President and Mrs Roosevelt greeted them at the station. The King and the President exchanged formal greetings and ‘a historic handshake’, setting off what one Washington newspaper described as ‘a tumultuous reception in which the Capital outdid itself to make welcome the first reigning British King and Queen ever to set foot on American soil’.84 Eleanor Roosevelt, who wrote a regular newspaper column called ‘My Day’, was quick to observe the Queen’s characteristic way of reacting to crowds, as they drove together to the White House: ‘She had the most gracious manner and bowed right and left with interest, actually looking at the people in the crowd so that I am sure many of them felt that her bow was for them personally.’85
At the White House, the King and Queen met the chiefs of mission of Washington’s diplomatic corps before, at last, they could change into lighter clothes and sit down to an informal lunch with the Roosevelts, their three sons and their wives – and, of course, Mackenzie King. The lunch was followed by a sightseeing drive around Washington. During this drive the Queen seems to have given a revealing glimpse of her attitude to her own role. According to Eleanor Roosevelt’s memoirs, the Queen expressed surprise that Mrs Roosevelt had been criticized in the press for attending a meeting of WPA workers,* for she thought that people with grievances should be allowed to air them, ‘and it is particularly valuable if they can do so to someone in whom they feel a sense of sympathy and who may be able to reach the head of the government with their grievances.’86 ‘Both women were committed to serving as their husband’s eyes and ears, and actively advised their mates,’ the historian Will Swift concluded from these remarks, in his account of the Washington visit.87 It is a tempting conclusion, and it is undoubtedly true that Queen Elizabeth kept her husband informed of what she saw and heard. But, as Swift pointed out, Eleanor Roosevelt sent barrages of memoranda to her husband, and that was definitely not the Queen’s style.
The humidity continued to be debilitating. According to Joseph Kennedy, the Queen told him that afterwards she lay on the floor in her room at the White House, the hottest place she had ever been to (despite the newly installed air conditioners), to recover.88 That evening they still had a state dinner and a reception to face. For this the Queen wore a crinoline of white tulle sprinkled with gold paillettes; she sat between the President and Vice-President Garner for the dinner. Harold Ickes, the American Secretary of the Interior, whose diaries provide a jaundiced view of the royal visit, remarked scathingly on the over-familiar behaviour of the Vice-President, who had no breeding and put his arm round the King as if he were a ‘poker crony’. He also commented that the King and Queen ‘looked like pigmies’ beside the Roosevelts.89 The heat was still relentless: according to Harold Ickes’s wife, ‘men’s shirts buckled in the middle and collars wilted. Women, including the unfortunate Queen, turned beetlike.’90
At the end of the dinner the President made a short speech emphasizing the harmonious relations between the USA and Britain, and the King replied in kind; in the interlude after the ladies had left the table, the men conversed in what appeared to be prearranged groups. The King’s group included a noted isolationist, Senator William E. Borah.91 Even now, the day was not yet ended. Two hundred more guests arrived to hear a concert which included negro spirituals, cowboy ballads, folk songs sung by the Coon Creek Girls of Pinchem-Tight Hollow in Kentucky, folk dances by the Soco Gap Square-Dance Team and a finale of ‘art music’ – songs by American and European composers – sung by the radio star Kate Smith, the Metropolitan Opera’s baritone Lawrence Tibbett and Marian Anderson, the black contralto, whose fine voice Mrs Roosevelt admired.92
To the astonishment of the King and Queen, the next day was even hotter – 97 degrees in the shade – and it proved even more strenuous. At the White House in the morning Eleanor Roosevelt gave one of her frequent press conferences to women journalists; she praised the Queen’s interest in social problems, and then – after issuing stern warnings that they must not write that the Queen had attended the press conference – ushered in her guest. The King surprised the eighty-four women by coming too.93 It was then back to the British Embassy, where they received members of the British community, including ex-servicemen, in the garden, before driving to the Capitol to be received by members of the Senate and the House of Representatives. The King was congratulated by one senator on being ‘a very good Queen-picker’. A Democratic congressman who the previous day had sent the King a telegram demanding the repayment of Britain’s war debt to the United States, stayed away; one of his Texan colleagues, seeing the Queen, remarked, ‘If America can keep Queen Elizabeth, Congress will regard Britain’s war debt as cancelled.’94
They lunched with the Roosevelts in the presidential yacht, USS Potomac, sailing to Mount Vernon, the home of George Washington.* The King placed a wreath on George Washington’s tomb; the Queen was presented with a bouquet by the Mount Vernon gardener. Afterwards they drove with the Roosevelts to Fort Hunt, Virginia, to visit the Civilian Conservation Corps camp, a New Deal project for unemployed youths. They had particularly asked to see this; it was a project which related to their own concern about unemployment in Britain, and the King’s boys’ camps had given him some expertise in the field. They impressed Eleanor Roosevelt by talking to each boy. From there they drove to Arlington Cemetery, where the King laid wreaths; an ‘informal’ tea at the White House followed – informal, but hardly relaxing, for some sixteen heads of government agencies concerned with social and economic programmes were assembled to meet them. Eleanor Roosevelt commented that evening: ‘The young royalties are most intelligent. At the tea they asked everyone questions & left them with the feeling that their subject was of interest & well understood. At dinner the King told me he felt that he had learned a great deal. She seems equally interested.’95 The long hot day ended with a dinner, given by the King and Queen for the Roosevelts at the British Embassy, and then they left to rejoin their train at Union station. They waved goodbye on the rear platform of their train, the Queen resplendent in her rose-tulle Hartnell crinoline and diamond tiara.
In a letter to Princess Elizabeth, the Queen described their two ‘burning, boiling, sweltering, humid furnace like days’ in Washington. There was no doubt that they had been a personal success for her. D’Arcy Osborne wrote to her later: ‘A friend of mine in Washington sent me a cable while you were there which simply said, “You have always known what you were talking about. She stole the show.” ’96 This was certainly the tone of the Washington press. ‘Three cheers for the King – and four for the Queen’ was one verdict; ‘Give the Queen a Crowd and She Mows ’em Down’ was another.97 Some, however, noted that she had ‘a pleasant way of remaining in the background until such times that her presence is required’, and that she smiled affectionately at her husband when he spoke, while ‘he returns the attention with a swifter, shyer glance.’98
The train took them overnight to Sandy Hook, New Jersey where they embarked in the American destroyer USS Warrington, to sail to the Battery in New York City. It was a trying day: there were miscalculated timings and unscheduled presentations, and the programme slid inexorably out of control in the hands of two ‘vociferous showmen’, the Mayor of New York, Fiorello La Guardia, and the President of the World’s Fair, Grover Whalen.99 The King and Queen were greeted by the Governor of New York, Herbert Lehman, and by Mayor La Guardia, and driven through Manhattan to the World’s Fair in Queens,* their open car showered with ticker tape, cheered by enormous crowds of between three and four million. One New York newspaper noted approvingly that the King had hit the right democratic note by appearing in the morning dress of ‘an ordinary English gentleman’ rather than in a showy uniform, but also commented that he looked very tired and waved mechanically. The Queen, who wore a plain blue crêpe dress and cape and a spectacular hat with an ostrich-feather plume, giving her extra height, was less visibly tired, and was able to ‘do the honors for both in waving to the crowd’. The drive with the wisecracking Mayor took forty minut
es longer than scheduled. Then Whalen insisted on presenting some 500 extra people to them. After shaking some 200 hands – and receiving a fascist salute from the Italian Commissioner to the Fair – the King had had enough.100†
They were well behind schedule for their next engagement, a brief visit to Columbia University (chosen because it had been founded by royal charter in the reign of King George II), and by the time they reached their final destination, President Roosevelt’s country home at Hyde Park in Dutchess County, after an eighty-mile drive, they were an hour and a half late. They were greeted by the President, his wife and his mother, Sara Roosevelt, a formidable matriarch who had little in common with her daughter-in-law Eleanor beyond a disapproval of alcohol. Offering the King a martini, doubtless very welcome, the President said, ‘My mother thinks you should have a cup of tea; she doesn’t approve of cocktails.’ ‘Neither does my mother,’ answered the King, as he took the drink.101
The King and Queen spent only a night and a day at home with the Roosevelts, but it was enjoyable for both of them. Springwood, the Roosevelt family home for over seventy years and Franklin Roosevelt’s birthplace, was an unpretentious but comfortable house on the banks of the Hudson. The King and Queen loved it; ‘at moments one really feels that one is at home in England!’ she wrote to Queen Mary. ‘Especially here, where we arrived about 8 last night – one might be in an average English country house, with a wide hall, & big sitting rooms & rather small hot bedrooms.’ She added that at dinner that night the President had proposed Queen Mary’s health ‘in the most touching terms & quite impromptu, addressing himself to his own Mother who was sitting opposite him. It was so nice & friendly, & of course I found tears coming into my eyes!’102 It was Eleanor Roosevelt herself who – to the fury of her mother-in-law – revealed in her ‘My Day’ column that a side-table had collapsed, sending part of the dinner service crashing to the floor, and that a butler had tripped on the library steps, dropping a tray loaded with drinks.103
After dinner the King, the President and Mackenzie King remained in the library, discussing the danger of war. The King and Roosevelt had already established a rapport. ‘He is so easy to get to know & never makes one feel shy,’ the King himself wrote; he wished his ministers talked to him as the President did.104 He came to regard the visit to Hyde Park as the high point of the whole tour; out of it arose a strong friendship and a continuing correspondence with the President.105 Their talks that night and next day, of which the King made detailed notes, showed that Roosevelt was anxious to co-operate with Britain and Canada in naval defence in the Atlantic. He was also working to convert American public opinion ‘on to the right tack’ in case of war in Europe, and to get the Neutrality Act amended to make it less difficult for the USA to help Britain. Mackenzie King’s record of the conversation adds that Roosevelt proposed helping Canada set up aircraft-manufacturing plants. Although the President was over-optimistic about what he could achieve against the isolationists in Congress, these conversations laid the foundations for the very real boost which the USA was later able to give to Britain’s naval resources through the Bases-for-Destroyers deal and the Lend-Lease Agreement.
The next day was Sunday, and the King and Queen went with the Roosevelts to the Episcopal Church of St James in Hyde Park village. Again, the Queen felt very much at home. ‘The service is exactly the same as ours down to every word,’ she reported to Queen Mary, ‘& they even had the prayers for the King & the Royal family. I could not help thinking how curious [it] sounded, & yet how natural.’106 Up to a point: President Roosevelt had specifically asked the rector to make the service just like matins in an English country church.107 Afterwards the Queen had the fun of talking to her daughters on the transatlantic telephone before she and the King were driven by President Roosevelt up to the cottage he had recently built on the Hyde Park estate. She later said that she had been more frightened by this than by any wartime experience, because, to cope with the fact that the President’s legs were paralysed by polio, the car was specially adapted to be driven with hands alone. Roosevelt drove at high speed, talking, pointing out sights and waving his cigarette holder about, as well as operating the controls. ‘There were several times when I thought we could go right off the road and tumble down the hills.’108
The picnic lunch which followed has become the best-known feature of the entire visit – again thanks to Eleanor Roosevelt’s column, as she sighed over the letters of protest she had received from compatriots objecting to the food she proposed to serve. ‘There were a lot of people there,’ wrote the Queen to her daughters, ‘and we all sat at little tables under the trees round the house, and had all our food on one plate – a little salmon, some turkey, some ham, lettuce, beans & HOT DOGS too!’109 The BBC’s Richard Dimbleby spent so long reading to his listeners from the National Sausage Casing Manufacturers’ pamphlet about the construction and history of the hot dog that he hardly seemed to mention the King and Queen at all.110
Then they moved on to Eleanor Roosevelt’s own little cottage, where the King and the President and his sons bathed in the swimming pool, while the Queen sat in the shade and watched. ‘It was deliciously peaceful, and the first really quiet moment we have had for WEEKS,’ she told Princess Elizabeth. ‘This evening, after dinner we are leaving, & tomorrow morning we start the last week of our trip. I must say that I don’t think that I could bear very much more, as there comes a moment when one’s resistance nearly goes.’111 ‘My complexion is ruined!’ she wrote to Queen Mary.112
The royal train had been driven from New Jersey to Hyde Park station, and here the King and Queen said their last farewells to the Roosevelts. The train pulled out to the strains of ‘Auld Lang Syne’ sung by the assembled spectators. It was an emotional moment for all of them. Eleanor Roosevelt wrote that the threat of tragedy in Europe weighed on every single person there, and the song evoked friendship, sadness and uncertainty for the future. ‘I think the King and Queen, standing on the rear platform on the train as it pulled slowly away, were deeply moved. I know I was.’113
Their departure from the United States prompted a flood of press comment on the political implications of the visit. A special dispatch in the Washington Post noted that the King and the President had had several ‘man-to-man chats’, and assumed that they had touched upon ‘parallel actions’ between Britain and the USA; the King and Queen had succeeded in focusing world attention on the ties of blood and sentiment between the two countries, just as Chamberlain had intended.114 The Washington Evening Star concentrated on the reaction in Europe: the vituperation in the Nazi press showed the resentment caused by the ‘tightening of the democratic bond’ which was the unofficial but no less tangible result of the visit; but it also quoted the Manchester Guardian’s warning that the strikingly friendly reception given to the King and Queen by the American public did not mean that Congress would rescind the Neutrality Act.115 In London, The Times again insisted that there was ‘nothing political in the visit’, and used the occasion to stress how well the King and Queen were playing their representational role, carrying on and broadening the precedents set by King George V and Queen Mary.116
The Queen’s contribution was substantial. At least one observer gave her credit for a complete volte-face in American public opinion. ‘In admiration of this one woman, America has somehow blinded herself to Chamberlain, has forgotten Munich, and now sees only the strong British nation again.’117 One press report from New York remarked on her ‘faculty for rapt attention to the persons presented to her, her quick, intelligent grasp of the background and the connections between people and things, such as the war veterans and their identifying war medals and berets’118 – expertise which she had acquired through her marriage into a family very well versed in uniforms and decorations.
Eleanor Roosevelt was not entirely uncritical. She liked her and thought her ‘perfect as a Queen, gracious, informed, saying the right thing & kind but a little self-consciously regal’, although, as she more
forgivingly remarked, who would not be self-conscious in the Queen’s place? ‘Turning on graciousness like water is bound to affect one in time!’ Later she recalled that she was fascinated by the Queen, ‘who never had a crease in her dress or a hair out of place. I do not see how it is possible to remain so perfectly in character all the time.’119 Evidently the President’s wife thought her guest played her role a little too professionally; but she was also acknowledging a personality, a style and a task very unlike her own. At the same time she warmly approved of the Queen’s interest in social problems, and of her thoughtfulness in small things – like thanking their chauffeur for his careful driving.120
For her part, the Queen was touched by the kindness the Roosevelts had shown her and the King; she thought them a charming and united family and praised their easy, polished manners. The President she thought delightful, and ‘very good company’.121 He was more than that for the King, who told Mackenzie King that he had never met anyone with whom he could talk so freely as Roosevelt; he felt ‘as though a father were giving me his most careful and wise advice’.122
*
WHEN THE ROYAL train crossed the border again into Canada, the Montreal Gazette announced ‘King George and Queen Elizabeth are back today in their own country.’ It was ‘Vive le Roi!’ and ‘Vive la Reine!’ again as they drove through cheering French Canadian crowds in Sherbrooke. The weather was dramatically different – there had been a hurricane and a bitterly cold wind was still blowing. The gruelling pattern of their Canadian tour was resumed, with visits to the provincial capitals of New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island, processions through the streets and official welcomes and luncheons with the lieutenant governors and premiers of each province, interspersed with stops at smaller towns. If the King was busy with correspondence or ‘state affairs’, the Queen would descend to the platform alone, and ‘the crowds thrill at her smile and the wave of her hand’. Most of the reporters who had been with them since 17 May were still ‘hanging on grimly to the end of the Royal visit’.123
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