When Queen Elizabeth wrote to D’Arcy Osborne on 5 March 1949, it was with apologies for tardiness. She, at least, had good reason for it. ‘The last year has been rather like the war in a minor degree! Daughters getting engaged, and daughters marrying, and daughters having babies, & the King getting ill, & preparing for a tour of Australia & New Zealand, & then having to put it off – all these things are very filling to one’s life.’ She indicated her great love for the infant Charles – ‘very delicious, and [he] makes for a very nice soft innocent topic of conversation in a rather horrid, unkind world!’ – and suggested that her husband was, at last, on the mend. ‘The King is really getting on very well, though it will be fairly slow progress, and one good thing is that he is having the first rest since 1936.’ Signing herself ‘your sincere but totteringly aged friend’,1 the queen tacitly acknowledged that it was not just George who was feeling less than regal, as the most eventful of decades drew unceremoniously to its close.
Her allusion to the monarch’s health was not entirely candid. He had rallied very slightly at the beginning of 1949, and had been able to visit Sandringham to shoot, but he was now, reluctantly, coming to terms with the knowledge that he would be an invalid for the rest of his life. Lascelles commented to Lord Hardinge that ‘the [King] continues to please his doctors, but he won’t be out of the medical woods for many weeks yet’.2 Even if Harold Nicolson, who was engaged in writing a life of George V, heard his son described as being ‘as sweet and patient as can be’3 – a far cry from the often impatient and splenetic man he had been over the previous years* – it was still both a personal and a national humiliation for the king to be bedbound and immobile.
His mood was not helped by his being told by Professor Lear-mouth that he would require a right lumbar sympathectomy operation: a complex procedure that was intended to restore blood supply to his leg by cutting a nerve at the base of the spine, and therefore give him a degree of movement again. Get it wrong, and the risks could be paralysis, or death. The king was irritated by this, believing that it suggested the previous treatment had been a waste of time, but Learmouth assured him that the months of tedious bed rest had been necessary for him to gather his strength for the operation. He was more candid with a courtier who earnestly asked him how the monarch could become robust enough for such an operation. ‘With iron pills from Boots’4 was Learmouth’s pragmatic response.
On 12 March, after a bespoke operating theatre was constructed in the Buhl Room of Buckingham Palace, the procedure took place. The king had been forbidden cigarettes to keep him as healthy as possible, but even as he blithely announced his lack of concern as the anaesthetic took hold, it was yet another reminder that he was all too mortal. The monarch’s optimism was rewarded: the operation was a success, and his leg was saved, dispelling fears – or, in some treacherous quarters, hopes – that he would be perpetually disabled.
Nonetheless, he was instructed to take the next months as quietly as he could, avoiding both mental and physical stress and instead concentrating on domestic matters. Unfortunately for his equilibrium, he had a telephone call with the Duke of Windsor, who wrote to their mother to say, ‘it was a good conversation and he made light of having to submit to Professor Learmouth’s knife on Saturday’, but pronounced the situation ‘very disappointing’, and ‘tough luck on Bertie’.5 The queen, meanwhile, wrote to Princess Margaret on 8 May to say, ‘Papa is down at Royal Lodge this week, & I think that he is really better. He is taking an interest in his rhododendrons, & making plans for more planting, & altogether beginning to perk up.’ It was with determined optimism that she confided in her daughter that ‘if he can go on as he is doing, & not get exhausted in London, he will soon be back to his old form’.6
On 21 March, Nicolson had an interview with Queen Mary, ostensibly to discuss the life of George V for his biography, but he soon found that she was more interested in talking about her ailing son. She hinted that his decline was the result of his elder brother’s behaviour: ‘he was devoted to his brother, and the whole abdication crisis made him miserable. He sobbed on my shoulder for a whole hour … but he has made good. Even his stammer has been corrected.’ Maternal feelings overcame regal reserve, as, ‘in such a sad voice’, Queen Mary said, ‘and now he is so ill, poor boy, so ill’.7
At first, the indications were that Learmouth had performed a kind of miracle. By 17 June, the king was sufficiently recovered to be able to dance at a ball at Ascot, albeit with discreet breaks during which his leg was placed in a foot rest,* and in July, he performed investiture ceremonies, wearing black suede shoes; a necessary contrast to the formality of the evening dress he wore for the events. His recovery seemed a blessing, and an enduring one. On 21 July, the queen could write, with genuine rather than forced confidence, to Eleanor Roosevelt, responding to her enquiries about her husband’s health, that ‘I am glad to be able to tell you that [the king] is really better, and with care should be quite well in a year or so. It is always a slow business with a leg, and the great thing is not to get overtired during convalescence.’ Acknowledging the problems with this forced inertia – ‘you can imagine how difficult this is to achieve with the world in its present state, & worries & troubles piling up’ – she nevertheless stated, ‘he is making such good progress, & for that I am profoundly grateful’.8
While the king rested and rallied, his elder daughter and her husband, unencumbered by the responsibilities of looking after their infant son, began to establish themselves as society figures. They associated with the leading actors and comedians of the day, including Danny Kaye, Laurence Olivier and his wife Vivien Leigh, and generally provided a youth and glamour that the princess’s parents were no longer able to offer. Channon, who remained besotted by Philip, wrote on 17 June in his diary, with an atypical touch of sentiment, that ‘the two Edinburghs made a somewhat late appearance [at a ball] and they looked superb. They were like characters in a fairy tale.’9 A fortnight before, he had been wildly – perhaps characteristically – inaccurate. ‘Princess Elizabeth’s pregnancy is becoming more obvious but nobody yet knows officially* … I am told … that the Windsors are getting on very badly; but I don’t believe it.’10
In early July 1949, the family moved into Clarence House in St James’s. The building had been designed by John Nash in the mid 1820s for the former Duke of Clarence – and subsequent William IV – and was once regarded as one of London’s finest private houses. However, years of neglect and the bed-blocking antics of the Duke of Connaught, the last surviving son of Queen Victoria, had turned it into an unsanitary wreck; it had been bombed in the war and was in desperate need of refurbishment to make it habitable, let alone luxurious.
Philip, who had not had a permanent home of his own in decades, undertook the renovation with typical vigour. He was helped by a grant of £50,000 – around £2.2 million in today’s money – that the family had been given by Parliament to make the accommodation acceptable for the future queen, which did not include allowances for some of the extravagant gadgetry and luxuries that the Duke of Edinburgh desired. These included everything from a basement private cinema to an automated closet that would spit out a suit of its wearer’s choice at the touch of an electronic button; sophistication that was only rivalled by that most modernistic of inventions, the electric trouser press. The total cost, unsurprisingly, came in at £28,000 over budget, despite countless gifts provided from well-wishers. It became almost a badge of honour for Commonwealth countries to provide samples of everything from timber to indigenous art, leading to the logistical nightmare of where to place often incompatible or unwanted products so as not to cause offence to their eager donors.
Philip and Elizabeth had what most would recognise as a thoroughly modern marriage.* Although each retained their own bedroom, kept apart by a dressing room, valets and other members of staff were somewhat abashed to see the two of them together in bed on more than one occasion, and James MacDonald, Philip’s valet, reported that the Duke of Edinburgh was blithely naked in his wife’s presence. They had separate bathrooms – Philip’s, naturally enough, was painted blue and decorated with pictures of the ships he had served on – and at a time when virtually no home in the country had a television, Clarence House could boast several, including one installed in the servants’ hall: a wedding gift from Uncle Dickie.
By now, those who were living in close quarters with the couple could observe their characters. The nursery footman, John Gibson, who was responsible for the gleaming maintenance of Prince Charles’s pram, described them as ‘just ordinary people … a lot less formal than some people I came across’.11 Philip’s often brusque and straightforward manner did not obscure a genuine interest in and, when needed, compassion for those who were paid to look after him. He continued his work at the Admiralty, which bored him, and threw himself into other activities to compensate. As Mike Parker said to Brandreth, ‘He crackled with energy. He made things happen. He made things jump … He wanted to make a difference and, if necessary, he was ready to make a noise.’12
His wife, meanwhile, was not one of life’s natural noisemakers, being given to a public reserve that some could take for shyness, or simply a desire not to overshadow her husband. When it was announced in October 1949 that the duke was to be posted to Malta as first lieutenant and second in command of HMS Chequers, there was no hesitation on either Elizabeth or Philip’s part that she should accompany him. As Parker informed her biographer, Ben Pimlott, ‘this was a fabulous period when it was thought a good idea for her to become a naval officer’s wife’.13 Perhaps surprisingly, the ultimate approval came from the king himself. Two years earlier, he had been overcome by emotion at seeing his daughter marry, but now he was sanguine about the prospect of her leaving the country with her family. After all, he had other things on his mind.
Philip left for Malta on 16 October, delighted to return to naval life proper, and Elizabeth was due to follow on 20 November. Their son would, as was customary, be left behind in Britain, to be cared for by nannies. In the intervening month, however, she became embroiled in controversy for the first time in her life. On 18 October, she addressed a Mothers’ Union rally at Central Hall in London. Her theme was a deeply conservative one – the evils of divorce – and it was to tumultuous applause that she denounced ‘the current age of growing self-indulgence, of hardening materialism [and] of falling moral standards’, and declared that ‘we can have no doubt that divorce and separation are responsible for some of the darkest evils in our society today’.14
She was applauded warmly, with the assembled audience delighted at the strong moral line she took – in a speech presumably written by her private secretary, Jock Colville – but others were less enamoured by an attitude that might have struck the more progressive as Victorian. The 1923 Matrimonial Causes Act had given women more rights in divorce than before, but it was still a complicated and humiliatingly public business to obtain a legal separation from one’s spouse. The Marriage Law Reform Committee’s comment that ‘the harm to children can be greater in a home where both parents are at loggerheads than if divorce ensues’ might strike contemporary readers as nothing more than common sense, but it was the royal imprimatur that had been given to the subject that seemed both unnecessary and almost insulting.
It may have been the case that, as one courtier put it, ‘King George and Queen Elizabeth were completely satisfied that their daughter had been right, for their views on marriage and family life were the same’,15 but it is unlikely that her husband would have shared her scripted opinions. Not only had his own parents separated, but his liberal political outlook and generally progressive, even libertarian, stances were decidedly different to the rule-bound ones held by the family – and institution – he had married into. Should his personal views collide with shibboleths that were held virtually sacred, the results could only be dramatic.
The most recent member of the royal family to fall foul of divorce laws, meanwhile, paid a brief visit to the country in April 1949, shortly after his brother’s operation. Although the Duke of Windsor’s return did not attract any particular attention on this occasion – Channon remarked that ‘apart from a hideous photograph in a newspaper he has caused not a stir’16 – his increasingly frequent trips to Britain carried with them a purpose that bore the inevitability of death and taxes: the desire for his wife to be recognised with the title Her Royal Highness.
It had been an idée fixe of the Duke of Windsor’s since his abdication that Wallis should be recognised on the same terms, and on the same level, as he was. This was expressed in ways both petty – on their wedding day, he insisted that his wife’s prayer book be inscribed with the words ‘Her Royal Highness’ by the presiding clergyman – and profound. Letters patent published on 28 May – 1937 declared that ‘the Duke of Windsor shall, notwithstanding his act of Abdication, be entitled to hold and enjoy for himself only the title, style or attribute of His Royal Highness, so however that his wife and descendants, if any, shall not hold the said title or attribute’.17 This had rankled at the time, and had been a continuing cause of anger and division between the duke and the king ever since.
Yet after the end of the war, Edward’s conditional acceptance within his family depended in large part on his being quiescent on this matter and not creating an embarrassing fuss. Towards the end of 1948, he decided that his silence was no longer appropriate. He may have been influenced by an incident that took place earlier that year at a dinner in Palm Beach, when Wallis was insulted by the Duchess of Sutherland, who claimed that she herself was a ‘proper’ aristocrat and worthy of higher standing than the arriviste Duchess of Windsor. Wallis mused to Allen on 23 February that ‘do I as the wife of a royal duke sit ahead of the wife of a non-royal duke? I am sure you can get an opinion or ruling from the Lord Chamberlain’s Office or whoever knows the correct precedence … What a pity it was not all settled in 1936.’ She, unlike her husband, had a wryly accurate idea of her standing, both in Britain and overseas. ‘I am convinced that the Lord Chamberlain’s Office would prefer not to have me at the table at all!’18
Nonetheless, the duke considered such treatment of his wife both insulting and morally wrong. He waited for his moment to make a fuss, and eventually its pretext arose from an unexpected quarter. Monckton had been served with a divorce petition by his wife, Polly, in 1946, on the grounds of adultery, and it was successful, leading to his forced resignation as attorney general to the Duchy of Cornwall; it was considered inappropriate for any member of the royal household, however honorary their role, to remain in post under such circumstances. However, Monckton was indispensable, and after he quietly married his former mistress, Bridget Hore-Ruthven, on 13 August 1947, he resumed his position in late 1948.
A decade previously, this would have been inconceivable, and even now, it was more a mark of Monckton’s high standing than the arrival of a more liberal perspective. However, it did not escape the duke’s notice that this return could be weaponised, and his letter to the king of 7 December concealed its intent beneath heavy-handed civility: ‘One of my main objections to the official attitude towards divorce in Great Britain has always been the regrettable loss of the services of able and experienced men, which are not infrequently incurred thereby.’
He had already made his feelings known to his brother, and Lascelles had drafted a suitably trenchant letter in response; he suggested to the king that ‘Perhaps I should make quite certain that Attlee would take the line I have said he would. I can easily do this privately if you wish.’19 The letter itself was a firm one. It stated that ‘I have been thinking over what you said about giving the title “HRH” to your wife. I do not see how this could be done. As you will remember, the present arrangement came into force through Letters Patent under the Great Seal, approved by me on May 27 1937, on a submission by the Prime Minister.’
Lascelles, in the name of the king, continued in similar vein. ‘More Letters Patent could not be revoked, and fresh ones issued, without another submission; I have been told that there is no chance of the present PM, nor any of his colleagues, ever agreeing to make such a submission and that in all probability the PMs of the Dominions might have to be brought into it also. I am told, too, that there would be very strong feeling in this country, and in most parts of the Empire, against one cast making controversial issues out of all that happened in 1936, as any attempt to alter the Letters Patent would be bound to do.’ He concluded with an admonishment. ‘I don’t believe that you would want to have such things thrashed out again any more than I do, and it would certainly not be a good thing from the public point of view at this particular moment.’20
Yet Edward was not a man who would simply admit defeat. He asked for, and was given, permission to have an audience with William Jowitt, the Lord Chancellor. If anyone might have been able to offer legal opinion that the letters patent were ineffective or invalid, it was him, and the duke had the advantage that Jowitt had already informally advised him, while a private lawyer, that he stood a good chance of having them overturned if he wished to mount a formal challenge.
The Lord Chancellor’s subsequent account of his interview with Edward, which took place on 14 April 1949, was freighted with embarrassment. He sent it to Lascelles with the note ‘Herewith my official report – but what a difficult position for me! I hope I did right.’21 Jowitt had acquired a reputation for playing all sides in his political career, having served at various points as a Liberal, National Labour and now Labour politician, in order to secure the high office that he now currently enjoyed. He came to resemble a latter-day Vicar of Bray, a fictionalised clergyman who was notable for his versatility in adapting his clerical and political principles to whichever monarch happened to be on the throne. He had also tried to curry favour with the Duke of Windsor, to keep the patronage and support of a man who might conceivably have been of use to him; he may have been forgiven for sighing under his breath that ‘whatsoever king may reign, still I’ll be the Vicar of Bray, sir’.
In any case, he was now faced with a situation where ‘in my faith and loyalty I never more will falter’. He reported that when he saw the duke, ‘I did not know on what subject he wished to see me’,* but ‘I thought it probable it would be on the question as to whether the Duchess should be accorded the title of “Her Royal Highness”’. He alluded to the previous, now discredited, advice he had offered – ‘any embarrassment I might have felt in view of my present position in discussing this matter with the Duke was allayed when he told me that he had mentioned to the King that he was going to ask me to come and see him to discuss this topic and when he added that the King had raised no objection’ – and then the majority of his statement consisted of backpedalling in legalese.
He informed a no doubt sceptical Lascelles that ‘my previous Opinion given in 1937 … had been that the Letters Patent of 1937 really proceeded upon a misapprehension of the law. In the view expressed in my Opinion it was erroneous to suggest that the fact of his Abdication and the fact that he had ceased to be in succession to the Throne involved the proposition that he had thereby ceased to be “His Royal Highness”. The Opinion was based upon the view that he became “His Royal Highness” not by virtue of any Letters Patent, but for the simple reason that he was the son of his father who was the Sovereign of this country.’
As regards Wallis, Jowitt stated that ‘it was of course clear that the Duchess could not found any claim on the Letters Patent of 1937; but supposing that she had a perfectly good claim apart from any Letters Patent, did the Letters Patent of 1937 take that claim away?’ His attitude had, he declared, changed over the past decade. ‘I expressed the view in that Opinion that the Duke was entitled to the style “His Royal Highness” because he was the son of the Sovereign; that he had never for one moment of time ceased to be “His Royal Highness” by his Abdication or in any other way; that it was a misapprehension to suppose that there was any need for new Letters Patent if it were desired to create him a Royal Highness; and that the Duchess was entitled to an equivalent rank because she was his wife.’ However, he now declared that ‘at our interview yesterday, I pointed out to the Duke of Windsor that whatever subtle arguments lawyers might adduce, the fact was that the Letters Patent of 1937 issued by the King on the advice of his responsible Ministers, plainly contemplated that the Duchess should not enjoy this honour’. This was highlighted by Lascelles with suitable gravity.
Jowitt now attempted to suggest that the matter of the duchess’s title was not a legal one, but simply one of etiquette. ‘The marks of respect which the subject pays to Royal personages are, I said, in no sense a legal obligation. They are rather a matter of good manners. The question for instance whether ladies should curtsey to the Duchess would depend in practice, not upon the view they formed upon a legal question, but upon their desire to uphold and carry out the intention of His Majesty the King as the fountain of honour.’ He then washed his hands of the affair. ‘I said therefore, that if this situation were to be reversed, it could only be effectively reversed by the issue of fresh Letters Patent; that such Letters Patent would not be issued by the King save on the advice of his Ministers, either in this country alone, or possibly throughout the Commonwealth.’
According to Jowitt, this was greeted with irritation by the duke. ‘The Duke of Windsor expressed his anxiety to end the present situation, which he thought had gone on all too long. It certainly needed tidying up. Its continuance amounted to nothing less than an insult to his wife, to whom he had been most happily married for many years past. He said that the position which had arisen was exactly what would have happened had there been a morganatic marriage; and this was exactly the position which Mr Baldwin had said was impossible in this country, and was a position to which the Duke of Windsor, when King, would never have assented.’
He concluded that Edward wished to speak to Attlee about the situation, in an appeal to higher authority, and had requested that the Lord Chancellor should put his case forward to the king, to which Jowitt had replied that ‘of course I am available if His Majesty cared to send for me’.22
Lascelles retained a certain scepticism about the lawyer’s turncoat ways. As he described it, candidly, to the king, who was still recuperating, ‘it is the best example I have ever seen of a clever lawyer trying to eat his own words without giving himself indigestion’. Although he allowed that ‘on the whole … Jowitt seems to have taken quite a sensible line’, he also noted that ‘the statement “I did not know on what subject he wished to see me”, is not, I am afraid, 100% true. Walter Monckton assured me that Jowitt knew perfectly well what the Duke wanted to see him about.’ Still, the prime minister could be relied upon; as Lascelles wrote, ‘It is quite certain that Attlee will not hold out any hopes at all of changing the present state of things.’23
The duke, however, felt that the meeting had gone as well as could be expected. He made a note of the interview, in which he wrote, ‘Letters Patent: although in existence and beside the point must be rescinded by the King on advice of his Ministers. No legislation required of Parliament. Ld Chancellor would like to explain it all to Bertie. Advises me to talk to Attlee. Dominion PMs here next week. Winston? He is writing Lascelles to report our meeting. Everything above board.’24 Jowitt might have suggested that he had given the duke a clear indication that his suit would not – could not – succeed, but Edward’s lifelong determination only to hear what he wanted meant that he believed it was only a matter of time until his wish was granted, and he visited Attlee for an interview in this spirit of optimism.
The prime minister disliked confrontation, but he knew that something had to be said to check the duke’s hopes. Accordingly, he wrote to him on 26 April to say, after ‘[my] most careful consideration’, that the ‘personal matter’ that concerned the duke had been discussed at length with Jowitt, and that while Attlee understood and was ‘very sensible’ of Edward’s desire to remedy the situation, ‘I feel bound to say that I do not think it advisable or opportune to take any action at the present time’.25
The duke, unsurprisingly, was furious. He initially blamed the Lord Chancellor, and on 3 June wrote him a coruscating tirade in which he declared that ‘I cannot attempt to disguise my intense disappointment at Mr Attlee’s letter, all the more so as the opinion you gave me in 1937 and your understanding attitude the other day gave me high hopes to believe that your influence in my favour would be considerable.’ After all, if you cannot trust a Lord Chancellor – even one who has changed political allegiance more times than most people have enjoyed hot dinners – who can you trust? Edward went on to complain that he had not heard from the king and ‘therefore I am uninformed as to whether he ever sent for you so that you might explain the invalidity of the Letters Patent of 27 May 1937’, before concluding angrily that ‘embarrassing situations created by the denial to the Duchess of my royal status are not infrequent and always undignified … after twelve years of loyal self-effacement, we should now be spared the social rudeness involved, a source of unnecessary pain to both of us’.26
Jowitt, at least, felt he had done all he could. He refused to see Edward again, sending him an understandably brief letter on 13 June, in which he expressed his sorrow that it was ‘not, of course, a matter in which I can in any way help Your Royal Highness’.27
The duke was incensed, and as usual, his attention turned to his brother, who he had always blamed for his misfortunes. Yet this time, George VI was not prepared to offer the usual mixture of indulgence and blame-shifting that he had previously deployed to keep the peace as far as he was able. He had become aware in the autumn of 1949, when he was still recuperating from his illness and operation, that his brother’s intention to write his memoirs, rather than merely a series of articles for Life magazine, was not mere gossip. Harold Nicolson described him as being ‘very distressed at the news of the Duke of Windsor’s autobiography’28 on 20 October, but this was, if anything, an understatement. Over the past dozen years, the king had witnessed his brother’s betrayal and mendacity over and over again, from his Nazi sympathies to his aggression towards his family, and he felt a sense of righteous aggravation towards the duke.
At last, in December 1949, the two men met to discuss the increasingly vexed situation. It did not go well. In a letter to Princess Elizabeth, the queen described it with commendable understatement. Remarking that ‘Papa seems well but gets a bit tired with all the worries’, she went on to relate, rather as if she was writing to a child, what had occurred when the royal brothers had been together. ‘Uncle David came & had one of his violent yelling conversations, stamping up and down the room, & very unfairly saying that because Papa wouldn’t (& couldn’t) do a certain thing, that Papa must hate him. So unfair, because Papa is so scrupulously fair & honest about all that has happened.’
The queen was increasingly irritated with her brother-in-law’s antics, and reflected, ‘It’s so much easier to yell & pull down & criticise than to restrain & build & think right – isn’t it.’ She might also have suggested that a degree of personal animosity played its part: she had been an implacable opponent of the duke since his abdication, believing that his selfish actions had affected her husband’s health irreparably, and was entirely disinclined to use her own influence – which was considerable – to sway wider judgement and allow the duchess the use of the title that Edward so desperately coveted for her.
Lascelles did what he could in the circumstances. He wrote to Attlee on 9 December to thank him for his ‘helpful advice’ and to impress upon him the continued importance of his support. ‘This is a case where the decision rests largely with the Sovereign … It cannot, however, be regarded as entirely a personal and family matter.’ Briskly outlining the constitutional difficulties that would ensue were the letters patent to be overturned, not least the sense that the abdication was still not a settled matter, he concluded, with a not-so-veiled hint of command, ‘the King trusts, therefore, that in any further discussion on the subject between himself and yourself … these considerations will not be forgotten’.29 Attlee’s reply was suitably conciliatory. ‘I entirely agree that, while the decision in the matter … rests largely with the Sovereign, the consequences of any action have public significance … Should the Duke approach me again on this matter, I will ensure that he is fully impressed with this and the other considerations which you have brought to my notice.’30
The king was nonetheless placed in a near-impossible position. Given the decline in his health, he was even less inclined to be conciliatory than before, and so, after his contretemps with his brother, he began to write a broadside against the troublesome duke, who had apparently announced his suicidal thoughts. In the draft that exists, dated 11 December, he set out what he called ‘his case’ with clarity. ‘In our talk the other evening you told me that your life was not worth living; that you resented the fact that I would not revoke the Letters Patent depriving your wife of the title HRH & that in not doing so I must hate you.’ He refused to spare Edward’s feelings, on the grounds that ‘all this, although you may not realise it, has hurt me very much’.
Describing the abdication as ‘that ghastly moment’, he channelled years of frustration at his brother’s selfishness into the letter. ‘What you did do, you have never given this fact any further thought even if you knew [it] was to leave a most ghastly void in everybody’s life both here, in the Empire & in the World. I had to try and fill this void in the first few months with nothing but sympathy for what had happened. 1937 was Coronation Year (yours, don’t forget). I don’t suppose you have ever given a thought to the effect on the people of this country & the resentment they felt towards you at the time.’
Likewise, the king saw his brother’s lack of commitment clearly. ‘You find this difference of status a hindrance in your private life. This I am afraid is one of the consequences of your position. I gave you, for yourself, what I thought would be the proper & brotherly status to one who has held the highest position in the land.’ In text crossed out from the draft, the monarch added, ‘I can see now that you must have everything to make life worth living … [you] will not rest content with what you have.’
His contempt for Wallis was unabated – ‘Your wife was not a fit & proper person to be your Queen Consort & neither your family nor the public would & could receive her … therefore she cannot become an HRH now that you have abdicated’ – and the king, atypically for him, ended with a sneer. ‘The only way to rectify this position is for you to give up & renounce your HRH which would mean of course your giving up your right to honours of knighthood & your rank in the Services … and this I know you will not countenance doing.’31
This was too strong – Lascelles suggested that ‘I think p.4 would be best omitted’32 – and the private secretary produced a toned-down version, in which the monarch now suggested that ‘When you abdicated, you accepted the view of the great majority of your subjects, that your intended wife was not the right person to be the Queen Consort. For that reason you renounced the Throne for yourself & your descendants. What you now ask me to do would be to reverse that decision which was your own. If your wife now became a member of our family there is no reason why she should not have become your Queen in 1937.’ He concluded that ‘It wouldn’t make sense of the past, and it would be just as unacceptable to a great many people now as it was then.’33 Wallis would never, it seemed, be welcomed into the royal family, any more than she would ever be accepted into public life in Britain.
The duke did not reply for nearly six months, after which time the second round of Life articles, entitled ‘The Education of a Prince’, had been published. When he did finally deign to answer his brother’s letter, on 6 June 1950, it was with a combination of icy politeness and anger. Describing how he wished to ‘naturally reserve this highly personal and confidential subject for verbal as opposed to written discussion between us’, he reiterated how happy thirteen years of marriage to Wallis had made him, and then stated his case. ‘No more did I get into “that state of emotion” as you infer … Considering the manner in which you have been temporising with me since I raised this subject almost two years ago, I have remained commendably calm and patient.’ He acknowledged his ‘greater frankness’, but put this down to the fact that ‘having found a normal approach ineffective and unproductive of any response from you, I merely stated my case and registered my feelings over what I consider an injustice to an innocent person, my wife’.
He was not disposed to look back towards the past, remarking that ‘the 1936 and 1937 “skeletons” you have now pulled out of the closet are hardly in line with some of the questions you asked me at our last meeting … I refer, for example, to your wanting to know whether the granting of my rightful request on behalf of Wallis would alter my attitude towards living in Great Britain.’ He then attempted to assert his ancestral rights as an elder brother with a suitably dismissive valediction. ‘From the things you and various people have told me since I raised this subject I cannot accept what you call “the facts of the case” as a reason for withholding my request – a tortuous and unconvincing thesis to which you have never so much as hinted in our conversations and which, quite frankly, I can neither follow nor understand.’*34
The duke may well have hoped to press his case in person again, and eventually wear the king down by a process of attrition. If so, he would be disappointed. Not only did the monarch have less than two years to live by the time Edward sent his scornful and dismissive reply, but that bad-tempered and vituperative encounter between the two in December 1949 would be one of the final times they ever saw one another.