Royal Sisters Read online

  Royal Sisters

  Books by Anne Edwards

  BIOGRAPHY

  Sonya:

  The Life of Countess Tolstoy

  Vivien Leigh:

  A Biography

  Judy Garland:

  A Biography

  Road to Tara:

  The Life of Margaret Mitchell

  Matriarch:

  Queen Mary and the House of Windsor

  A Remarkable Woman:

  A Biography of Katharine Hepburn

  Early Reagan:

  The Rise to Power

  Shirley Temple:

  American Princess

  The DeMilles:

  An American Family

  Streisand:

  A Biography

  AUTOBIOGRAPHY

  The Inn and Us (with Stephen Citron)

  Leaving Home:

  A Hollywood Blacklisted Writer’s

  Years Abroad

  NOVELS

  The Survivors

  Shadow of a Lion

  Haunted Summer

  Miklos Alexandrovitch Is Missing

  The Hesitant Heart

  Child of Night

  CHILDREN’S BOOKS

  P.T. Barnum

  The Great Houdini

  A Child’s Bible

  Royal Sisters

  Queen Elizabeth II and Princess Margaret

  ANNE EDWARDS

  Guilford, Connecticut

  For Jane Goulden

  with great admiration

  An imprint of Globe Pequot

  Distributed by NATIONAL BOOK NETWORK

  Copyright © 1990 by Anne Edwards

  First Lyons Paperback Edition, 2017

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote passages in a review.

  British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available

  The Library of Congress has catalogued an earlier hardcover edition as follows:

  Edwards, Anne, 1927–

  Royal Sisters: Queen Elizabeth II and Princes Margaret / Anne Edwards.

  p. cm.

  ISBN 0-688-07662-9

  I. Elizabeth II, Queen of Great Britain, 1926– . 2. Margaret, Princess, Countess of Snowden, 1930–. 3. Great Britain—Kings and rulers—Biography. 4. Great Britain—Princes and princesses—Biography. 5. Sisters—Great Britain—Biography.

  I Title.

  DA590.E34 1990

  941,085'0922—dc20

  [B]

  90-34031

  CIP

  ISBN 978-1-6307-6265-0 (paperback)

  ISBN 978-1-6307-6266-7 (e-book)

  The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.

  Contents

  Foreword

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  20

  21

  22

  Afterword

  Appendices

  Speeches and Quotes

  Lines of Succession

  Notes

  Sources

  Bibliography

  Acknowledgments

  Foreword

  I was propelled into the world of British royalty in the early 1950s when, as an American writer, I went to London to adapt a story of mine with an English background into a screenplay. The venerable Queen Mary, consort of King George V, and their second son, King George VI had recently died and the coronation of the young Princess Elizabeth, to be thereafter known as Queen Elizabeth II, was about to be held. The combination of mourning and celebration was overwhelming and heady. At the time, I was a divorced woman with two small children (who came with me). My contract called for sixteen weeks of work. It came as a surprise to me that I did not return to the States until twenty years later. In the interim I had given up screenwriting for a literary career, and married a British subject. From then on, my devotion was divided and each year, when physically able, I have returned to England for several months, or longer, at a time. A good many of my novels and biographies are set there and deal with British history—royal and theatrical.

  I certainly could not compare my personal situation on arrival from across the sea to South Hampton with that of the new Queen. However, there were certain statistics we shared that gave me a sense of understanding and wonder with her. We were both the same age; we each had two young children, a boy and a girl also the same age; and we had both recently lost a close and much loved family member. My feelings toward the Queen grew more empathetic when she was faced at the very beginning of her reign with the serious constitutional problem when her younger sister, Princess Margaret, wished to marry a divorced man, Peter Townsend. Twelve years older than the Queen herself, Peter Townsend also happened to be Great Britain’s greatest air ace during World War II, a country wide hero who had been her father’s, King George VI’s, equerry and confidant. Public sentiment was much divided and heatedly argued. In the end, it would be the right of the Queen, as Margaret was a royal subject, to make the final decision to either grant her the right to marry Peter Townsend, the man she considered the love of her life, or not. If it was the latter and her sister, against royal degree, proceeded with her desire she would be excommunicated from the Church of England, lose her title, be erased from the secession (she was third in line to the throne, at the time), denied her income as a Royal, and would have to leave Great Britain and its aligned countries for a good number of years.

  The stakes were incredibly high for both sisters. Margaret, if she refused to give up Townsend, would have the man she loved and forego much else. The Queen chanced a great backlash from her subjects if she was to make the final edict against the marriage. Townsend was a national hero who had many times proved he would give his life for his country (and World War II, in which he had served so gallantly, was only a decade past). Margaret was a great favorite of the people. There was hope that a middle ground could be reached. However, the Queen remained staunch in her decision. The timing was too close to the terrible repercussions of their Uncle Edward VIII’s abdication to grant Margaret’s wish.

  This was a Shakespearean case of sibling rivalry. Even Mary and Edith, in the recent television drama series, “Downton Abbey” never had this kind of disconnect. For this was not a domestic squabble studded with old grudges. It was a historic tale of a young queen (about the same age of Elizabeth I when she mounted the throne) facing her first test on the throne and her treatment of it.

  This epic tale of the royal sisters dominated my thoughts for many years. I did not feel ready to write it at the time. However, my dedicated interest in British Royalty (and strong-minded women in general) had taken hold of me. I wrote two successful biographies: Vivien Leigh and Sonya Tolstoy (certainly their husbands—Laurence Olivier and Leo Tolstoy—could be called royalty in their own spheres). I then spent three years in archives of various sorts searching for the material I needed to write Matriarch, Queen Mary and the House of Windsor. By then the affair of—as the newspapers called it, “The Princess and the Pilot”—was long over. But, I was up on my British history, and had the good fortune to be able to interview many of the survivors (downstairs and upstairs) of Queen Mary’s reign as Queen Consort to George V. By chance, I had al
so become a close friend to Peter Townsend.

  Peter, remarried and living in Paris, had decided to write a book that would include the history of the American side of his family, of which he knew very little except that a male descendent had married a young American woman back in the early 1800’s. He needed help in searching out those roots and in the social history at that time in the United States. I could not actually help him in his research but I was able to get someone Stateside who could do it for him.

  He brought up Princess Margaret, not I. It was one of those “Well, I suppose you know ...” kind of things. “Only what the newspapers reported,” I told him. Eventually, I confessed that I would like to write a book about the royal sisters as their relationship fascinated me, there were so many difficulties they had to ford. First, their father’s unlikely ascent to the throne, which made Elizabeth the star in the family, whereas Margaret had been previously. A complete, unexpected shake-up. It was always assumed in their household that “Uncle David”, as they referred to Edward VIII, would marry an acceptable bride and have a family of his own. With his abdication it became important that Elizabeth be given special training and a deeper understanding of the monarchy and of the country whose throne it had occupied and that she might well do one day. Margaret was excluded in these one-to-one studies which brought Elizabeth ever closer to her father, while her sister was “kept busy otherwise.” There was her music and young friends. She had a good singing voice, loved theatre music the most, did hilariously funny take-offs on friends of whom she had many. In an ordinary family, it is possible that she would have sought a life in the theatre—and been successful at it (so said Noel Coward who knew something about success in the theatre).

  I began the book. Peter turned out to be a great help and inspiration. He was not living in England, although after all this time, after his remarriage, (Margaret would marry a year later to Antony Armstrong-Jones, friends said in retaliation) he and his new family might have had no trouble in establishing a home in England. He was terribly bitter. His forehead would always furrow, his mouth tighten when he spoke about being exiled from his homeland for many years in distant countries for no other reason except for having been decently and strongly in love with a princess of the realm. During the writing of the book, I got two truly threatening letters (a bit frightening) from his first wife, advising me that I had better not write anything about her in the book (which she heard I was engaged in at present). In truth, there was no need for me to write much about her. Peter secured the divorce and custody of the two boys, which seemed to state the case clearly.

  But this was to be a story of two women at a dramatic time in their lives. Margaret’s problem was also her sister, the Queen’s, dilemma, and not only was she coping with her new, heavy responsibilities, a complete change in her life, she was dealing with serious problems in her marriage. Another decision had to be made. Phillip was dispatched on a year-long tour of duty to the farthest regions of the realm.

  The sisters’ relationship was never smooth. They were, however, bound by blood and dedication. It seems a sorry miscount of judgement that, little more than a decade after the heartbreaking decision Margaret had to make, which deeply affected her for the rest of her life, she was allowed to divorce the father of her two children without much said about it. She was an unhappy woman who for a long time frittered away years that could have been extremely productive. Peter took the blame for part of this. He had been exiled and told that for a number of years he could not return to Great Britain nor could the lovers meet elsewhere. They made a written vow to each other that neither would remarry, that their love would last forever. But, finally, not too many years later, when he did remarry, Margaret never forgave him. It was the following year that she married Antony Armstrong-Jones.

  My friendship with Peter was maintained. We met often in Paris to discuss his book and mine. Our last meeting, however, was in London, where he was now free to return. He flew in from France and asked if I would have lunch with him, that he was only going to be there for 24 hours. “Yes, of course,” I replied. A time was set to meet at a small Italian restaurant near Sloane Square. He was rather painfully thin, I recall, but his grey, flinty eyes were as bright as ever, and his handclasp warm. He had a black leather attaché with him and placed it under the table. He told me about his family, I recounted tales of mine. At the end of a pleasant 45 minutes or so, he reached down and brought forth the attaché, pushing espresso coffee cups out of the way and placing it on the table

  “You saw it in the paper?” he asked. “About the medals?”

  “Yes.”

  “I did.”

  There was to be an auction of medals, gold, etcetera, and the key items were all of “Group Captain Peter Townsend’s war medals,” which he was selling and donating the amount raised by them to a charity he had been supporting for years. He unlocked the attaché, lifted the top and turned it around so the contents were visible for me to see. I was overwhelmed. I can’t say I counted them but there must have been over fifty, gleaming and be-ribboned, all won for his bravery during World War II, some the highest medals given for service and self-sacrifice (he had faced death numerous times to save members under his command and some of the stories I had heard, were harrowing).

  “The worse crime I was guilty of was to fall in love, and have my love returned. We sacrificed ourselves. Neither of us got a medal for that. I did find happiness and I grabbed it—perhaps like I fought for my life and for the lives of others during the war. Margaret still blames me for that. She sent me an envelope with the burnt shards of our vow before she married.”

  I thought he might cry. His eyes did tear up. But he took back the attaché, closed and locked it. “Margaret lost a true love. I lost not only that—but my great love for my country as well.”

  The Queen and her sister somehow bridged their historic standoff and they did it, in fact, with the gallant help of Peter Townsend. Margaret finally accepted the fact that as a member of the Royal Family, a rank that carries with it unimpeachable honors and inescapable duties, she and her sister, the Queen, lived lives that were different from other people and yet had the normal feelings of love and betrayal as their subjects.

  ANNE EDWARDS

  MARCH, 2016

  1

  King Edward VIII steered his newest acquisition, an American-made Ford station wagon, a type of car then almost unknown in Great Britain, along the winding road of Windsor Great Park to Royal Lodge, the country home of his brother Bertie, the Duke of York. Seated beside the King was his American mistress, Wallis Simpson. In the rear seat were three other Americans: Gladys and Mike Scanlon and Foxy Gwynne (“so nicknamed because of her rufous hair”), who had been weekend guests at Fort Belvedere, the King’s country retreat. The fraternal visit was impromptu. Bright sunshine filled the April day. “Let’s drive over to Royal Lodge. I want to show Bertie the car,” the King suggested, and they all piled in and set off with him at the wheel.

  Enormous oaks obscured the view of Royal Lodge until the car turned into the sweeping sandy drive that led to the front of the unusual large pink building with its flat white battlements. The original structure, a small hunting chalet known as Lower Lodge and built in 1814, was where George IV had retired into seclusion from a wife he found intolerable and subjects he did not understand. Queen Victoria enjoyed describing how she had been taken as a small child to hear the King’s German band play in the conservatory. In 1931, George V, Bertie’s father, had leased Royal Lodge to the Yorks, who had greatly enlarged and modernized it. When the renovations were completed, Royal Lodge had been painted pink, the color of Elizabeth, Duchess of York’s beloved childhood home, St. Paul’s Walden Bury. Royal Lodge meant a great deal to her, for it was the first Royal residence the Yorks were to occupy and she had taken a marked interest in all the alterations and in the redesigning of the gardens and the front facade.

  Her charm was legendary, her demeanor entirely feminine, but the Duchess was a s
trong-minded woman, fiercely protective of her family and intractable in her code of moral ethics. Before her marriage to the Duke of York, the Duchess had been Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, the daughter of the 14th Earl of Strathmore and Kinghorn, but legally a commoner. She had been introduced to the Royal Family through her society contacts, as had Mrs. Simpson. By a curious coincidence, both women could claim descent from three English kings and had a British dukedom on their maternal side. But that is where any similarity ended, an ocean, two cultures and lives unparalleled dividing them. Divorced once and currently married to a gentleman seemingly occupied elsewhere, Mrs. Simpson had led a comparatively scandalous life, and in the Duchess’s opinion was neither a suitable companion for the King nor an acceptable guest in a Royal household. Despite such feelings, she was prepared to play the part of the courteous hostess.

  The King now “made a complete swing around the circular driveway and drew up at the front door with a flourish.” As the car came to a halt the occupants could see “from one of the upper windows two small bright heads,” the young Princesses Elizabeth and Margaret Rose, unable to contain their curiosity. The front door opened and a small corgi dog ran barking from the house down the front steps. At a sharp whistle from within, the dog turned on its heels and bolted back inside. The Duke and Duchess of York stood in the doorway waiting to greet their visitors.

  Once introductions had been exchanged, the King insisted on showing his brother the workings of his dazzling new automobile. They shared only a vague family resemblance: the set of the mouth, on occasional expression of the face. Although the King was the elder by eighteen months, his smooth-skinned face, his slight build and bounding gait gave him a more youthful appearance. Bertie, who had always been the frailer of the two, was disconcertingly nervous. Plagued by a serious speech impediment and numerous twitches, he sometimes blinked repeatedly and often lost control of the muscles around his mouth. Since his youth, his ongoing battle with alcohol abuse had cast a permanent haggard look to his lean, gaunt face. The King, on the other hand, who had never bothered to control his own alcoholic appetite, had maintained a boyish charm which his shorter stature and more stylish dress emphasized.