LONDON, March 30: The Queen Mother, the 101-year-old mother of Britain’s Queen Elizabeth, died in her sleep on Saturday, Buckingham Palace said.

The Queen Mother, the widow of King George VI and a rock of support behind her eldest daughter Queen Elizabeth, 75, died after a period of increasing frailty.

Buckingham Palace said: “The Queen, with the greatest sadness, has asked for the following announcement to be made immediately.

“Her beloved mother, Queen Elizabeth, died peacefully in her sleep this afternoon, at Royal Lodge, Windsor.”

Her death adds personal tragedy to a succession of domestic traumas suffered by the royal family in recent years, most recently the death on February 9 of her younger daughter, Princess Margaret at the age of 71.

The “Queen Mum”, as she was affectionately known, was the queen consort during World War Two and was the devoted companion of King George, who unexpectedly became king after his brother Edward VIII abdicated in 1936 to marry American divorcee Wallis Simpson.

Nazi Germany’s Adolf Hitler branded her the most dangerous woman in Europe for her morale boosting contribution to the British war effort after she refused to leave London to escape the wartime attacks called the “Blitz” and visited areas of the city damaged by bombing.

To younger generations of Britons she was the nation’s favourite grandmother.—Reuters