© Richard Randall

Caribbean

Sundries

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• Princess Margaret (August 21, 1930 — February 9, 2002).

Reluctant king

The Duke and Duchess lived a relatively sheltered life at their London residence, 145 Piccadilly; one of the few stirs was when George V proposed that the Duke become Governor General of Canada in 1931 — a proposal which the government rejected. [3] On January 20, 1936, King George V died and Prince Edward ascended the throne as Edward VIII. As he had no children, Albert was now the heir presumptive to the throne until the unmarried Edward VIII had any legitimate children. However, Edward VIII abdicated the throne on December 11, 1936, in order to marry his love, Wallis Warfield Simpson. Thus Prince Albert, Duke of York, was now king, a position he was reluctant to accept, and due to his nervous disposition, there was some discussion to bypass him and have his brother Prince George, Duke of Kent succeed instead. The day before the abdication, he went to London to see his mother Queen Mary. He wrote in his diary 'When I told her what had happened, I broke down and sobbed like a child.' [4]

Upon the abdication, on 11 December 1936, the Duke was proclaimed Sovereign, assuming the style and title King George VI to emphasise continuity with his father and restore confidence in the monarchy. His first act was to confer upon his brother the title HRH The Duke of Windsor. Three days after his accession he invested the Queen with the Order of the Garter. [5]

George VI's coronation took place on 12 May 1937—the intended date of Edward's coronation. In a break with tradition, Queen Mary attended the coronation as a show of support for her son. There was no durbar held in Delhi for George VI, as had occurred for his father, as the cost would have been a burden to the government of India in the depths of the Depression. Rising Indian nationalism made the welcome which the royal couple would have received likely to be muted at best, and a prolonged absence from Britain would have been undesirable in the tense period before World War II without the strategic advantages of the North American tour which in the event was undertaken in 1939.

Reign

The beginning of George VI's reign was taken up by questions surrounding his predecessor and brother, who had reverted to his previous title of Prince Edward. George VI decided to create Edward the Duke of Windsor. The Letters Patent creating the dukedom entitled Edward to be styled His Royal Highness, but prevented any wife and children from being similarly styled. George VI was also forced to buy the royal houses of Balmoral Castle and Sandringham House from Prince Edward, as these were private properties and did not pass to George VI on his accession.

The growing likelihood of war erupting in Europe would dominate the reign of King George VI. Initially the King and Queen took an appeasement stance against Adolf Hitler, supporting the policy of Neville Chamberlain. The King and Queen greeted Chamberlain on his return from negotiating the Munich Agreement in 1938, and invited him to appear on the balcony of Buckingham Palace with them, sparking anger among anti-appeasement MPs including Winston Churchill. One historian went as far as to declare this "the most unconstitutional act" by a British monarch in the 20th century for its allegedly blatant partisanship. It has been theorised that the King and Queen intended to avoid war with Nazi Germany because they thought it would act as a counterweight against Russian communism.

In 1939, the King and Queen paid an extensive visit to Canada from which they made a shorter visit to the United States of America. George was the first reigning British monarch to visit either of these countries. The aim of the tour was mainly political, to shore up Atlantic support for Britain in any upcoming war. The King and Queen were extremely enthusiastically received by the Canadian public and the spectre of Edward VIII's charisma was comprehensively dispelled; they were also warmly received by the American people, visiting the 1939 New York World's Fair and staying at the White House with President Franklin D. Roosevelt and at his private estate at Hyde Park, New York.

When war broke out in 1939, George VI with Queen Elizabeth resolved to stay in London and not flee to Canada, as had been suggested. The King and Queen officially stayed in Buckingham Palace throughout the war, although they often escaped to Windsor Castle to avoid bombing raids. George VI and Queen Elizabeth narrowly avoided death when a lone German bomber despatched to bomb Buckingham Palace attacked. The bomb exploded in the courtyard, shattering windows in the palace. [9]

Throughout the war, the King and Queen provided morale-boosting visits throughout the UK, visiting bomb sites and munition factories. [10] It has been alleged that, contrary to how they portrayed themselves, the royal family ignored wartime rations (although their servants domiciled in the Palace were subject to them). [11]

It has been suggested (see Will Swift, The Roosevelts and the Royals: Franklin and Eleanor, the King and Queen of England, and the Friendship that Changed History (John Wiley & Sons, 2004)) that a strong bond of friendship was forged between the King and Queen and President and Mrs Roosevelt during the 1939 Royal Tour, which had major significance in the relations between the United States and Great Britain through the war years. There may be a marginal element of validity in this view but it is largely fanciful: it has never credibly been suggested that the King took any strategic role in the War; his frequent letters to the President were mostly unanswered and it was, of course Roosevelt's relationship with Churchill that was critical. Eleanor Roosevelt took a wry view of the utility of kings and queens and the substance of George and Elizabeth ("a little self-consciously regal," was her verdict on Elizabeth).

On VE Day, the Royal Family appeared on the balcony of Buckingham Palace to celebrate the end of the war in Europe.

Illness

The war had taken its toll on the King's health. This was exacerbated by his heavy smoking and subsequent development of lung cancer. Increasingly his daughter Princess Elizabeth, the heiress presumptive to the throne, would take on more of the royal duties as her father's health deteriorated.

On 6 February 1952, George VI died aged 56 in his sleep at Sandringham House in Norfolk. He went to bed the previous night and was found dead in the morning. He was the only British monarch of modern times whose death was not observed and whose precise moment of death was not recorded. His funeral took place on February 15, and he was buried in St George's Chapel in Windsor Castle. In 2002, the body of his wife Elizabeth and the ashes of his daughter Princess Margaret were interred in a tomb alongside him.

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