Her christening took place on 29 May in the private chapel at Buckingham Palace, which was later destroyed by a bomb. It was presided over by Archbishop of York Cosmo Gordon Lang, and her godparents were Lady Elphinstone (her aunt); Arthur, Duke of Connaught (great-great-uncle); Queen Mary and King George V (paternal grandparents); the Earl of Strathmore (maternal grandfather); and Princess Mary, Viscountess Lascelles (aunt). The occasion was described by Mabell Airlie, who was in attendance to Queen Mary as one of her ladies of the bedchamber on that day: ‘She was a lovely baby although she cried so much all through the ceremony that immediately after it her old-fashioned nurse [Clara Knight] dosed her well from a bottle of dill water – to the surprise of the modern young mothers present and to the amusement of her uncle, the Prince of Wales.’

The baby was named Elizabeth Alexandra Mary – after her mother, her great grandmother and her grandmother – and she wore the gown of cream satin Honiton lace that had been worn by all of Queen Victoria’s nine children and subsequently by every royal child until 2004. She was baptised with water from the River Jordan, which had been sent from the Holy Land for the christening. The bottle of holy water was delivered by Mabell Airlie to Bruton Street the day after the general strike ended, and she had to push through the crowds outside to gain entrance. ‘There are always a few people waiting to see her,’ the Duke of York told her when she finally got through, ‘but there have never been so many as today.’

It was a pattern that was to last her whole life. But in the 1920s and for much of the 1930s, the idea that Princess Elizabeth might become Queen was hardly considered, least of all by the Yorks, who were looking forward to gradually expanding their family. They expected to be pushed down the line of succession by the children from any union the Prince of Wales might make, little realising what was to come.