Trudy Gold
Edward VIII: A Wasted Life?

Trudy Gold - Edward VIII: A Wasted Life?

- Good evening everyone, and today I am kind of changing tack. Having looked at all the nuances of Jewish identity, I wanted to really come back to the centre of the British Empire and look at the royal family and Edward VIII, the man who became Edward VIII, because he was such a controversial figure. And of course there is the American connection with Wallis Simpson. Now, let me say from the beginning, I’m going to spend very little time talking about Wallis for a very, very good reason. Next week, Anne Sever, the really good, the really, really good writer, you will remember a couple of weeks ago she gave a brilliant presentation on Ethel Rosenberg. She wrote a brilliant book about Wallis Simpson. So I’m not sidestepping her. Suffice to say that Anne will be looking at her in a lot of detail with you. So what I want to look at is Edward, his flirtation with Nazism, and really the tragedy of the man who gave up a crown. So let’s have a look at the man. The reason I’ve started with his grandmother is never forget he’s actually born in Edwardian England. He was born in 1894. He died in 1972. He becomes the Duke of Windsor, of course, after his abdication. So he is the eldest grandson of Queen Victoria by her eldest son, so great grandson. Beg your pardon, can we go on please? Here you see his parents. George V was the grandson of Victoria, and of course was married to Mary of Teck. Now, Mary of Teck was a German princess. She had been brought over to marry George’s elder brother, Eddie, also a very, very controversial figure.

Eddie died and she was then engaged and married George V. So remember, it’s Victoria then Edward VII who I’ve lectured on, who was a fascinating character and far more of a freedom seeker. His son George, was a very pedantic man. He was really a very middle class English gentleman who happened to become king of England. And it’s fascinating if you look at his face, he is also first cousin to the Czar of Russia, Nicholas II. So it’s important as I tell this story to remember how interrelated all the families of Europe are, and also how German. George V of course, he is the grandson of Victoria, who is herself German. Victoria’s mother was a German princess. Her father was the Duke of Kent, a Hanoverian. So when it comes to the First World War and the Second World War, never forget that the aristocrats in Germany and the aristocrats in England had a lot of blood ties. So he is born into this family. It’s a very structured family. Evidently, George… The majority of historians who write about George V said he would’ve been totally happy if he’d been a country gentleman. He didn’t really like the panoply of royalty. Having said that, he was a stickler for etiquette and decorum. He loved clocks. All the clocks had to be wound up. He was not a good father. But then it’s very difficult when you think of parenting in the royal family. They spent their time actually engaged in royal duties, and the children were brought up by a whole group of nannies.

Now let’s have a look at the next picture, please. Because he has a very traditional background, when he goes to the Royal Naval College, what is the route in for princes royal? Well, either the army or the navy. He was created the Prince of Wales on his 16th birthday, six weeks after his father had succeeded as king, he serves in the British Army in the First World War, and he did a lot of overseas tours on behalf of his father. Now as a young man, he was very charismatic. According to the idea of beauty at the time he was seen to be very, very good looking. He had charm, he had charisma, and also he becomes a fashion icon. So he goes to the Royal Naval College and then he goes on to Oxford. Let’s have a look at that beautiful Oxford of the period. Yeah, Oxford in the early… It was a beautiful place. He wasn’t very bright. In fact, he left Oxford without graduating. But what he was was a very keen sportsman. He learned how to play polo for the University Club, but he had no academic qualifications. He was officially invested as the Prince of Wales at Carmarthen Castle in 1911. And the investiture took place because of the important Welsh politician, Lloyd George. So when World War I breaks out, he joins the Grenadier Guards, and he is very much part of the English establishment. What was he like as a person? Well, the royal family had a terrible tragedy. They had a young boy called Prince John. There’s a brilliant play written about Prince John by the late lamented Horowitz, it’s a brilliant play. Prince John was probably, he was probably an epileptic. He seemed to have some sort of mental problems. But what the family did, Edward’s 11 years older than him, they had very, very little to do with him. Basically, they shut him away.

In fact, the letter that Edward wrote to his mistress when he died, can we see it please? What he said about… There you see him as Prince of Wales. Can we go on Corina? Yes, he writes to his mistress of the time. he was “little more than a regrettable nuisance.” And let’s have a picture of of Prince John. It’s fascinating because if you think of that family, George V’s brother was a real no good prince. He was known as Eddie. He didn’t come to the throne because he died. And I think all the politicians so absolutely breathed a sigh of relief. At least with George V, you had somebody depend upon. But in his family circumstances, he and Mary have this tragic little boy who is shut away. And in fact, the letter that Edward wrote to his mother has been lost. But he had to write her apology in which he stated, “I feel such a cold-hearted and unsympathetic swine. No one could realise more than you how little Johnny meant to me who hardly knew him. I feel so much for you darling Mama, who was his mother.” But the reality was they didn’t really show either brotherly or family feelings for the little boy. And what happens with Edward, he continues being a very popular Prince of Wales. He becomes part of the organising committee for the British Empire Exhibition. And what he wanted was a great national sports ground. He played a part in, those of you who love football, he was very important in the creation of Wembley Stadium. The family use his, they use his charisma, they use his popularity. Let’s have a look at the next slides. Yeah, this is the British Empire Exhibition.

It was very, very important. I’m sure Patrick’s already lectured on the great exhibitions in France. These exhibitions where all the show of the talent and the inventions of the British Empire are put on show. And it goes back to Prince Albert and his wonderful exhibition at the Crystal Palace. So this was the period of the great exhibitions. He’s very much involved in it. He’s representing his father abroad. He has a very successful tour of India. And not only that, he visits parts of poverty-stricken England. He went on 16 tours of the British Empire, and important to remember that he becomes very popular with the people. He has a kind of touch which his remote father doesn’t dream of. So as a response to the people, he seemed to be a very, very affectionate man. But the other side of him, it didn’t take long for it to come out. Let’s have a look at the next slide. Here you see him, he’s very much a pinup boy. There he is on the front cover of “The Bystander” magazine. This is just a selection. He was a fashion icon. Post-war, think post-First World War, that terrible war that really changed the way people looked at the world. He also becomes part of the bright young things. And I’m going to be talking more about that when I talk about the Mitford family next week and the week after. But he becomes a pleasure seeker. And now I’m afraid we have to start talking a little bit about his love life, which really, really upset his very pedantic father and he’s very dutiful wife, Princess Mary.

Now, a royal match with his second cousin, Princess Victoria Louisa was suggested and nothing came of it. And in fact, he keeps on having these German princesses put in front of him. But remember he’s a party boy. And in the First World War whilst he was in Paris, he was introduced, let’s have a look at the next slide, please. This is Marguerite Alibert. She was a beautiful French woman. He meets her in Paris in one of those clubs that his grandfather, Edward VII, had frequented. She had been a prostitute. Later she becomes an incredibly successful cortisone in Paris. She is a socialite and she has an affair with Prince Edward that goes on for over a year. He’s infatuated with her at the beginning. And you can imagine how that went down in royal circles because they have to keep an eye on the prince. He’s in Paris. Never forget that Prince Albert, one of the reasons Prince Albert died young is he tried to sort out his son, Edward VII. Remember when Edward VII was a young man? He got involved with an actress and the very stern Albert went to clear the mess up. He had a very bad cold. It disintegrated into serious illness and he died. Now you have his grandson mixing with a woman of, shall I use the terribly old fashioned term that they would’ve used, dubious reputation. However, when she breaks with him, she goes on to have a fascinating life, which is also going to impact on him. She’s obviously a great beauty and a woman of great charm. She married an Egyptian aristocrat. So, and she is really a party girl. These are the bright young things of Paris, of London, of Berlin, of New York. They are partying, they are drinking champagne till the end of the world. What have we got to go on for after that terrible, terrible war?

It’s like the destruction of the old order. Now what happens is she is staying at the Savoy Hotel with her husband in London. The relationship with Edward is over, but she shoots him, and she’s put on trial for murder at the Old Bailey. And unfortunately, Edward had written her many candid letters during the affair, and so everything comes out. The former mistress of the Prince of Wales has shot her lover. She was acquitted, although she was probably guilty. That’s another story I don’t want to go onto now. And however, she had insurance policies. She kept back the most candid of the letters and she actually managed to keep a lifestyle going. And she lived in an apartment opposite the Ritz in Paris right up until her death in 1971. And it was then that the last letters from Edward were destroyed. So there was a long string of women and most of them were married. Let’s have a look at the two most famous mistresses before Wallis Simpson. They were always aristocratic. They were part of his circle. What I’m trying to give over to you is a man who has got the charm of the devil. He’s popular with the people, he has the common touch. His brother, known as Bertie, who later is going to become George VI, the father of Queen Elizabeth and the grandfather of King Charles, he was a far more traditional character. He’d married Elizabeth, a Scottish aristocrat.

They of course produced Princess Elizabeth and Princess Margaret. And they lived the kind of life that George V and Mary of Teck approved of. But here you have with Edward, the man who’s going to become king, his very kind of beautiful aristocratic mistresses, and important to remember they lived according to their rules. The royal family, if you think about the morality of the time, Victoria had introduced into England the whole notion of the family, then her son, Edward VII, much more carefree, and I know Patrick talked to you about certain aspects of his life. And then of course George V, very, very solid, rather boring, but nevertheless, this figurehead of a king who did everything correctly. He had a wild brother. He was the second son. Now you have the Wild Prince of Wales. So who was Freda Dudley Ward? She came from very aristocratic background. She was married, he always went for married women. And this is what Winston Churchill, remember Winston Churchill was himself an aristocrat. He was part of the circle, although a much more serious, level-headed part of the circle. Having said that, he was invited everywhere and he was on a train with them. And he said, “It’s quite pathetic to see the prince and Freda. His love is so obviously undisguisible.” He seemed to have a thing for strong women. Look, he hadn’t, look, if I was a psychologist, I’d point to his very strange relationship with his very, very distant mother. But anyway, he was with Freda Dudley Ward. She, later on, after he broke with her, she had a very, very colourful life.

She divorced her husband in 1931. She married a Cuban theatre impresario and actually lived, those of you who are in London, she lived in Hamilton Terrace. And her husband actually founded the Curzon Cinema chain. And she herself was a writer and involved with cinema. And she was painted by John Singer Sergeant. So that’s the first of his important mistresses. And the second is Thelma Furness. Freda Dudley Ward gives way to Thelma Furness, who is the daughter of an American diplomat and his half Chilean and half Irish wife. She had a very exotic background. She became a motion picture producer and an actress. She was one of three sisters, and one of her sisters, Gilda, one of her sisters, Golda, Gloria, her twin was the mother of Gloria Vanderbilt, the rich Americans who came to Britain looking for husbands, the heiresses. So also don’t forget, there’s American high society, there’s British high society, French high society, and they’re all intermingling. What happened to her, she’d married a wealthy American, a man called Marmaduke Furness, who was 1st Viscount Furness. The rich heiress comes to Britain looking for a husband. He’s chairman of the Furness Shipping Company. And she becomes involved with the prince in 1929. She actually joined him on an East Africa safari. Now the British press were very respectful.

The British press didn’t go near any of his affairs, but the American press did and that’s going to be rather problematic. Can we see the next slide, please? In 1934, George V gives his son a present of Belvedere, Fort Belvedere in Surrey, and that becomes his residence. It’s where he got away from the world. That’s where he had his mistresses entertain, and that is really where he and his friends lived the very, very high life. She becomes his first regular companion at the Belvedere and entertained all his friends there. She was his hostess. And also again, those of you who live in London, they had a big house in Elsworthy Road, plus a country house. In March, 1934, she went to visit her sister in America, and she had acquired an American friend called Wallis Simpson. Wallis Simpson, and as I said, Anne Sever is going to lecture entirely on her next week, on the Thursday. And I’m sure those of you who have heard her on Ethel Rosenberg, she’s absolutely brilliant. Now the point is, Wallis Simpson was a twice-divorced American. She was living with her husband. They were incredibly… They were incredibly social climbers. And in fact, her husband was of Jewish descent. When I visited the synagogue in Plymouth, his grandfather had endowed the synagogue. Wallis and her views on Jews, I think that’s something that Anne will spend more time with you on. But certainly Mr. Simpson, Mr. Ernest Simpson was a, he was a broker, he was a banker, and the fact that his wife was so charming and mixed so easily, she came from the south, she had that wonderful southern charm, and she quickly acquired some very, very influential friends.

And ironically, it was Thelma who asked her, she’d already met the prince, and it was Thelma who asked her to keep an eye on the prince for her while she was in America. And that is when Wallis usurps her, and Edward falls completely for the woman in a absolutely pathetic dog-like way. There seems to have been a part of Edward that totally wanted to be dominated. So the affair with the American divorcee became very, very complicated. It led to such concern that we know that the Special Branch were following them, and also because not everything is shredded, we know how much they were followed and how suspicious it all was. Can we see the next slide please?

• [Karina] Yes. I will go to the next slide. There’s a banging noise coming through. It might be a bracelet if you’re wearing it that the microphone is picking up.

• Okay, I’ll keep, alright, sorry about that. Thank you Karina. Okay, George V dies on the 20th January, 1936. And evidently his doctor said to him, “You’ll get better and you’ll visit Bognor. And his last words were meant to be, "Bugger Bognor.” It’s a very ordinary English seaside town. And now Edward is the king. He is proclaimed Edward VIII. Now the next day, accompanied by Wallis Simpson, he broke with custom. He actually watched the proclamation of his own accession from a window in St. James’s Palace. And he actually was the first monarch to fly in an aircraft when he flew from Sandringham for his accession council. And there’s a very famous picture of Wallis in the window with the king looking at the proclamation. Let’s have a look at the next slide. This is what his father said. “After I’m dead, the boy will ruin himself.” Now, he’s already broken with tradition. He further breaks with tradition over such as what we would consider such a trivial matter. What happens is this. Of course, as king, and we are doing this at the moment with the present King Charles III, he will have his face on the stamps and on the gold coins of the realm. And he insisted that he faced left to show the parting in his hair. He broke the tradition and only a handful of test coins were actually struck because what happens is he only reigns, can we have a look at the next one?

He only reigns for 326 days because he has no intention of giving up Wallis Simpson. And in August and September of the year that he is not yet crowned, he is the king-in-waiting, he is the king, but not yet crowned, Edward and Simpson cruised the Mediterranean on a steam , and it was becoming more and more clear how serious the whole relationship was, and it’s beginning to break in the American press. And it’s not much time before it’s going to break in the British press. And on the 16th of November, 1936, Edward invites Stanley Baldwin, the prime minister, to meet him in Buckingham Palace to discuss him marrying Wallis Simpson when she became free to marry. Now you’ve got to remember one of the titles of the king is he is head of the Church of England. And go back to the 30s when divorce was completely frowned on. So he has problems from his ministers. He has problems from the archbishops and the bishops. And he also has problems from the heads of the commonwealth. I mean the prime ministers of Australia, Canada, and South Africa made their opposition absolutely clear. They said that they could not countenance as the head of the British Empire a man who was marrying a divorcee. You see the whole thing breaking in the press. Wallis is going to be become more and more of a trapped animal. Whether she wanted to go through with it is another story. And as I said, that’s going to be dealt with by Anne Sever. And as a result of all of this, he decides that he’s going to give up the throne. He is actually going to abdicate.

So let’s have a look at the abdication document. Now this is absolutely huge for the King of England to abdicate. And there you have his broadcast. It means that his brother, George, will ascend the throne. On one level, George had the correct family values. He was married with these two pretty little girls. But the problem was George had no preparation for kingship, plus something else much more complicated. He had a very bad stammer and he was absolutely terrified of taking over the kingship, but he did his duty. And from the point of view of the future of Britain, it was incredibly important that he did. Now, can we see the next slide, please? Because what happens is there is a huge rift in the royal family. Wallis flees to France where she stays with the Rothschild family in a beautiful villa. She’s obtained her divorce from Wallis Simpson. It is the scandal of the century. And the royal family, they are horrified and they refuse to give her the title of HRH. He was so in love with her that he wanted her to be Her Royal Highness. He refuses to give her the title. And then what happens is he is invited to a state visit to Nazi Germany. He marries Wallis in France after the abdication, after her divorce has come through. None of the members of the royal family turned up. His equerry who had to make the arrangements. Let’s have a look at the… Should we have a look at the equerry, or we come onto that in a minute, I beg your point. So this is so done, can we go back and then go…? Let’s look at Dudley Forwood. He was the equerry to the Prince of Wales.

Can we look at him and then go back to these pictures? He had actually met the Duke of Windsor just after his abdication. He met him whilst he and Wallis were on a skiing holiday, and he was attacked to the British ligation and he was given to them as a butler. He made a very good impression on the prince. And after the abdication, he goes to stay at the castle with Wallis and is really responsible for arranging the marriage. And of course he had to actually tell Edward that the title HRH had been refused. And later on he went on to Germany and he reported that this is what Edward said. He said, “The British and German races are one. They should always be one. They are of Hun origin.” And forwarded his own memoirs. He said, “I fear that his highness neglected to mention the Norman Conquest.” So let’s go back to the pictures of his visit to Nazi Germany. Can you imagine what this is doing to the British at home? It is now 1937. Germany has pulled out of the League of Nations. Germany is re-arming. Germany is sabre rattling. They have already invaded the Sudetenland. Plus, of course, if you think of the policy towards the Jews, already the Nuremberg laws of 1935 had been issued, which deprive the Jews of citizenship, made inter-marriage a crime.

You have complete censorship in Nazi Germany. The whole of the press, everything is being, everything is being contained by the evil propagandist Goebbels. And this is the report on the visit in the New York Times. “Hitler showed his guests the house and the grounds. They stood for some time on the terrace looking down into Austria.” Remember I’m reporting in the New York Times. This is October, 1937. A few months later, Hitler is going to go home to Austria. “They stood on the terrace looking down on Austria with the border town of Salzburg framed between the mountains. After a two-hour visit, he gave the Nazi salute.” This is a report on him for Dr. Adam Lownie, in his very good book, “The Traitor King.” He says, “He was a very weak man, very stupid. He had no inner life. He was a very heavy drinker, no sense of public duty. It was all private pleasure and superficial cafe society.” Now, but this is where it does become terribly, terribly problematic because he’s come… So what you see there is Edward next to a man called Ley who was one of the most evil of the Nazis. And there you see him surrounded by the Nazis. He’s entertained by Goebbels, he’s entertained by Goering, and also don’t forget that other English aristocrats are already in Germany. The British Union of Fascists under Oswald Mosley. Diana Mitford was there. She was a close friend of Edward VIII. Also Unity, who was with Hitler in the 30s and shot herself when war was declared. And also don’t forget that he felt very at home in Germany, all the more so because of the Duke of Saxe-Coburg. Can we have a look at the Duke of Saxe-Coburg, please?

Yeah, this is Charles Edward, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, 1884 to 1954. Who was he? Now, he’d been born in England, in Claremont House in Esher. He was the son of Prince Leopold, Duke of Albany, who was the eighth of the nine children of Queen Victoria. His father died of haemophilia before he was born. His sister was married to Queen Mary’s brother. They are incredibly close to each other. And Prince and Queen Mary absolutely adored him. And they spoke to each other in German. Now he was educated at Eaton. For the first 15 years of his life he is an English gentleman. So he has an Eaton education, but a series of dynastic mishaps meant that he has to become the heir to the Saxe-Coburg crown. It’s a very important principality in Germany. So when he’s 16, his cousins have died, he inherits the throne, so his cousin Willi, Kaiser Wilhelm II, sends for him. So by this time, it’s before the First World War, and age 16, he becomes the Duke of Saxe-Coburg. He marries Victoria Adelaide, who is the niece of Wilhelm II’s wife, the Empress Augusta. Why am I telling you this? So you understand the interconnection between the families. And he is called by everyone, Willi’s Seventh Son. He becomes a general in the German army in the First World War. And of course, at the end of the First World War, he is going to be dethroned.

What happens in the First World War is of course the house, if you think of the title of Charles… If you think of the title of King George V in the First World War, he actually was the prince. he was the prince of Saxe-Coburg Gotha. Think Albert, they changed their name to Windsor. So his nephew, and also a very close relative of his wife, he had been a general in the German army in the First World War. As a result, he loses all his English titles, including the Order of the Garter. But then what happens, his territory borders on Munich, and you all know what happened in Munich. There are three revolutions, one after another. Each of those revolutions, the leadership was Jewish. He believed that communism was Jewish because there’s a worker’s council. The Kaiser, of course, abdicates. And Germany, as far as he’s concerned, has completely gone to the dogs. Even Weimar was far too socialist for him. And what happens is he is attracted to the right wing. And he first meets… He’s lost his land. He still has his title, but he has no power. Kaiser Wilhelm is abdicated. He goes to live in Holland. He lives the life of a gentleman farmer. He doesn’t die till 1941. And he was quite supportive of Hitler. Anyway, he meets Hitler. He’s attracted more and more to the right.

And don’t forget that Hitler needed to, if as it were he needed the aristocracy with him. And after the Nazi victory in 1933, he joins the Nazi party and he flies the swastika over his castle. He becomes the president of the German Red Cross. And the German Red Cross was totally infiltrated by Himmler’s men because if you think about it, the Red Cross was meant to look after people in concentration camps, et cetera. Well, the record was absolutely abysmal. Back in 1935, he’d become president of the English German Society. And in the 30s, there was a hope that in fact a deal could be struck between the British and the Germans. And it was him, it’s Charles Edward, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, who actually hosts Edward and Mrs. Simpson when they come on this tour to Germany. And the point is, she is given huge honour. It’s treated as a royal visit, so he gets what he wants. She is treated as her HRH. She is wined and dined by all the functionaries of Nazi Germany, but also many of the German aristocracy who support the right. They are so terrified of communism that they’ve thrown in their lot with the right. Now, what actually happens to him? Three of his sons served in the German army in World War II. One was killed. His daughter married the man who later became the king of Sweden. And when he went to England in ‘36 for the funeral of George V, of course, he reported back to his Nazi masters.

So important to remember that in Germany, Edward feels very much at home. He has relatives, he has friends, and he has a natural sympathy with Germany because Germany is looking after him and his beloved wife. Now, this is a comment from… This is a comment from Albert Speer. He’s quoting Hitler. This is what he writes in his book. “I’m certain that through him,” talking about the prince, “permanent friendly relations could have been achieved. If he had stayed, everything would’ve been different. His abdication was a severe loss to us.” So basically Hitler already thinks that, and that there is going to be an idea that once the war starts and England is engaged in the war, remember there were many Brits who wanted to do a deal with Hitler. Don’t forget Nevelle Chamberlain and the Appeasement Lobby, the Duke of Kent, all sorts of characters wanted to do a deal. And what happens to the Prince and Wallis Simpson, they actually go to Paris. They lease a mansion in Boulevard Suchhet from late 1938. When war breaks out, believe it or not, the Prince asked the Germans to look after his properties in France. He really didn’t get it. I think that’s the most important thing that I would say about it. So on the outbreak of the Second World War in September, 1939, what on earth are we going to do with Edward and Mrs. Simpson? What happens is they are brought back to Britain on board HMS Kelly by Louis Mountbatten.

What are we going to do with him? We already know because one of the first things he did before the Germans invaded France, he was working with the British officially. I mean, after all, he is the Duke of Windsor, and he inspected the French, a lot of the French installations. One of the problems with what I’m dealing with now is we haven’t got the full documentation. A historian called Urbach, and a couple of historians, and there’s been a documentary on it, actually believe that there’s enough evidence to actually point the finger at Edward that he did, either by accident or carelessly at his supper parties, give evidence that was used by the Germans of the weaknesses in the French line. So this is very, very important. Was he actually a traitor? Now, certainly Count Julius von Zech-Burkersroda, he claimed that Edward had leaked the Allied War plans for the defence of Belgium. The Duke later denied it. And when Germany invaded the North of France in May, 1940, the Windsors, they flee south first to Biarritz, and then they go to Spain. In July, they move to Portugal, where they go… Portugal, of course is neutral. And they move into the home of a man called Ricardo Espirito Santo. Can we go on please? This is the man I’ve just quoted to you of what he was actually an ambassador. He believed that, well, his evidence was that Edward was traitorous to Britain. So let’s go on to Ricardo Espirito Santo. Now he’s a bit of an interesting character.

He’s a Portuguese banker, he’s an economist. He was a patron of the arts. He was part of the international jet set. And he was very close to the Portuguese dictator Salazar. And he made the Portuguese bank into one of the most important financial institutions in Portugal. Portugal made a fortune in the war. Ironically, he was married to a woman of Jewish origin. And we know, you know, people are terribly complicated. In the war, he actually helped Jews, but he becomes the entertainer of the Prince of Wales and Wallis. So they are staying with him in Portugal. And what happens is there are a lot of supper parties. There’s a man there called Charles Bedeau, who was definitely a spy for the Nazis. And there was a proposed Nazi plan, it’s called Operation Willi. They believed that if they could capture the prince, eventually that he wouldn’t mind at all being put back on the English throne. Now, I want to be very careful about this because there are historians who are making a very good case, but you don’t forget that a lot of this is hushed up. Winston Churchill, who probably was quite well aware of what was going on, he never let the records be opened, and nor did the Americans. Some of the records have been opened now, but the picture is still a little bit hazy because it’s an incredible accusation to actually accuse the man who for a short time was king of England for 326 days of actually being a traitor to his country. Certainly Winston Churchill, who at one time had been a supporter of the prince, because the prince at one time had proposed a morganatic marriage to Mrs. Simpson, which had meant that she would be his consort and not the Queen.

Winston Churchill had felt that the man should have been given a chance, but he becomes more and more angry. So imagine there’s a war on, he’s in neutral Sweden and he’s in neutral Portugal. Portugal is making a fortune in the war. There are spies for the Germans there. There are spies for the British. It’s a real hotbed. And we know that Charles Bedeau who’s a part of this circle, is certainly a spy for the Nazis. We know that Edward was very, very careless in his talk. And to what extent was there this… We know that there was a plot to kidnap him. To what extent was he involved in it? And the man who was kind of involved in the kidnap was a very, very unpleasant character called Walter Schellenberg. We see Walter Schellenberg. Can we go on? Walter Schellenberg was a member of the Nazi party. He was in the SS. He was implicated in all sorts of appalling crimes. He got away with a lot of it, actually. He becomes head of the German Foreign Intelligence Service. And later on, he was the man who negotiated that the Wehrmacht would aid the Einsatz group. And now we’re talking about real evil here. Don’t forget that the Einsatz group, and after the invasion of Russia in June, 1941, this is when the Nazis begin what we call the final solution. Between the invasion of Poland and much of Europe to the invasion of Russia, Jews were herded, they were mistreated, they were sent to concentration camps, their lives were hardly worth living, but they were not being executed as government policy. Of course, many of them died. They died of starvation.

They died of torture. But it’s only with the invasion of Russia because following the invasion of Russia go the Einsatz group and 3,000 elite SS officers who are tasked with shooting, murdering, and they murder nearly one-and-a-half million people, men, women, and children between the invasion of Russia and February, 1942. It’s by that time they decide on a more “humane,” and I’m quoting Hitler, way of killing. And of course, 3,000 men could not shoot one-and-a-half million people. Historians have had to work backwards because for a long time the archives were held by the Russians. We now know that the Wehrmacht was up to its neck. And it was Schellenberg who negotiated that the Wehrmacht would aid the Einsatz group and in the killing fields. And after Heydrich’s death, he becomes Himmler’s closest confidant. And in June, 1940, he was charged with a blueprint for the occupation of Britain after the invasion. The Germans believed, you see, you’ve got to remember, Hitler didn’t want war with Britain. He really wanted a peaceful solution. His dream was to put Edward VIII back on the throne. The British would have a puppet government. Churchill would either have been killed or escape. And also along with Operation Sea Lion, that was going to be the occupation of Britain. A black book was compiled with 2,300 prominent Brits, including leading Jews who were to be taken away and murdered. They believed that they had to do this because, quote unquote, “Britain was a country run by Freemasons, Jews and a small public school elite.”

And he was actually sent to Portugal at Ribbon Trops’ request to intercept the Duke and Duchess of Windsor. This is Operation Willi. In fact, it doesn’t happen. Mountbatten gets them out of the country. Did he want to go? Did they want to go? They stayed tallied, they tarried in Biarritz. They enjoyed staying with Esperito Santo. But in the end, what’s going to happen to them? And of course Churchill is going to send them off to where? To the Bahamas to become governor of the Bahamas, keep him out of the way where he supervised the Happy Valley set. A very large group of decadent. Now, he was furious they didn’t give him a proper post. Now what happens to Schellenberg? And this is another story for you, because people do not receive justice in this world. He actually, he was captured and he was put on trial at Nuremberg. He testified against the SS and the Nazi leaders. He writes his memoirs. He was sentenced to six years in prison. After two years, he was let out because of ill health. He had a liver condition, cirrhosis. He died in Italy in 1952. And this is the man who not only did he draw up, helped draw up the list, but also he negotiated that the Wehrmacht to be involved in the kitten process. And of course, Edward, Edward was a terrible antisemite. Now, what happens to Edward later on is after he’s the governor of Bahamas, he comes back, but he never comes back to Britain.

He goes to Paris where he and Mrs. Simpson live a very, very, a very, very sad life in many ways. Should we have a look at some last pictures? You’ll see Churchill. Churchill lost any faith in him, sent him off to the Bahamas, which is basically saying, “We can’t trust you.” And let’s have a look at the last picture. And here you see him and Mrs. Simpson. And we know that the CIA were very suspicious. And they did in fact intercept a lot of their correspondence. They were very wary about them coming to America. I’m going to leave Anne to talk about Mrs. Simpson because she has got a terrible reputation and how much that has to be redressed. I put a lot of the blame actually at the feet of her husband. After the war, as I said, they go to Paris. They lead this terribly sybaritic life going from party to party, polo match to polo match, mixing with the kind of Euro trash, mixing with the semi-aristocracy. He always insisted that she be called HRH. Everybody had to curtsy to her. She obviously became very fed up with him and took lovers. He does come back to England for the funeral of his brother. When he dies, he was buried in England, and she was allowed back under his niece Elizabeth.

When Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, was alive, that she hated Wallis Simpson for a passion. Because she always believed, because George VI did his duty in the war, the palace had been bombed. He was not a very imaginative man. He wasn’t a very clever man. But my goodness, he was a dutiful man. And she believed that his death was actually hastened by the fact that he had that terrible burden during the war. So she never forgave her brother-in-law or Wallis Simpson. And in the last years of her life, living in total luxury in Paris, she did in fact have dementia. So in many ways, very sad and wasted lives, but not half as sad of the good lives that they themselves were complicit in wasting. So I’m going to stop there. As I said, I deliberately avoided Mrs. Simpson because I want Anne Sever to do that. But I’m going to be talking in a couple of weeks about the Mitfords, and of course in Paris, they were very close to Sir Oswald Mosley and Diana Mosley. Diana Mosley was also part of the English aristocracy. And they did keep a lot of connections up. And of course it was Oswald Mosley who had been chairman of the British Union of Fascists. In a lot of his table talk, he loathed Jews. He was violently anti-communist. But I think I’d go to that quote that he was a very vain man, a very weak man. a very empty man. Now let’s have a look at the questions.

Q&A and Comments:

I’ve tried to hold the balance. Let’s see if I have. Let’s see what you have to say. Julius gives a nice compliment to Wendy.

Oh, Sharon’s reading “Women’s Experiences in the Holocaust,” by Agnes, yes, I know her, yes.

Q: Oh, “What is the book we should read?”

A: Oh, yes, somebody made a comment about “Daniel Deronda,” which was a previous lecture I gave. “Daniel Deronda” is a book written by George Eliot, the English writer. And “Daniel Deronda,” it’s a fascinating novel written by a non-Jewish writer, a 19th century brilliant novelist. And it’s been made into a film called “Daniel Deronda” on Prime Time, and I recommended it.

This is Shelly. “Most aristocratic families had little to do with their children who were raised by nannies and sent off to boarding school. Disabled children at the time were isolated if the family had money. We can’t look at these things through current eyes.” No, I agree with you. But on the other hand, Shelly, Prince John had such a miserable life. And I do think once in a while we should show pity. I don’t excuse that behaviour. Just because everybody did it, I’m not going to excuse it. Yes, it was common currency, but that didn’t mean everybody followed it.

Oh sorry, I know what the knocking is. It’s actually my table.

Q: And Ann says, “Do we know the novel, ‘Famous Last Words,’ by my Canadian friend, Timothy Findley, as Edward’s and Wallis’s Nazi sympathies?”

A: Yes. Yes I do. And of course, yeah. Look, he wanted the kingship. He wanted the glory for his wife. Mrs. Simpson’s father’s family name. Yes, it was Solomon’s, you are correct. That’s Mr. Simpson. Her family was Wallis Warfield. They came from the southern states. She’d been bought up as a southern belle but didn’t have any family money. And her first marriage was an absolute disaster, but Anne will talk about that.

Oh, this is interesting. This is Michael Britain. This is when lockdown really comes into its own. “When Edward Prince of Wales toured South Africa in 1925, I bet he went on safari. The local press noted that his playboy dalliances continued unabated, including on the royal train used for the visit.” Yes, you see the press the press in England was incredibly respectful. It was only after the scandal had broken everywhere. By the time he is king, he’s traipsing Wallis all over Europe, and the story is there in the American press, in the European press. It’s the number one scandal. Think the Princess Diana’s scandal. And in the end the British, it does seep into the British press.

Q: “Where does Princess Stephanie come into recruiting Wallis?”

A: I’m going to check that for you, Shelly.

Q: “I find it hard to believe that Edward VIII gave up the crown for love. Will the real story ever come out?”

A: Arlene, it’s a very good point. How much of it, he was obsessed, there’s no question about that. He was an incredibly weak man. Evidently he was also sexually rather strange. But I’m going to leave all that to Anne.

Q: Did he believe they would accept the abdication? Were there certain forces who were terrified of his Nazi sympathies?

A: Look, on the other hand, don’t forget Neville Chamberlain and Lord Halifax. They all wanted appeasement, too. We will never know the complete story. Different historians, Urbach’s doing a brilliant job, they are putting things together. Will we ever know the real story? Will we ever know the story of Rudolf Hess flying to England? He flew to England to meet with whom? The story we are told officially is that he had gone completely mad. Not likely to be true. You know why he did it? I don’t believe it was against Hitler’s orders because Hitler paid a pension to his wife and children. And I do not believe he would’ve done that if he believed Hess was a traitor to him. So, and was he going to meet the Duke of Kent, who was a Nazi sympathiser? He flew up to Scotland. We will never really know. There’s too much shredding and there’s too much vested interest. You know, there are certain documents that are never released.

Q: “How much was the opposition to Edward based on Wallis being twice divorced? And how much based on his laziness, indiscretion and Nazi sympathies.”

A: Shelly, it depends entirely who you read on it. Certainly he is head of the Church of England. There’s a big fuss at the moment because Charles wants to be head of all faiths. But there’s a problem because certainly up until Charles, Elizabeth was head of the Church of England, and the church up until the last 20 years frowned desperately on divorce. A twice divorced American commoner. Think about it. It’s only in the recent decades that the royalty are marrying non-royals. Look, Victoria might have had an arranged marriage, but it was a love match, but that was with a prince. Edward VII married a princess, a Danish princess. They were dynastic marriages. George V made a dynastic marriage with his brother’s fiancee. His brother died, his elder brother died, so Mary was passed on to George. Dynastic marriage. George VI seems to have made a love marriage, but with a Scottish aristocratic who was impeccable. His brother, who becomes king, he’s having affairs with all these married women, moving with the bright young things. It’s a complicated story.

Yes, Edward stayed at the Rothschilds. Wallis stayed with American friends, the Rogers, at their village, but they marry from the Rothchilds’ villa, yeah.

Q: “Why did the Rothchilds in Paris host Wallis Simpson? Didn’t they know she was a Nazi sympathiser?”

A: Asked that question of Anne, please. Yes, the picture was before the Nazis had gone into the, yes. Sorry. No, no, no, no, no. Wait a minute, they had gone into the Sudetenland, unless I’m going completely mad, in 1936. Wait a minute. No. Where did they… I’ll check the books. Thanks Sheila.

Where did they go in first? Something happened in 1936. I’ll have to think about it. Can someone help me? But to give a Nazi salute, do you know how offensive that was? Think about Archbishop Temple. I talked about him last time when I was talking about… I was talking about Archbishop Temple. He’d been part of those academics who was trying to bring Jewish refugees in from Germany. Think how offensive it was.

Q: “Why was Edwards such a terrible antisemite?”

A: Look, he believed all Jews were communists. Think protocols of the Elders of Zion. “Jews are too arriviste,” in inverted commas. Look, many of the upper classes had antisemitic tendencies. There was a club in London called the Friday Club. The Duke of Wellington was a member. They were all violently antisemitic. Look, Jews are capitalist. Jews are communist. If you really want me to analyse that, it’s a very huge question you’ve just asked. Speaking personally, and this is very much my view, I think 2,000 years of making a people into the pariah, into the pariahs, it goes very, very, very deep. And also don’t forget, Edward was not very bright.

Yes, that’s right. Nancy Koehn, the life of Prince John, “The Lost Prince,” written by Horowitz. It’s brilliant if you can get hold of it.

No, he didn’t talk about… No Shelly, Hitler never talked about restoring the monarchy, but he got the aristocrats to go along with him. It was the fear of communism. And also he promised a Germany that would give respect back. The genius of Hitler is he promised everybody everything. He promised the trade unions that they… He promised them full employment, and there was. But he took away all their freedoms and the freedom to strike. You know, Germany was desperate after the Wall Street crash. Look, think about today, and I’m not making any parallels except to say, we are living in an age where people are looking for leadership. And quite often it’s the wrong kind of leadership. They want the kind of people who will tell them how to be, someone comes along who’s got huge charisma and they say, “I will solve all your problems for you.” Most people, it would tragically seem, don’t necessarily want to think for themselves. That’s tragic.

“According to Dr. Lownie, there was documentary evidence of treason, which he unearthed.” But the problem is it hasn’t been proven, hasn’t been proven satisfactorily enough. And can you honestly imagine how anyone could even consider the execution of a king, a former king? It just would not happen. Churchill wouldn’t allow any of the documents to be released. And Churchill was very hostile to Edward after this. It just couldn’t have happened, Nicholas.

“How guilty were…” Look, Mary of Teck, she was very pro-German. The Duke of Saxe-Coburg was one of her favourites. She was doubly related to him. He visited England all the time in the 20s and 30s. There was a lot of communication between the two between the German aristocracy and the British royal family. The British royal family was mainly German. That’s why

George V changed his name to the House of Windsor. Yes, I should have mentioned that. You are right, Shelly. The Duke of Windsor actually did say, he did say “The best way to bring Britain to its knees is to extensively bomb Britain,” yes. Now that is enough for some. Look, in this world, it does seem that many people did not get their just desserts. Look at all the Nazi war criminals who were not given proper judge, who were not brought to retribution, in my view. And I’m not going to use the word retribution, I use, I misspoke, justice. They were not given justice.

Oh, yes. Judy says, “I’ve read he would invite people to posh restaurants, ate and drink lavishly, and left the bill to those who were invited.” Yes, he was also very, very mean. Sure. Yeah. He was a real, an American friend of mine would use the term bum. You know, he demanded that his brother give him a huge amount of money, that he was broke, and I’m talking about after his abdication, when it turns out he actually had millions. He was very upset to go to the Bahamas because he didn’t think, he thought it was beneath him. He insisted that everybody was lavishly servile to the Duchess. He was a horror in my view.

Read “Hitler’s Aristocrats,” yeah.

Rod, “Listening to you the last series appear that the history of Britain and Europe is history of war and roar into marriage.” Yeah, not just that, I’m looking it from a certain angle. You’ve got to listen to all of us.

Yes, I know Susan’s book, “Hitler’s Aristocrats,” yes.

“Maybe Helen Fry should do an investigation about what we don’t know.” This is a subject that Helen is very knowledgeable on. I will speak to her. It’s a very good idea, Susan.

“Just to say, I’ve just returned from the British Film Institute in Tottenham Court Road where it’s possible to watch both episodes of Rex Bloomstein’s programme, ‘Auschwitz and the Allies,’ a fascinating two hours with loads of hindsight.” Yes, as you know, Rex lectures for us sometimes. He’s a very close friend. And that documentary is enough to make your hair stand on end, is it not? And it was the earliest documentary about this. It was written, “Auschwitz and the Allies” was written by Martin Gilbert, who’s a superb historian. So yes, we are trying to work out a way of showing it. But as I’m sure you are waiting to know, the website will be up this year, I promise you that, and then we are going to be talking seriously about film. But it’s a lot of effort to clear all the copyrights because we have a marvellous collection of films, and I know there are people who listen who also have access to some very interesting films, and we have filmmakers online.

Yes, the Windsors married Charles Bedeau.

Yes, Shelly. “It was the demilitarisation of the Rhineland.” Thank you, Jonathan. I dunno what’s the matter with my brain today. And that should be enough of a signal.

This is Sophie. “I was told that Ed was antisemitic because he was taught German by Herman Fielder Oxford, and Fielder was antisemitic.” Look, there are lots of paths on the way, but I think it was just inherent in his group, frankly. What is interesting, of course, is that Wallis’s husband, her second husband, had a Jewish father. Yeah, yeah. The other story is, of course, so many Jews wanted to be part of that aristocracy. And I was talking about that last week, last session if you remember when I was talking about how people like Schechter, and of course Israel Zangwill was so upset about that, saying that our history is just as great as anything. That it’s a kind of phonism, and it’s an area that’s still with us today. Are we British? Are we Jewish? Are we American? Are we Jewish? What society did we take on? What used to be called hyphenated identity.

Q: “Edward and his brother were both masons. So why the anti-mason rhetoric?”

A: That came from Hitler. Hitler loathes mason, Hitler and the Nazis, and of course the Berlin Olympics.

Thank you, Melvin. So there’s a lot of reasons that the Prince of Wales, the former Prince of Wales, the former Edward VII, now the Duke of Windsor should not have gone to Nazi Germany. It was a state visit. They treated him like the king, and that’s what he was missing.

“They’d gone into the set up Rhineland,” yes.

Gillian, “Just went to Versailles. In the palace, there’s a picture of Napoleon giving his salute to his generals. This is where Hitler took the lead on salutes. dropped out of my head.”

Q: Rita, “Do I believe a Chinese dossier exists in reference to Wallis?”

A: I do not know, but I think I know someone who does. Thank you everybody. I’m sorry I misspoke over the Rhineland, but I think what I want to take away, for you to take away, the fact that Edward, who’s given the throne now to his brother who was so ill prepared, he’d been so popular. There were a lot of people who didn’t want him to abdicate, you know? And yet what he does is he goes on a state visit to Nazi Germany. That to me, on the very basic family level, forget the rights and wrongs and the Jews and morality, on a family level, it’s stabbing your brother in the back. It’s stabbing your family in the back. Now, how much was it his obsession with Wallis Simpson? How much was it he was just an empty headed, non-entity? And you know, in a way, thank goodness he didn’t become King of England. Thank goodness for the abdication crisis, because can you just imagine if he’d been King of England at the time of Hitler’s overtures, particularly with Nevelle Chamberlain, particularly with Lord Halifax. If Halifax had become Prime Minister instead of Churchill in May, 1940, and I know William’s lectured on this, the world would’ve been a very different place. So on that very, very happy note or not, I thought it would be a completely different tack. But I’m going to continue on this very different tack talking about the Mitfords, and we’ve got a wonderful series of lectures. I’m doing that the week after next. We’ve got a wonderful series of lectures lined up for you next week, including Anne Sever. So I wish you all well and I’ll see you all soon.

Lots of love. Bye.