Eighty Years Ago This Week

Monday 30 th November 1936 Behind the Scenes Lord Beaverbrook assembled a group of the King’s supporters at his London mansion, Stornoway House, to try to find a way of cutting the Gordian knot. To begin with he had relished the sensation of power, but was not finding it easy to work with the King, who paid little attention to his advice. The conclusion was that the best chance of saving the King on the throne lay in persuading Mrs. Simpson to withdraw. The man chosen to undertake the task was “Perry” Lord Brownlow one of the King’s courtiers. 

Monday 30 th November 1936 The Crystal Palace, which had been moved to Sydenham Hill after the Great Exhibition of 1851, was completely destroyed by fire that broke out at 7.30pm. It was never established precisely what caused the blaze, but given the amounts of flammable material present and the relatively dilapidated state of the building, it was probably an accident. Even the efforts of 436 firemen using 88 fire engines could not prevent total destruction. There were no casualties, even the birds in the Palace’s aviary escaped. Prominently situated 100m higher than the Thames, the fire was visible across much of the London area. The pilot of a plane landing at Margate could see it. Huge numbers of people flocked to the area to witness the spectacle, including the Duke of Kent, who was lent a pair of fireman’s boots for his safety and comfort. The spectacular event seemed to mark a symbolic, final and ominous end to the certainties and optimism of the Victorian age.

Sunday 29th November 1936 Behind The Scenes When Mrs. Simpson came to Fort Belvedere she found the atmosphere changed for the worst. It had gone from being an enchanted refuge from the cares of the world to a beleaguered fortress. After a long discussion with his legal adviser, the King admitted to Mrs. Simpson how poor his position was. She saw a glimmer of hope in the idea that the King might set out his position to the British people in radio broadcast and let them judge

Saturday 29 th November 1936 The Soviet response to the Anti-Comintern pact dispelled any faint hopes that its signatories might have had that it would be treated as a measure against one organ of the Soviet state (or, officially of the Communist Party) and not the USSR itself. It pointed the finger at Mussolini’s Italian for attempting to spread Fascism abroad through intervention on the side of the Spanish Nationalists. The Soviet Foreign Minister insinuated that the there were further secret clauses to the Pact that went well beyond the brief paragraphs that had been published, He implied that it masked a full-scale military alliance against Russia. He framed Soviet defiance in soaring rhetoric, "the Soviet Union will stand and proudly tower as an impregnable fortress, against which will be broken the turbid waves of the frenzied Fascist sea".

Saturday 28 th November 1936 Behind the Scenes The King’s campaign to drum up support against Baldwin had got off to a fitful start. His most potent potential ally was Lord Beaverbrook, the press magnate, but it was far from a perfect partnership. Beaverbrook had no confidence at all in the morganatic scheme and little liking for Mrs. Simpson. Beaverbrook’s one friend in Cabinet was Sir Samuel Hoare, the First Lord of the Admiralty, but he had already declined to back the King when sounded out directly. He knew the cause was hopeless. Hoare and Beaverbrook were in regular contact, but this served more to keep the government informed of the doings of what was coming to be called the “King’s Party”.

Saturday 28 th November 1936 The widow of the explorer, who had captured the Komodo Dragons by then in the Bronx Zoo, further extended the family’s reputation as animal collectors. Mrs Ruth Harkness was the first person to capture a Giant Panda alive with the aid of a local guide. They scared a female away from her cub, which they took hold of and bottle-fed on the way to the coast. It was a male, but somehow it was mistaken for a female. The baby was named Sun-Lin and eventually sold to a zoo in Chicago, where he was visited by Shirley Temple and the President’s son, Kermit Roosevelt amongst others. An attempt to provide him with a companion proved unhappy as he and Mei-Mei fought. Sun Lin survived only two years in captivity, dying of pneumonia in 1938.

Friday 27th November 1936 Behind the Scenes Baldwin finally summoned the Cabinet to discuss the King's affair, broadening the tiny circle of government figures officially in the know. Baldwin was probably motivated by the recognition that bringing ministers into his confidence would reduce the reduce of leaks, but the morganatic idea was discussed. The informal consensus was that the idea had no prospect of working, but it was formally decided to refer it to the Dominions. Ministers were asked to spread the rumour that the meeting had been hastily arranged to deal with the question of arms for Spain, a pretence that was also directed at the King himself.