The Queen Mother

by William Shawcross

  With these friends she discussed literature, art, education, social problems, domestic and international politics, people and places. She wrote them vivid and amusing letters, roving over serious subjects with a deceptively light touch. Given the reputation she acquired of reading nothing more challenging than the novels of P. G. Wodehouse, the books she discussed with D’Arcy Osborne, Duff Cooper and later Osbert Sitwell, all of whom kept her supplied with reading matter, come as a surprise. As we have seen, she read Graham Greene, Aldous Huxley, Radclyffe Hall.8 She read Duff Cooper’s biographies of Talleyrand and Earl Haig, and he recommended The Tale of Genji, the tenth-century Japanese romantic novel by Lady Murasaki, a work which delighted her.9 Thornton Wilder sent her his Woman of Andros.10 Osbert Sitwell too sent her his own prolific oeuvre, together with finds on subjects he thought would interest her, such as the letters of William Beckford.11

  D’Arcy Osborne gave her the American Agriculture Secretary Henry Wallace’s Statesmanship and Religion, which he said showed that politics could be combined with Christianity – a proposition after her own heart – and urged her to send it on to the Prince of Wales, as one of the future ‘leaders of the world’.12 It might not have had much effect on him. But the Christian faith she had learned as a child remained strong; like her mother, she took seriously the need to pass it on to her own children, and she was equally convinced of the importance of Christianity to the wellbeing of the nation as a whole, and of the power of prayer. Archbishop Lang remained a friend and counsellor; and her patronage of philanthropic causes showed that she was drawn to those with a Christian basis, like the Church Army and Toc H.

  Owen Morshead later commented that the Queen was ‘noticeably modern in her tastes, whether in books or pictures, or in her outlook on life; and this makes it easy for her to establish contacts in circles new to Court life.’13 Where pictures were concerned, as duchess she had not yet the means, nor perhaps the motivation, to involve herself in the patronage of modern British artists that she would pursue so successfully as queen. But with the guidance of Dick Molyneux, a considerable connoisseur, and of Kenneth Clark, the Surveyor of the King’s Pictures, she had begun to learn about the Royal Collection. She had some acquaintance with the younger artistic and literary scene; she liked the work of Rex Whistler, and she liked him; he wrote her a kind letter after the abdication and promised to design a bookplate for her;* modern ballet was another enthusiasm and Frederick Ashton became a lifelong friend.

  Brought up in a traditionally Conservative family, she had decided political views which remained, on the whole, constant, although she was careful not to betray in public the strict neutrality required of members of the Royal Family. Her comments to D’Arcy Osborne on the first Labour government in 1924, flippant and whimsical in the manner of her youthful letters to him, conveyed a fundamental distrust. ‘I am extremely Anti-Labour. They are so far apart from fairies & owls and bluebells & Americans & all the things I like. If they agree with me, I know they are pretending – in fact I believe everything is pretence to them.’14 It was an intuitive antipathy, a sense, perhaps, that socialism sought to drag everything down into uniform and unimaginative drabness and political humbug. Her views matured, she could be critical of governments of right as well as left, and in fact she got on well with many Labour politicians, whether Ramsay MacDonald or the Labour Mayor of Sheffield; this sympathy continued all her life, Ernest Bevin and James Callaghan being later examples of socialists she liked.

  In a different life she might have become politically active: indeed, despite her position, she did do so to the extent of sending ‘a busload of servants’, as she afterwards confided to Duff Cooper, to vote for him in the by-election in March 1931 in which he stood as official Conservative candidate against the Empire Free Trade candidate supported by Lords Rothermere and Beaverbrook.15 It was not the battles of party politics that attracted her, however. It was that her public life had brought her increasingly into contact with poverty and unemployment and she felt that she knew what needed to be done. Despite the occasional frustration her position caused her, her correspondence shows her both deeply concerned about social conditions and aware that sometimes she could do something about it.

  Her views on the international political scene, like those of most of her correspondents, were inevitably dominated by the threatening developments in Europe and the worldwide economic crisis in the early 1930s. She shared the fears D’Arcy Osborne expressed to her about ‘a regression from civilization under economic pressure’, and about the growth of the malign forces of fascism and Nazism.16 By nature more optimistic, however, she praised Britain’s recovery from economic depression and considered that it was ‘the only civilised country in Europe today’.17 She had no illusions about the effectiveness of the League of Nations.18

  By 1937 she had come a long way since the early days of her marriage when she had taken on a modest round of public duties. At first inclined to regard public engagements as mere ‘stunts’, often tedious, she had characteristically got what fun she could out of them – like the fundraising dinner in 1924 at which she looked forward to extracting as much money as possible from ‘RICH SNOBS’.19 Nevertheless she was lucky to find herself in a role for which she had a talent, and she had taken to it with an ease born of her natural self-confidence, and out of the early training she had received from helping her mother in charitable activities, and in the wartime convalescent hospital at Glamis. She had gradually built up her own long list of patronages, while at the same time accompanying her husband on many of his public engagements. As a pretty young woman with a charmingly friendly manner she often attracted more favourable press comment than her husband, and she could easily have outshone him and taken the starring role. She never did so.

  Her handling of her public life became more professional and focused; she took care to select and combine engagements in different areas; she built up relationships with certain organizations and followed up promises to return, using her excellent memory for detail and instant rapport with people to skilful effect. She was well aware of how best to please – singling out individuals in crowds, concentrating her attention fully on each person she spoke to, and falling back on her acting skills where necessary. ‘It amused me to hear that your sense of drama took you through any awkward moments of official entertaining!’ she wrote to D’Arcy Osborne. ‘It sometimes helps me when I am faced with difficulties in that line. What a lot of our life we spend in acting.’20 It helped that she enjoyed it and genuinely liked people. But it would have been impossible to continue smiling and shaking hands so tirelessly if she had not known that what she did really helped, in terms of giving pleasure, raising funds for philanthropic works and extending the reach and popularity of the monarchy.

  Meanwhile she had also learned a painful lesson: that her private life would have to take second place to her husband’s and her own public role, never more so than during her six-month separation from the infant Princess Elizabeth in 1927. Sometimes she wondered whether it was worth it, especially when her efforts were wilfully shown in the wrong light by the press. But ‘Keep the old flag flying’ was her characteristic response.21

  By any standards she had played her first part with great aplomb, and in so doing she had acquired the qualifications for the much more demanding and important role which she now had to fill. As duchess of York, however, she had enjoyed greater freedom, in both her private and her public life, than she would as queen. Now she would have to work harder than before, and here the observant Owen Morshead had reservations. ‘She is full of ideas, public spirit, and good intentions,’ he said; but he considered that she was much less energetic and punctilious than Queen Mary.22 Or was private indolence perhaps the other side of the coin to her indefatigable sense of public duty?

  What concerned the Queen in 1937, however, was not so much the many tasks that faced her and the King as the fear that they might not be accepted and liked, and that they could never adequately replace h
er glamorous brother-in-law. But as her mother put it, they were determined to do what was ‘really good & best for the Empire’. Lady Strathmore’s heart ached, she said, when she thought of the burden on her daughter – ‘but she is so more than wise, & foreseeing & full of tact, & the King takes her advice so wonderfully & charitably, that I do feel very proud as well as anxious.’23

  *

  THE CORONATION was a process, not just an event. The consecration of the King and Queen in Westminster Abbey was undoubtedly the most significant moment of the year, but it was followed by many engagements, public and semi-public, in which the new King and Queen were introduced to their people.

  Two days after the Coronation the King presented medals to detachments of overseas troops, and there was a dinner at the Foreign Office, followed by a state ball at Buckingham Palace. That night the King and Queen went out on the balcony again and were cheered with great enthusiasm by the crowds braving the rain in the Mall. After a welcome weekend resting at Royal Lodge the King and Queen, together with Queen Mary, attended the Duke and Duchess of Sutherland’s ball at Hampden House in Mayfair. Queen Mary wrote in her diary that it was ‘a lovely sight, all the Royalties and Representatives were there, the tennis court was turned into a ball room with the fine tapestries hanging on the walls’.24

  Next day there was an official luncheon with the Lord Mayor of London at the Guildhall, and then the King, Queen and Princess Elizabeth took the train to Portsmouth and embarked on the royal yacht, Victoria and Albert, to prepare for the review of the fleet at Spithead. It was a magnificent occasion to which eighteen countries had sent warships. From the flagship the King sent out the traditional signal, ‘Splice the mainbrace.’

  The rest of May’s engagements included a thanksgiving service at St Paul’s on Empire Day and a dinner given by the Prime Minister at 10 Downing Street. This was by way of a farewell, for Stanley Baldwin had decided to resign, having skilfully guided the new King and Queen to the throne. Both regretted his departure and the King wrote to him of his ‘real sadness’ at accepting his resignation.25 Baldwin was made an earl and a Knight of the Garter, and his wife a Dame Grand Cross of the Order of the British Empire. After a farewell lunch with the King and Queen at Buckingham Palace, Lucy Baldwin wrote to the Queen, ‘Both our hearts are beating so warmly in gratitude to you both that I felt I must put pen to paper & try and express a little of what we feel.’26 Baldwin was succeeded by Neville Chamberlain, the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

  The King and Queen then made the customary post-Coronation visits to the four quarters of the United Kingdom – Scotland, Ireland, Wales and England. The country they visited was changing fast. Britain had been led out of the worst of the Depression by a housing boom, and by the accompanying growth in consumer industries. There had been one million telephones in the country in 1922 – by 1938 there were three million. Shops were full of electrical goods, often made of newly versatile plastic materials. In the 1920s, motor cars had belonged only to the rich. Now they were becoming cheaper and ever more popular.

  Bypasses were being built to spare town centres from heavy traffic. These were soon lined with new suburban villas. ‘Roadhouses’ became popular if not fashionable. They sprang up all along the Great West Road and other highways; some even boasted swimming pools and invited people to ‘Swim, Dine and Dance’. Road accidents were frequent and the Ministry of Transport introduced more regulations to try to improve safety. In 1934 driving tests had been introduced and that year the minister, Leslie Hore-Belisha, had given his name to the orange beacons which began to mark road crossings for pedestrians, and introduced speed limits of thirty miles an hour for towns. Motorists complained, and one magazine criticized the Belisha beacons as giving London the feel of ‘being prepared for a fifth rate carnival’.27 This feeling was increased by the new neon lighting with which shops could now decorate their fronts.

  Social science and social research became new disciplines; advertising firms made more use of ‘market research’ which meant sending young women (because they were treated more politely than men) from door to door asking people questions about their likes and dislikes. From Dr Gallup in America came the innovation of asking people, over time, to tell pollsters their changing views on a wide range of subjects. A more ambitious project was Mass Observation, which proposed to involve ordinary people in surveys and observations about pretty well everything. It was to be the science of everyday life. It was ridiculed by newspapers – ‘Mass Eavesdropping’ was one description, and, although the zoologist Julian Huxley supported the scheme, the Spectator declared of its methods: ‘Scientifically they’re about as valuable as a chimpanzee tea party at the Zoo.’28

  There was a lot to discover, particularly in regard to the lives of the poor. The Depression of the early 1930s had ended and economic recovery was well under way by the time of the Coronation. Industrial share prices doubled in value between 1932 and 1937. But it was a slow process and in 1937 there were still over 1,600,000 people unemployed. Conditions were especially harsh in the so-called Special Areas of the country – in some mining and industrial areas more than half of the workforce was still without jobs.

  The King and Queen found their tours, especially of deprived areas, tiring but rewarding. They imposed an especial strain on the King, who knew that he had to try to disprove rumours that he was sickly and could barely speak. Nonetheless they both began to realize that they could do the job, and with that realization came enjoyment. Lord Harewood, the King’s brother-in-law, said to him, ‘You’re getting through a lot of work, and I’ve never seen you looking better, or seeming happier.’ To which the King replied, ‘I am working hard and I am liking my job … It makes such a difference now that when I come home I’m not for certain going to be told that I’ve done whatever it may be all wrong.’29

  The two Princesses accompanied their parents on part of the Scottish tour. In Edinburgh the Queen was installed as the only Lady of the Order of the Thistle. She went shopping in the rain in George Street and enthusiastic crowds broke through the police and surged around her car. They had ‘two very strenuous, and inspiring days in Wales’, the Queen wrote. ‘The courage of the people in itself is inspiring when one thinks of the terrible times they have been through, & still are, in the mining valleys of S. Wales. But Hope is in the air, and I saw more [coal-]black faces, & saw more smoking chimneys than when I was there a few years ago, which pleased us very much.’30

  In Northern Ireland also they received a warm welcome, despite threats of IRA violence. Newspapers on the continent carried an account of an assassination attempt against them. In fact a customs post was set on fire, some railway trucks were mined and a land mine exploded in Belfast. But the crowds were large and bubbling with enthusiasm.31 The trip was considered a great success. According to Commander Oscar Henderson, the Governor’s Private Secretary and the man who had organized their visit to Northern Ireland in 1924, the King had ‘firmly cemented the feelings of the people of Ulster to himself and The Throne. For The Queen all our people now have a love which it is impossible to put into words.’32

  In the course of this summer the Queen became colonel-in-chiefof two regiments, the Black Watch and the Queen’s Bays. The relationships she built up with many different units of the armed services meant a great deal to her – and to those units. She never liked to be seen to have favourites but perhaps the most important to her was the Black Watch, in which her brother Fergus had served and died in the 1914–18 war. The previous Colonel-in-Chief had been King George V; she was appointed at the time of the Coronation and remained close to the regiment all of her life.

  In July 1937 she made her first visit to the Queen’s Bays at Aldershot, soon after her appointment as their colonel-in-chief. This former cavalry regiment had recently become fully mechanized, a process which caused much anguish among many of the men. The Queen seems to have had an extraordinary impact. The regimental commander, Lieutenant Colonel E. D. Fanshawe, was grateful for her s
upport, writing that until now there had been such shortages of men and equipment that it was difficult ‘to keep the “spirit” really going. Ever since Her Majesty’s appointment as Colonel an entire change has taken place. – Now, after the visit on Saturday, I have no fear for the future – She has done more good than it is possible to imagine.’33

  Their main tours complete, the King and Queen were able to leave for a holiday at Balmoral, their first visit there since their Coronation. Instead of taking the train as usual direct from London to Ballater, the nearest railway station to the Castle, they alighted in Aberdeen and drove with their daughters the sixty miles to Balmoral. The road was lined with hundreds of people in all the villages through which they passed. They drove under scores of welcoming arches and swathes of bunting; even remote cottages and hamlets flew whatever flags they could muster. When they reached the Balmoral estate, they exchanged their car for a carriage which was pulled not by horses but by scores of estate workers, with pipers marching at the head of the column; ‘altogether the cavalcade looked like a rather gay funeral!’ the Queen wrote to Queen Mary. ‘It was very delightful to be welcomed like that, but also very amusing.’34

  At last they were able to relax with their daughters, even though the constant turnover of guests made the Castle often seem more like a hotel than a home. For the King and Queen outdoor life was the most important – just as it had been in their respective childhoods. The hills, rivers and gardens dominated everything – except on Sundays. There was stalking for the men, more gentle walks for women, picnics by waterfalls for adults and children, with a kettle boiled on a fire between four stones. There were friendly games of cricket on the lawn. Days were warm but there was already a frost at night. Those who had known the Castle before thought the best of times had come again; those for whom this was a first visit were enchanted.