The royals - Kitty Kelley [15]
“Now, of course, so many years later, her friends deny this, but that’s what the Duke told me a few years before he died.”
Upon the abdication of King Edward VIII in 1936, his younger brother, Albert, known to the family as “Bertie,” ascended to the throne. To keep continuity with the reign of his father, he became King George VI. His wife, who as a little girl had dressed up to play queen, now became a real one. The news was delivered to the public by newsreels and radio, but the coronation on May 12, 1937, was not broadcast. The ceremony in Westminster Abbey was considered too sacred to be aired. The Archbishop of Canterbury feared men in pubs would listen with their hats on.
Upon his accession, the new King, George VI, was determined to keep his older brother out of England to avoid competing with a second court. Churchill recommended the Duke of Windsor be appointed Governor of the Bahamas. But the King objected because the Queen felt that even that insignificant position was too good for the Windsors.
“She wanted them banished and completely stripped of all status,” said Michael Thornton. “She was so vengeful that she wrote a letter to the Secretary of State for the Colonies, Lord Lloyd, and said that to make the Duchess of Windsor, a divorced woman with three living husbands, the wife of the Governor of the Bahamas would result in a disastrous lowering of standards.”
Sir Walter Monckton, the royal courtier who acted as intermediary, also recognized the Queen’s motivation. As he wrote in his diary:
… I think the Queen felt quite plainly that it was undesireable to give the Duke any effective sphere of work. I felt then, as always, that she naturally thought that she must be on her guard because the Duke of Windsor, to whom the other brothers had always looked up, was an attractive, vital creature who might be the rallying point for any who might be critical of the new King, who was less superficially endowed with the arts and graces that please.
Despite the Queen’s objection, the appointment was made. “She wreaked her sweet revenge later by making sure the Duchess of Windsor never received a curtsy or was addressed as Her Royal Highness,” said Thornton. “The Queen helped institute the Letters Patent, which bestowed upon the Duke of Windsor ‘the title, style, or attribute of Royal Highness’ while withholding such title, style, or attribute from his wife and his descendants.”
The King referred to the Duchess as “Mrs. Simpson,” while the Queen disparaged her as “that woman.”
Together, Their Majesties instructed the Lord Chamberlain to wire their new ruling to all Government House officials. His telegram from Buckingham Palace read:
You are no doubt aware that a lady when presented to HRH the Duke of Windsor should make a half-curtsey. The Duchess of Windsor is not entitled to this. The Duke should be addressed as “Your Royal Highness” and the Duchess as “Your Grace.”
The Duke of Windsor drafted a passionate, bitter letter of protest to Winston Churchill:
… I am up against the famous Court ruling… whereby the King (or shall we say the Queen?) decreed that the Duchess shall not hold Royal Rank…. I am quite sure that had your wife been the target of the vindictive jealousy… you would have the same repugnance to service under the Crown that I have….
Until this time, every wife automatically enjoyed the status of her husband. Now the rules were suddenly changed to deprive the Duchess of Windsor of royal acceptance. If the twice divorced American was not fit to be Queen of England, then she certainly was not fit to be a member of the royal family or admitted into their exalted circle. So no member of the House of Windsor ever received her until her husband’s death, and even then she was accorded only minimal courtesy. “They were polite and kind to me,” she said, “but they were cold. Very cold.” The Duchess of Windsor died several years later at the age of ninety, alone and shriveled by infirmity.
Long before she became Queen, Elizabeth and her husband had assumed responsibility for restoring