Page 74 of The Gathering Storm

Kit startled them by bursting out laughing. ‘There speaks the woman who drove an ambulance at the Front amid shock and shell, ran her own decorating business, and uses her fortune to build blocks of flats to house the working classes. I am completely in awe of her, and hardly dare speak in her presence, unless she speaks first.’

‘You are a dreadful man,’ Emma said, shaking her head. ‘What am I to do with you?’

‘Anything you like,’ he said, grinning.

Events staggered on, with Cabinet meetings, speeches in Parliament, anguished telephone calls. Influential figures scuttled in and out of Downing Street at all hours, collars turned up against the freezing fog. There were articles in every newspaper, even some demonstrations in the streets: crowds gathered outside Buckingham Palace shouting, ‘We want the King.’ Others marched along Piccadilly with placards saying, ‘No to Mrs Simpson’ and ‘Remember the War Dead.’ As Kit remarked to Emma, ‘HM and Wally still believe the working classes are for them. But they, above all, want their monarch to be virtuous.’

‘A lot of the younger set are for the marriage. They think it’s romantic.’

‘But it’s the Dominions that matter,’ Kit said. ‘There’s no way past that.’

Preparations for the Coronation had been halted, dealers were trying to buy up Edward VIII postage stamps, and the King still would not make clear his intentions. Even Baldwin had no idea – as he constantly had to tell ministers, ambassadors and high commissioners – when or even if the King would go.

The person suffering the most was the Duke of York, who pressed for an interview with his brother and was constantly put off. Frail, desperately shy, and with a crippling speech impediment, he was terrified of having the throne thrust upon him. To add to his troubles, his duchess, on whom he relied heavily, was ill with influenza and unable to support him. Sick with dread, he called at Number Ten every day, going through the garden entrance to avoid being seen, to beg Baldwin for clarification. The rest of the Royal Family might be starting to think that perhaps David had better go, since he couldn’t be trusted any more, but Bertie would have done anything to keep him on the throne, had there been anything he could do.

It wasn’t until the 9th of December that the King finally told the prime minister that he had decided to abdicate.

‘Apparently what made up his mind,’ Eddie told Kit, ‘was a visit from Goddard. He said someone might be about to make a formal application to the King’s Proctor to investigate the Simpson divorce. HM was convinced it was part of a plot by the Beaverbrook press to scare Wally into giving him up, so he decided to pre-empt it by announcing his abdication.’

So now frantic negotiations and preparations began.

‘You know,’ Kit said to Emma, ‘I don’t think he realises even now how serious this is. Eddie told me he heard from Sir John Simon that he was cheerful and smiling when he told Baldwin his decision. I think he believes that he can give up the throne without giving up the privileges, just go back to the life he enjoyed as Prince of Wales, while poor Bertie York does all the disagreeable duties. He thinks he’ll have a honeymoon trip abroad with Wally, then come back refreshed to his old position. I don’t think he understands that he’ll have to live in exile, that he will never be allowed to come back.’

Emma thought about that. ‘Poor Wally,’ she said.

‘Yes, she’s for it, now. Imagine spending a lifetime with him, in exile, on a budget, with nothing whatever to do. Golf and shopping for all eternity.’

‘And not so very much shopping, either, on a budget.’

The Instrument of Abdication read:

I, Edward the Eighth of Great Britain, Ireland and the British Dominions beyond the Seas, King-Emperor of India, do hereby declare my irrevocable determination to renounce the Throne for Myself and My descendants, and My desire that effect should be given to this instrument of Abdication immediately.

‘To give up the throne and the Empire because he wants to marry Mrs Simpson,’ Emma said, wonderingly. ‘All that for so little.’

At 1.52 p.m. on Friday, the 11th of December, the Instrument took effect, and from that moment the Duke of York became King and Emperor. His names were Albert Frederick Arthur George, and he’d always been known in the family as Bertie, but he’d been advised that Albert was too Germanic a name to sit happily with the British people. So he was to be King George VI. The ex-King was to have the title Duke of Windsor.

At the Royal Lodge, Windsor, there was a farewell dinner that evening for the royal family only: the Queen, his brothers and sister, and the Queen’s brother and his wife, who had been staying with her since the beginning of the crisis. An effort had been made with flowers and pretty china to lighten the gloom of the occasion, and the Duke of Windsor at least seemed cheerful, though the Queen was nervous about what he might say in the broadcast he had persuaded the government to allow him to make. Sir John Reith and Walter Monckton were waiting for him in a specially prepared room in Windsor Castle, and he began speaking at ten o’clock to the nation.

At long last I am able to say a few words of my own. I have never wanted to withhold anything, but until now it has not been constitutionally possible for me to speak.

A few hours ago I discharged my last duty as King and Emperor, and now that I have been succeeded by my brother, the Duke of York, my first words must be to declare my allegiance to him. This I do with all my heart.

You all know the reasons which have impelled me to renounce the throne. But I want you to understand that in making up my mind I did not forget the country or the Empire, which, as Prince of Wales and lately as King, I have for twenty-five years tried to serve.

But 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.

And I want you to know that the decision I have made has been mine and mine alone. This was a thing I had to judge entirely for myself. The other person most nearly concerned has tried up to the last to persuade me to take a different course.

I have made this, the most serious decision of my life, only upon the single thought of what would, in the end, be best for all.

This decision has been made less difficult to me by the sure knowledge that my brother, with his long training in the public affairs of this country and with his fine qualities, will be able to take my place forthwith without interruption or injury to the life and progress of the Empire. And he has one matchless blessing, enjoyed by so many of you, and not bestowed on me – a happy home with his wife and children.

During these hard days I have been comforted by Her Majesty my mother and by my family. The ministers of the crown, and in particular, Mr Baldwin, the Prime Minister, have always treated me with full consideration. There has never been any constitutional difference between me and them, and between me and Parliament. Bred in the constitutional tradition by my father, I should never have allowed any such issue to arise.

Ever since I was Prince of Wales, and later on when I occupied the throne, I have been treated with the greatest kindness by all classes of the people wherever I have lived or journeyed throughout the Empire. For that I am very grateful.

I now quit altogether public affairs and I lay down my burden. It may be some time before I return to my native land, but I shall always follow the fortunes of the British race and Empire with profound interest, and if at any time in the future I can be found of service to His Majesty in a private station, I shall not fail.