The Duchess Of Windsor, page 24
Marion Crawford later recalled her meeting with Wallis: “She was a smart, attractive woman, already middle-aged but with that immediate friendliness American women have. She appeared to be entirely at her ease; if anything, rather too much so.... She had a distinctly proprietary way of speaking to the new King. I remember she drew him to the window and suggested how certain trees might be moved, and a part of a hill taken away to improve the view.” This seemingly innocent action caused great distress to both the Duke and Duchess of York; the Duke had himself helped plan the garden at Royal Lodge and taken particular care in the placement of the trees and lawns. Wallis’s comments were met with stony silence. “The atmosphere was not a comfortable one,” Marion Crawford later wrote.24
The Duchess of York eventually turned to the governess and said, “Crawfie, would you like to take Lilibet and Margaret into the woods for a while?” As they left, Princess Elizabeth, having encountered the woman whose love affair would one day place her on the British throne, turned to her governess and asked, “Crawfie, who is she?”25
The afternoon had been anything but a success. If the Duchess of York had previously harbored a dislike of Wallis, her ill-conceived gardening suggestions and easy treatment of the King only intensified Elizabeth’s feelings. “I left,” Wallis wrote, “with a distinct impression that while the Duke of York was sold on the American station wagon, the Duchess was not sold on David’s other American interest.”26
Wallis continued to operate under considerable strain. Although she and Ernest appeared to have reached something of an understanding, David remained insistent. This was terribly wearing on Wallis, who found the strain almost unbearable. By the beginning of May, it was apparent even to Wallis that things could no longer continue as they had in the past. In a letter to her aunt Bessie, she explained that her former life with Ernest at Bryanston Court had now slipped away forever; Ernest might be content to let the situation continue, but she was not. “I’ve outgrown it and Ernest,” she admitted candidly. She knew there was no going back. If she gave up the King, she would always be haunted by a string of what-ifs; at the same time, she realized that one day it would all come to an end. “Should HM fall in love with someone else I would cease to be as powerful or have all I have today ...” she wrote. “I should be comfortably off and have had a most interesting experience . . . .”27
On May 10, Chips Channon wrote: “It appears that the King is Mrs. Simpson’s absolute slave, and will go nowhere where she is not invited, and she, clever woman, with her high pitched voice, chic clothes, moles and sense of humour is behaving well. She encourages the King to meet people of importance and to be polite; above all she makes him happy. The Empire ought to be grateful.”28
Two days later, Wallis and David attended a party given by Col. Mike Scanlon, assistant military attaché for air at the U.S. embassy, and his wife. Among the guests were Col. Charles Lindbergh and his wife, Anne, who left a detailed account of her meeting with Wallis: “Mrs. Simpson beautifully dressed with the poise and ease of knowing that whatever she does is right and that she is the person in the room that people will turn to.... She at least is honest and playing her own part, not someone else’s. She is one of the few authentic characters in a social world—one of those who start fashions, not one of those who follow them . . . . She is not beautiful and yet vital and real to watch. Her vitality invests her movements with charm or a kind of beauty. I like watching her.”29
One day in May, David told Wallis he was inviting the prime minister, Stanley Baldwin, to join him for dinner at the Fort. He asked Wallis to act as hostess. “It’s got to be done,” he said with a smile. “Sooner or later my Prime Minister must meet my future wife.”30
Wallis later wrote that she was startled at this piece of information and protested that such a marriage could never take place. But her letters make quite clear that the issue had already been discussed between them, at least in some cursory fashion, and so, at least on this count, her memoirs must be dismissed.31 From this point forward, irrespective of what she would later claim, Wallis was fully aware of David’s designs to make her his queen. Whether she herself wished this or thought there was any likelihood of this happening is another matter entirely.
The dinner took place at York House on May 27. The guests included not only the prime minister and his wife but Lord and Lady Louis Mountbatten; Lord and Lady Wigram; Duff and Lady Diana Cooper; Emerald Cunard; the King’s equerry, Sir Piers Legh, and his wife, Sarah; Admiral of the Fleet Sir Chatfield; and Col. and Mrs. Charles Lindbergh. Ernest also attended. During the dinner, Lindbergh, who had just returned from Germany, reported on the state of affairs under Hitler. Both Baldwins seemed curious about Wallis, and she noted that they seemed to exchange meaningful glances as the evening wore on.32 Afterward, Lucy Baldwin commented sadly, “Mrs. Simpson had stolen the Fairy Prince.”33
The dinner, having been an official function, was duly noted—along with the names of those present—in the court circular the following day “It was ironic,” wrote Lady Hardinge, “that the Press which had steadfastly restrained itself from linking HM’s name with Mrs. Simpson was now obliged to do so at his insistence. Great efforts were made to stop the King from doing this, by those members of his staff who were trying to protect him.... If Mayfair society had shown any self-restraint before in speculating about King Edward’s private life, it had no cause to do so now.”34
Queen Mary showed the court circular to Mabell Airlie. “He gives Mrs. Simpson the most beautiful jewels,” she said quietly. Then, after a pause, she continued: “I am so afraid that he may ask me to receive her.” Lady Airlie recalled: “Bright spots of crimson were burning on her cheek bones. It was easy to imagine what such a demand would represent to her all-pervading loyalty to the Monarchy.”35
Nancy Astor, born in America and the first woman to sit in the House of Commons, was horrified when she read the court circular. Harold Nicolson found her
terribly indignant at the King for having invited to his first official dinner Lady Cunard and Mr. and Mrs. Simpson. She says that the effect in Canada and America will be deplorable. She considers Lady Cunard and Chips Channon as “disintegrating influences,” and she deplores the fact that any but the best Virginian families should be received at Court. I stick up for both Emerald Cunard and Mrs. Simpson, but I refrain from saying that, after all, every American is more or less as vulgar as any other American. Nancy Astor herself, by her vain and self-conscious behaviour in the House, cannot claim to be a model of propriety In any case, she is determined to tell the King that although Mrs. Simpson may appear at Court, she must not appear in the Court Circular. I suggest to her that any such intimation would be regarded by HM as a gross impertinence. She says that when the dignity of the United States and the British Empire is involved, it is her duty to make such sacrifices.36
By the beginning of June, not even Wallis was able to withstand the constant pressure from David, and she agreed to seek a divorce from Ernest. The King himself was working against the calendar: he wished to marry Wallis before his coronation, which had just been announced for May 12, 1937. If she began proceedings immediately, the case would most likely be heard in the fall. There was, according to British law, a six-month waiting period between the decree and its formalization, a span of time which would mean that Wallis would be free to marry again by April.
Once she had made her decision, Wallis asked David if he could recommend a lawyer. He arranged for her to see his solicitor, Sir George Allen. Allen himself sought out another lawyer to handle the case; eventually, he settled on Theodore Goddard, a specialist in divorce.
Throughout the proceedings, David consulted his friend Walter Monckton, solicitor for the duchy of Cornwall, and one of his few intimates. Monckton, the son of a family from Kent, had made a great success of his time at Balliol College when he was president of the Oxford Union. A man of medium height, with thinning hair and thick glasses, Monckton resembled nothing so much as an Oxford don. A brilliant barrister, he had also advised the nizam of Hyderabad. That summer, he came to know Wallis particularly well. She told Monckton that she wished to pursue a divorce. The King himself complained to Walter that he in no way wanted his friendship with Mrs. Simpson to bring unwanted publicity to her divorce. “I was convinced that it was the King who was really the party anxious for the divorce,” Monckton noted, “and I suspected that he felt some jealousy that there should be a husband in the background.”37
On Wednesday, June 10, David and Mrs. Simpson attended a dinner given by Lady Colefax at Argyll House. Among those present were Kitty and Perry Brownlow; the Duchess of Buccleuch; Lady Diana Cooper; Lord and Lady Vansittart; Mr. and Mrs. Artur Rubinstein, Harold Nicolson, and Robert Bruce Lockhart. Lockhart noted that Edward “looks older and harder—a little stiffer perhaps since he became King, definitely more confidence in himself since he met Mrs. Simpson.” He continued: “Afterwards Artur Rubinstein played to us. King sat down on little stool beside Mrs. Simpson. Seemed rather bored, but stayed on.” At half-past twelve, Winston Churchill, Noel Coward, Daisy Fellowes, and the Kenneth Clarks arrived. Rubinstein had been playing classical pieces on the piano for nearly an hour, and the King had had enough. As he prepared to play another, Edward stood up, walked across to the piano, and said loudly, “We enjoyed that very much, Mr. Rubinstein.”38 Instead, the King asked Noel Coward to entertain, and for the next half hour, Edward, Wallis, and the other guests sang along while Coward thumped out such tunes as “Oh, Mrs. Worthington, Don’t Put Your Daughter on the Stage” and “Mad Dogs and Englishmen.”39 Lockhart recalled that the “King bucked up and looked quite amused.”40
By the first week of July, Chips Channon reported, “The Simpson scandal is growing, and she, poor Wallis, looks unhappy The world is closing in around her, the flatterers, the sycophants, and the malice. It is a curious social juxtaposition that casts me in the role of Defender of the King. But I do, and very strongly in society, not for loyalty so much as for admiration and affection for Wallis, and in indignation against those who attack her.”41
Wallis was just beginning to learn that her private life had become the subject of great interest in the American press. She wrote to her cousin Corinne Murray: “Darling Rinny—Please don’t believe all you read. I am still the same nut you have always known—and it makes me pretty damn sick that it is my country and my countrymen and especially women who take the trouble to talk so shabbily about me—the English have been too kind and lovely to me....”42
On July 9 the King gave another controversial dinner party at York House, presided over and planned by Wallis. Several members of Parliament attended: Winston Churchill and his wife, Clementine; David Margesson, Conservative chief whip; Sir Samuel Hoare, newly appointed First Lord of the Admiralty, and his wife, Maud Hoare; and Sir Philip Sassoon, undersecretary of state for air. The Duke and Duchess were also present. During the conversation after dinner, Churchill—one suspects with a certain amount of gleeful deliberation—introduced the topic of George IV’s mistress, Mrs. Maria Fitzherbert. Hearing this, the Duchess of York replied cautiously, “Well, that was a long time ago.”43
Churchill did not notice the disapproving look on the Duchess’s face, for he next launched into a pointed conversation about the wars between the houses of Lancaster and York and the War of the Roses. The Duchess, with more determination in her voice, said strongly, “That was a very, very long time ago.”44
On July 16 the King participated in a military review at Hyde Park. Wallis sat in a special stand with Emerald and the Fitzgeralds; a royal box held Queen Mary and the two York princesses. As he reviewed the gathered members of the Guards regiments, he spoke movingly of the horrors of war and expressed his sincere sentiments that the world would never again engage in such devastating conflict. As the King, riding on his horse behind a contingent of guards, returned to Buckingham Palace, he passed Hyde Park Corner and beneath Wellington Arch. At just this moment, a man standing in the crowd raised a gun and aimed at the King. Before he could fire, however, a horse came between him and the King, and he threw the revolver; David saw what had happened and, keeping charge of his horse, yelled for the police to grab the would-be assassin. David, calm, continued his ride to the palace. There he learned that police had indeed apprehended the suspect, George McMahon, an Irishman living in Glasgow. After a trial, he was sentenced to twelve months in jail.45
On July 20, Wallis attended the Kemsleys’ ball at Chandos House; nearly all London society was present. Chips recorded that Wallis “was in a rage, as she had just received a letter from an MP signed by a well-known name, which she was clever enough not to reveal, in which he warned Mrs. Simpson against Lady Astor and her campaign. Wallis asked Honor [Chips’ wife] for her advice, and soon Honor had spilt the beans about Nancy Astor’s various attacks on me in regard to Wallis at the House of Commons. I fear that there may be a proper scandal and ‘bust up’ as Wallis will, and in fact, already has, told the King.”46
A week later, Sir Robert Bruce Lockhart noted: “Emerald told me ... that Lady Astor has been attacking Mrs. Simpson very violently—and by implication the King—in the House of Commons and elsewhere and that a Member of Parliament had written to Mrs. Simpson and Mrs. Simpson had shown the letter to the King.”47
The scandal was indeed growing and at times threatened to overwhelm society. As Michael Thornton points out, “By constantly appearing in public covered in costly jewels bought for her by the adoring King, Wallis Simpson proclaimed herself maîtresse en titre to society at large. It was on the grounds of vulgar display, rather than alleged immorality, that the criticism of her, and of him, was justified.”48
On July 21 the King hosted his first garden party at Buckingham Palace, which he also managed to make into a formal court presentation of debutantes. Formerly, George V had held four presentation courts in May and June, and they were generally regarded as the highlight of the season. This year, however, George V’s death had pushed the courts into July, the end of the six-month mourning period. As a result, six hundred debutantes waited for their formal presentations at court.
Lord Cromer, the Lord Chamberlain, suggested to the King that he expedite the situation by holding two massive garden parties at Buckingham Palace and using them as an opportunity for presentations. A special dais had been erected in the garden to make the occasion more impressive: The King sat beneath the huge red-and-gold Shamiana canopy, used by his parents at the 1911 Delhi durbar in India.49 The Yorks, the Kents, and several other members of the Royal Family sat beside him, waiting to greet the debutantes; Wallis occupied a discreet seat near the rear of the pavilion.
Three hundred girls, all dressed in their summer finery, stood waiting in a long line which stretched around the lawns and back into the palace. As the Lord Chamberlain called out a name, the debutante stepped forward, curtsied to the King, and moved on. Throughout the ceremony, David appeared bored, tugging nervously at his collar and occasionally glancing down the line to see how many more girls waited. Unfortunately, midway through this ceremony, London’s notorious weather struck, and the skies opened up, pelting everyone with a violent rainstorm. David, sitting in his covered pavilion, was safe, but the debutantes were rapidly becoming drenched and their dresses ruined. Eventually, the King summoned the Lord Chamberlain to his throne and said, “We can’t let this go on.” Cromer agreed, and the remaining presentations were canceled.50
The following afternoon, the second garden-party presentation took place, but those debutantes who had not been presented the previous day were not asked to return. The Lord Chamberlain issued a statement that was carried in the Times the following morning: “Those ladies summoned to the afternoon’s reception who, owing to the interruption of the ceremony by the weather, were unable to pass the King’s presence, would be considered as having been officially presented at Court.”51 Many of the debutantes and their families were angry, and court officials quickly pointed out the occasion as another example of David’s inability to cope with the burdens of the throne. Indeed, David himself later admitted that he had made a mistake and underestimated the importance of the presentation. In retrospect, he said, he should have walked down the line of remaining debutantes and wished each girl well. But it was too late; his distaste for the ceremony had led him to seek the easiest way out, and the damage had been done.52
As the summer wore on, so did the preparations for the Simpson divorce. Although both Wallis and Ernest wished to divorce, according to British law such desire was not itself sufficient to dissolve a marriage. Nor was the wish of one party to marry another a circumstance which was regarded in divorce cases as collusion. The only circumstances in which divorces were ordinarily permitted were those where the petitioner—in this case Wallis—could show that the respondent had grievously damaged the marriage through improper conduct. In short, Ernest had to agree to accept total blame for the failure of the marriage and provide evidence sufficient to the court to prove his wife’s claim. Thus, Ernest agreed to go through a ludicrous charade in which he would theatrically flaunt his adultery with another woman in order to provide Wallis with a motive to seek a divorce.
On July 21 he booked himself into the Hotel de Paris at Bray under the name Ernest A. Simmons. He was accompanied by a lady who gave her name as “Buttercup” Kennedy. They took breakfast in bed together the following morning and were thus observed by the hotel staff. This was all the evidence needed for Wallis to begin proceedings, and she had in fact hired a detective to follow them. It cannot have been an accident that this was done, and one can only assume that she must have known what was to take place. Within a day, Wallis wrote a letter to Ernest informing him that she knew he had been at the hotel with a lady other than herself and that she was beginning proceedings to end their marriage.
