Edward VIII & Wallis Simpson: A Royal Scandal

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[Music] No royal scandal has rocked Britain quite like this one.

“Well, unless you include Richard III possibly murdering his nephew's or well,”

one of Tom John, starred his nephew to death. All that other time, when Henry II children all hooked up with the French king and tried to pose that, well, okay. No royal scandal in the modern era has rocked Britain quite like this one. Well, unless you don't particularly believe a piece of express in working as a valid alibi. But anyway, it's one of the greatest gandals in the history of the modern monarchy, okay.

A member of the monarchy defies expectation and family. Takes on social convention and marries a divorced American woman. The couple faced a brutal media stall. They're exiled from their family, they chased out of their country. And they reinvent themselves with other media projects to survive.

I am, of course, talking about the marriage between Edward, the eighth, and Wallace Simpson. The American socialite for whom he abdicated the British crown in December 1936. He chose love, over duty, and cause not just a familial riff, but a constitutional crisis, because he was head of the Church of England, which was against remarriage after divorce. And she had been divorced twice.

His choice on exceptional to the old folkies in the British government, and many people within the British public. It was unprecedented. The scandal reshaped the monarchy in... ...made public the tensions between role duty and personal desire. Something that we still see today.

So if explore this infamous episode in the monarchy's recent history, I'm drawn by the wonderful Professor Kate Williams, who hosts the exiled King's Queens and dastardly things podcasts, this is Dan Snow's history and the story of the scandal that rocked the royal family. She might've hit the top of the top, top, top, top, you, or she might've liked the king. No black, white unity till there is first and black unity.

Never to go to war with one another to gain.

And look down, and the little head's wear the power. Kate Williams, great to have you on the podcast. You can see you, Dan. Oh, it's good to see you. This is one of their great stories. Give us a sense of just how...

“The Prince of Wales was a pretty cool character, wasn't he?”

The Prince of Wales was popular. He was loved when he came to the throne. There was a lot of optimism about what a great king he might be. Of course, he'd had this investiture in 1911 as Prince of Wales to show off. He was loyal to Wales and going to be a marvelous king, best king ever.

You're quite that story. No, not at all guys, wrong, pretty quick. But he has movie star looks. His dad taught a fifth, not the most charismatic guy in the world. So, is there a sense he could be a king for this new age?

Where kings were able to broadcast across the empire. They were film cameras that was radio broadcast. He should have been the right man the right place. He was the king for the modern age. Just as you say, Sena's an early adopter of technology.

George the fifth was popular, but he was very much seen as a solid old person. New pretty much belonged in the Victorian era. But then we have this young, exciting, vibrant person who's going to lead the country into this exciting new technical age. We saw so many incredible inventions during the 1920s and 1930s.

We see the growth of the airplane. We see medications developed. We see building technologies. All these new technologies, the car is becoming dominant. And Edward seems like just the king to lead Britain into future dominance.

So what's OK there must be reality? Because as we know with royal families, there can be a little bit of a gap between

what the public sees and what the reality is.

Tell me about him growing up family brothers dad and mum. What is his situation? Edward is born in 1894. And he's the eldest son of George and Mary. And of course, that means he's got his lineage right back to Queen Victoria.

His great grandmother is Queen Victoria. She should have bounced him. I'll actually say life. She was, didn't die to a 1901. So he would have met Queen Victoria.

And he would have known her as a small boy. So he really has all the royal blood, all the royal glamour. He's there to take the throne. He's Mr. Popular. They have quite a difficult childhood.

“I think George the fifth in Queen Mary aren't the most.”

We might say modern loving of parents. It's a very strict upbringing. They have some other cruel nannies who pinched them to make them cry, which will annoy their parents. But actually, when he becomes a gang man, he really throws himself

into the world of a prince. And as we've seen with so many princes before, the prince of Wales, Edward the seventh was a glamorous man about town.

And the sons of George the third, they spent every little penny they could on being

on fast carriages and women and diamonds. Edward comes into this role of the prince of Wales. And he's seen a real glamour boy. Now, but what he also wants, which is very significant, is he does want to go to war with the other young men.

He really wants to fight with the other young men. And that's denied really because he would be too much of a kid in that risk. Too much of a security risk. Yeah, so he wants to go to the trenches. His brother goes and fights their navies.

Yes. This is about a juggling the future, George the sixth. So he, what he feels a bit insecure about that. He's not allowed to go and get involved.

“Yes, he tours and sees the suffering first hand.”

But he's not allowed to be part of it. OK, so he's not happy about that. And as Prince of Wales is he doing those kind of photo calls. He's visiting the troops on the front line.

What's his role through the 20s and 30s?

Prince of Wales, his role is one of royal visits. And when he comes, he's so popular. And there is this thought, this thinking, that he sees more of the suffering of the working class. Because, of course, we see post in 1926, the General Strike,

just before the birth of his niece, Elizabeth II, the General Strike, and the suffering of the working classes, the working classes who fought so hard in World War One, they're now saying, what do we get back? So it is generally thought that he is someone who hears

the working man. He understands the working man. It's famously said that when he's touring and sees poverty, he says something must be done. So there are great hopes that he's not just a modern technical advanced king.

He's also a intelligent king, very handsome, movie star, looks as you say. But also that he's the kind of king that's going to give something that helped the working classes and really

pay them back for this huge sacrifice they made in World War One.

Is this something modern about the way that he or his mum had been a European princess? You're coming off a period where monarchs are just an heir to the throne who expected to marry European royalty. Is he expected through that?

What's going on with his love life?

“Is his dad trying to hook him up with some German princess?”

Edward really is quite a modern man. And I think the idea is he's going to be allowed to make his own choice. He's going to be allowed to make his own choice among the British aristocracy just as George VI does. The future is a little broader.

When he marries Elizabeth Bow's line, so I think that's going to be the vision that he's going to make this kind of alliance because post World War One, the idea of making a German alliance is going to be... Well, there aren't many worlds left.

There aren't many worlds left. You can't have the Catholic ones in the middle of the world. Most of the worlds are dead. The other ones that are still there are seen as the enemies. So the idea that Queen Victoria had that marrying all her children,

grandchildren, and great-grandchildren into the war families of Europe was going to create lasting peace, had been shattered by World War One. So the idea is quite the opposite. Quite the opposite actually made it worse. So the cousin's war.

So really what you see with Edward is that David, as the family caught him, is you know, you can probably make your own choice, but the right type of young lady. And that would mean aristocratic. That would mean young.

That would mean a virgin. Okay. And that's not who he wants to date. And so who does he want to date? He wants to date the older married woman.

And in that he's taking off to Grandpa, Grandpa, Edward VII, he liked a married woman. He liked a nice, older married woman, because he knows what's really great about a married woman. We are... I can't answer that question.

You tell me. You can hide the pregnancy. Okay, if she gets pregnant, you can hide it. And you can pay off the gentleman, the husband, with various estates.

And that's the marvelous answer. So he likes a married lady. But increasingly he doesn't necessarily choose the married ladies of the British aristocracy, whose husbands turned a blind eye.

When it was Edward VII, including, of course, Mrs. Kappel's husband turned a blind eye. He likes the American lady. He likes his glamorous fun, rich Americans, who are, I would say, withy, almost flooding

into London at this point. In the late 1920s, early 1930s, they are coming into London.

they've got all these wonderful innovations in America,

and they have fascinated by them. But they have a huge weakness for a prince. They have a weakness for a prince. And do you know what he apparently his chat-up line to Wallace Simpson is?

No, I don't. He says, "I hear you've got good central heating in America." And she says, "This I love it." She says, "Everyone asks me about central heating. I don't want to talk any more about central heating.

Find something better.

“That's how he sees Americans, you know, new,”

fangled inventions. And she is, there's no difference." Yeah, they're all so bad. None of this difference, she's, I expect you to entertain me. So he gets very fond of all these American ladies,

and he has a mistress. Well, he's got a few mistresses. So various married older, intelligent hostesses, the great hostesses, that's who he likes. I've just realized that I've bought into the British propaganda

about him that he was a complete nerd, do well. But actually, that shows enormous taste. Rather than like chasing these teenage aristocratic English girls around, he likes sassy, intelligent, opinionated, older American women.

That's what he likes. That's what he likes. Yeah, absolutely. So having that shows... He makes, what do you call a kougar prey? A kougar? I don't know.

They're not very much older, they're not very much older, but in the perceptions of the time, when a girl has to be so young and very much younger, it is pretty revolutionary. Right, okay. So any likes emancipators at where?

Women that can answer back have intellectual discussion to about technology, is it? Yeah. And also, I think the benefit to him of married ladies is not just that you can have sex with them and hide the pregnancy, but also that he can have various ones going at the same time.

So he's usually got quite a circle of ladies. I guess we call it a thwappel, or... Okay. In the modern languages. More modern than I ever knew. You know, collection of American ladies.

Now, we might say that he's not spending an awful lot of time preparing for the throne and his father George and his mother Mary, who are obsessively moral, they're devoted to each other,

they never had any other thoughts of anyone, but each other,

they find it totally baffling the behaviour of the Prince of Wales. And it's kept out of the newspapers, because it's not really appropriate. This isn't what the Prince of Wales is supposed to be doing. Well, you say that, but every single descendant of George the first

wasn't well, nearly all of them were complete wrongens. Complete wrongens. They came to their romantic lives and he thought it wasn't appropriate. You should've read a family history. Better family history.

Okay, anyways, we've got Prince Edward, whose real name was David. They family cord in David, it was his middle name. His middle name. Always complicated. Because you obviously have five names.

And then, for your five or six names, then the last name is your real name. So it was like me being called Katherine and then six of the names. And then saying, well, actually my name is the sixth name.

“And that's what I'm using Lee for whatever it might be.”

So we got Prince Edward also known as David. He meets Wallace and see you've already teed that out. With that terrible chat online. Where and when do they meet? Well, he meets Wallace in 1931.

And she's born in 1896. She grows up in Baltimore, Bessie Wallace wore field. Her father dies and her mother is a bit dependent on relations. Then her mother remarries.

There's a wealthy stepfather. She goes to a good school. And while this marriage is age 20, Win Spencer and Naval Aviator. Now, he seems great on paper. But it's not a good marriage.

She drinks. She's abusive. So she does divorce him in 1927, which is very radical. She divorces him in 1927. And there were some talks of various affairs.

She goes to China and has a period of living in China. And then she meets Ernest Simpson and Anglo-American shipping executive.

It was a very different man to her first husband.

He's kind, he's very thoughtful, and they marry. He divorces his wife. They marry. And they're in London. And they are making their way in high society.

Getting in huge amounts of debt as they do. But you know, you can find this sometimes, can't you? And I've certainly had friends who've gone to live in other countries who found this. That you can live in other countries. And the higher market is in the network.

It's the same important in your home country. Overturned. And perhaps you can head faster at the social scale if you're an expert that you wouldn't be allowed to do in the United States. Because you're not part of the right social grouping in London.

You can be free. So they are having these gigantic parties. They have a huge flat in May fair. And she really gets very friendly with the in crowd of underprince of Wales. There's some propaganda around her that she was almost sex-warker whilst in China.

Is there only, she just sounds to me like, she's a normal person going through life. But has had these two relationships? Recent scholarship has actually gone into Wallace in China and said no. There isn't any idea. Although all these rumors weren't that she'd been a sex worker there.

And she'd learnt text, she's serious. She's serious. So it's all very oriental. It says, you know, she learnt these sex techniques.

“And that's what Edgewood was so gripped by.”

And when we see some of the conversations about Anne Belinda, we say about Anne Belinda that she learnt techniques at the French course, including her perhaps all sex. And that was what tempted Henry VIII. She says no evidence for it.

But she was in China. But certainly, she's much more international. She's been globally than any woman he's ever met before. He meets her in 1931.

And of course, that's a shock to a royal,

because royal is expect the most boring question or terrible joke. To be met with hysterical laughter. Oh, you're saying funny, sir. Oh, how interesting. How brilliant.

And Wallace says, oh, not central heating again. Now, she has a friend, film a furnace. Who is the established partner? I don't really like the word mistress. The established partner.

She's married, of course. Me all are. A established partner along with food a deadly ward of the prince. And Thelma, in 1934, has to go back to America to look at some of her investments for three months. And she knows that our prince Arret Wood has an attention span of a flee.

And he needs entertainment. And she doesn't want any other girls coming in and seizing him.

“So she thinks, who shall I give him as a baby sitter?”

She's a whineau. I'll give him my most plain, my most boring, my most ill-dressed, and actually in proper-ish friend Wallace, I'll give him Wallace to the calf to him, because she's so plain and boring, he won't like her.

Wow. Whoops. So she wasn't super glamorous, it conventionally. Not as glamorous as the other women around her. Not as glamorous, not as well-dressed, not as well-connected,

not as rich, and not seen as as witty. Even though she was actually very witty, I think. I think actually, she was these things, but everyone rather looked down a bit upon her, because she hadn't got to particularly glamorous marriage.

So Thelma says, Wallace, the calf to David, well, I'm away. I'm back in three months. She gets back three months. Whoops. They apparently go for a lunch and Wallace does something

to Edward's food, cuts it up or, and that's really the signal to Thelma that she's out. And also, she also finds that she doesn't have a direct line to his telephone anymore. She is ghosted, and Wallace sees off Thelma.

Thelma is out, and she also sees off the other lady. Frieda Dudley Ward. She is out. Wallace sees them both all very fast. David is infatuated with her, almost immediately.

Really? We could say they fell in love. It can't just be jokes about central heating. It must be something more.

“I think that's why it's often credited with the idea”

that she must have these secretive, amazing sexual techniques.

But simply, I think he was fascinated by her. She was very a reverent to him. She refused to bow to him, she refused to defer to him. She was often actually, really, sato-icim, and sometimes taking the mickey out of him,

and that often got more than taking the mickey, actually sort of, you know, picking on him. And I think he found that very refreshing. I bet he did. Did she want to become queen?

This is the million dollar question. Does Wallace want to be queen? Or really, was she tempted into this relationship, and you can't be saying no to the prince. Was she in this relationship?

And it was a tiger that she was writing that was more out of control than she ever could have imagined. Because, you know, he's got form. This is not a man, a lady date, thinking he's going to be a long-term guy.

You think, oh, not really. You know, he's not below it, but maybe I'll stay within for six months, get a few nice jewels, a couple of hats, and he'll move on to another younger model, and Seb has very good book that woman about Wallace.

You know, this is what she's researched and looks into this. And said, you know, it's very much the case,

“but I think Wallace thinks, well, I'm pushing 40.”

You know, I'm not young anymore, and I'm not beautiful and glamorous. So he's just going to have fun with me for a while, and this man with an attention span of a flea, is going to find a younger model. So she'll stay in it for a while, because they get

on-train-high society. Ernest Simpson is really quite pleased about this. On-train-high society. He doesn't, yes, he doesn't really mind at this point. Presence, he showers jewels on her.

So at this point, it seems win-win. And very much, Wallace, I think, doesn't realise how much he just becomes fascinated by her. So they meet in 1930, let me tell you. Thank you, Mike at 34. So they meet in 31.

In 1934, film a furnace makes a fatal error. OK.

So never ask your friend to babysit your love of hunger.

I don't know what we're supposed to do, really. I guess we want to, we do, lock them up in a cage or something, and say, "Yes, let's be friends." It would just tell them to just tell themselves, "I've watched Netflix to get back."

It's what he's saying. This is Dan Snow's history. The one of the best. What started the Civil War? What ended the conflict in Vietnam?

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American history here, a podcast from history here. [ Music ] At case of the time, it's interesting. I see so 94 they get together.

“So they're still in that bloom, that sort of”

infatuation of early love. When is Father dies? You are so right. So 94 they get together.

She thinks it's never going to last.

She goes in a holiday with him to 1935, and by this point, Ernest is having enough. I mean, it's one thing going to parties with him. But going on holiday, the prince and his wife going to a holiday, Ernest does not like that.

And then everything has turned upside down. It is January 1936. George the fifth dies, as we know, dispatched rather quickly by his doctor with his own story. Small combination of a cocaine and a morphine and bunged in,

so he dies much faster than they get the news in the morning papers, not the deep infradict, evening papers, and George dies. And Edward is devastated. And it's fascinating. His George dies, the king dies, and the minute he dies, Queen Mary,

she turns and she kisses her son's hand. He is now the king. She differs to him. And Edward, he's heartbroken, the new Edward VIII. He's heartbroken.

He weeps over his father.

“Even though his father hadn't been very happy about the whole”

while his business. He'd heard about it. He told him to stop. He'd forbidden while his ever to come to the palace. He'd been furious when she had been in the palace.

And he was very angry about it. But now, Edward is heartbroken. He plans his father's funeral. He really is playing the role of the best king in history. And of course, Wallace is married.

So he's going to have to find some more suitable young lady. Perhaps a little bit of both line. It got spare little friends that he might throw over to him. So Wallace is married. Everyone says, well, we know that the king has this friendship with Wallace.

Everyone knows the royal household know the politician knows. The royal family know everyone knows that the king is obsessed with Wallace. But they think that now he's the king. She's just going to melt away. But it isn't astonishing decision by him to try and make it official.

And what pushes him into it is Wallace's divorce. Now, Wallace feels rather bad for poor old Ernest Simpson, poor old Crocodile. And so you know what she does? She asks her old school friend, Mary Kirk, to the go after him. And what happens?

He falls in love with Mary. Wow, a lot of looking, huh? Yes, I know. You know, extensive 1930s babysitting.

Yeah, so never, as we say, if your husband or spouse or your lover or your wife is going away,

you tell us to stay in bed and get takeaway. Mary and Ernest for the love. And Ernest decides he's had enough of his wife with the king. And he says, we've got to get divorced. He actually goes to Edward and he says, sure, you're never married Wallace.

And Edward says, oh, I will marry her. And that gentleman's agreement between two men when Ernest realizes that if he divorce is Wallace, she's not going to be out on her ear as a woman abandoned by society. He agrees to the divorce.

So they get divorced in October. As we know what happens in the 1930s divorce, it has to be adultery. And Ernest agrees to have that whole set up in which you are discovered in a hotel room. And that means it's adultery.

So this is what they all have in the 1930s.

“If you want to get divorced, you have to go to a seaside resort”

and get discovered in a hotel room. And that's what happens to Ernest. And then the judge will say, fire. They're just as far as gross. So the divorce, the decree needs to come as in October 1936.

And now the king can marry Wallace. And the government begin to panic. They think, he's going to marry her. What are we going to do? Baldwin, who's the prime minister.

Who was hoping for a nice, quiet term. He's a gentle, long, constructive. A gentle old, you know, trotting to the sunset. Oh, he's a no, no, not on my watch. And then the government have to deal with it.

And the government, Baldwin says to him, you can't do this. And his private secretary says to him, you cannot do this. The government will resign. And you'd think Edward might say, oh, I don't want the government

resigning that or look bad. He says, no, I want to marry Wallace. I really want to marry her. I'm determined to marry her. And so we have a gigantic constitutional crisis on their hands

that he wants to marry her.

And the problem is, is that he is head of the church of England.

And she has two husbands still living. Perhaps if they been dead, it might have been a different matter. But she is twice divorced. She cannot marry a divorcee. And there's the fact that she's an American an issue.

It is an issue because there is anti-Americanism coming at this point. So she's not popular. She's an American. People think she's too old. There were all kinds of reasons why she's disliked.

But the actual constitutional crisis is that she has been twice divorced. Had she not been divorced, it would have been a very different matter. Isn't that interesting? So it's the fact that she's twice divorced.

That's against church England. Yes, you can't marry a divorcee in the church of England. Divorcees were not welcome at court and they weren't welcome at all in society. And therefore, Wallace had been very radical in what she'd done.

He's told you can't marry her. And he won't listen. So this is almost on a scale, a generation or two ago, of a monarch saying that they were gay. Yes, this is a huge moment.

And you see things moving very far. So the divorce of Wallace and Ernest comes in October. And everyone knows that press, no. They've seen them all holiday together. The European press has talked about the king's friendship,

but not the British press. And they've kept it out of the stories. And in fact, the private sector says, "Oh, the press has been silent." And I think that's two reasons.

Number one, there's been pressure on them to keep silent.

“But also, I think I wonder whether it's been shooting the messenger.”

Whether they think that if they print this big story that the king is dating, a divorced woman, that the papers will be in loads of trouble, that this continued silence can't be relied on. So the government are arguing. Ed would say no.

He's saying, "Absolutely, I won't." And then there's actually a sermon. A bishop gives a sermon saying that he hopes Edward will be a better king. He will work harder.

Now, I think that Paul Bishop doesn't know anything. He's just talking about work. But this is really seen by the press as, here we go, it's been talked about. And in it goes into the press,

and therefore, Baldwin has to do something about it. And suddenly, the people are made out of it. Everyone knows about it. Wow. So Baldwin has to hear something about it.

And Churchill, as we can imagine, Winston Churchill is putting his orbit. He's getting his nose and he doesn't like Baldwin. He's trying to bring him down. And he sees an opportunity here. And he's very fond of Edward B.A.

And he says, "Let's come up with a solution.

Come up the solution is that Edward will marry Wallace,

"but it'll be a magnetic marriage." So that's a marriage by which he's a wife, but not a queen. She's not going to be queen consort. She's just going to be a magnetic marriage. So it'll be like the transferred man.

This is the plan, yes. Yes, this is the plan. It's happened a lot in Europe. So the idea is that this is what's going to happen. After the statute of Westminster in 1931,

he's got to go to the dominions. He says, "Okay, I'll go and see what the dominion's saying." Because they're the empire, but they're running the show. And unfortunately, the dominions all say no. South Africa, Australia, they say no.

No, no, no, no, no, organic marriage. New Zealand says all maybe. And Ireland says, "We don't in the parts of the empire anyway." So essentially, it's a no. And what can then Baldwin do?

And he says, "We're going to resign." And actually, he speaks to his liberal and Labour counterparts. And says, "If I resign, would you not form a government?" They say, "No, we don't want to form a government. We are great. This is all terrible."

But whatever they try, Edward will not be shifted. He doesn't want to Morganatic marriage. He says he wants her to be Empress of India. And that's all back of tricks.

“I mean, that's why the empire is a bag of tricks.”

And so he's determined to abdicate. She begs him not to. Well, it says, "Please don't." She's fled to France when the news broke. She's been pleased, don't.

Please don't. Because she knows she'll be so attacked.

And maybe she never really loved him that much.

She just thought it was an affair that would last. She's not obsessed with him. And perhaps that's why he's so obsessed with her. Because she was always a bit of one reserve. You hear stories about Roman offs, weeping when they were,

I said, "Next in line to the throne." Do you think that's a part of him? They did not want to be King Emperor. Do you think part of him thought, "A, I'm in love with this room." But actually, this is my way out. I think that's a really good point.

I think he did see it as his way out. He was vitally stuck on marrying Wallace. And she begged him not to. And she tried to give him up. And he wouldn't have any of it.

She's actually, by this point, writing to Ernest Simpson saying, "She's still very fond of him. She's still loves him." Even though he's married to a school friend by now, swings around about.

And Edward, he has his vision of what? If he advocates, then he can push away with all this boring, ribbon cutting and all the boring jobs of being King. He can marry Wallace. And he can be that glamorous Prince of Wales again.

So he has his vision of what he will be abdicating. And he essentially, you're right.

“I think he just thinks, "I don't want to do this job.”

I'm young and fun and glamorous. I don't want to be that my boring old father and do this job for the rest of my life." Ribbon cutting and shaking hands with the Prime Minister. "I want to do something fun.

And Wallace is away out." Right. And so he extraordinarily abdicates the throne. His little brother takes over, who he thinks is a bit more boring. And likely to want to cut ribbons and do all that kind of thing.

"What do you do next? Does he get to live that life feed so hopeful?" No, he does not. He is not going to be that day in the country. The King, George Sigmund, Queen Mary,

or allied on that. He's not going to be that day in the country. He has to go. It's like, "Come as a shock to him." It does come of shock to him.

You're hang on, my little brother's treats. I mean, what's going on? He thought his little brother was very under his thumb.

Everyone always underestimated George Sigmund.

He thought he was a very lacking in intelligence, young man, and he could just tell him what to do. And therefore, it's a big shock to him when he is told out. And the government agree. The government want him out as well.

He goes to Austria. And there, he spends the whole time, Andrew Launey, wrote about his very well and his very good booktrade to Queen. And he said, "He spends the whole time on the phone saying, "How much money can I have?

"I want money, give me more money."

He also ran off with bits and pieces of jewelry when he left.

“He ran off with the Prince of Wales coronate.”

So he runs off with the Prince of Wales's crown that he was crowned within 1911. He runs off with that. So when Prince Charles gets invested as Prince of Wales in 1969 in Kanova and Carl's, so they haven't got crowned,

they have to make a makeshift for the Pinkpong boy and spray it gold on top. Because it doesn't have them got one. Because Edward's run off with it, so they don't want to ask it back. So he's in Austria.

He can't be with Wallace. She's in France. Her divorce is not fully through yet. So he's in Austria complaining, ringing up, saying, "I want more money."

And then finally, her divorce goes through in May, 1937.

And they marry in France on June the 3rd. "I think that's quick work." It's quick work. He marries her super quickly and now he's a newlywed. And now he's out on his ear.

What is he going to do? He wants you Prince of Wales and he's out on his ear. But of course, there's a regime in Europe who really want to see him and see that use can be made of him. And that's the Nazis.

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What do you think? Do you think that actually he was seeing battle of Hitler's quite a useful figure like a puppet? Like they're jackabits. If we invade Britain or if we come to deal with them,

we stick our man back on the throne. And do you think he was willing a participant in that sort of however loose conspiracy it was? So this is the question about Edward. Does he know what Hitler's plans are for him?

Hitler's plans are when he invades, he'll put edit on the throne, he'll be a puppet king. Does he know that and does he support Hitler in that? And there are so many different questions about this. But I think it's very clear that certainly in the 1930s,

in 1937, October, 1937, when he and Wallace go to Germany and they meet goables and they meet going and then he meets up with Hitler has a private meeting with Hitler that he loves the accolades. He loves what he gets in Germany.

They treat him like a king. They treat Wallace like a queen.

“And that is very important to him and that's what he wants.”

He wants her. She can't be HRH. She hasn't been allowed to have that. She's treated as a queen as HRH. It's all marvelous.

And so he has this private meeting with Hitler. And we don't know what said there. We don't know what they discuss. But there's a photo opportunity. They go all around Nazi Germany.

And of course, by this point, Jews have been excluded from professions. There are restrictions. They're the idea of the anti-Semitism. It's become a policy. You know it's happening.

And then there's only going to be a year later when there's Crystal Nackton or the Jewish businesses are vandalized. So it is there, everyone knows about it. And yet on, he carries on. Now, Edward himself says later, he says I was taken in by Hitler.

He took me in because I believe he was the only ballast against communism. That's what he says. But certainly he loves the accolade that Hitler gives him. And when the Nazis invade France, Edward and Wallace,

flee, they head down first to Spain.

Then they head to Portugal. And this is the question, is he involved? Is he giving information to German spies? They stay with a banker who actually is a German asset. And is he passing on information?

And there are these many files that are found in 1945. In which there's all about Hitler's plans and the Germans plans in which, you know, it suggests that maybe he could encourage Britain to a peace and the idea of the doing this would be mass bombing of Britain. And then they'll come to a peace with Germany.

How much the Duke knew about it or not? And really learning as he does. Many other biographers, he doesn't really know about it.

“It's a question, I think, will never know.”

But essentially, isn't him because no, it's a different story. But Anthony Blunt, who's later unmasked as the spy, the who gave away so many secrets in World War II, he goes over on a secret mission after World War II. For the raw family accompanied by the raw librarian to get documents.

And they say they're all about Prince's Vicky, Victoria's daughter. I mean, I don't know why they would be her letters. And a few crowns, but I think what he's really going to try and find

That's what he's really supposed to be looking for.

And obviously, many of them he doesn't find. And they are found and exposed and found by American officers. So the print sent a special expression to the ruins of Berlin to comb through them and try and find these files. And then, yes, what they want?

Actually, they want to protect the reputation of Queen Victoria's oldest daughter. Yes, that's why I come on. Princess Vicky, come on. Yes, Princess Vicky, in Victoria. I might have said a few.

Cows of her home's mom. Yeah, okay, that they might have said something. So they're extensive correspondent. That's what this secret mission is for. They want to go to all these car souls and get hold of them

before the Americans do. They also bring back a few bits and pieces of treasure. I think that they want to make sure that aren't taken.

“But that's what I think they're really looking for.”

Is Duke of Windsor letters because is he actually giving information to the Nazis?

There's lots of stories around about Wallace. Some of them very malicious. Do you think she was a Nazi in fact? Do you think she was in fact, people say she's romantically engaged with senior Nazis? That is the question that most kind of condemns her reputation.

Was she involved with Nazis? Was she part of the Nazi groupings? And there was talk that she was a lover of ribbon trope and he sent her flowers. Now we've put this for a minute. It's for a minister and so that she was a Nazi spy as well.

Now was this the truth? Now Ann Seber, she really argues it is not the truth. There's no evidence for this whatsoever. There's really no evidence for this. As there are many rumors about her.

But certainly there is absolutely no doubt that when she and Edward went to Nazi Germany, they appreciated the welcome they got. And if they went back when there had been even more severe horrific restrictions on Jews, would they have been condemnatory? I think we could possibly say that they would not.

Well, what we can't say about that is that they were not alone in the British elite. No. Wide swings, the British conservative elite in particular were quite, you know. And that footage came out a couple of years ago, didn't it?

Of even before Edward abdicated, there he is doing a Nazi solution encouraging the Queen mother and the princesses to do it. Well, of course, Elizabeth and Margaret were children, they didn't understand. But there he is already seeing Naziism as, as he said later said, he thought it was something a liberation from communism,

this total disaster.

“So I think, well, this probably wasn't a Nazi spy or a Nazi agent.”

But if the Nazis had invaded, I really can't see her in Edward saying absolutely not to be put on the throne. So after going to Spain Portugal, he was then sent by the British very deliberately to the Bahamas. But that's it. They can't cope with all the chaos he's causing,

off he goes to the Bahamas to the governor of the Bahamas. Complaining all the way, they complain, he's a two-hot and the government's, I'm sorry. People are being bombed, people are suffering. You can stop complaining about being in the Bahamas and it being too hot. Now, what this actually does do,

war work with the Red Cross and she does actually do work for infant mortality. But she does use racial slurs in her letters. I mean, I'm sure he does as well. So literally, they are in Bahamas, playing the life of the wealthy elite. And all the government wants is going to be out of the way.

And they are sitting there complaining about their suffering. Joining World War II when the whole world is on fire. What happens afterwards, is this energy with the royal family continue after 1945? After the war, they go back to France and they live in exile in France. And there is no connection with the royal family.

When Elizabeth II comes to the throne, she has crowned in 1953. And Edward is not invited to the coronation. He's not invited and he sits and watches it in Paris with a hostess. She gives him a special gold chair to sit and watch the coronation on TV, because that's the only gold chair he's ever going to get.

So he has no relationship with the royal family whatsoever. But in 1965, he comes over for an eye operation in London. And then he does meet the Queen. He does meet Elizabeth II and they do invite him to a family occasion. So we do see as of thawing of relations between Edward and the royal family.

But that is after the King's death. And the Queen mother, when she sees Wallace again at this occasion, because the Queen mother and Wallace were at Dagger's drawn. They hated each other. And Wallace apparently called the Queen mother cookie,

because she said that she was always lucky to eat lots of food.

So they hated each other. So that was not a good friendship.

“But I think Elizabeth II tries to create a relationship.”

And then, not long after in 1972, the Duke dies. And then the Prince of Wales coronate comes back. So the crown jewels. And Wallace Simpson usedfully for the British firm, the monarchy, does not have any children.

You exactly watch, does not have any children. So there's no pretenders. But that would be the constitutional question. If they had a child, that child would always be there popping up, popping up, and could be a possible pretender.

King over the water. Even though he abdicate, his son would still be theoretically superior to Elizabeth II. Seven, some seconds. It's very true. It's very abdicated.

He abdicated. And then you're exactly right. And then it still has the royal lineage.

Because we know what we're saying that does he see Wallace

as a way out of being into King? Does he think about that?

“He's thinking, she's probably not going to have a child.”

There was some talk that an early procedure rendered her infertile.

You know, we don't know the truth of that or not.

But certainly she didn't have a child with either of her husbands. And she was by the time that she was with Edward. She was well under the way of 40, which was seen as too old for having children.

“So maybe that was something else that was appealing that she wasn't going to have the air.”

So you can completely abdicate himself from royal life. This used to be the greatest royal scandal of recent history. And now it's been superseded by another one. But that's another one for a different podcast. A different later historian's going to look at that one. Kate Williams, thank you very much for coming on this.

Thank you so much for having me. Thank you so much for listening to this episode of Dan Snow's History It. You know, you could have watched this episode and others on YouTube. That's right. You can peek behind the curtain of how you record this podcast on our YouTube channel.

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