King Edward Abdication Conspiracy

KING EDWARD ABDICATION A CONSPIRACY

"The Abdication of Edward VIII
must have dealt royalism a blow from which it may not recover.
The row over the Abdication, which was very violent while it lasted,
cut across existing political divisions....
The rich were anti-Edward and the working classes were sympathetic to him.
He had promised the unemployed miners that he would do something on their behalf,
which was an offence in the eyes of the rich....
Some continental observers believed that
Edward had been got rid of
because of his association with leading Nazis
and were rather impressed by this exhibition of Cromwellism."
~ George Orwell

Orwell moved to the Hertfordshire village of Wallington -- model for ANIMAL FARM -- in the third month of the reign of King Edward VIII who abdicated the throne eight months later on December 10, 1936.

I've had an interest in Edward the 8th ever since learning -- from a book I bought in England -- that he was the most popular Prince and King the British Empire had ever had and that he was especially loved by the common people but not by the so-called "establishment", ie the aristocracy, corporations and politicians. He was nicknamed THE PEOPLE'S KING, just as Lady Diana came to be known as THE PEOPLE'S PRINCESS.

Since reading that first book about King Edward -- who after his abdication became known evermore as The Duke of Windsor -- I have read several other books about him and about Wallis Simpson, the king-breaker, black-magic woman who cost him his crown by stealing his mind -- not his heart as they want us to believe.

I've scanned the books below, in the order they were published, firstly those about KING EDWARD and then those about THE DUCHESS:

I've also read a book about Gloria Vanderbilt who was the twin sister of Lady Thelma Furness who was the love of Prince Edward's life until he unceremoniously dropped her for Wallis Simpson while Thelma was in America attending Gloria's custody trial.

All of the above books -- although none dedicated to the premise of a conspiracy behind the abdication of King Edward VIII -- support the fact that there WAS a conspiracy -- some of it requiring reading between the lines.

Now getting back to Orwell, ie Edward being King in 1936 when Orwell lived in Wallington. Orwell later wrote his thoughts about the abdication, and according to him, "Edward had been got rid of". I've scanned the passages below from Volume 3 of Orwell's COLLECTED ESSAYS, JOURNALISM AND LETTERS:

...My own opinion is that royalism, i.e. popular royalism, was a strong factor in English life up to the death of George V, who had been there so long that he was accepted as "the" King (as Victoria had been "the" Queen), a sort of father-figure and projection of the English domestic virtues. The 1935 Silver Jubilee, at any rate in the south of England, was a pathetic outburst of popular affection, genuinely spontaneous. The authorities were taken by surprise and the celebrations were prolonged for an extra week while the poor old man, patched up after pneumonia and in fact dying, was hauled to and from through slum streets where the people had hung out flags of their own accord and chalked "Long Live the King, Down with the Landlord" across the roadway.

I think, however, that the Abdication of Edward VIII must have dealt royalism a blow from which it may not recover. The row over the Abdication, which was very violent while it lasted, cut across existing political divisions, as can be seen from the fact that Edward's loudest champions were Churchill, Mosley and H. G. Wells; but broadly speaking the rich were anti-Edward and the working classes were sympathetic to him. He had promised the unemployed miners that he would do something on their behalf, which was an offence in the eyes of the rich; on the other hand, the miners and other unemployed probably felt that he had let them down by abdicating for the sake of a woman. Some continental observers believed that Edward had been got rid of because of his association with leading Nazis and were rather impressed by this exhibition of Cromwellism. But the net effect of the whole business was probably to weaken the feeling of royal sanctity which had been so carefully built up from 1880 onwards. It brought home to people the personal powerlessness of the King, and it showed that the much-advertised royalist sentiment of the upper classes was humbug. At the least I should say it would need another long reign, and a monarch with some kind of charm, to put the Royal Family back where it was in George V's day....

...One of the most extraordinary things about England is that there is almost no official censorship, and yet nothing that is actually offensive to the governing class gets into print, at least in any place where large numbers of people are likely to read it. If it is 'not done' to mention something or other, it just doesn't get mentioned. The position is summed up in the lines by (I think) Hilaire Belloc:

You cannot hope to bribe or twist
Thank God! the British journalist.
But seeing what the man will do
unbribed, there's no occasion to.

No bribes, no threats, no penalties — just a nod and a wink and the thing is done. A well-known example was the business of the Abdication. Weeks before the scandal officially broke, tens or hundreds of thousands of people had heard all about Mrs Simpson, and yet not a word got into the press, not even into the Daily Worker, although the American and European papers were having the time of their lives with the story. Yet I believe there was no definite official ban: just an official 'request' and a general agreement that to break the news prematurely 'would not do'....

A quick overview of the main characters and events in King Edward's abdication can be found in a booklet I came across during a trip to England in 2003 entitled SCANDALS, GRIPPING ACCOUNTS OF THE EXPOSED AND DEPOSED:

...Edward first got to know Wallis Simpson during a weekend at his Fort Belvedere residence in Windsor, England at the end of January, 1932. She was a flirty socialite, and best friend of his long-standing mistress, fellow-American Thelma Furness. Mrs Simpson was a determined social climber, and her clever and witty conversation gained her acceptance in the highest circles, together with toleration for her more reserved husband Ernest.

Thelma Furness went on an extended holiday two years later, and at her request the now well-established Wallis Simpson looked after the Prince. When Thelma returned, she had been replaced as his mistress. The affair blossomed, and Wallis accompanied Edward to many of his engagements, usually with Ernest chugging along behind for the sake of appearances. Within a year the relationship was common knowledge in society circles, although the British press declined to reveal it to the general public. The arrangement was tolerated so long as Edward was a carefree prince: it would be different when he became king.

His father George V died on 20 January 1936. The emotionally insecure prince grieved deeply, both for the King, and for the way of life he would now lose. He moved into Buckingham Palace reluctantly, and the initial vigour with which he handled state affairs soon weakened. It was so clear that he had no interest in the documents sent to him, and that all the royal decisions were actually made by Wallis Simpson, that officials began witholding sensitive information from the monarch. Meanwhile, Wallis ensured that palace life ran along the informal, sociable lines that Edward enjoyed, vetting guest lists and menus, and bringing their cafe society friends onto the royal circuit, much to the annoyance of the rest of the royal family, particularly Edward's mother Queen Mary.

This annoyance turned to alarm when the Simpsons divorced on 27 October, enabling her to marry the king the following summer. Prime Minister Baldwin expressed his concern to Edward, who replied that he would marry Wallis even if he had to renounce the throne. He told the rest of his family this news over the next few days, but then began to suggest that a morganatic marriage might be possible. This would have allowed him to remain as king but his wife would not become queen, and nor would any children inherit the crown. Baldwin advised him that his suggestion required a special Bill to be passed in Parliament, and that this would be unlikely to succeed. This was based on the view that the British public -- still in the dark about the affair -- would not accept Wallis in the role of the King's wife. Her nationality did not help, but the chief problem was her image as a flighty socialite and divorcee.

The story finally broke on 2 December, after the Bishop of Bradford made a speech to a Diocesan conference in which he implied that the King was lacking in the moral and spiritual dedication required for his role. "We hope that he is aware of this need", he said. "Some of us wish that he gave more positive signs of such awareness." The comments of an obscure bishop gave the British press their chance to break silence, and they seized it with a vengeance.

The general public were told the tale of the affair, and they did not like what they read, demonstrating in London with signs calling "Wally" a "whore", and pleading "Save our Edward VIII".

Ironically, the King who was about to sacrifice his crown for his heart was very popular with his people, because he had visited them extensively in earlier years and had the common touch.

A week later, on 9 December 1936, Edward signed the Instrument of Abdication and the next day he broadcast a farewell speech to the nation.

"You must believe me when I tell you that 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." Soon Edward VIII left his country and joined Wallis Simpson in Paris. His reign had lasted 325 days, and he was now known as the Duke of Windsor....

In future essays I'll excerpt further passages from the aforementioned books that give credence to a conspiracy behind the abdication of THE PEOPLE'S KING. It's a drama Shakespeare could do justice to -- the TRAGEDY OF KING EDWARD VIII. ~ Jackie Jura

PS - I subsequently ordered and have now received the autobiography Edward wrote in 1951 and a DVD of the 1965 film that was based on the book. In future essays I'll be posting excerpts:

listen BLACK MAGIC WOMAN, Santana, YouTube (... got a black magic woman trying to make a devil out of me...stop messing around with your tricks...got your spell on me baby...turning my heart into stone...I need you so badly i can't leave you alone...)

ORWELL'S WALLINGTON ROYAL MAIL DELIVERY ...Speaking of postboxes and King Edward VIII, I have a roundabout connection to him through my maternal grandfather having to do with the Royal Mail. On January 1st, 1935, my grandfather received an OBE -- the Order of the British Empire -- for delivering the Royal Mail in Canada's north -- by dogsled -- on the longest and toughest route in Canada. It was signed by both King George, during his Silver Jubilee year, and Prince Edward one year before he became King on January 20, 1936 (exactly 25 years before JFK became President on January 20, 1961)...

1984 A GIFT FIT FOR A QUEEN (The president of Mexico received one of the more unusual gifts given by the Queen during an incoming state visit today - a copy of the classic dystopian novel 1984...)

LENON'S DARK FATE ONO (Lennon's dark fate is entrapment by a woman who stalks him for months, desperate to exploit his celebrity and his millions. Yoko Ono is a she-wolf dressed in black and such a core of negativity that she sucked the air out of the room. Ono is also credited with destroying Lennon's will...)

PEOPLE'S GOOD KING EDWARD VIII (...King Edward's warmth and concern for the poor marked him out as different from previous monarchs. He had first visited South Wales in 1919, after the end of the war, when he had spent four days visiting slum areas and had gone down a pit. This was the first of his numerous tours as Prince of Wales to the industrial and impoverished parts of Britain. King Edward VII, Edward's grandfather, had shown little interest in the ordinary people of Britain. 'He'd just sit in the open landau, receive an address, snip a ribbon and declare something open', observed Edward many years later, returning 'to dine with his girl friends. He didn't even leave that landau.' David Lloyd George had considered King George V, King Edward VIII's father, to be obtuse about working-class grievances 'He is a very very small man and all his sympathy is with the rich - very little pity for the poor', he wrote to his wife from Balmoral in 19ll, when he was Chancellor of the Exchequer. 'The King is hostile to the bone to all who are working to lift the workmen out of the mire.'

'You seem to us to be about the only reigning monarch who is worth anything at all', wrote a Chester woman to Edward VIII. '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, or shown signs of appreciating their distress in the way you do.'...

Edward had been a dominant figure in the newsreels ever since the end of the Great War, first as Prince of Wales and then, when he ascended the throne on 20 January 1936, as King. Audiences saw him on his numerous visits to the industrial areas and the inner cities, touring factories, visiting housing estates, opening hospitals and inspecting lines of ex-servicemen in Britain and France. Films such as 50,000 Miles with the Prince of Wales showed his overseas tours. When he became King, commented Sir John Simon, who was then Home Secretary, Edward was the most widely known and most universally popular personality in the world.

His popularity came not simply from his being the newsreels' favourite star. He earned it with his warm personality and genuine concern for people, whatever their background, age or status....

Edward may not have been a socialist, but he was driven by democratic ideals. One ex-miner described him as 'a real democratic King, The Common People's King (as the snobbish aristocracy will have it)'. Using imagery that drew on the experience of his working life as a miner and washer-up, he told the King, 'You have constantly been mining under the feet of the snobbish aristocracy. You have washed it up and dried and drained it wherever you went.'...Edward could be 'a very serious young man on serious questions', said the American writer Alexander Woollcott in 1936, adding, 'That is what will get him into trouble one of these days with the Tory prigs and bigwigs.'...

This massive popularity with the general public did not make Edward popular with his father, George V. When George came to the throne in 1910, Edward was sixteen. "To the very natural dislike that a very conventional man often feels for an adolescent,' commented Diana Mosley, 'was added in this case an equally natural grain of jealousy of the physical beauty and winning manners of the Prince.' Many things about Edward annoyed the King, but 'above all his undoubted popularity'...

It was not just the ministers of the National Government who were irritated by Edward's visit to South Wales. Dismay was felt across the whole matrix of the Establishment - that is, the groups of men and women who ruled Britain by reason of their traditional prominence or their wealth. The Establishment represented a very powerful alliance of the Conservative party, the Church of England (which was - and still is - the official or 'established' church) and the Tory press, especially The Times, the Telegraph and the Morning Post...

At the centre of the Establishment was 'Society' - the exclusive circle of upper-class men and women who were closely tied to each other by birth, marriage and culture. Society was a tiny fraction of the population, but enormously influential in terms of social and political power. At its apex was the royal family, supported by the senior functionaries of the court. It was understood that either you were 'in' Society, or you were 'out'. If you were 'in', then you shared with other members of Society a horror of anything vulgar - the word 'common' was used to express contempt. If you were 'out', then you simply did not belong. Businessmen were mostly 'out', unless they came in through the door of Conservative politics. Baldwin tried to imagine, said Beaverbrook, 'that he had the mind and habits of a country squire'. But in fact his family had made their money in iron and steel....

On their own, Edward's democratic leanings might have been ignored. But combined with his massive popularity they were a cause of grave concern to the Government. Stanley Baldwin, the Conservative Prime Minister of the National Government, made it clear to a colleague that he was increasingly perturbed about 'the delicate situation created by the personality of the new King'. Clement Attlee, the leader of the Labour Party, noticed Baldwin's anxiety at a meeting of the Accession Council after the death of George V....

Jackie Jura
~ an independent researcher monitoring local, national and international events ~