Queen Elizabeth II ascends to the throne in The Crown in 1952. The series depicts her accession following the death of her father, King George VI, on February 6, 1952.
Elizabeth was in Kenya with Prince Philip when she learned that her father had died. At only 25, she immediately became queen, although the formal coronation took place later, on June 2, 1953, at Westminster Abbey. The Crown’s first season dramatizes both the sudden change in her status and the preparation for that ceremony.
The year 1952 marks accession, not coronation. That distinction causes the most common confusion in this question: Elizabeth became monarch in 1952 but was crowned in 1953. Her reign lasted more than 70 years, making it the longest of any British monarch at the time of her death in 2022.
The first season also places the transition within a wider political setting. Winston Churchill was prime minister, and the young queen had to learn how to work with successive governments while balancing constitutional duties with the private pressures of royal life.