# What if Edward VIII had managed to stay on the throne? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [May 7, 2011, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-edward-viii-had-managed-to-stay-on-the-throne/581088 "2011-05-07T19:57:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2011, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-edward-viii-had-managed-to-stay-on-the-throne/581088/1 "2011-05-07T19:57:30Z")
George VI became King of the UK, etc. – and his daughter Elizabeth eventually became Queen – only because his elder brother [Edward VIII](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_VIII_of_the_United_Kingdom) was determined to marry a twice-divorced (and still married when she met him) American woman considered unsuitable, and decided to abdicate rather than give her up. If that had gone differently – if Edward somehow had managed to keep the throne and Wallis both – how would it have affected history? Was Edward really such a Nazi sympathizer as he is portrayed in _The King’s Speech_ and _Bertie & Elizabeth?_ How might that have affected the course of WWII? Presumably Churchill would still run the show, but could Edward VIII and Wallis have played the valuable morale-builder role that George VI and Elizabeth played IRL? Edward and Wallis, as Duke and Duchess of Windsor, never did have any children, and being on the throne would have made them no more fertile; so I suppose that, **if** the British nation and monarchy survived the war, Elizabeth would become Queen when her uncle died. (In our timeline, the Duke of Windsor died in 1972.) ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2011, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-edward-viii-had-managed-to-stay-on-the-throne/581088/2 "2011-05-07T20:14:11Z")
> [@](#): > > Was Edward really such a Nazi sympathizer as he is portrayed in The King’s Speech and Bertie & Elizabeth? At that time, being a Nazi sympathizer wasn’t all that big a deal, since it wasn’t yet apparent just how incredibly evil Hitler and his regime were. Yeah, he was trying for empire-building, but then, so has everyone else in European history. And if he didn’t like the Jews, well, most other folks at that time weren’t too fond of them, either. Presumably, once the full impact became known, Edward (like almost everyone else) came to renounce them. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2011, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-edward-viii-had-managed-to-stay-on-the-throne/581088/3 "2011-05-07T22:03:55Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > At that time, being a Nazi sympathizer wasn’t all that big a deal, since it wasn’t yet apparent just how incredibly evil Hitler and his regime were. Yeah, he was trying for empire-building, but then, so has everyone else in European history. And if he didn’t like the Jews, well, most other folks at that time weren’t too fond of them, either. Presumably, once the full impact became known, Edward (like almost everyone else) came to renounce them. Well, [Hitler thought otherwise:](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_VIII_of_the_United_Kingdom#World_War_II) > [@](#): > > In October 1937, the Duke and Duchess visited Nazi Germany, against the advice of the British government, and met Adolf Hitler at his Obersalzberg retreat. The visit was much publicised by the German media. During the visit the Duke gave full Nazi salutes.[63] The former Austrian ambassador, Count Albert von Mensdorff-Pouilly-Dietrichstein, who was also a second cousin once removed and friend of George V, believed that Edward favoured German fascism as a bulwark against communism, and even that he initially favoured an alliance with Germany.[64] Edward’s experience of “the unending scenes of horror”[65] during World War I led him to support appeasement. Hitler considered Edward to be friendly towards Nazi Germany and thought that Anglo-German relations could have been improved through Edward if it were not for the abdication. Fellow Nazi Albert Speer quoted Hitler directly: “I am certain through him permanent friendly relations could have been achieved. If he had stayed, everything would have been different. His abdication was a severe loss for us.”[66] And, Edward’s loyalty was, rightly or wrongly, suspected during the war: > [@](#): > > The Duke and Duchess settled in France. On the outbreak of World War II in September 1939, they were brought back to Britain by Lord Mountbatten on board HMS Kelly, and the Duke, although an honorary field marshal, was made a major-general attached to the British Military Mission in France.[32] In February 1940, the German Minister in The Hague, Count Julius von Zech-Burkersroda, claimed that the Duke had leaked the Allied war plans for the defence of Belgium.[67] When Germany invaded the north of France in May 1940, the Windsors fled south, first to Biarritz, then in June to Spain. In July the pair moved to Lisbon, Portugal, where they lived at first in the home of Ricardo de Espírito Santo, a Portuguese banker with both British and German contacts.[68] During the occupation of France, the Duke asked the German forces to place guards at his Paris and Riviera homes: they did so.[69] A “defeatist” interview with the Duke that was widely distributed may have served as the last straw for the British government: Prime Minister Winston Churchill threatened the Duke with a court-martial if he did not return to British soil.[70] In August, a British warship dispatched the pair to the Bahamas, where, in the view of Churchill, the Duke could do the least damage to the British war effort. ---
**Author:** ![Quia\_Sic\_Dico](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/bbce88/32.png) [@Quia\_Sic\_Dico](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quia_Sic_Dico)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2011, 11:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-edward-viii-had-managed-to-stay-on-the-throne/581088/4 "2011-05-08T11:04:58Z")
Contrafactual history is obviously just speculation, and impossible falsify properly, I know, but would it be completely unthinkable that the British monarchy would not have survived a king as Nazi-sympathetic as the above post argues that he was? ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2011, 2:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-edward-viii-had-managed-to-stay-on-the-throne/581088/5 "2011-05-08T14:01:15Z")
> [@Quia\_Sic\_Dico](#): > > Contrafactual history is obviously just speculation, and impossible falsify properly, I know, but would it be completely unthinkable that the British monarchy would not have survived a king as Nazi-sympathetic as the above post argues that he was? The really important question is not whether it would have led to the abolition of the monarchy, but whether it would have led to the Allies losing WWII. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2011, 2:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-edward-viii-had-managed-to-stay-on-the-throne/581088/6 "2011-05-08T14:17:03Z")
I think Edward would have eventually found the limitations of his power. If it had come to a direct confrontation, I think the majority of Britons would have chosen to follow Parliament over the Monarch. ---
**Author:** ![Frank](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Frank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Frank)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2011, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-edward-viii-had-managed-to-stay-on-the-throne/581088/7 "2011-05-08T15:05:34Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > I think Edward would have eventually found the limitations of his power. If it had come to a direct confrontation, I think the majority of Britons would have chosen to follow Parliament over the Monarch. Perhaps he would have been tried and executed for high treason. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2011, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-edward-viii-had-managed-to-stay-on-the-throne/581088/8 "2011-05-08T16:16:49Z")
> [@Frank](#): > > Perhaps he would have been tried and executed for high treason. I doubt it would have come to that point. Charles I was executed because he was regarded as a legitimate threat - there was a fear that people would follow him. Edward could have just be ignored and treated as a harmless figurehead. ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2011, 4:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-edward-viii-had-managed-to-stay-on-the-throne/581088/9 "2011-05-08T16:52:31Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > At that time, being a Nazi sympathizer wasn’t all that big a deal, since it wasn’t yet apparent just how incredibly evil Hitler and his regime were. Yeah, he was trying for empire-building, but then, so has everyone else in European history. And if he didn’t like the Jews, well, most other folks at that time weren’t too fond of them, either. Presumably, once the full impact became known, Edward (like almost everyone else) came to renounce them. I tend to read things in the same way as **Chronos**. Disclaimer: I base much of my understanding of this on Churchill, probably the strongest Anti-Nazi of all the major 20th century figures and a personal friend of the Duke of Windsor. His view seems to have been that Windsor was much like Charles Lindbergh – loyal to his own nation, impressed by what the pre-war Nazis had done to turn Germany around, sufficiently statist not to be shocked by their anti-individualist attitudes… The Nazis early in the war were clutching at straws in seeking anyone who might possibly look with favor on them in nations generally united in staunch opposition to them, and they saw Windsor in that light. Giving him the Bahamas as a sinecure that kept him out of the public spotlight during the War was an intelligent precaution, not a definition of disloyalty – and as much putting him somewhere where the Nazis could not “play” him as a comment on his own loyalties. If he had kept the throne…? Who lnows? Remember that at the time of Munich, Churchill and a few others were scattered voices crying in the wilderness, while the majority of Britain rejoiced that Chamberlain had brought them “peace in our time.” It was only in early 1939, when Hitler abrogated his treaties with the Czechs, that the sea change to steadfast anti-Nazism took hold in Britain, with America as a whole waking up to the danger shortly thereafter. I suspect that Windsor’s views would be much like those of Halifax and Chamberlain, holding out hope for a negotiated peace well past what we with perfect hindsight know was wrong, but then moving resolutely into anti-Nazi mode, renouncing his previous views as founded in naivete. I may be wrong in this, but it’s my assessment of his character based on the views of someone who did know him well. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2011, 4:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-edward-viii-had-managed-to-stay-on-the-throne/581088/10 "2011-05-08T16:56:28Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > I doubt it would have come to that point. Charles I was executed because he was regarded as a legitimate threat - there was a fear that people would follow him. > > Edward could have just be ignored and treated as a harmless figurehead. That might have put quite a strain on the constitutional order, though, which in Britain depends on at least pretending that the Sovereign and the Crown are one, and the source of all legitimate authority in the state. And, every man and woman in the British Army and the RAF swears an oath of personal loyalty to the Sovereign. (I read once that Royal Navy personnel don’t, they swear to the Admiralty, don’t know why.) If they received one set of orders from the War Office and a contradictory set from the Palace, how would they know what to do?! ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2011, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-edward-viii-had-managed-to-stay-on-the-throne/581088/11 "2011-05-08T17:14:13Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > And, every man and woman in the British Army and the RAF swears an oath of personal loyalty to the Sovereign. (I read once that Royal Navy personnel don’t, they swear to the Admiralty, don’t know why.) If they received one set of orders from the War Office and a contradictory set from the Palace, how would they know what to do?! On that note, here’s an interesting comment from the [TVTropes Useful Notes page on the British Political System:](http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BritishPoliticalSystem) > [@](#): > > An extremely important thing to note about the British government is that it is more or less synonymous with Parliament (the Civil Service notwithstanding): all authority flows from Westminster. Beyond that, Parliament theoretically holds absolute power: any law passed by Parliament may be repealed by Parliament at any time for any reason. This setup is a result of the English Civil War (1641–51), the result of which was the monarchy handing over all its power (which in the Tudor era had been de facto absolute) to Parliament—a process helped by the fact that George I and II barely spoke English and didn’t much care for governing Britain anyway—and incidentally resembles Thomas Hobbes’ conception of government. In any case, though this sounds rather scary at first— **in theory, British liberty could be dead with a single Act of Parliament** —the UK’s membership in the EU and its institutions, as well as a couple of other well-enforced treaties, have added a measure of restriction to the actions of Parliament; for the first time, Parliament has to deal with potentially making illegal laws.\* > although Parliament still asserts legislative supremacy over Europe and intended to keep applying an anti-terrorism law partially found illegal by Europe > > \ > > The modern monarch doesn’t really do all that much: his or her powers are purely ceremonial, a result of Parliament taking on more and more of the monarch’s remaining powers in the 18th and 19th century, helped by a succession of monarchs who were, in order, unable to speak English (George I and II), mad (George III), a total dilletante (George IV), very old and only king for seven years (William IV), a woman (Victoria) and another dilletante (Edward VII). There were only three periods when monarchs tried to assert themselves in any serious fashion, and they were ended, respectively, by losing a war in America, the death of George IV and the death of Albert. To be honest, the monarchs would barely have been able to prevent the eroding of their remaining power if they’d made the effort. While the monarch does technically have the ability to veto any act of Parliament, to refuse a nominated Prime Minister, to sack the Prime Minister if he messes up, or to mobilise the army, to actually do so would likely cause a massive public outcry as it would be going against the will of the people by virtue of going against their democratically-elected leader. It is also extremely unlikely that the monarch could face-off against the rest of the British political establishment and win (the last monarch to do anything against the will of Parliament was King William IV in the 19th century and even then his action - appointing his own choice of Prime Minister - was extremely controversial). > > However, the current Queen does have one useful function. **As the armed forces swear allegiance to the monarch and not to the Government, should the Prime Minister declare himself a dictatorial leader the queen can directly order them to stand down and, if necessary, turn against Westminster.** This would be an awesome ending to a film, if anyone wants to make it. She also holds similar powers over most of the other nations in the Commonwealth via her Governors-General, her official representatives to the Commonwealth nations who swear allegiance to her as their head of state. The entire Australian Parliament was even dismissed by one Governor-General as recently as 1975, mainly because the politicians were arguing too much over money and how it should be spent. The Sovereign as the final bulwark of freedom and/or democracy? Interesting concept. ---
**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:** [May 8, 2011, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-edward-viii-had-managed-to-stay-on-the-throne/581088/12 "2011-05-08T18:35:32Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > …Edward could have just be ignored and treated as a harmless figurehead. Or he would’ve had an accident and broken his neck falling down one of the Palace’s many flights of stairs. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2011, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-edward-viii-had-managed-to-stay-on-the-throne/581088/13 "2011-05-08T19:49:55Z")
> [@alphaboi867](#): > > Or he would’ve had an accident and broken his neck falling down one of the Palace’s many flights of stairs. [Could be worse](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_II_of_England#Death) . . . > [@](#): > > The popular story that the [King Edward II] was assassinated by having a red-hot poker thrust into his anus has no basis in accounts recorded by Edward’s contemporaries. Thomas de la Moore’s account[citation needed] of Edward’s murder was not written until after 1352 and is uncorroborated by other contemporary sources. Not until the relevant sections of the longer Brut chronicle were composed by a Lancastrian (anti-Mortimer) polemicist in the mid-1430s was the story widely circulated. [19] Nevertheless, the idea was out there . . . 😉 ---
**Author:** ![penultima\_thule](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/penultima_thule/32/3833_2.png) [@penultima\_thule](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/penultima_thule)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2011, 10:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-edward-viii-had-managed-to-stay-on-the-throne/581088/14 "2011-05-08T22:33:06Z")
> [@TVTropes Useful Notes](#): > > However, the current Queen … also holds similar powers over most of the other nations in the Commonwealth via her Governors-General, her official representatives to the Commonwealth nations who swear allegiance to her as their head of state. The entire Australian Parliament was even dismissed by one Governor-General as recently as 1975, mainly because the politicians were arguing too much over money and how it should be spent. Hopefully TVTropes description of British political system has some foundation in reality, because that glib description of the causes and consequences of the 1975 Dismissal is purile. ---
**Author:** ![Nametag](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/nametag/32/406_2.png) [@Nametag](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nametag)\ **Post date:** [May 9, 2011, 6:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-if-edward-viii-had-managed-to-stay-on-the-throne/581088/15 "2011-05-09T06:29:45Z")
Edward would have had to be a very different man for him to have remained on the throne. It’s not as if he was faced with an agonizing choice between his beloved crown and his beloved. He didn’t seem to want to be king in the first place, and the kerfuffle over his wife-to-be gave him an out. (Not that he didn’t truly love her, as it certainly seems that he did, but to be the sort of king who changes the course of his nation, he’d have to be the sort of king who thought that being king was more important.)