On the day of his abdication, Edward VIII had lunch with Winston Churchill before spending the afternoon packing his personal belongings.
His brief reign of 326 days had come to an end, ratified by parliament a few hours earlier.
The atmosphere at a family farewell dinner later that evening was strained. His younger brother Bertie, now George VI, was in shock as the enormity of his new role sank in.
The rest of the family, meanwhile, were still reeling from the events of the past few weeks, when Edward had threatened to commit suicide if he could not marry the twice-divorced American, Wallis Simpson.
At 9.30pm, on Friday, December 11, 1936, Edward was escorted to Windsor Castle for a radio broadcast to the nation.
‘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,’ he said.
‘I now quit altogether public affairs, and I lay down my burden.’
Edward VIII (right) had threatened to commit suicide if he could not marry the twice-divorced American, Wallis Simpson
Half an hour later, now the Duke of Windsor, he returned to nearby Royal Lodge to say his goodbyes to his family.
His cousin Dickie Mountbatten remembered: ‘Everybody was in tears when he [Edward] came in but he was jubilant. He was like a schoolboy going off on holiday. “It’s all over!” he kept saying. “It’s finished, thank God!” ’
Edward bent over the new Sovereign and declared ‘God bless you, sir! I hope you will be happier than your predecessor’, before disappearing into the night, leaving the rest of the Royal Family, according to stunned observers, lost for words.
Within hours, the new Duke had boarded a ship for France, and then on to Vienna to wait for his future wife’s divorce from her second husband.
A brief, but torrid Royal era was over.
Since that day, much has been written about the Abdication crisis.
Plays, TV series, books and movies telling the romantic story of the handsome monarch who gave up the throne for love continue to enthral.
By contrast, relatively little has been known about the details of the couple’s life in the decades that followed.
Now, drawing on previously unexplored archives and via a series of interviews with people who knew them, I have pieced together a comprehensive picture of the former King and his wife during their years in exile.
It is not an uplifting one. Far from the happy-ever-after love story that is often portrayed, their later relationship was fraught with betrayals and feuds.
I will reveal how:
The couple were obsessed with status, expecting still to be treated as Royalty; They made a fortune by exploiting their celebrity via Hollywood and through books, films, media appearances and endorsements; The couple created a luxurious, self-indulgent lifestyle entirely without purpose; Edward fought unsuccessfully for his wife to be given an HRH title; There was bitterness over their ‘financial settlement’; The couple rebuffed attempts by the Royals to repair the relationship; The Duke of Windsor thought he would still be able to perform ceremonial and military duties after his exile; Relations with his brother became so dire that resentment lingered until the Duke died; Friends were suddenly airbrushed from their lives if they were believed to have said anything wrong.Wallis Simpson had listened to the broadcast at a villa belonging to friends in Cannes.
‘I was lying on the sofa with my hands over my eyes, trying to hide my tears,’ she remembered. ‘I lay there a long time before I could control myself.’
She spent the following day in bed, depressed by the turn of events.
In official circles, there was relief that the threat posed by Mrs Simpson to the monarchy had been neutralised.
Quite apart from being divorced and therefore not allowed to remarry within the Church of England, there had long been concerns about her suitability as a possible queen.
On the day of his abdication, Edward VIII had lunch with Winston Churchill before spending the afternoon packing his personal belongings
A Special Branch report had noted that Wallis ‘was regarded as a person as very fond of the company of men and to have had many affairs’.
Horace Wilson, a senior civil servant, had written of his fears that she intended ‘not only to come back here but (aided by what she expects to be a generous provision from public funds) to set up a “Court” of her own and… do her best to make things uncomfortable for the new occupant of the Throne’.
He continued: ‘It must not be assumed that she has abandoned hope of becoming Queen. It is known that she has limitless ambition, including a desire to interfere in politics.’
In the same month, the Liberal MP Robert Bernays had noted: ‘He [the Duke of Windsor] hasn’t one real friend to lean upon in this frightful emergency. He is the spoiled child of success with the film star mentality.
‘He imagined that he could quietly retire into private life, leaving his brother to perform the dreary ceremonial functions, while he spent a tranquil life gardening at Fort Belvedere [the Duke’s former home in Windsor] and holidaying on the Riviera, occasionally emerging to open a hospital or review the Fleet and receive the cheers that mean so much to him.
‘For the first time he has been brought up against the fact that abdication means exile and that for the rest of his life he can serve no useful purpose.’
The Duke was indeed taking time to accept his new situation.
The Welsh Guards did not want him as their Colonel in Chief and he no longer remained a member of the Privy Council.
But there were compensations, including an invitation from a Los Angeles theatre offering him and his ‘lovely lady’ $1 million and a Hollywood mansion to star in a ‘stupendous historical film’.
He fell into the habit of ringing the new King at all hours.
On one occasion, when George VI was too busy to take a call, the Duke’s friend Edward Metcalfe wrote to his wife Baba: ‘It was pathetic to see HRH’s face. He couldn’t believe it! He’s been so used to having everything done as he wishes.’
Eventually, the King told the Buckingham Palace switchboard to stop putting though the calls.
Edward had been desperate to sort out his affairs – his possessions had been temporarily moved to Frogmore House at Windsor – and arrange a financial settlement, along with recognition for Wallis.
But his mother, Queen Mary, was adamant that nothing should give the impression that the Royal Family accepted the relationship.
The result was diminishing goodwill between the brothers and a resentment that was to last for the rest of the Duke’s life.
The real break in their relationship was over the financial settlement. During the Abdication negotiations, it was agreed the Duke would receive £25,000 a year (about £480,000 today), the amount traditionally paid to the sibling of a Sovereign.
It was quickly discovered, however, that the Duke had not been open about his finances.
Edward had been desperate to sort out his affairs – his possessions had been temporarily moved to Frogmore House at Windsor – and arrange a financial settlement, along with recognition for Wallis
He had told his brother he had just under £100,000 (£2 million today), when he had £800,000 (£16 million) deposited abroad, much of it controlled by Mrs Simpson.
A further £80,000 (about £1.6 million) was to be paid from the Civil List and Duchies of Cornwall and Lancaster.
The Duke felt his private wealth irrelevant to the compensation he wanted for relinquishing his interest in Balmoral and Sandringham, reiterating he was not well provided for ‘considering the position I shall have to maintain and what I have given up’.
The negotiations would drag on wearily, with George VI eventually subsidising his older brother from his own private funds.
‘Of course, he’s on the line for hours and hours every day to Cannes,’ wrote Edward’s friend Metcalfe to his wife.
‘She is at him every day on the phone. I feel so sorry for him – he is never able to do what she considers the right thing.’
In March 1937, Wallis moved with 26 pieces of luggage to Chateau de Cande, a fairytale castle in the Loire Valley, in preparation for her third wedding.
The Duke had hoped that some of his family would attend and that one of his brothers or Dickie Mountbatten would be best man.
But the Palace was having none of it. Not only were close members of the Royal Family forbidden from accepting an invitation, but friends and former advisers were warned not to go.
There was a further blow. The question of Wallis’s status as Her Royal Highness was discussed by the Cabinet.
The next day, Edward’s lawyer Walter Monckton passed the Windsors a letter that would cause their enduring bitterness towards the Royal Family.
Under a Letter Patent, Wallis would not be granted the title of Her Royal Highness.
It was argued that the Duke had renounced his Royal rank and therefore that of his wife.
She could hardly be made a member of the Royal Family now on her marriage – the reason her husband had given up the throne in the first place.
Edward was furious.
‘The bitterness is there all right,’ wrote Baba Metcalfe.
‘The family, he is through with. He intends to fight the HRH business, as legally the King has no right to stop the courtesy title being assumed by his wife. He will be loyal to the Crown but not to the man, his brother. He blames him for weakness in everything.’
The couple were
