Edward and Mrs Simpson

[chowder]

There was a programme on UK TV last night covering this remarkable story.

What I fail to understand is why “The Establishment” refused to allow King Edward to marry the woman he loved. he had suggested a morgantic marriage which meant that should they marry, Wallis Simpson would not be queen, this was rejected.

The ordinary Mr and Mrs Commoner didn’t give a toss about the whole business.As far as they were concerned the King should be free to marry the woman of his choice, that happened to be Wallis Simpson.

Matter of fact Joe and Joan Public only learned of the hullaballoo about a week before the shit hit.

Now then, admittedly she had been twice divorced but so what?
She was an American, again, so what?
She was a commoner, big deal!

So ultimately King Edward abdicated in favour of Wallis. This itself should have been a firm indication that he loved the woman more that he loved being King, if he ever did.

The pair of them, after they married, were shunted out of the country and lived in a number of places.

They met Hitler and this gave rise to accusations that not only was Wallis a German spy but that Edward was pro-Nazi.

All sorts of rumours were tossed around, the couple had no peace and having read a bit about them I can’t help but feel they were shat upon from a great height.

They remained married for 36 years, if that isn’t love then I don’t know what is.

FWIW I am not a royalist but those two people deserved better treatment.

And Stanley Baldwin, the PM at the time, comes across as a right shit head

[Quartz]

I missed this: is it repeated any time soon? As for the content, you should consider the biases of the broadcaster of the show.

[Giles]

@chowder

Now then, admittedly she had been twice divorced but so what?
She was an American, again, so what?
She was a commoner, big deal!

I don’t think being American was a big deal, and all Americans are commoners, so that wasn’t either. It was the double divorce that was the issue, plus the adultery that went with that. People are more accepting of divorce now, but there were still big issues when the current Prince of Wales married Camilla Parker Bowles, who had only been divorced once.

[AK84]

The marriage was unacceptable to all the Brit dominions of whom Edward VIII was also King. And the Government of India (where he was an Emperor); the last thing they needed was for the nationalists to say “look the Brits are immoral too”.

And I have a friends whose grandaprents (both in their mid 80’s now) were around at the time and as they describe it the feeling was “oh you love her, so sweet, then get lost”.

[chowder]

@AK84

The marriage was unacceptable to all the Brit dominions of whom Edward VIII was also King. And the Government of India (where he was an Emperor); the last thing they needed was for the nationalists to say “look the Brits are immoral too”.

And I have a friends whose grandaprents (both in their mid 80’s now) were around at the time and as they describe it the feeling was “oh you love her, so sweet, then get lost”.

That’s not quite true about the dominions. It was revealed later on during the programme that Canada NZ and Australia whilst not liking the idea of the marriage were not altogether against it PROVIDED Wallis did not become queen.

Quartz

The prog was on BBC4 so it was a repeat but I expect it’ll be shown again at a later date

[Giles]

The series was actually made in 1978, and it’s available on DVD.

[Freddy_the_Pig]

@chowder

Now then, admittedly she had been twice divorced but so what?

He was hitting on her while she was still married. It was considered a little tawdry, at the time, for the Prince of Wales to be hitting on a married woman.

[ElvisL1ves]

I had understood that the government and the rest of the royal family *wanted *Edward gone, due to his Nazi sympathies and overall twittiness. He would not have made a good King during the war that seemed about to start. Note that he never made his way back into the family’s good graces for the rest of his life. The marriage stuff could have been worked out easily enough IF the government and family had wanted to, sure, but it made a very convenient cover story, and Edward really was too dumb to realize it.

Now wait for the Brits to jump ugly on this one …

[villa]

@chowder

They met Hitler and this gave rise to accusations that not only was Wallis a German spy but that Edward was pro-Nazi.

I’d have to look it up, but I think there was pretty good evidence he was at least sympathetic to the Nazis. IIRC, one plan was to reinstate him on the throne after a Nazi invasion.

If there is any truth to any of the claims he was a sympathizer (as was much of the British aristocracy at the time, to be honest) then screw any sympathy for him. Oh hell, screw any sympathy for him anyway, he was a member of the Royal Family so deserves none.

[Quartz]

@ElvisL1ves

Now wait for the Brits to jump ugly on this one …

Not this Brit.

[Kimmy_Gibbler]

If a modern country persists in keeping a royal family around, a hereditary chamber in their legislature (however qualified this is today), and a division of its populace into nobility and commoners, I don’t know why anything else they do in pursuance of such an antiquated system should be singled out as peculiar or unseemly.

[smiling_bandit]

@Kimmy_Gibbler

If a modern country persists in keeping a royal family around, a hereditary chamber in their legislature (however qualified this is today), and a division of its populace into nobility and commoners, I don’t know why anything else they do in pursuance of such an antiquated system should be singled out as peculiar or unseemly.

First off, this was some time ago. Second, the House of Lords does not, today, have Lords in it (well, there are a couple, but they are, IIRC, elected and just happen to be nobles). Third, the ancient system of nobility doesn’t mean much today. Or in Edward’s day, either: it remains more a system of public social importance than anything else, and would go on more or less the same even if the formal titles were abolished (witness the many celebrities who become nobles of one sort or another).

[alphaboi867]

@chowder

That’s not quite true about the dominions. It was revealed later on during the programme that Canada NZ and Australia whilst not liking the idea of the marriage were not altogether against it PROVIDED Wallis did not become queen…

Surprisingly the overwhelminly Roman Catholic Irish Free State (where divorce was illegal) didn’t have a problem with the marriage at all, but that’s only because de Valera was a republican and used the abdication as an excuse to remove any reference to the monarch from the constitution.

[Kimmy_Gibbler]

@smiling_bandit

Second, the House of Lords does not, today, have Lords in it (well, there are a couple, but they are, IIRC, elected and just happen to be nobles).

Everyone in the House of Lords is a lord. There are 92 hereditary peers in the Lords. They were elected in 1999 by the whole House of Lords which at that time included all hereditary peers. They are not democratically elected. And they do not “just happen to be” nobles. Members of the House of Lords are peers, and peers are forbidden from serving in the House of Commons.

Third, the ancient system of nobility doesn’t mean much today. Or in Edward’s day, either: it remains more a system of public social importance than anything else, and would go on more or less the same even if the formal titles were abolished (witness the many celebrities who become nobles of one sort or another).

An official system of public importance. Few Americans (or for that matter, Frenchmen, or other egalitarian-striving countries, I don’t know, Germany?) would countenance an official division of the citizenry into Worthies and Ordinaries.

John Monson, 11th Baron Monson, say, would not enjoy such social importance, and certainly not a hand in crafting national law, were it not for his favorable birth. Indeed, I’ve only heard of this person because I looked at the wikipedia list of elected hereditary peers.

[Lord_Mondegreen]

@Giles

It was the double divorce that was the issue, plus the adultery that went with that. People are more accepting of divorce now, but there were still big issues when the current Prince of Wales married Camilla Parker Bowles, who had only been divorced once.

It’s hard for me to imagine exactly how divorce was considered in the early to mid 20th Century, but I remember hearing the story of how Australian Billiards player Walter Lindrum (who was so good they had to change the rules to give others a chance) was to receive a knighthood, but it was rejected because he was divorced.

[alphaboi867]

We’re forgetting the religious aspect. The Church of England did not allow divorced persons to remarry; as king Edward was it’s Supreme Governor and Defender of the Faith. As far as the CoE was concerned he’d be openly living in sin with his mistress. He’d would be able to take communion let alone be anointed with oil and have a crown placed on his head (nor would Wallis). Members of the royal family weren’t even allowed to have a register office wedding in England. Edward would have need to get married in Scotland.

[PeskiPiksi]

This is just a general feeling I’ve gotten from watching documentaries and movies about the situation, but I always thought Edward never wanted to be King in the first place. I tend to think he seized on the “true love” angle as a way out of his responsibilities. And then after having made all that fuss, he couldn’t very well divorce her, now could he?

[Guinastasia]

@PeskiPiksi

This is just a general feeling I’ve gotten from watching documentaries and movies about the situation, but I always thought Edward never wanted to be King in the first place. I tend to think he seized on the “true love” angle as a way out of his responsibilities. And then after having made all that fuss, he couldn’t very well divorce her, now could he?

That’s what I’ve always understood as well. He was never all that responsible, and he would have made a horrible King – even if he didn’t have “Nazi sympathies”. He pretty much hated any royal fuss (coronations, public appearances, things like that), and seemed to do anything he could to avoid it.

[Cunctator]

@chowder

The ordinary Mr and Mrs Commoner didn’t give a toss about the whole business. As far as they were concerned the King should be free to marry the woman of his choice, that happened to be Wallis Simpson.

I’m not so sure about that point of view. There was evidence of strong, if not universal, opposition to the proposed marriage from all quarters of the UK, not just the ‘Establishment’. Philip Ziegler notes in his biography of Edward VIII:

The working classes, where the King might have been expected to find most of his support, proved resolutely hostile: reports came flooding in…from the East End of London and from industrial areas in the Midlands and North and in South Wales that the general mass of middle-class and working-class readers of the Herald were deeply upset that a woman who had been twice through the divorce courts might become Queen.

He also quotes the American Consul in Plymouth, whose views were less likely to have been pro-Establishment, and presumably more favourable to Mrs Simpson:

[he] reported that feeling against the King had hardened every day: it was nothing to do with Mrs Simpson’s nationality, but ‘people here consider that the proceedings leading up to the second divorce were too much of a farce for them to endure’.

This is presumably a reference to the obvious collusion involved in Mrs Simpson’s divorce action.

@chowder

It was revealed later on during the programme that Canada NZ and Australia whilst not liking the idea of the marriage were not altogether against it PROVIDED Wallis did not become queen.

While the governments of New Zealand and Canada may have been relatively ambivalent, Philip Ziegler notes that the Australian government’s response was one of unequivocal opposition to the proposed marriage, morganatic or otherwise. He goes on to comment:

There is always some doubt how far such lofty sentiments reflect the true feelings of the man in the street. It is worth quoting the dispatch sent to Washington from the American mission in Canberra after abdication had become inevitable: ‘Australian opinion was virtually a unit in holding that no other solution was possible without weakening the ties of Empire…The Australian outlook on life is distinctly middle-class, and on morals is distinctly Victorian’.

The South African government’s response was consistent with that of Australia. Ziegler quotes similar evidence to demonstrate that there was no trace of any disposition on the part of the South African public to accept Mrs Simpson.

@chowder

Now then, admittedly she had been twice divorced but so what?
She was an American, again, so what?
She was a commoner, big deal!

Putting aside the religious and moral issues, the big deal was that right up until the end of his reign, Edward VIII refused to accept that his choice of wife was anything other than a private decision for him to make for his domestic happiness. The fact that he seemed prepared to completely ignore his Government’s views on the subject only served to underscore – to the PM and Government – Edward’s lack of understanding of the role of a constitutional monarch. I agree that, post-abdication, he and the Duchess of Windsor were treated very shabbily. But I think he brought most of it on himself.

[Moirai]

@alphaboi867

Surprisingly the overwhelminly Roman Catholic Irish Free State (where divorce was illegal) didn’t have a problem with the marriage at all, but that’s only because de Valera was a republican and used the abdication as an excuse to remove any reference to the monarch from the constitution.

Good God, I’d forgotten how long Eamon De Valera was involved in Irish politics!