# Queen Elizabeth was conceived through artificial insemination? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 4, 2011, 11:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/queen-elizabeth-was-conceived-through-artificial-insemination/573534 "2011-03-04T23:33:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Lord\_Feldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lord_feldon/32/341_2.png) [@Lord\_Feldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lord_Feldon)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2011, 3:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/queen-elizabeth-was-conceived-through-artificial-insemination/573534/21 "2011-03-05T03:10:03Z")
> [@Blake](#): > > Since it didn’t in 1936, I think we can safely say that the answer is “No”. But in 1936, the UK Parliament hadn’t [explicitly renounced its authority](http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1986/2/section/1) to create legislation that is binding in Australia. ---
**Author:** ![Uncertain](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Uncertain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uncertain)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2011, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/queen-elizabeth-was-conceived-through-artificial-insemination/573534/22 "2011-03-05T04:00:50Z")
If George VI had merely been impotent, his sperm could have fertilized his wife, one way or another. ---
**Author:** ![joebuck20](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/74df32/32.png) [@joebuck20](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/joebuck20)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2011, 5:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/queen-elizabeth-was-conceived-through-artificial-insemination/573534/23 "2011-03-05T05:49:58Z")
I highly doubt. If you’ve ever seen a picture of King George VI, he looks a lot like Prince Charles. As a sidenote, I also think he looks a lot more like Geoffrey Rush than Colin Firth. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2011, 6:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/queen-elizabeth-was-conceived-through-artificial-insemination/573534/24 "2011-03-05T06:10:47Z")
I think we can be very sure that IF she was conceived through artificial insemination no records would have been left around where [del]Rita Skeeter[/del]Kitty Kelley could uncover them. If people didn’t know about his speech therapist you can be damned sure they wouldn’t know about fertility procedures. Even the nurses probably wouldn’t have known who they were working with. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2011, 6:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/queen-elizabeth-was-conceived-through-artificial-insemination/573534/25 "2011-03-05T06:21:06Z")
> [@Uncertain](#): > > If George VI had merely been impotent, his sperm could have fertilized his wife, one way or another. They made a move about it! _The King’s Spooge_ ---
**Author:** ![Heyoka13](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Heyoka13](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Heyoka13)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2011, 6:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/queen-elizabeth-was-conceived-through-artificial-insemination/573534/26 "2011-03-05T06:43:44Z")
Probably too much to hope for that the Queen (or anyone else in the ‘know’) will ‘pull a Nancy Reagan’ and confirm, at least in broad swatches, any of the meat and potatoes in the Kelley book. But we can hope . . . :eek: ---
**Author:** ![Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/46a35a/32.png) [@Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tim_T-Bonham.net)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2011, 8:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/queen-elizabeth-was-conceived-through-artificial-insemination/573534/27 "2011-03-05T08:11:24Z")
> [@j66](#): > > Apparently, I was not clear. > > Leaving aside such minor issues as thrones and such, hasn’t this been challenged? > > Can a child born during a marriage who is proven not the child of the male by DNA testing be denied child support or inheritence under current English law? Don’t know about UK law, but there have been cases within various US states of this. Generally, courts have ruled that legally, the child is the child of the mother’s husband at the time, regardless of physical, genetic, or DNA evidence. The general reason given is for the benefit of the child – it’s in their best interest to continue to have as legal parents the people who have been raising the child, rather than forcing the child to adjust to a new parent. This has more weight the longer they have been raising the child (some states may have statute of limitations clauses that affect this – 18 years would seem an obvious one). Since some 85 years have gone by for Elizabeth II, the legal question is probably moot. ---
**Author:** ![jackdavinci](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackdavinci/32/3259_2.png) [@jackdavinci](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jackdavinci)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2011, 8:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/queen-elizabeth-was-conceived-through-artificial-insemination/573534/28 "2011-03-05T08:32:34Z")
> [@dolphinboy](#): > > Did they have artificial insemination in 1925 (she was born in 1926)? I didn’t think so… Errr… external fertilization in a petri dish is one thing, but artificial insemination only requires scooping up some sperm and sticking it in the vagina. This is stone age technology. Worse case scenario, involves a quick fuck. ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2011, 8:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/queen-elizabeth-was-conceived-through-artificial-insemination/573534/29 "2011-03-05T08:47:46Z")
> [@Lazy](#): > > From what I can tell from Google, the earliest recorded case of human artificial insemination dates to 1884, when a Doctor Pancoast injected a medical student’s sperm into a woman using a syringe. **(The woman, who was under anesthetic at the time, was unaware that he had done this.)** So… It was a prank, then? ---
**Author:** ![Cunctator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/43a26b/32.png) [@Cunctator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cunctator)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2011, 9:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/queen-elizabeth-was-conceived-through-artificial-insemination/573534/30 "2011-03-05T09:12:42Z")
The same claim has been made about the conception of [King Olav V of Norway](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olav_V) (1903-1991). He was said to have been fathered by Sir Francis Laking, the doctor of Queen Maud (possibly without her knowledge), in order to cover up for the infertility of King Haakon VII: [link](http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/3746596.stm) ---
**Author:** ![A.Gwilliam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ea5d25/32.png) [@A.Gwilliam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/A.Gwilliam)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2011, 11:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/queen-elizabeth-was-conceived-through-artificial-insemination/573534/31 "2011-03-05T11:25:46Z")
> [@Blake](#): > > Since it didn’t in 1936, I think we can safely say that the answer is “No”. That was before the _Statute of Westminster_ was adopted into Australian law, and long before the passage of the _Australia Acts_. The combination of the two has two consequences: (a) the Australian federal parliament was incapable in 1936 of legislating to affect the succession to the throne, whereas it has that power today; and (b) in 1936 the “Imperial” abdication Act applied to Australia by the “request and consent” principle, which can no longer be used today. > [@j66](#): > > Apparently, I was not clear. > > Leaving aside such minor issues as thrones and such, hasn’t this been challenged? > > Can a child born during a marriage who is proven not the child of the male by DNA testing be denied child support or inheritence under current English law? I believe so, although only (not necessarily using DNA testing) since the 1960s. However, I very much doubt (though don’t claim to know for certain) that it would be possible for the paternity of a child to be challenged in court where the dead husband had accepted the child as theirs. And we still have the problem of finding that irate member of the family with _locus standi_… ---
**Author:** ![MandaJo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac91a4/32.png) [@MandaJo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MandaJo)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2011, 11:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/queen-elizabeth-was-conceived-through-artificial-insemination/573534/32 "2011-03-05T11:50:43Z")
It’s not the technology of insemination that was lacking, but the technology of _timing_. Eggs have about a 24 hour window where they can be fertilized. These days, artificial insemination involves very close monitoring of the ovaries to catch ovulation, and even with that, the success rate is under 10% per round. With medication to up the number of eggs and ultrasound to more closely monitor the ovulation and a trigger shot to force the ovulation at the optimal moment, the odds can inch up to as high as 25% per round. I’m not sure how much they knew about the timing of ovulation in the early 1920s, but to have any chance of it working, they have to had used a real shotgun approach, and even then it would have taken a while. Almost certainly, it wouldn’t have been a one-time procedure, it would have been a way of life for everyone involved for months and months. Which doesn’t mean it still couldn’t have been kept secret, but it would have been an elaborate and complicated conspiracy, not just a squirt in the dark. ---
**Author:** ![Lazy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/9fc29f/32.png) [@Lazy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lazy)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2011, 1:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/queen-elizabeth-was-conceived-through-artificial-insemination/573534/33 "2011-03-05T13:21:27Z")
> [@Johnny\_L.A](#): > > So… It was a prank, then? No. Apparently the woman was being tested for infertility. Eventually it was discovered that the problem was the husband’s. The doctor, I guess believing he was doing a good deed, artificially inseminated her without ever telling her. She gave birth 9 months later. I wonder if that was legally rape. It wasn’t reported until 25 years later, in 1909. ---
**Author:** ![alphaboi867](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alphaboi867/32/3898_2.png) [@alphaboi867](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alphaboi867)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2011, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/queen-elizabeth-was-conceived-through-artificial-insemination/573534/34 "2011-03-05T17:06:12Z")
> [@Sampiro](#): > > I think we can be very sure that IF she was conceived through artificial insemination no records would have been left around where [del]Rita Skeeter[/del]Kitty Kelley could uncover them. If people didn’t know about his speech therapist you can be damned sure they wouldn’t know about fertility procedures. Even the nurses probably wouldn’t have known who they were working with. There were no records kept back then. Once the woman got pregnant any record that could be used in paternity proceedings or to dispute inheirtance would’ve been promply burned. Certainly the donor would’ve never been told who he was donating too (remember a fresh, not frozen, speciman would’ve been used back then so he’d be in another room while she was at the surgery/clinic). > [@Lazy](#): > > No. Apparently the woman was being tested for infertility. Eventually it was discovered that the problem was the husband’s. The doctor, I guess believing he was doing a good deed, artificially inseminated her without ever telling her. She gave birth 9 months later… The doctor didn’t tell _her_. Her husband knew, gave consent, and was the one to instruct the doctor not to tell her. She thought she was being inseminated with her husband’s sperm. The husband may have also been the one to select which medical student provided the donation. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2011, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/queen-elizabeth-was-conceived-through-artificial-insemination/573534/35 "2011-03-05T19:21:52Z")
> [@kunilou](#): > > Elizabeth was born in 1926 and Margaret was born in 1930. At that time their father was the kid brother of the Crown Prince… Nitpick: Prince of Wales. > **[Edward VIII](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_VIII_of_the_United_Kingdom#Titles_and_styles)** > > Edward VIII (Edward Albert Christian George Andrew Patrick David; 23 June 1894 – 28 May 1972), later known as the Duke of Windsor, was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India, from 20 January 1936 until his abdication in December of the same year.\[a\] > Edward was born during the reign of his great-grandmother Queen Victoria as the eldest child of the Duke and Duchess of York, later King George V and Queen Mary. He was created Prince of Wales on his 16th birth... ---
**Author:** ![Lazy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/9fc29f/32.png) [@Lazy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lazy)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2011, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/queen-elizabeth-was-conceived-through-artificial-insemination/573534/36 "2011-03-05T20:04:53Z")
> [@](#): > > The doctor didn’t tell _her_. Her husband knew, gave consent, and was the one to instruct the doctor not to tell her. She thought she was being inseminated with her husband’s sperm. The husband may have also been the one to select which medical student provided the donation. Checking a bit further, I find that the husband did indeed give his permission. That was really sloppy of me not to have noted that. That modifies the ethical question, for sure. ---
**Author:** ![j666](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/9de0a6/32.png) [@j666](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/j666)\ **Post date:** [March 8, 2011, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/queen-elizabeth-was-conceived-through-artificial-insemination/573534/37 "2011-03-08T23:16:49Z")
> [@Lazy](#): > > Checking a bit further, I find that the husband did indeed give his permission. That was really sloppy of me not to have noted that. That modifies the ethical question, for sure. How? ---
**Author:** ![horsetech](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/dec6dc/32.png) [@horsetech](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/horsetech)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2011, 12:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/queen-elizabeth-was-conceived-through-artificial-insemination/573534/38 "2011-03-09T00:22:53Z")
> [@Heyoka13](#): > > Probably too much to hope for that the Queen (or anyone else in the ‘know’) will ‘pull a Nancy Reagan’ and confirm, at least in broad swatches, any of the meat and potatoes in the Kelley book. > > But we can hope . . . > > :eek: I think this is more of a frank and beans issue than a meat and potatoes issue. Manda JO, that success rate sounds low enough that I wonder how much patient selection is a factor, since almost by definition couples that go to the trouble of AI instead of the old-fashioned way are having fertility problems. I’m not doubting your numbers, just musing on WHY they’re so low. Do you know any numbers for women of unknown/presumed normal reproductive status who START with AI for whatever reason? ---
**Author:** ![A.Gwilliam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ea5d25/32.png) [@A.Gwilliam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/A.Gwilliam)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2011, 12:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/queen-elizabeth-was-conceived-through-artificial-insemination/573534/39 "2011-03-09T00:24:15Z")
> [@j66](#): > > How? It modifies it from one horrible set of circumstances to another horrible set of circumstances! ---
**Author:** ![j666](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/9de0a6/32.png) [@j666](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/j666)\ **Post date:** [March 9, 2011, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/queen-elizabeth-was-conceived-through-artificial-insemination/573534/40 "2011-03-09T02:00:33Z")
> [@A.Gwilliam](#): > > It modifies it from one horrible set of circumstances to another horrible set of circumstances! Yes, but the ethical issue, in this womb holder’s opinion, does not change. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/queen-elizabeth-was-conceived-through-artificial-insemination/573534.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/queen-elizabeth-was-conceived-through-artificial-insemination/573534.md?page=3)