Abdication: A Very British Coup

ever since his abdication edward viii has been portrayed as a royal who failed to do his duty a king who gave up the throne for love a pro-nazi that britain was lucky to be rid of in the dangerous years that followed but there is another story we look back on it as an abdication but of course it was more than that i mean he was ready to post seventy years ago king edward viii was pushed off the throne it was a coup engineered by a powerful conspiracy of court church and government they loathed his informal style his dislike of royal traditions and they feared his appeal to ordinary people we felt that there were machinations and higher levels of government society that had really pushed edward out not the will of the people and when edward fell in love with an unsuitable woman they had the perfect excuse the fact that edward wanted to marry wallis simpson was perceived by many members of the establishment as a godsend it was a crisis of only 45 days in which the british state with brutal efficiency removed a troublesome king it was the biggest event to affect the throne since cromwell london is hushed as the king of england walks behind his dead father and the world takes leave of the man who was the symbol of all the might majesty and power of the british commonwealth of nations on a cold winter's day in january 1936 the body of king george v was taken from westminster to be buried at windsor the mind of the 41 year old king edward viii as he followed the coffin was in turmoil he was madly in love he hated the stuffy pomp and tradition of the old court and he wanted change and at last the journey is over and the coffin is born indus and georgie's chapel the place which of all others is most appropriate to the ideals king george represented in life the old king george v had reigned for 25 years in stultifying boredom collecting stamps and massacring pheasants he was loved by his courtiers in government for his devotion to the unchanging traditions and duties of royalty he never stepped out of line edward was different the corpse of his father was barely cold when he ordered the clocks at sandringham to revert to greenwich mean time king george had kept them half an hour fast to save daylight for his beloved shooting the old court was horrified to them it was a symbolic act a sign of potential revolution the archbishop of canterbury lamented i wonder what other customs will be put back also we can see edward i think as very much exemplifying the spirit of the generation he loved jazz and he likes to wear american clothes he didn't like to dress up with the same kind of formality he flew he was the first royal to fly and he was so interested in new things that were happening people saw edward very much in that way as exemplifying this new era as prince of wales edward had forged a tremendous bond with the ordinary people of britain and the empire the first war he visited the trenches and came face to face with the suffering of the common soldier an experience he never forgot in the great depression he identified with the poverty of veterans and the mass unemployed with nearly a quarter of the population out of work many in the national government feared civil unrest but edward spoke directly to the people we felt that he was a modernizer and we felt that he had a contact with the people we believed in him i think that was the best way to work we really did believe in him on his many exhausting tours of the empire the prince of wales matinee idol looks and his easy charm meant a star was born on the world couldn't be stage plus that intelligent face you have a disgraceful charm for me he shook so many hands he injured his right and often had to use his left he was the joy of all hearts it must have been very difficult to avoid being spoiled by this adulation that he got everywhere you see sickly from girls i have been terrified this truck again and again by the resemblance between king edward viii and the late princess of wales it became clear what an astonishing capacity he had to communicate to strike a note not just with individuals but with a crowd he had a dazzling charismatic appeal and all this made him a pop star of quite extraordinary dimensions like diana part of his charm seemed to stem from a personal unhappiness what once was described as a look of velchmatz world wariness always in his eyes this was partly the result of deep strains in his relationship with his father what the prince of wales seemed agreeable in formality a attempt slightly to sort of humanize the monarchy to key georgia fifth seemed most monstrous almost reasonable behavior he was not merely angered he was alarmed he felt that this was something calculated in the end to rot the very foundations of the molecule institution which is so cherished and valued over the years the old king had become more distant from the prince of wales known to his family as david and ever closer to his more conventional and dutiful second son albert the duke of york you have always been so sensible and easy to work with and you have always been so ready to listen to any advice and to agree with my opinions about people and things very different to dear david it was a preference for the deeply conservative younger brother that came to be shared by a much wider group by the time edward viii was king in this era of political instability many members of the government feared edward's mass appeal and apparent disregard for the established order the conservative prime minister stanley baldwin wrote that he was alarmed by the delicate situation created by the personality of the new king neville chamberlain the chancellor of the exchequer agreed i do hope he pulls up his socks and behaves himself now he has such heavy responsibilities for unless he does he will soon pull down the throne at some james's palace the garter king of arms reads the proclamation the king's strained relationship with the politicians was kept well hidden from the public at its heart was a secret that would be his downfall that the high and mighty prince edward albert by the god as the new monarch was proclaimed a woman could be seen watching with the king from a window in saint james's palace king defender of the faith emperor of india she was wallis simpson a 40 year old american this footage of the king with his lover was so sensitive that it was never shown to the public the king's relationship with mrs simpson was nearly five years old when he came to the throne what i think is extraordinary is that in the 1930s it was actually possible for the small group of upper-class people known as society to know everything going on in royal circles and to know about wallis for example and yet nearly everybody else knew nothing about her those in the know were all too aware that wallace was already once divorced and currently married to ernest simpson a new york shipbroker to the old guard she was totally unsuitable wallace was not an aristocratic woman she came from the wrong side of the tracks she had grown up in baltimore in a life of relative poverty she knew what struggle was and when she came to britain and became acquainted with royal circles she never pretended that she came from any from a different background she treated the prince of wales with a indifference with a casualness almost a contempt which was something he had never encountered before and which he found exciting and stimulating and enormously attractive now i've found the right girl oh what a girl oh what a future i'm in a well if she disagreed with me she never failed to advance her own views with vigor and spirit that side of her enchanted me my search has ended by the past she was quite managerial i mean she bossed him about she had no hesitation in telling him what she thought he ought to do and what she wanted him to do and um he better seldom that i can remember kicked against the bricks he was just besottedly in love for the first time in his life i mean he'd been in love before but not like this this was this was something different it was different for wallace too i only hope that i can make you feel i am always loving you working for you and with you i am your wallace the king's affair with wally simpson took place in the london salons and the country house parties of the fashionable set this hedonistic lifestyle so scandalous to the older generation was in part a reaction to the dark days of world war one they did behave badly they did take drugs they did drink too much they did fornicate but all this in a sense was an expression of relief grief and other human emotions after what had been a really terrible war in 1936 war was looming again but the royal love affair was all that those in the know could talk of henry chip shannon was a champion of edward and wallace an american-born millionaire and a brilliant diarist of the crisis she is a woman of charm sense balance and great wit with dignity and taste she's always been an excellent influence on the king who's loved her openly and honestly mp harold nicholson was also a gifted diarist whose writings give a brilliant and more detached insight into the gathering storm mrs simpson is bejeweled eyebrow plucked virtuous and wise she is clearly out to help him duff cooper minister for war was a friend of the king and mrs simpson and another diarist with an unrivaled view of events my father he was a curious figure in many ways because i mean he was uh a very ambitious politician but at the same time he was very much a sort of man about town he was known for his love of pleasure his love of drink his love of women the king probably saw that side of him and thought that my father more than any other member of the cabinet was possibly going to be on his side or at least he might be convertible to his side duff cooper recorded the prime minister's view widely held in court and government of how edward should conduct his affair with wallace simpson if she were what i call a respectable [ __ ] he said he wouldn't mind by which he meant somebody whom the prince occasionally saw in secret but didn't spend his whole time with while the establishment railed in private against the new king and wallis simpson edward was as popular as ever with his subjects many happy returns of the day to his majesty king edward viii on his 42nd birthday is the thought uppermost in the hearts of thousands crowding around buckingham palace and echoed in the hearts of millions of others all over the world as the king rides down the mall to the horse guards for the birthday parade what edward hated most about what he was referred to as princing appearing in public playing the role was the the pomposity and the formality that was what really almost broke his nerve when he was actually breaking through when he was in direct communication with people he became enthused he became excited he enjoyed it he loathed the fussiness of buckingham palace and wanted to cut through the hierarchy of rank and tradition he would suddenly appear in the kitchens the cellars and the storerooms or other behind-the-scenes parts of the palace walking around alone or with one on tours of inspection it was all very informal and quite unlike anything we had seen king george v do at the palace buckingham palace garden and out of the palace issue the privileged young ladies who are to be presented today at the first of the reception which this year are to replace the formal courts the king showed his distaste for the old court's traditions during the presentation of debutants at the beginning of the season he regarded this as an archaic and snobbish tradition and found it hard to conceal his boredom during the ceremony the king bows puncturiously as each debutant makes the courtesy which will be for her an exciting memory in afterlife there was a long line of debutants waiting to curtsy to him and it started to rain so then he said well let's just stop this then and regard them all as you know having achieved what they've come to do and of course everyone was very upset about this they felt he wasn't doing things properly only six months into his reign and the king's behavior had confirmed the old court's worst fears he had offended a deadly coalition of courtiers politicians and churchmen chief among king edward the eighth enemies was cosmo gordon lang the unctuous archbishop of canterbury who wrote of the new king it was clear that he knows little and i fear cares little about the church and its affairs there is not only a new rain but a new regime in the press the king had a powerful opponent in geoffrey dawson editor of the times to him king 8 was everything which was to be deplored it was a serious danger something which threatened to subvert the whole structure of society the government led by the ovuncular but cunning conservative stanley baldwin came from a different generation with a different attitude they were the generation who had been in power in fact at the time of the first world war and they had stayed in power because so many members of edward's generation had been killed so one has got this young man trapped among a cohort of stuffy elderly courtiers and stuffy elderly ministers the elderly cohort latched on to edward's love for wally simpson this scandalous affair became the focus of a campaign to be rid of him such was a suspicion of the monarch that special branch was ordered to spy on the couple what on earth were they doing spying on the prince of wales and then the king there's nothing in those records actually to show why but we do have the reports that were filed the conversation showed they were on very affectionate terms and addressed each other's darling a number of purchases were made in orders given for the goods to be sent to york house and marked fort belvedere the opinion of the dealer expressed after his distinguished client had left was that the lady seemed to have the prince of wales completely under her thumb it is remarkable that edward both as prince of wales and then as king was being trailed by a special branch operative it's a sign of the degree to which the establishment felt they simply could not trust him he wasn't one of them in the summer of 1936 wallis and edward charted a yacht the gnarlin to cruise the mediterranean the darius duff cooper filmed this remarkable unseen footage take me where the sun burns thrill you with sweet refrains we'll make hay while the sun shines we'll make love when it rains the anointing was the time when i saw them at their most relaxed and happiest there was no swimming there's no doubt he thought enjoyed himself and so did she the lovers were cheered as they strolled through the streets of dubrovnik where they were greeted not with shouts of long live the king but vive la mor while this was fun she had a grasp of the american wisecracking technique she was very quick she had a sense of humor certainly she was a little bit mischievous the holiday was a turning point it showed that the king was prepared to flaunt his love for the whole world to see whatever the consequences my parents did enjoy but at the same time knowing this mrs simpson thing was hanging over the whole thing you know um i'm sure they didn't show it but it must actually have cast a little bit of the cloud over everything i think my father was desperately worried a head-on collision between the king and the establishment was now inevitable the question was when the world's press widely reported the open romance during the gnarling cruise but in an act of unparalleled self-censorship nothing appeared in british newspapers while the masses were ignorant a tiny upper-class minority was a gog though nothing about mrs simpson appears in the english papers her name seems never to be off people's lips for those who enjoy gossip she is a particular treat the sound of her name implies secrecy royalty and being in the know after the mediterranean cruise the king invited mrs simpson and some of her american friends to stay at balmoral there is a final draw on because mrs simpson went to balmoral with her friends the rogers and appeared in the court circular this has shocked the scotch and british bourgeoisie edward sparked further outrage when he chose to be with mrs simpson over opening a hospital albert the king's dutiful younger brother and his wife elizabeth performed the royal task instead the york stepped into the breach once more by inviting the archbishop of canterbury to balmoral after the king had refused him his customary invitation edward perceived that as a threat to him and an undermining of the decisions he was making as king that hit in a sense they were setting up a rival court a court that mimicked the one that had been held by king george the fifth the future queen mother detested everything about wallace simpson she felt that mrs simpson was not the sort of person might not have around court but it was deeply regretted that her brother-in-law had taken up with this um hard-faced harpy and um her one desire was that um this essentially should disappear in a puff of smoke and never be heard of again elizabeth and wallace met for one memorable dinner during their balmoral holiday when they arrived mrs simpson came forward in rather proprietary way to greet them and that's his view he said to have swept pastor playing nerd and say i've come to dine with the king she said brushing this contemptible figure to one side to the extreme annoyance to mrs simpson with this calculated snub an undying feud was born the yorks were now cut off by the king who mistrusted all around him including even his key official the private secretary alec harding he was a man who shared entirely the views of king george v about how monarchs ought to behave what they ought to do and the last thing that king of the eighth wanted around his court was a man who stood for all the values of his father and his father's court alec harding now visited the duke of york behind edward's back to warn him the situation was so grave it could end with the removal of the king and his taking over after the meeting the duke wrote that he would be a willing substitute if the worst happens and i have to take over you can be assured that i will do my best to clear up the inevitable mess if the whole fabric does not crumble under the shock and strain of it all five days later an obscure legal notice ignited the crisis wallis simpson filed for divorce from her husband ernest opening the way for her to marry the king and if nothing was done to become the queen at buckingham palace the archbishop of canterbury and times editor dawson met the king's private secretary without edward's knowledge lang was horrified at the prospect of the coronation the thought of my having to consecrate him as king weighed on me as a heavy burden indeed i considered whether i could bring myself to do so one could say that this was the start of plotting between different members of the establishment to bounce edward off the throne at ipswich decisis to avoid unwanted attention wallis simpson's case was heard and her divorce granted a brief notice was buried in the press but in the united states the american press was going to tone on the story yes yes my baby said yes yes i'm glad she said yes so too was high society in london mrs simpson has now obtained her divorce and there are very serious rumors that the king will make her duchess of edinburgh and mary in the highest court circles there is great consternation it is said that queen mary weeps continuously 18 years after the last shot was fired and peace massively descended upon war act europe britain's armistice day tribute is led for the first time by her new king edward viii the prime minister his cabinet and opposition leaders are among the distinguished persons taking part but the watching politicians and dignitaries were just hours away from making the first move to dethrone the king edwards private secretary now wrote a letter addressed to the king alec harding warned that his affair was doing untold damage to britain's image abroad and that the resignation of the government over wallis simpson was a real possibility mrs simpson he wrote must leave the country the letter was given by alec harding to the king as something that he himself had written in fact behind that letter were many meetings involving the prime minister members of the cabinet dawson editor of the times the head of the civil service all coming together to write this letter after a day inspecting the home fleet the king returned to his retreat fort belvedere to discover the letter he was appalled at the disloyalty of his private secretary and was immediately suspicious he later wrote how was i to construe this a warning an ultimatum who could have told alec harding all this but the prime minister what was mr baldwin's purpose there was little sleep for me that night it was the crisis of a king there is no doubt it was plotting behind the king's back it was a conspiracy if you like he had no idea the level of involvement from all these different and very powerful interest groups and so here was the king one most important person in the country getting a letter from his private secretary that had actually been crafted by all these different men who were at the highest levels of of power and um not actually telling edward what was going on i mean really it was the thing was a lie it was a cover-up three days later the king summoned the prime minister to meet him alone buckingham palace baldwin told him you may think that i am an old man dating from the victorian regime but i do know public opinion in this country since the war there has been a lowering of public standards and of public morals but people expect even more of the monarchy when stanley baldwin spoke about public opinion i think he was speaking about the world of society where the people who counted were not the masses of the people but rather the small group of people who had influence and were powerful but edward insisted that he had the right to marry the woman of his choice if the government opposed him he would go the king had played straight into baldwin's hands far from being upset by the threat baldwin was delighted as he told ramsay mcdonald 7 30 met p.m evaliant he said the king was determined to marry mrs s and was prepared to abdicate nice kettle of fish the next day the king met the daris duff cooper edward described how the prime minister had told him that while the country would never accept such a marriage they would not object so strongly to his having a mistress that he thought was the height of hypocrisy he said he would not like to go through a solemn ceremony like the coronation without being perfectly frank with the country beforehand he would not like to be keeping something up his sleeve in the evening the king took the royal train from paddington for a tour of the impoverished coalfields of south wales he later wrote reflecting on the turmoil that i knew must by this time have gripped white hall i was at peace with myself my spiritual struggle was over i had passed the climax but as events would prove the climax was just beginning bringing the whole problem of depressed areas out of the shadows into the floodlight of world attention his majesty's visit to south wales is not only a promise of new life but a gesture of sympathy with men and women who for years have borne bravely the misery and sufferings of unemployment who have had to watch helpless while their homes and their towns fell into ruin and decay the king's visit to south wales was a reminder of the strong bond he had with ordinary people outside the closed world of london society and the magnetism of his personality he was a young dynamic moderniser and good looking he was a personality um i don't think he sold it wasn't a package personality as you get nowadays but it had the same effect as a package personality many thousands cheered the king as he arrived at matthew tidwell in the rondo valley but the purpose of his tour was deadly serious not triumphal when he visited mercer people lined the streets but more than that when he passed they were rushed into the next place to same is unbelievable it happened it's similar to them pop stars of today were mobbed basically it was as if the beatles of the right in the town but beneath all this his majesty saw the disillusion and suffering wrought by long worthless years the letters he received after the visit are a vivid testimony to his ability to reach out to the suffering of working class people by your stooping to us you have gained what no other king has ever had the deepest love and trust of his people we down here in wales are grateful we like you for the concern you have for the welfare of the poorest and most unfortunate of your subjects no other king has gone among them as you have done of this terribly afflicted area the town of dallas is the blackest spot of all not a single workman has toiled in its steel works which employed 9 000 since 1928 more than 2 000 people were waiting for him at dallas the king was profoundly moved by what he saw and what he said was these works brought these men here something must be done to get them back to work and it was that something must be done that rarely echoed almost around the world the king left south wales with the determination that something must be done though he said that only to a small number of people around him at the time it just spread um like a fire right throughout the borough that everybody knew that this is what he said and that is when i think the ray of hope came i think that on the future south wales welcomed king edward as the only man in britain to whom this distressed area problem is not a matter of boat catching and politics but others did not think so for edward's enemies this was an unwarranted intrusion into politics it was not simply that edward said something must be done and appeared in this way to be criticizing the government's failure to do anything it was also the fact that he he was so popular and people all over the country really cared what he said and what he thought about and if he said that something must be done then clearly something must be done his visit has cheered them as nothing else could and as he leaves there's a newfound faith that some solution will be found jeffrey dawson the times editor and the king's enemy wrote in his diary that the king's intervention was monstrous in a times leader he warned against a constitutionally dangerous proceeding and would threaten we've continued to entangle the throne in politics ramsay mcdonald wrote in his diary these escapades should be limited they are an invasion into the field of politics and should be watched constitutionally the king's successful visit was a watershed in the crisis to his enemies it confirmed him as a dangerous liability a man who could rouse the masses in a socialist heartland but edward's popularity during the tour convinced him not only that he had every right to remain king and marry his love but that he should do so for the sake of his country meanwhile winston churchill for years a loyal supporter became his parliamentary champion my father's friendship with edward viii went back a long way to um before the first world war my father was a very loyal person and all his feelings of warmth for the prince of wales and then the king were once of spontaneous loyalty and affection winston churchill suggested a morgan attic marriage as a solution meaning that wallis simpson would marry the king but not be queen there was uproar at westminster when mps learnt of the plan a bombshell leslie horeb alicia thinks the conservatives will resign and that winston churchill will create a new party and rule the country i can think of nothing else but the changes and terrors ahead the country divided mental civil war going on and schism in the royal family the battle for the throne has begun but the prime minister had got wind of the morganatic plan and was in no mood to bargain he regarded churchill as a highly dangerous maverick a man he could not trust he summoned him to downing street and demanded a pledge that he would not form a king's party my father thought baldwin was pretty determined to have the king out his role was in the support the personal support and sympathy he was able to give the king who he felt was being pushed into a corner the next morning egged on by churchill the king had an audience with baldwin he proposed a morganatic marriage refusing point blank to abandon his love prime minister said this was unacceptable but offered to consult the cabinet and empire the king agreed it was a fatal tactical error from the time at which he agreed with baldwin the baldwin should consult the commonwealth governments and generally sort of establish a formal position on the subject it became inevitable that if that formal position turned out to be contrary to the king's wishes then he would not be able to go ahead and marry as he wanted but would have to go i'm putting all my eggs in one baldwin moved fast that weekend sending out telegrams to the leaders of the dominions asking for the empire's opinion he added his own view i feel convinced that neither parliament nor the great majority of the public in all parties here should or would accept such a plan of a more morganatic marriage any more than they would accept the proposal that mrs simpson should become queen everything i've got every single thing i've got i bet on you four days later baldwin drove to fort belvedere and told the king that the empire was unanimous in its opposition to the morganatic marriage but he was not telling the full truth as we can reveal far from being unanimous the five dominions were divided ireland and canada sat on the fence while cabinet minutes showed clearly that new zealand's prime minister actually supported the morganatic marriage to keep the king this was carefully doctored by the cabinet secretary it was a very passionate plea for something to make sure that education on the throne and that was literally crossed out on the page baldwin was absolutely determined that his view should prevail still not a word of the crisis had yet appeared in the british press despite the intense political activity but now as sermon by the bishop of bradford criticizing the king's commitment to religious duty was to change everything the bishop of bradford was the trigger he was in a sense the fuse in the bomb he literally spoke and bang topic number one bishop blunt of bradford made a speech accusing the king of not being worthy of his own coronation service this leads to a blowing of the whole gaffe the storm has burst the fat is now properly in the fire then as now royal scandal sold papers as i drove down to the station an issue of the afternoon paper had just appeared and there was not a man or woman in the street was not either carrying a copy or trying to buy one the new papers had kept all the pictures ready for months while the respectable broadsheets were against him the mass circulation press backed the king and his love on the one hand the tory press the times the telegraph and the morning post were so powerful and yet the readership amounted to about 80 000 the other press the express newspapers the male newspapers and so on had a readership of about nine million and these were the papers that were read by the majority of the people of britain at the time and these newspapers supported edward the general public sent in letters by the thousands ninety percent were reckoned to be pro king in the first few days alone more than five thousand letters poured in please do not abdicate as we poorer class people will lose a would-be great and loyal king if mrs simpson is good enough for his majesty we want her stick to your guns god save us from the long faced duke of york who would i'm sure be the best of good boys please i beg of you to remain our king and please remember there is not one who could fill your place in the hearts of the people meanwhile wallis simpson was close to breaking point her home was besieged by journalists and she had been sent death threats it was decided that she should flee to france i think everyone here would like that except one perhaps after a while my name will be forgotten and only two will suffer instead of a mass of people that evening wallis prepared to take leave of her lover the king reached across for one last touch of her hand there were tears in his eyes and his voice was shaking wherever you reach tonight no matter what time telephone me bless you my darling parliament and country were divided over the crisis baldwin was told by his chief whip that at least 40 mps were pro-king cheering on churchill in the house there was a groundswell of public support baldwin was worried situation here has become in many ways much more serious a section of the popular press is also canvassing the idea of a morganatic marriage we still felt that love should overcome everything else i don't think we would would have wanted her as a queen but um as a morganic marriage we would have been quite happy to accept it if he loved that person that was it my opinion of the king he should marry who he loves he's been a good chat to the working class that's my opinion of him what are your views on this i think the king should marry the woman he loves so the nation is behind him and we must not lose him all right the king should please himself doing marriage because he knows he got everybody behind there were large crowds outside downing street when we left shouting we want king edward down with the politicians the world is now divided into cavaliers and round heads and the king's faction grows people process the streets singing god save the king and assemble outside buckingham palace they parade all night after the first shark the country is now reacting and demands that their king be left in peace wallis simpson arrived at her hideaway in cannes where she was quickly discovered by the paparazzi she was in constant touch with the king i am so anxious for you not to abdicate don't be silenced and leave under a cloud i beseech you there is no more to say except that i am holding you tighter than ever despite wallace's entreaties the king mindful of his constitutional position had lost the will to fight over the weekend at the fort he pondered his future in the end the decision i reached was to put out of mind all thought of challenging the prime minister a civil war is the worst of all wars its passions saw highest its hatreds last longest and a civil war is not lesser war when it is fought in words and not blood on monday winston churchill in the house of commons showed that parliament had no taste for civil war either baldwin and the whips had strong-armed the conservative party into line winston says i am not afraid of this house when i see my duty i speak out clearly thus when baldwin sits down winston rises and is immediately greeted from all sides of the house with cries of no no and sit down he encountered disastrous opposition he was um jaired at he was booed he had met with more hostility than i think probably he ever had encountered in house of commons before or still more afterwards and it was a for him a shattering experience he was quite astonished at the violence of the put down he'd received in the house of commons but he was no he was depressed after churchill's humiliation set the seal on the abdication on tuesday the king met the victorious baldwin for the last time his concluding words on leaving the fort had been can i take it for certain sir that if an archangel came down from heaven and asked you to change your mind it would have no effect on you the king had replied not the slightest baldwin was delighted and relieved in the car he said to his secretary this is making history this is what i like at ten o'clock the next morning the king signed the instrument of abdication renouncing forever all claimed to the throne he had been king for 326 days the public had been aware of the crisis for little more than a week behind the scenes the government court and church had conspired in secret to remove a king they considered unsuitable it was a clear demonstration of where power lies in britain not with the people and the popular king but with the establishment the diaries chips channel witnessed baldwin's announcement to the house at last he went to the bar at the words renounce the throne there were stifled sobs in the house winston churchill sat doubled up throughout the speech the chamber has witnessed yet again a scene that will always live in history for baldwin the abdication was his greatest triumph but for the royal family it was a double tragedy a young charismatic king had been removed and the burden of the crown placed on the head of a shy and dutiful man as a reporter i was sent to the duke of york's home in piccadilly we knew that was the day he was going to move to the palace and i did see him and the queen emerged from their home and there was something in his face that was lasted it was a portrait you never forget i can best describe it as the look of a soldier going into battle very set very set that evening crowds gathered outside buckingham palace waiting for news the former liberal prime minister lloyd george commented the tories now have just the sort of king which suits them he will not pry into any inconvenient questions he will always sign on the dotted line and he will always do exactly what he is told before he left britain and began his exile the former king now duke of windsor made a final broadcast i have found it impossible to carry the heavy burden of responsibility and to discharge my duties as king as i would wish to do without the help and support of the woman i love when i heard the abdication speech i felt so bitter against the establishment besides baldwin is concerned i thought that he was a traitor and i think at the time i think i felt he should have been shot perhaps because he had i felt then he'd done so much harm to the country and more specifically that he had eliminated any hope that we'd had in murder of something being done as edward had promised us i now quit altogether public affairs and i lay down my buddy god bless you all god save the king i wept and i murmured a prayer for he who had once been king edward viii six months after the abdication wallis and edward the duke and duchess of windsor were married in france not one member of the royal family attended wallis was denied her legal right to be called her royal highness the former king was never allowed to return to live in the country where he had once reigned or take up an official job for fear that he and his wife might set up a rival court george vi and his wife elizabeth were crowned on the very day planned for his brother edward's coronation king george's premature death in 1952 was always blamed by the queen mother on the strain of kingship she never forgave edward and wallace the former king spent his days abroad golfing and consorting with celebrities in many ways deprived of a role he became the empty man his enemies had predicted in a self-fulfilling prophecy but he never regretted sacrificing all for love sun sea and sangria next tonight on bbc4 as we take a great british foreign holiday you

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Views: 1,239,476

Rating: 4.4937611 out of 5

Keywords: King Edward VIII, abdication, Edward VIII, British Monarchy, wallis simpson, british royals, british royal family, conspiracy, throne, love, bbc, documentary, Edward VIII (Monarch), History, United Kingdom (Country)

Id: th0o-ZyuL2k

Length: 58min 57sec (3537 seconds)

Published: Thu Jan 10 2013