Queen Mary - How She Saved The Royals - British Royal Documentary

[Applause] of all the recent royals there's one who may have done more to save the monarchy than any other queen mary wife of king george v and grandmother of our current queen today she may have been largely forgotten but her influence on britain has been huge there's no doubt she helped save the monarchy our country today would not have been the same without her from unpromising beginnings the whole experience of her childhood was about being embarrassed by her mother she rose to become the power behind the throne helping to steer the country through two world wars the great depression of the 1920s and 30s and the abdication crisis which threatened to bring down the monarchy [Music] what mary felt was okay if that's what my son wants and he wants to marry wallace simpson he can but she's not going to get the title royal highness but how did this paragon of conservatism become an unlikely modernizer and along with her husband helped redefine the role of royalty they played a role really on the world stage which made a huge impact on the idea of the monarchy as a global brand how was she able to become the first royal to reach out to the working classes mr house minor and he and his family have the pleasure and honor of showing queen mary over their house it wasn't any longer enough to just do a wave and she and george v were the first of the royals to interact with the general public and why was she such a huge influence on our current monarch mary exuded that duty exuded that steadfastness exuded that uniting a nation and that's exactly what elizabeth has done throughout her reign this is the truly remarkable story of a queen who not only reshaped royalty but had a profound effect on the whole country the truth is mary's influence is still around today we would be a very different world i think if she had not been around and married her king december the 15th 1948 the chris the four-week-old prince charles sat resplendent next to the queen her grandmother queen mary matriarch of the windsor clan and a living link between the victorian era and our present monarch however four years later she would be mourned by the nation a devotion to the monarchy her services to britain which will not be forgotten [Music] but who was the woman that helped steer the crown and the country through some of the most tumultuous times in our history and how did she almost single-handedly ensure the monarchy's survival when the great royal houses of europe were toppling like cards mary or may as she was nicknamed as a child was born in 1867 the eldest of four children her mother princess mary adelaide known as fat mary was a cousin of queen victoria her father was a european prince who had been bestowed the ceremonial title the duke of tech after a castle in southwest germany mary was actually born in the same room in kensington palace where queen victoria had been born and queen victoria did actually come and visit her and say she was a fine infant with a good quantity of hair mary's parents had been granted their apartment kensington palace by queen victoria to live up to their status as minor royalty they spent lavishly but didn't possess the fortune to maintain their grand lifestyle when mary was just 16 her family was threatened with bankruptcy and driven into exile there came a point when the tax really basically ran out of money so they had to decamp rather quickly to florence to avoid their creditors this of course was brilliant for princess may because she was very very cultured and so going around all those wonderful galleries she literally absorbed information and emerged from that phase as a very cultured young woman mary's interest in art and culture would stay with her throughout her life however her upbringing had another more sobering effect on shaping the future queen's personality i think the whole experience of her childhood really for may was an a about being embarrassed by her mother who was loud and enormous and extravagant and her father who was also very extravagant but also slightly mad and eventually in fact went insane and so i think she's very influenced by this she grows up to have a sort of immense desire for respectability mae grew up to really need order and control and a sense of a routine and a sense of things being calm organized following protocol it was order it was decorum and all of those kind of things uh felt were very important to me [Music] and it was monarchy that best represented the virtues that mary held dear virtues that hadn't gone unnoticed by queen victoria as victoria approached the end of her long reign she was preoccupied with the future stability of the monarch but edward was a notorious womanizer his heir and victoria's grandson albert victor who everyone knew as eddie also displayed a worrying lack of suitability for the top eddie was not the sharpest pencil in the box he had a reputation for being both quite dim and also sort of useless and floppy and sort of fragile and queen victoria felt he needed a wife who was going to kind of support him basically and make sure that he did his duty queen victoria set her mind to finding a good looking girl she had to be good looking because he likes beautiful women the woman who queen victoria decided had the perfect combination of beauty and breeding for her grandson princess mary mary there was something really central about knowing your position knowing your duty and knowing what you had to do and queen victoria could see this she recognized this in the young princess victoria then was this great matchmaker she saw inmate exactly the kind of calming stabilizing influence victor albert or eddie needed mary's devotion to the monarchy also made her an ideal future queen she truly believed that royalty had been ordained by god to do good and to be embodiments of more beautiful ways of doing things so there was almost a religious certainly a vocational element to her thinking and her attitude queen victoria saw in may a woman who was very like herself very determined very intelligent and someone who thought above all about duty by december 1892 victoria's matchmaking proved successful prince eddie proposed for mary the engagement offered the chance to restore the damage down to her family's reputation by their financial difficulties and place herself at the center of royal affairs royal matches were really about uniting royal families together she wanted to help her family her parents and so when this uh opportunity of this very good marriage came up and she really had no choice but to say yes at the time there was no question of somebody falling in love and getting married it was you just married who you were told to marry a date was set for the wedding but mary's prospects would be cruelly dashed between 1889 and 1892 the world was struck by an influenza pandemic which claimed the lives of around a million people even the royal family weren't immune just weeks before mary and eddie were due to get married he was taken seriously too tragedy struck eddie contracted the flu which later developed into pneumonia and on the 14th of january 1892 he died the family had originally decided to meet at sandringham to celebrate the union but instead it became more of a mourning party princess mary had been struck by the first of several tragedies that would mark her life however once again queen victoria would play matchmaker and rescue her prospects the man victoria had in mind was now in direct line to the throne almost at once queen victoria starts lobbying for her to marry george who is the second son now george i think initially was shocked by this you know he had loved his brother and he felt it was all too soon but queen victoria was very bossy he actually went off to greece with his mother in order to try and avoid having to do anything about it but in the end he gave in little more than a year after the death of her fiance eddie mary was now engaged to his younger brother george whilst they were brought together by circumstance in her new fiancee mary had found a kindred spirit george was very very different than his brother rather than being wayward um dissolute lifestyle george was much more measured much more ordered much more well behaved and so in that sense him and may were a well suited match like eddie george had trained as a naval officer but unlike his elder brother george adored the regimentation and formality of life in the armed services george was very straight laced and he liked to keep things simple he understood his position as now second in line to the throne and this was reflected in mary judy ran to her call and she understood what was expected of her as a new member of the royal family mary and george were married in july 1893 at st james's palace in london what started out as an arranged marriage would last for over 40 years and come to redefine the role of monarchy i think that they were so much alike in their sense of duty and responsibility but considering this was really an arranged marriage i mean who would have thought that this would turn out to be you know one of the the greatest couples the monarchy has ever seen mary and george would have to wait another 17 years before they came to the throne however with the country in the grip of unrest and division how would the new queen help save the monarchy and help it become a global brand she understood that the world was changing and that the monarchy had to change with the world [Music] tech or queen mary as she would later become was grandmother to our current queen and the woman credited with helping to save the monarchy the reverence for the crown she displayed as a young woman saw her being hand-picked by queen victoria to marry her grandson george the future king however in the early years of their marriage mary's surroundings weren't as palatial as she'd hoped for they lived in a modest cottage on the sandringham estate which was a wedding present and this suited george very much he liked shooting he liked all kinds of country pursuits what he did in those years was to shoot whatever bird happened to be in season at the time of the year now i don't think queen mary was particularly interested in outdoor country sports but she was a very duty wife and so she accompanied him you know wherever he was mary would give birth to six children including two future kings but after the death of queen victoria in 1901 george was now next in line to the throne that meant taking on more responsibilities he and may soon demonstrated a more modern style of royalty when edward vii became king this had a huge impact on the life and role of mary and george they became as apparent and they were to have a role which was increasingly important to the position and the perception of the monarchy in particular they played a role really on the world stage they went on a six-month tour of india which made a huge impact on the idea of the monarchy as a i suppose a brand as a global brand however for mary and george the dedication to their royal duties came at the expense of their children she was not a natural mother she was more sort of committed perhaps or duty-bound to the institution of monarchy into the royal family rather than her own children we were brought up by governesses i think certainly affection wasn't something that she displayed lavishly but ultimately family was about the firm and it was about the royal family it was about doing your duty and i think ultimately that came above everything else in may 1910 edward vii passed away after just nine years on the throne his son george was now king and mary was queen however the changing of the guard also seemed to herald a return to the 19th century ideal of monarchy edward vii was a very colorful king and so his death marked a sudden change particularly then with the accession of george and mary who was seen as complete opposites they were very much seen as a very conventional couple committed despite their different outlooks george was overruled by the prospect of replacing his father as king shortly after edward's death george confided in his diary i have lost my best friend and the best of fathers but god will help me in my responsibilities and darling may will be my comfort as she has always been he dreaded becoming a king but for him due to everything and so he knew he had to step up to the mark and for that i think may was very very important because although they had this rather strange stiff marriage he knew that she would always support him and she did on the 22nd of june the following year huge crowds lined the streets of westminster to witness george's coronation with mary at his side the coronation was an amazingly well choreographed traditional ceremony and for somebody like me she had a great interest in understanding of the historical significance of the coronation and the whole history of monarchy and for her she feels her life is changed by this completely but despite the joyous scenes of the coronation day the future of the monarchy itself was far from assured the rise of democracy meant the old order was under threat many of the crowned heads of europe often related to the british royal family would soon be swept away by the great war back at home the country was in political turmoil george came to the throne a quite inauspicious time there was a growing sense that the constitution needed reform that the house of lords needed to be reformed sensitive to public opinion soon after george came to the throne he was asked by the liberal government of the day to assert the supremacy of the commons over the house of lords king george v actions were invisibly saying to the people the royal family is here for all the people it's not her for the aristocracy george and mary not only had to cement their popularity at home they were also faced with the task of holding together the british empire which counted around a quarter of the world's population as its subjects nationalist movements all over the empire were agitating for independence nowhere more so than india to strengthen the monarchy's home in 1911 the royal couple returned there to be anointed emperor and empress during the lavish ceremony in delhi practically the entire indian nobility swore their allegiance to the crown they were the only emperor and empress of india to actually go there as british monarchs so it was really an important way of trying to and those countries around the world the visit to india proved a welcome diversion from the problems that were mounting for the new king and queen back at home the country was racked by social division and the suffragette movement was fighting for women to be given the vote during the epson derby of 1913 as mary and george looked on one protester emily wilding davison ran onto the track and was hit by the king's horse [Music] tragically she died four days later from her injuries this brought home very very acutely the threat of social reform to the monarchy but also made it personal the country was also beset by strikes as the working classes became increasingly unhappy with their lot despite mary's victorian outlook she and george realized the social changes underway threatened the stability of the monarchy they were determined to avoid the fate that would befall their european cousins mary and george realized that there was a job of work to do to find a place for the monarchy in the midst of these great tides of social and political unrest and agitation they were instinctively conservative but they knew that they needed to be amongst the people aligning themselves with the social strength the troubles the life really of many of the factory workers who were looking for an improvement in their conditions the couple embarked on a series of visits to working-class communities in some of the poorest parts of the country there are really quite serious strikes railway strikes minor strikes which seem to sort of threaten to paralyze the economy and uh george v and queen mary really believe that the crown has a part play in kind of making contact reaching out to the working classes and to the industrial areas so for the first time um the king and the queen may always insist on accompanying him to these visits as someone who believed that the role of the monarchy was to set an example to the working classes mary was an unlikely modernizer she understood as did king george v that the world was changing and that the monarchy had to change with the world it wasn't any longer enough to just do a wave and she and george v were the first of the royals to interact on a consistent basis not only with their courtiers and fellow royals but with the general public queen mary's first call is at the unemployment years later queen mary would demonstrate her common touch when she undertook a tour of the villages of south wales he mary insisted that she go to a miner's cottage so what happened was she went to the miners cottage visited the miner and perched on his kitchen stool and drank a cup of tea he and his family have the pleasure and honor of trying queen mary over their house including even the scully what she felt very strongly was that if she was seen as being very friendly with the working classes chatting with a minor in his kitchen drinking a cup of tea the queen herself that it would strengthen the monarchy mary would display a surprising affinity with the working classes throughout her life but just four years into her and george's reign war was looming mary's example during the conflict would help unite the country and preserve the institution to which she devoted her life she without question helped save the monarchy when so many royal families around europe no longer existed [Music] queen mary's influence on the modern day monarchy is huge in times of crisis our queen is a figurehead to the nation just like her grandmother was over a century ago the monarch is a point around which the people can unite for example most recently the queen in her coronavirus speech together we are tackling this disease and i want to reassure you that if we remain united and resolute then we will overcome it king george and queen mary are seen as the brains behind this hands-on style of monarchy that we see today having that monarch who is actually just there for the good of the people and keep the country going that's really key and george and mary recognise this king george and queen mary were catapulted into the center of their first national emergency on the 4th of august 1914 when britain declared war on germany and it seems incredible that it should have started with such a relatively unimportant event as the assassination of the archduke leopold of austin world war one not only threatened the future of the country but also the crown the incident that began the war was a shooting of a royal that really was quite shocking to them and i think they felt very strongly that it was a possibility that people would want to throw them off their thrones queen victoria had imagined that if she simply married her children into enough european royal families then there would never be a war but here was the kaiser who of course was queen victoria's grandson beginning a war with george v for george i don't think he ever imagined he'd be a wartime king european monarchs related to king george was stripped of their crowns including his cousin sar nicholas russia and royals all over europe lose their thrones and some of them are assassinated the british crown wasn't as secure as it needed to be it had come under threat it was in danger and george and mary needed to do something about it this wasn't their only problem almost nine million troops from the british empire were sent into battle and the death toll at home and abroad was quickly rising so many people died with so many families lost relations there's never been such a tremendously awful wipeout of talented well-educated sound people was a terrible terrible loss of life as war raged on and with the crown under threat king george was in a precarious situation queen mary is often credited as being his most trusted advisor and her wisdom and knowledge would become critical for the survival of the monarchy he was very concerned about the millions of his subjects who were losing so many loved ones and he relied tremendously on his wife she had been taught a lot about history by her governess and she would offer examples of how otherwise had coped in different times with her by his side he felt confident enough to make decisions and bring us through the wall [Music] in 1918 rationing was rolled out across the country under queen mary's guidance the new austerity measures were implemented at buckingham palace the royal family would now experience the hardships of war alongside their people queen mary had a reputation for being fantastically frugal she felt the royal family had to be seen living very simply she turned off the heating in buckingham palace and kept the lights down low and you know served completely horrible sort of grim food like lots of blemonge [Music] this was a clever and popular move by the queen but driven by her duties and the survival of the crown work didn't stop there her selfless nature would leave a lasting legacy mary was brought up by her mother to always think of others who didn't have the same advantages that they had and despite being shy she attached herself to numerous charities she passed this on to the queen mother she passed it on to our queen and i suppose you could compare all three of them to a stick of rock and that wherever you broke it they were duty ran all the way through queen mary followed in her mother's footsteps and became patron of the london needlework guild in 1897. during the war years the queen took charge the needlework guild collected garments and articles of clothing to send to soldiers veterans and their families the queen mother was the next patron of the organization and princess mary princess royal and later princess margaret were also members queen mary's drones are the first female police officers and by 1918 almost a million women were employed in munitions work this was the first war in which women were playing an active role and mary really saw it as her key role to really encourage this and to be part of the woman's effort in the country she set up a band which was for unemployed women because their men folk were of fighting in the war or sadly killed and so they would organize areas where they could actually develop careers and do things and get paid for them that had never happened before queen mary became a beacon of hope especially to those affected by the tragedies of war as she visited the wound the press and public were won over by her tender ways qualities which are seen today in her granddaughter the queen this was very difficult for her because she was shy reticent and didn't have small talk nonetheless she felt it was her duty what happened in one hospital was the head came down to her and said oh your majesty would you really kindly spend some time with the sailor most of his face has been burnt off and he feels very very low she sat very close by him talked to him for a long while and he seemed to be calm i always think of queen mary as like behind the scenes of really making sure that this monarchy not only survived but that it thrived it wasn't all sort of pomp and circumstance and being waited on hand and foot she was able to go out there and see what in a sense normal life was like and then bring that into the monarchy queen mary made an impressive impact alone but when she was with the king the strength of the crown really started to soar i think it was very clear to her that they couldn't be like victoria with victoria's wars be in the palace far away from it that because people were dying on the western front women and men that it was vital that the monarchy played a role for morale but also strengthen the monarchy itself on the streets of warchorn britain they started to ship a new relationship with the public they walked the war they were very much sort of in and amongst londoners showing solidarity and in that sense bolstering the national mood and national unity they mixed with more people and effectively they began what we now know as a royal walkabout with crowns across europe falling left right and center they knew that actually these changes need to be permanent to ensure the british crown did not before the same fate i think that that was really the start of where we see the monarchy and the royal family today looking back at how well received queen mary and king george were at that time for charities you can say the same thing for queen elizabeth ii and prince philip with thousands of troops losing their lives anti-german feeling was rife and the royal family's background was soon brought into question as war weariness set in there was some very very outspokenly nationalistic newspaper who intimated that actually the british royal family was too german and actually it secretly had sympathy with its german relatives when the royal family at windsor castle there were many reports given to the police that they were shining out lights from windsor castle two german u-boats to come and invade actually when the police investigated it was the likes of the local vicar going home his car lights the king had to take action in 1917 he changed the royal family name from the german dynasty of sax coburg goater to windsor after the much-loved castle rename was a huge statement of englishness that george and mary knew that the survival of the monarchy they had to really cut ties with that german background and it was that revolutionary act carried out by george supported by mary which saw this rebrand of the monarchy for mary of course her parents had both deep german roots and it might have been a little bit painful for her to reject her heritage however she would have done this gladly because she was willing to do almost anything to ensure the survival of the crown it was the end of an era for the royal family they had steadied the crown and the house of windsor was officially born [Applause] by 1918 millions of soldiers had lost their lives but at 11 am on the 11th of november the war finally came to an end [Music] a day that will become known as armistice day there is in london a sort of mad rush of people to buckingham palace and the king and the queen are called out again and again onto the balcony during a war or anything tragic you want to be able to look at something within your own country that is steadfast that is continuity that is strong and that during that period was queen mary and king george the british royal family had retained the support of the nation and unlike some of their european cousins avoided the downfall of the crown there were people in british politics who rather hoped they might be able to get rid of the monarchy after world war one but they were disappointed from a position in 1914 when the monarchy looked to be very much on the ropes through the actions of mary and george in the war it left the monarchy after the war stronger perhaps than it had ever been cured the british monarchy for the future george and mary had modernized it they'd made a new dynasty and they'd saved the british crown queen mary's devotion to duty through the great war had helped save the monarchy for now although it wasn't long before her strength and support would prove critical to the crown once again the country was bankrupt the country was in a terrible mess there was massive unemployment they had a very sticky situation on their hands and i think that georgia fifth was worried there might be a revolution [Music] the role of royal consort is often a difficult one prince philip has spent 68 years at the queen's side and in that time has become her rock guiding advising and supporting the monarch and more than a century ago this was the job of the queen's grandmother queen mary she like philip made the role her own queen mary definitely shaped the role of queen consort there were more royal visits she helped him write his speeches i have much pleasure in declaring the dark open for you and of course she used her bookish ways as one of the cleverest members of the royal family we've possibly ever had to actually influence her husband and the way he dealt with politics she was very quietly the power behind the throne probably in a very similar way that um the queen mother uh supported george vi with mary as his committed consult king george had emerged more popular than ever from the great war however the celebrations were short-lived just a few months later their youngest son john who had epilepsy passed away she writes in her diet that she's very sorry and that it's incredibly sad but she never refers to him again i think that she felt very deeply that it was her job to remain strong both in public but also for her husband and for the family and for the crown along with their personal problems post-war britain presented the house of windsor with a new set of worries throughout the later years of the king's reign 600 million pounds has been spent in unemployment paid the country was bankrupt in a terrible mess there was massive unemployment they had a very sticky situation on their hands and i think that george was worried there might be a revolution the world really shifted and george and mary were aware of that and they had to shift with it it's under king george and queen mary that the working classes demand for more representation that women get the vote and that everything becomes a more egalitarian society and aside over this period of huge social change king george and queen mary were seen by many including their family as unlikely modernizes but to keep themselves relevant and revered by the public they began to embrace the changing face of britain they were conservative with a small sea um so much so that their son david said that they were waging a private war with the 20th century though they didn't like change they understood that it had to be done one of the biggest changes was in 1924 when james ramsey macdonald became the first labor prime minister the king makes this very strong attempt to befriend the labour prime minister and the queen too plays an important part in trying to um uh you know invite the labour wives to court to make them feel at home this is politically really important with this huge political and social change happening around them it was the british public who really needed convincing by the ground george and mary really go out to try and win over the british public be seen to be visiting all sorts of different parts of britain they were seen at industries fairs visiting charities visiting hospitals traveling quite a lot through england and and being seen much more widely the public appearances endeared the king and queen to their people and crucially the press pathe news would record what they were doing the british public would get to know them much better than previous generations that it had been possible queen mary understood the value of publicity she regarded it as her royal duty to cooperate with the press she would always stop and let a photographer get his photograph with their reputation on the rise the king and queen decided to go one step further and use technology to bring their voices straight to their people if monarchy was to survive it had to reach the working classes and the working classes had to back it up this is what george the fifth and queen mary understood in a way that many other monarchs did not understand hence why many of them ceased to exist [Music] in 1923 the king and queen recorded a message for empire day together on this day my people in all parts of the world join to celebrate their unity and they draw closer to common time which hold them together think always of what you can do to make your home happy the spirit of the good home is one of the best schools in the world the emergence of a more modern life but as the king's health deteriorated he looked to the queen to take on a more prominent role in 1928 particularly he suffered from a really bad episode with his lungs queen mary sat by his bedside helped nurse him through the worst of it and she was actually recognized by one of the king's doctors when he was asked who had saved the king's life he quite simply replied the queen he really did suffer from periods of great exhaustion and in some sense the energy of the monarchy as had been so visible during the early years of uh the rain really now was uh focused on mary throughout the 1930s queen mary increasingly took center stage keeping up the popularity of the crown was vital for its survival queen mary's unwavering commitment to the crown and support to her husband didn't go unnoticed in 1930 he opened up to his wife in a touching and personal letter i can never sufficiently express my deep gratitude to you darling may for the way you have stood by me this is not sentimental rubbish but what i really feel they were an extremely devoted couple they could have been missed and mrs george windsor in serbian they were so down to earth in terms of their personal relationship in 1932 the palace was contacted by the bbc with an innovative idea they asked if the king would be willing to record a christmas message to the nation now he'd already been approached a decade earlier but the king had declined not thinking it was such a good idea but fast forward 10 years and it seems that queen berry might have whispered in george's ear recognising that actually a radio message could be a really good way of getting the people to hear them they set up a recording studio at sandringham and they had the king's favorite wicker chair there he sat down rather too hard and went through the seat of the chair so that was hastily put together again and he addressed his people through one of the marvels of modern science i am enabled this christmas day to speak to all my peoples throughout the empire and it was a massive massive success and it was then carried on by george vi and of course um the queen today [Applause] by the king's silver jubilee in 1935 the popularity of the crown had reached an all-time high a golden day for the silva king george and queen mary had triumphed through adversity and become an inspiration to the people of gratitude to them of support very different from edward vii but crucially had given britain what it needed at that time steadfast duty loyalty a sense of service and it was that that would become i think one of their greatest legacies there are rather nice stories of queen mary in floods of tears for her was something very unusual because she was so moved by the reception that she and the king had received however behind the scenes there was a worry the king's health was in decline and on the 20th of january 1936 things took a turn for the worse he was at sandringham his favorite place in the whole world he was getting weaker and weaker and eventually he died at 11 55 and there's always said that he was given a lethal injection by his doctor of morphine and cocaine so that he could die just before midnight so that it could be in the first edition of the london times which was his favorite newspaper what she wrote very very soon after king george died revealed so much about her she said the sunset of his death tinged the whole world's sky i think the comment she made was so poetic beautiful and incredibly moving on the 28th of january 1936 the funeral took place and people from all over the country lined the streets to pay their respects to their beloved king and so we turned the last page of this chapter of sorrow in sadness he passes his majesty king george v burned by the whole world the nation was distraught they went into mourning everybody was in mourning there was this figure that to their mind represented continuity and stability and suddenly he was no longer there as long as he lived he was the guiding star of a great nation when he died the little children cried in the street king george with queen mary by his side had transformed the british monarchy setting the house of windsor a high standard for the future the death of george v ended a progressive period for the british monarchy he and mary had decided what was necessary to take the royal family forward and to secure the monarchy for the future i don't think we would be speaking about king george v in the same way that we talk about him now in present day if it hadn't been for queen mary and her influence on him steadfast strong clever and having his ear britain now had a new king edward the eighth but king george v was still on the forefront of everyone's minds and the future of the crown and a huge sense of unease really about what was to come people were shaken and uh no one obviously more than mary herself even in her grief queen mary continued shaping the british monarchy and her commitment to the crown remained as strong as ever even when it was under threat from her own son she couldn't understand how somebody was prepared to throw away all his heritage and all the things that people expected of him for the sake of one woman [Music] for queen mary duty and the crown came above all else each family she and george had five sons two of them would go on to become king the first was edward when his father passed away he became edward viii what do you mean by launching a ship he said that's a woman's job not a man edward was very handsome he was small in stature but very good looking he was swamp he was intelligent beautifully dressed he was an innovator of fashion everything he wore people copied but he did not share his mother mary's views on the importance of duty edward was not bound by protocol by expectation in the way that mary always had been edward ultimately saw personal happiness as his right and mary saw that that always had to be subjugated to duty and service much of this was down to edward's childhood although they had triumphed in their reign as parents mary and george failed to instill their own values in their first born son george and mary were basically she was i think quite a cold person she didn't really know how to talk to her children certainly not then when they were young mary was particularly strict with her eldest son prince edward and there had been quite a lot of eldest sons in the past who'd misbehaved being profligate had mistresses that was not what she wanted she and george really saw it as their role to bring in this very moral very strict type of monarchy but their strict and distant parenting style appeared to have the opposite effect edgewood couldn't have been more different to his mother he was young experimental fun entertaining he was really a party boy edward was always having affairs especially affairs with married women couldn't really settle down she couldn't bear the fact that he was having a lot of relationships with people she didn't consider was suitable one of edward's lovers caused more concern for mary than all the others edward fell in love with water simpson a glamorous divorced american and it was the divorce that was a sticking point and the problem was if you were king was that you were head of the church of england you could not marry a divorcee in the church of england it wasn't seen as acceptable the queen mary was very very worried i mean she didn't think for one moment that he was going to dry matt wallace but she didn't like the influence that wallis had over her son who she knew was perhaps quite weak and here was this very strong american lady that seemed to have bewitched him but before being crowned king what mary didn't realize was that edward had already decided he wanted to marry wallace one time he thought he could have a morganatic marriage so he could be king and be married to wallace simpson but she wouldn't be queen that wasn't acceptable to edward he wanted to marry her absolutely all out he wanted wallace to be queen wallace and also the morganatic wife was not acceptable to some parts of the empire as well and he's told very clearly that you either don't marry her or you abdicate edward was forced into a corner when it was looking likely that he would abdicate queen mary stepped in the dutiful dowager queen was not prepared to allow the personal life of her son to affect the reputation of the crown when queen mary realized that he really was going to give everything up for wallis simpson she summoned him to mulberry hunts where she was living and said you've got to reconsider you must you cannot do this she just couldn't believe that he could do it to be placed in the position of having to choose between love and the throne is one of life's most tragic dilemmas even if the dilemma is of the king's own making but edward's decision was made and only five months prior to his coronation on december the nineteen thirty six edwardian a burden of responsibility and to discharge my duties as cain as i would wish to be but i want to help in support of the woman i love well queen mary could not believe that anyone being a king of england would give it up for anybody or anything she had given up her whole life for the crowd and hare was this son of hers just chucking it over it was a huge crisis and here again was a chance for the monarchy to crush and crumble into the ground mary put monarchy before family and with the reputation of the crown under threat she had a hand in ensuring edward was revoked of his royal duties and exiled along with wallace to france she loved her son but if he abdicated that meant she could no longer see him he was in exile she would not go to his wedding if he was to have children she would not meet them i think what mary felt was if that's what my son wants and he wants to marry wallace simpson he can but she's never going to be a royal highness to me and she is not going to get the title royal highness and he can stay out of this country because i've got to help my second son take his role as king and i don't want my first son interfering and trying to maybe stir up affection for himself because people loved him edward was given the title duke of windsor and was not allowed to return home without permission his brother bertie the duke of york became king george vi he was the second of queen mary's sons to become king and was known for his stammer and shy retiring nature everybody thought he was going to be a chamber and that his inadequacies would jeopardize the continuity of the monarchy it was a huge personal crisis for queen mary everything that she and her husband had built up together potentially could bring the whole monarchy down mary as dowager queen had to do something that no other dowager queen had done most dowager queens after their husband dies really they get to step back from the public role and that simply wasn't the case for mary she was expected to be out there to be showing her support for her son for george vi and on the 12th of may 1937 queen mary's support was on full display at the coronation of king george vi breaking with age old tradition mary made a very significant decision and that was to go to george vi coronation and that was something that dowager queens do not do they do not go to the correlation of the successor she broke precedent left right and center she was giving the message back my youngest son as king because there was some doubt as to whether george vi would be able to even fulfill the role adequately however thanks to the support of his mother mary george would quickly prove to be a powerful symbol of courage and fortitude at the outbreak of the second world war just two years into his reign for the second time in the lives of most of us we are at war george in those activities through the war that him and the later queen mother performed were very much inspired by mary leading from the front showing a sense of solidarity with people and guiding her son through another war that left once again the monarchy strengthened by it not undermined as it may well have been mary was ruthlessly determined to protect the monarchy even putting it above her son by instilling the same principles and dedication in queen elizabeth mary would prove to be a huge influence i have to tell you i do not think that she would have made as good a queen as she has made had she not had her grandmother's influence [Music] queen mary weathered many storms in her time as consort to george v public scrutiny war and political change all threatened the monarchy but despite the chaos of the world her sense of duty to the crown was something she was keen to pass on to future royal generations mary was very aware that elizabeth would be queen one day that she was next in line to the throne queen mary i think had a real sense of responsibility instilling in the young elizabeth the kind of values which she knew would ultimately be needed if the monarchy was to endure mary felt very strongly that elizabeth should be having more education in history in geography learning about her country and she took it upon herself to take elizabeth and margaret out on outings to galleries and to really try and show them around because princess elizabeth's parents were a little bit distrustful of education mary also felt that as future queen elizabeth's education should include etiquette the first thing she taught young princess elizabeth was to sit up straight and to sand straight not to fidget and she made sure that the pockets of the princess's coats were sewn up so she couldn't put her hands in her pockets and she also taught them the royal wave with a handkerchief and elizabeth said to margaret handkerchiefs are for waving not for blowing your nose the same royal qualities which she and her time had exemplified here is a charming picture the other generation and a sovereign of the future but above all mary wanted to instill in her what it meant to be royal as depicted in this stirring scene from netflix's the crown monarchy is god's sacred mission to grace and dignify the earth to give ordinary people an ideal to strive towards an example of nobility and duty to raise them in their wretched lives monarchy is a calling from god this wasn't a job to her and she felt that she had been chosen to do this and she instilled that in the young princess elizabeth that duty was all important and self was not important it was duty and you were you were a special person you've been picked out to do this and you had to do it for the best of your ability all your life and it would not be long before the young elizabeth would have to perform that duty when in 1952 king george vi passed away at only 56 years old the death of george vi in 1952 was a great shock to queen mary but no one expected him to die so young i think she was quite broken by the death of her son and also the end of his reign into which he put so much effort i do think the death of george vi had a great effect on queen mary and really you start to see a rapid decline in queen mary even though it was her beloved granddaughter who's on the throne even though she'd been devoted to elizabeth ever since she was a little girl [Music] sadly soon after the death of king george vi and only 10 weeks before elizabeth's coronation mary passed away queen mary has for so long been a familiar presence in britain's way of life her standards have so greatly helped to build british ideals of conduct that it will be both strange and sad not to see her in the future taking her a custom part in the life of the nation i think it was a moment of great sadness and so soon after the death of the king she represented such an ideal of how people should comport themselves and a sense of duty and a sense of dedication of support for her husband her son her granddaughter but even after the death of queen mary her strong sense of duty remained she understood the likelihood was that she might die before the coronation and she gave instructions that should she die before it that it was to proceed queen mary understood that the role of royalty is to not only embody all the interests of all the people in your country but to be self abnegating at only 27 years old queen elizabeth ii was crowned the young queen elizabeth would have been very very upset by the death of her grandmother so that she could ask her advice but what she did have what she did use and take on board and repeat was her grandmother's sense of duty her grandmother's resolve that it was a very important role she had in her role as the new queen it was evident she resembled the ideals and values of her grandmother i have to tell you i do not think that she would have made as good a queen as she has made had she not had her grandmother's influence and one of the proofs of that pudding that is in the eating is that whenever lilybet has had the choice between her personal preferences and the good of the monarchy she has invariably taken the good of the crown mary left a great legacy through her sheer determination and dedication to duty by building a stronger monarchy in a time driven by war political turmoil and social change at the age of 94 it's apparent that mary still resonates with the queen today just recently the speech that she gave to the nation on the coronavirus right there the brooch that she's wearing is queen mary's brooch and you can only sense that she specifically and purposely chose that broach because mary exuded that duty exuded that steadfastness exuded that uniting a nation and that's exactly what queen elizabeth was doing and has done throughout her reign mary's devotion to the crown and the nation during times of crisis have had a considerable impact on how the monarchy is viewed today if we marry we're alive now she would say above all that she had succeeded because queen mary's great vision her great aim the ambition was that the monarchy would continue she helped lead the country through two major wars and she's generally opened up to the subjects i think she helped to save the monarchy looking back i don't think she could have realized how important she really was we would be a very different world i think if she had not been around and married her king [Music] [Music] [Laughter] [Music] [Music] [Laughter] [Music] [Music] [Laughter] [Music] [Music] [Music] the social changes underway threatened the stability of the monarchy they were determined to avoid the fate that would befall their european cousins mary and george realized that there was a job of work to do to find a place for the monarchy in the midst of these great uh tides of social and political unrest and agitation they were instinctively conservative but they knew that they needed to be amongst the people aligning themselves with the social strength the troubles the life really of many of the factory workers who were looking for an improvement in their conditions the couple embarked on a series of visits to working-class communities in some of the poorest parts of the country there are really quite serious strikes railway strikes minor strikes which seem to sort of threaten to paralyze the economy and uh george v and queen mary really believe that the crown has a part play in kind of making contact reaching out to the working classes and to the industrial areas so for the first time um the king and the queen may always insist on accompanying him to these

Channel: Royal Family History

Views: 26,885

Keywords: royal family history, royal family documentary, british royal, british royal history, british royal documentary, history, documentary, queen, queen elizabeth, prince philip, prince charles, prince andrew, princess diana, prince william, kate middleton, prince harry, meghan markle, lilibet, prince george

Id: _yZSoTICIg4

Length: 64min 41sec (3881 seconds)

Published: Wed Nov 17 2021