Sorry chaps, we're still at Belvedere...
Chapter 37, Fort Belvedere, 9 Aug 1936
“And, Sir,” Lord Londonderry said in a conspiratorial tone as Beaverbrook blundered into the drawing room, “I have just heard from Berlin, they have nominated Von Ribbentrop as their new Ambassador to London.”
The King acknowledged Beaverbrook and looked at Londonderry with interest. “The chap from the Naval treaty?”
“The same, Sir. He was also here during the Rhineland incident. He is thought to be of an anglophile leaning, and my contacts in Berlin are confident that he will be sent to us with instructions to create a closer understanding between Britain and Germany, something that we both want. In any event, Sir, he will be their Ambassador."
“When?”
“I believe that Eden and Baldwin were told it would be October.”
“I did not know that,” he said in a wounded tone. “Baldwin and I are irreparably estranged. Can I count upon you, Charles?”
“Surely, Sir,” Londonderry said with a hint of reverence. “But, if I may offer some advice?”
“Yes”, the King said in an ominously flat tone.
“It would not politic for the Sovereign to be openly seen to rely upon disagreeable elements for his survival.”
The King frowned, but Beaverbrook knew immediately what he meant. “He means Mosely,” he said in a mocking way.
“Mosely?”
Londonderry nodded. “He has publicly attacked Baldwin.”
“That doesn’t, Charles, mean that he supports me.”
Londonderry frowned but Beaverbrook chuckled.
Beaverbrook chuckled. “You’ll never win middle England if you’re relying on the Blackshirts. But Your Majesty is correct. I think he’s just capitalising on the chaos, instead.”
“The enemy of mine enemy, and all that,” Londonderry said slowly. Knowing Beaverbrook’s religious zeal, he tried to remember the source for that quotation but failed. “It’s er, biblical, I think?”
The King, frowned and it was Beaverbrook who rescued them. “It’s an ancient proverb,” he said simply. “Mosley is an irritant,” he snapped derisively. "He has said nothing that shows support for your, er,
our cause. He is doing what he can to harm Baldwin."
“But, ‘hurrah for the Blackshirts,’ and all that,” Londonderry said, still confused.
“That was the
Mail, Charles, not one of mine. Mosley and his band,” Beaverbrook explained, focussing on the King to the obvious irritation of Londonderry, “they’re rabble rousers, Charles, they’ll seek to create room for themselves by damming Baldwin;
if they can exploit their position on Spain,” he said with a slight air of superiority.
“Ah, so it’s more ‘a plague on both your houses’, eh?” The King nodded, wearily. “Charles, perhaps you could stick around, unless you’re heading off somewhere?” Londonderry shook his head. The King waved them both to a couch and sat in an armchair, facing them. “Alright, Max, are we ready?”
“You can’t do the radio interview,” he said with devastating directness.
“I
know!” The King snapped, “Charles here has just given the great news,” the King said with heavy sarcasm.
Beaverbrook now looked at, rather than through, Londonderry. “You bring news from Baldwin?”
“More Hankey really, although I understand that his words carry the imprimatur of the PM. They thought that someone close to His Majesty, but recently in the Cabinet, would be a fair intermediary. Here is their letter.” He handed a crisp, creamy sheet to Beaverbrook.
“Let’s see then. Whoa, ‘Such a broadcast can only be given on the advice of your ministers who would be responsible for every sentence of it’," Beaverbrook read aloud. “My goodness. And this bit. ‘For the King to broadcast in disregard of that advice would be appealing over the heads of his constitutional advisers. The last time when this happened in English history was when Charles I raised his standard at the beginning of the Civil War on August 22nd 1642’. Baldwin is not mucking around is he?"
"In our audience,” Londonderry continued, “Hankey told me that it would shock many people, especially womenfolk where sentiment for the monarchy is so strong, to hear directly from the King of his intention to marry a woman who is still another man's wife.”
The King looked sharply at Beaverbrook. “Well, as of tomorrow, she won’t be.” His tone suggested that the looming divorce made this objection simply dissolve away. “So Max, what
can we do?”
“I will have my newspapers, and Rothermere’s, come out in support of the marriage.”
“An interview?”
“An interview,” Beaverbrook confirmed. “Rothermere and I agree. I’ve got two reporters outside, one from the
Mail, one from the
Express. I’ll sit with you, Charles here can as well” Beaverbrook enjoyed Londonderry’s flustered expression when this was suggested, “and you tell them about Wallis, and about how you are modernising the Monarchy”.
The King smiled. “Alright, Max, send them in.”
Londonderry, although no longer in Cabinet, was still, in theory, a loyal member of the National Government and felt a sudden flash of fear. He longed for a Churchill, a Lloyd George, a wily operator to keep the King under control. “Are you sure, Sir that this is…”
“…not now, Charles. This is what we should have bloody well done months ago."
"Does, Mrs, er, Walis, ah, Simpson agree?"
That stopped the King, who looked from Londonderry to Beaverbrook. "Max?"
Beaverbrook smiled at his monarch as a kindly uncle would a favoured nephew. "Sir, we can always delay it until the hearing is over, give you a chance to speak to Wallis. But the reporters are here now, Sir."
"You advise 'seize the day' and all that?"
"I do."
"Yes, well, send them in.”
The reporters nervously arrived and bowed. The King gestured them to the couch, which Londonderry and Beaverbrook vacated. Beaverbrook loomed over them, Londonderry retreated to a small chair at the back of the room, wishing that he could imperceptibly float away.
“Gentlemen, thank you for your coming," the King said in a rushed, nervy way. "Let's get right on to it. By ancient custom, the King addresses his public utterances to his people," he began, “so perhaps tonight we could portray this as a me reaching out, in the modern way, to two popular newspapers, to
my people”.
The
Express journalist was Andrew Fenn, who seemed, despite a yearning to travel to Spain to write on the fighting there, to be wrapped up with Royal stories (the normal chap was on leave). Seeing his proprietor glowering over them, he went first; he had been well prepared by Beaverbrook and despite his privately expressed terror that this would end catastrophically for all, opened his satchel and pulled out a notebook. “Sir, might I ask what it is that you wish to say to your subjects.” He said this warily. All of the British newspapers knew about Mrs Simpson, some even had stories ready to print on this matter in case the united front of the embargo was compromised.
“I want,” the King said with a rushed passion, “I would like the British people to read my words, without meddling.”
Fenn, despite Beaverbrook’s presence, worried again that he was about to earn himself the Government’s, what? At best disapproval, at worst a jail sentence. “Are we sure…”
“…this is your King,” Beaverbrook interrupted, a flatly threatening tone conveying the order.
The King behaved as if nothing had happened. The reporters were astonished, but then a footman brought a honey coloured drink in a heavy tumbler, from which the King drank heavily. “We will talk, no doubt, about Mrs Simpson. But the point for my people is that I am still the same man whose motto was 'Ich Dien', I serve. And I have tried to serve this country and the Empire for the last twenty years."
The
Mail journalist, irritated that this was dominated by the Beaverbrook press, now spoke up. “Why all of this now?”
“I have no choice,” the King said passionately. “I have reached the point where I have no choice but to speak out. It has taken me a long time to find the woman I want to make my wife.” Warming to his theme, the King poured out his heart, telling the reporters about his meeting Wallis, exaggerating his father’s grumpy, helpless tolerance for a heart warming tale of benevolent support. But at the heart was Wallis, always Wallis. "Without her, I have been a very lonely man. With her I shall have a home and all the companionship and mutual sympathy and understanding which married life can bring.”
Fenn, the
Express reporter, finished his scribbling and looked directly at his King. Risking Beaverbrook's wrath he tried a question. “How do you think that the British people, both here and in the Empire, will feel at reading these words?"
“
I believe,” Edward began with his odd emphasis on ‘
I’, “that my subjects would wish for me to be blessed with the same good fortune in happiness as themselves.”
“Thank you, Sir. If I may, I understand that the Prime Minister has ruled out you marrying Mrs Simpson and of her becoming Queen. Can you comment on that?”
"Neither Mrs Simpson nor I have ever sought to insist that she should be Queen. All we desired was that our married happiness should carry with it a proper title and that dignity for her befitting my wife."
There were further discussions, with the two journalists eventually settling into a comfortable rhythm, Beaverbrook brooding large over the interview.
Fenn, sensing that the King was happily answering everything, kept going. “Sir, this is a very sudden, and dramatic break from tradition. Does Your Majesty feel that you are forcing this issue through?”
“No! I do not. I am willing, while our country has a debate on my proposal, to go away for a while. But nothing is nearer to my heart than that I should return," he said with feeling. "But whatever may befall, I shall always have a deep affection for my country, for the Empire and for you all."
That more or less wrapped things up. The reporters were granted a further few minutes of polite conversation, where the King gave them his maximum charm, and then they all filed out.
Both newspapermen agreed that this would not be rushed. They would allow some Godforsaken court somewhere to hear the case. There would need to be substantial liaison between editors (perhaps even owners) and then an agreed release date to ensure that everyone bought their papers. But the clock was ticking, and both the
Daily Mail and the
Daily Express anticipated that they would carry on their front pages the ‘story of the century’.
______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
GAME NOTES
I had the “Edward VIII Holds Radio Speech” event. After much reflection upon this I have concluded that there is no chance of Stanley Baldwin agreeing to let Edward VIII loose on the airwaves; the BBC was
the radio broadcaster and so allowing the King to make an appeal would have almost certainly required senior ministerial (probably Prime Ministerial) approval. But I like the event because in the real world, had Edward VIII decided to press on with a morganatic marriage, a radio appeal was his proposed way of getting his message across to the nation.
And so I have adapted Baldwin’s very real objection to a radio broadcast and had Londonderry take it in a note. It wasn’t Londonderry in the real 1936, it was Baldwin, but, alas, the game stretches out the crisis much more than reality and I guessed that by now they are utterly estranged. And so a right-leaning, aristocratic former Cabinet minister would be a sound choice and Londonderry could be relied upon to act with discretion. As a leading proponent of Anglo-German friendship he would, of course, be keenly interested in the identity of the new German Ambassador and so I injected the gossipy point about Ribbentrop; his nomination to Whitehall was confirmed in early August and so it's fitting for Londonderry to know about it and to share it with the King. Londonderry’s misapprehension of Germany and her intentions was to haunt him; I am always reminded very strongly of Londonderry when I read / watch
Remains of the Day, a genuinely great novel (and film) that captures remarkably the end of the great houses as well, in my view, as
Brideshead Revisited (no Downton comments here please – it’s bilge). The character of Lord Darlington seems heavily drawn from Londonderry and his chums. Never too bright, he was of course, utterly traditional in his leanings and will be a staunch (if uninspired) supporter of the King.
Max Aitken, Lord Beaverbrook, “The First Baron of Fleet Street” or simply “The Beaver” was and is an even more divisive figure than Londonderry. His life is remarkable, even if he is not an easy man to like. I remember a number of skirmishes in the other AAR where I had my Halifax-as-PM Cabinet pack him off to Canada as Governor General as soon as possible and provoking the ire of the “he increased aircraft production” tribe (cough,
@trekaddict cough). I think that we are both right. He was a remarkable character, on one hand utterly ruthless and scheming (he detested Baldwin, which is why the King is being more than slightly used here) and on the other very, deeply religious and weirdly uptight. I remain ambivalent about him but in finding that his enemy’s enemy is his sort-of-chum (and much of the support for King Edward really rests on this premise) he is probably the King’s most useful ally. If public opinion can form behind him, there is hope that MPs nervously glancing back at their constituencies might fall in behind the rebels.
There have been a few Mosley comments littered around the comments by the commentAARiat and so I have tried, after some insightful comment from
@DensleyBlair (sorry old chum, that it's so brief at the moment) to suggest that which we think is likely (well, hint at it at this stage). The game makes a frankly weird alignment that Mosley must follow the King, and that the King gleefully accepts that support. Neither of these is true. We're exploring, at this juncture, assembling on Edward's behalf a coalition of sympathetic MPs. There is no way that wavering MPs would support the same cause as Mosley, particularly the Liberal MPs on whom Edward, Lloyd George and Churchill seek to rely.
@DensleyBlair was wonderful in getting into Mosley's head (that'll be £240 please commentAARiat, for our therapy) and I agree with his conclusion that his approach would be focussed on attacking Baldwin rather than overtly supporting the King.
And so to Edward. The text given to the anonymous reporters (I considered fleshing them out, but demurred) is lifted with minimal editing from his proposed radio appeal. I wanted to at least show what Edward would have said, and this marks another significant POD from the real abdication crisis in that he actually got to say it (or have it printed, and I think it actually works better in print than it would read aloud). The journalist, Fenn, is of course fictional, but I wanted to have him pop up again given some important stuff that will come his way later.
We're at a point now where I have, almost, mapped out who would go where in the maelstrom that's unfolding. I have updates sketched out looking at Eden, Duff-Cooper, Sinclair and (sort of) Chamberlain. If you have a favourite figure from Britain in 1936, and he / she is reasonably well-known, I am willing to have a punt and write them into the narrative.
Because, dear reader, I'm a lawyer, so next update I'm going home...
Churchil and Lloyd George are in... so, when will Mosley show up?
Well, hopefully I have shown that this is not in an automatic thing!
At minimum. More likely getting rid of the royal perogative in all but rubber stamping parliaments choice, and restricting the monarchy even further down to modern day standards or less.
This is an interesting point, because no matter what happens, the residual power of the monarchy will be looked at (even if an ultra-loyalist considers it for a second and says 'nothing to see here').
As usual the Simpson woman manages to irritate both the politicians and this reader even with very few lines to say.
She's going to feature heavily in the next update. Thou hast been warned.
One thing that strikes me about this chapter is the air of unreality that runs like a thread through this entire chapter, starting with the very fairy-tale nature of Fort Belvedere itself. I get a strong impression that the King simply doesn't want to face the reality of his situation, both in his relationship with the Government and in his own personal life. One can, of course, chalk up the latter at least partially to the influence of That Damnable Woman, but I feel that there's an equally powerful compulsion on the King's own part to be seen as a "strong" figure (even if, in truth, he's playing at being much stronger than he really is).
I think you're right, Belvedere, in both updates, felt slightly unreal / fantastic
My oh my. David is really stepping up his game, isn’t he? The fallout in Parliament is going to be delicious, never mind the fact that the entire constitution is probably about to get torn up (and rewritten?) By the end of the year Britain is going to have a ministry chock a block with all the worst bounders, cads and rotters you could care to think of.
Feel free to suggest anyone that you want to feature in this ironic twist on "ministry of all the talents".
I hated reading the ancient Welsh chronicles. Mostly Latin, but when they went Welsh they really went welsh and it makes no sense.
Unfortunately, my family have been suitably Anglicised in the last couple of generations that my Welsh would probably be utterly useless to help me, too.
Despite the surname, I have almost no experience of Wales or the Welsh. I have enjoyed precisely four days in Cardiff, which was fun. But that's it. Most of it is an utter blank canvas.
I find it notable that Edward is finding himself frustrated even at these two relatively easy to secure supporters. I think that is of interest to the future - he needs to squirrel away his frustrations and put on the charm. Perhaps with these two he feels safe showing a more of himself though? In a way it might be thought of as a curious privilege.
I think that he's still finding his way; his handling of The Beaver and Londonderry is slightly different (perhaps less candid, still a bit frantic).
But this does look like we are going down the HOI4 Kings Party path (unless a massove fakeout is about to occur, and baldwin gets them to back down right at the last moment too late to save the empire but just in time to prevent the focuses to get it back...
At the risk of sounding like an old fogey in my time of the forums I have seen entire plots created from random revolts, or a stability loss, and also from linking together any number of oddities. Even in their modern more detailed states Paradox games have only blunt tools to represent the wide variety of human actions. In HoI we have but two states: war or peace, for example. Clearly that is insufficient - and that insufficiency is just one avenue a writAAR can, should they chose, exploit.
Yes, you're right of course, and this is an area I will reveal a bit more of the gameplay as the crisis erupts, I did have to enter a cheat to reflect something in which I disagreed entirely with Paradox.
Speaking of which, the impression was of Churchill being somewhat out of his depth and losing control of the situation (to the extent he ever had any control) while Lloyd George was not only happy to ride the tiger but kept poking it. I do think Churchill would back out of anything that burnt too many bridges. If absolutley forced to chose between Parliament and Monarchy then he would always go Parliament and he must know that this is a fight the King cannot win without going to those extremes. Crazy gambles and mad cap schemes may be an inevitable part of Churchill, but so was cutting his losses and abandoning allies when in a hopeless situation.
I am worried about what churchill might do, since he will choose parliament eventually as he always does but how far will he go before he realises thats what he has to do? What damage will he do before he eats shoots and leaves?
That's very balanced, Pippy and TBC. Churchill believes that he still has something to lose, and that any lingering chance of a return to Cabinet in a Tory / Tory-dominated Government. We know the history books, we know that all he has to is not-be-Chamberlain, but he doesn't. He is always going to keep one eye on the Tory Party.
This definitely brought a smile to my face this evening. Thank you.
If all I acomplish on the forums is a laugh between friends now and again, it's going well.
As it did me.
Wallace Simpson, by report, got along very well with men of the Nazi Party. They may have liked her as much as they could respect any woman.
There was of course that rumour that she was 'jiggy' with Ribbentrop.
For someone who could be quite aware of his own egoism, he was not that good at recognising when he was feeding others' egoes. To be fair, he was bad in general at recognising politics, to others, wasn't a sport where people 'left their feelings on the field,' so to speak.
I think that's fair, and I wonder if he will see the looming chaos too late...
We now get to the nub if things. They won’t have any nervous energy or political capital left to be able to push Hitler back, whoever wins (I speak here narratively - not familiar with what the game gives one).
Oooh, just you wait.
