European Royalty

Stuck in Nassau (Click Magazine, 1941)

This Click Magazine article concerns the diplomatic posting to Nassau, Bahamas that was the lot of the Duke of Windsor shortly after the outbreak of World War Two. The Duke and Duchess had gleefully met Adolf Hitler some two years earlier and, following that error, were overheard on a few occasions making defeatist statements concerning the British war effort. Wishing to keep him in a spot where he could do no damage yet still be monitored, the British Foreign Office granted him the title of Royal Governor and posted him to Nassau.
Illustrated by four seldom-seen color photographs that, no doubt, the two were simply delighted to pose for, the interview makes clear just how bored the Windsors were on that hot, sticky island paradise, where they remained until 1945.

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Can Mrs. Simpson Marry the King? (Literary Digest, 1936)

Once the cat was out of the bag and the whole world had learned of the whirlwind romance between the King of England and the twice-divorced American social-climber Wallis Simpson (1896 – 1986), one of the favorite social pastimes soon involved musing aloud as to whether British laws would permit him to marry such a woman. Constitutionally, the King cannot marry a Roman Catholic, which she was (although this journalist erroneously stated that she wasn’t); recognizing he couldn’t get around this law, he abdicated.

This article can be printed.

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Henpecked (Coronet Magazine, 1953)

Assorted snide stories concerning the Duke of Windsor – the world he made and the man he became:

It is both sad and amusing to see a former King of England reduced by the woman he loves to a ‘Little Man’, to the rank of a meek husband. What should one do, laugh or cry, when one looks at the ex-Caesar in the role of handbag-carrier, a sort of walking ornament…

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The World He Made for Himself (Coronet Magazine, 1953)

The ‘real’ world into which the Duke has entered by his ‘own’ free will is international café society, that glittering, gilded bubble floating above the stormy seas of history…The Duke lives a rather different life. An hour or so with one of those American businessmen he admires, following tips on the market, looking over the quotations in stocks and bonds, and he has nothing to trouble about for the day, or the next month or so, until another empty hour obtrudes itself in the almost ceaseless round of pleasure like a hole in time waiting to be plugged by something, anything.


Available at Amazon: Gone with the Windsorsstyle=border:none

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Edward VIII: As Prince of Wales, His Politics Seemed Radical (Collier’s Magazine, 1933)

The Prince of Wales, to quote a conservative peer of the realm, day by day is getting commoner and commoner. There are even those who consider him a dangerous radical. But that doesn’t bother the prince. Unperturbed, he continues to fraternize with his unennobled subjects and to defend their interests – hotly and sometimes profanely.

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His Fashion Influence (Men’s Wear, 1950)

The Duke’s influence on men’s fashion throughout the Western hemisphere is undeniable and it is highly likely that there are a number of bucks in your life who loaf about town entirely ignorant that they are wearing the togs that he first introduced.
The attached is a 1950 article from an American fashion trade magazine that lists a number of fashion innovations first sported by the Duke of Windsor, illustrated by seven photos.

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