whose gaze falls upon the Throne…

The last few months of King George’s life, with all the pain and physical stresses that he endured—his life hanging by a thread from day to day, and he all the time cheerful and undaunted, stricken in body but quite undisturbed and even unaffected in spirit—these have made a profound and an enduring impression and should be a help to all.

Wedding portrait of Prince Albert, Duke of York (future King George VI) and Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, April 26, 192

King George VI (center) with British troops in Holland, October 13, 1944

He was sustained not only by his natural buoyancy, but by the sincerity of his Christian faith. During these last months the King walked with death as if death were a companion, an acquaintance whom he recognized and did not fear. In the end death came as a friend, and after a happy day of sunshine and sport, and after “good night” to those who loved him best, he fell asleep as every man or woman who strives to fear God and nothing else in the world may hope to do…

Queen Elizabeth II in 1953

Now I must leave the treasures of the past and turn to the future. Famous have been the reigns of our queens. Some of the greatest periods in our history have unfolded under their sceptre. Now that we have the second Queen Elizabeth, also ascending the throne in her twenty-sixth year, our thoughts are carried back nearly four hundred years to the magnificent figure who presided over and, in many ways, embodied and inspired the grandeur and genius of the Elizabethan age. Queen Elizabeth II, like her predecessor, did not pass her childhood in any certain expectation of the Crown. But already we know her well, and we understand why her gifts, and those of her husband, the Duke of Edinburgh [later “Prince” Phillip] have stirred the only part of the Commonwealth she has yet been able to visit. She has already been acclaimed as Queen of Canada.

Philip and Elizabeth on their honeymoon

Queen Elizabeth with her husband Prince Philip, daughter Princess Anne, and son Prince Charles (now King Charles III), 1957

We make our claim too, and others will come forward also, and tomorrow the proclamation of her sovereignty will command the loyalty of her native land and of all other parts of the British Commonwealth and Empire. I, whose youth was passed in the august, unchallenged and tranquil glories of the Victorian era, may well feel a thrill in invoking once more the prayer and the anthem, “God save the Queen!””
—Winston Churchill’s broadcasted tribute to King George VI

Prime Minister Winston Churchill (seated) with his son and grandson, dressed in their finest for the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II

Image Credits: 1 Queen Elizabeth II Coronation (wikipedia.org) 2 Elizabeth, 1933 (wikipedia.org) 3 King George VI (wikipedia.org) 4 King Edward VIII with Wallis Simpson (wikipedia.org) 5 Queen and Princess with troops (wikipedia.org) 6 Elizabeth in ATS (wikipedia.org) 7 Engagement Portrait (wikipedia.org) 8 Wedding Portrait (wikipedia.org) 9 Royal Family with Churchill (wikipedia.org) 10 Churchill, 1949 (wikipedia.org) 11 King George & Queen Elizabeth (wikipedia.org) 12 Wedding of George & Elizabeth (wikipedia.org) 13 King George in Holland (wikipedia.org) 14 Queen Elizabeth II, 1953 (wikipedia.org) 15 Honeymooners (wikipedia.org) 16 The Royal Family, 1957 (wikipedia.org) 17 Churchill for Coronation (wikipedia.org)