AGE 5 Queen Elizabeth II Signed LILIBET Royal Christmas Card Document to Crawfie

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AGE 5 Queen Elizabeth II Signed LILIBET Royal Christmas Card Document to Crawfie:
$10199.96

LOT-O240. For your consideration is an exceedingly rare and historically important original antique c.1931 royal family presentation Christmas card to Governess Marion Crawford (also known as Crawfie, hand-signed, inscribed, and colored by H.M. Queen Elizabeth II as H.R.H. Princess Elizabeth at age 5!

Royal card measures approximately 3.0" x 3.5". Condition is original / excellent. Incredibly, hand-colored by Elizabeth II. Although small, this is one of the rarest and most sought-after examples of Queen Elizabeth's autograph in existence. Although simple and elementary, the fact that this card was also hand-colored by Princess Elizabeth places it in a category so exceptionally rare, only one other card like this is known to exist and now resides in a private collection.

Museum quality. One of a kind. Signed LILIBET!

Elizabeth was born on 21 April 1926, the first child of Prince Albert, Duke of York (later King George VI), and his wife, Elizabeth, Duchess of York (later Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother). Her father was the second son of King George V and Queen Mary, and her mother was the youngest daughter of Scottish aristocrat Claude Bowes-Lyon, 14th Earl of Strathmore and Kinghorne. She was delivered at 02:40 (GMT) by Caesarean section at her maternal grandfather's London home, 17 Bruton Street in Mayfair. The Anglican Archbishop of York, Cosmo Gordon Lang, baptised her in the private chapel of Buckingham Palace on 29 May, and she was named Elizabeth after her mother; Alexandra after her paternal great-grandmother, who had died six months earlier; and Mary after her paternal grandmother. She was called "Lilibet" by her close family, based on what she called herself at first. She was cherished by her grandfather George V, whom she affectionately called "Grandpa England", and her regular visits during his serious illness in 1929 were credited in the popular press and by later biographers with raising his spirits and aiding his recovery.

Marion Crawford, CVO (5 June 1909 – 11 February 1988) was a Scottish educator and governess to Princess Margaret and Princess Elizabeth (the future Queen Elizabeth II), who called her Crawfie. Crawford was the named author of the book The Little Princesses, which told the story of her time with the royal family. After the book was published in 1950, Crawford was socially ostracised and left Nottingham Cottage, her grace and favour house, which had been granted to her for life. Neither the Queen nor any other member of the Royal Family spoke to her again.

Crawford was born, the daughter of a mechanical engineer's clerk, at Gatehead, East Ayrshire, on 5 June 1909. She was raised in Dunfermline, Fife and taught at Edinburgh's Moray House Institute. While studying to become a child psychologist, she took a summer job as the governess for Lord Elgin's children. This led her to take a role in the household of the Duke and Duchess of York (later King George VI and Queen Elizabeth), as the Duchess was a distant relative of Lord Elgin. After one year the arrangement was made permanent.

Crawford became one of the governesses of Princess Elizabeth and Princess Margaret. Following the abdication of King Edward VIII in 1936, the Duke of York ascended the throne as King George VI, and Elizabeth became the heir presumptive. Crawford remained in service to the King and Queen, and did not retire until Princess Elizabeth's marriage in 1947, Crawford herself had married two months earlier. Crawford had already delayed her own marriage for 16 years so as not to, as she saw it, abandon the King and Queen.