The prince, who was known as David to his close friends and family, had also had other relationships before Rosemary. He had been a late developer. His assistant private secretary, Tommy Lascelles, suggested that for some physiological reason his normal mental development had stopped when he reached adolescence. The outward symptom of this was that he needed to shave less often than most men.31 However, once he discovered the pleasures, both romantic and sexual, offered by the opposite sex he showed a voracious appetite for encounters of both kinds.
His first romantic attachment was to Marion, Viscountess Coke, who was married to Tom, the son of the Earl of Leicester. The couple had four children. Twelve years the prince’s senior, Marion was the type of experienced quasi-maternal figure who would often appeal to him. Small and lively, with a good sense of humour, she was the prototype of the women the prince would be attracted to for the rest of his life.32 The flirtation began early in 1915 during one of the prince’s periods of leave from active service with the Grenadier Guards in France. She was the first in a long line of female confidantes who mothered him and proved themselves willing to listen to his self-centred monologues. By November 1915, the prince wrote in his diary that they had had ‘a most delightful talk; she is a dear!!’33 Soon Edward was writing frequently to Lady Coke about his frustrations at not being able to fight on the front line. No doubt the older woman was flattered by the attentions of the world’s most eligible bachelor. When her younger son was born at the end of 1915, she called him David, the name by which the prince was known to his closest friends, and the prince stood as sponsor for the new baby. As in his later relationship with Freda Dudley Ward, Edward showed a genuine interest in Lady Coke’s children. He used to visit them in the nursery and play with them. It seems that at first Marion’s husband, Tom, was happy about his wife’s friendship with the Prince of Wales as he attended events with them and the trio played golf together. However, as the prince’s attentions became more intrusive Tom was less sanguine.
As was to become the pattern in Edward’s love life until he met Wallis, he always had at least two women in his life at the same time. While he was flirting with Marion Coke he was also courting the Honourable Sybil Cadogan, one of the daughters of Viscount Chelsea. Sybil, who was known as ‘Portia’ to her friends, was the first young single woman who could have been a potential bride. Unlike so many of his later girlfriends she was acceptable to the royal family. As she was a close friend of Edward’s sister, Princess Mary, she was invited to stay by the king and queen at Windsor Castle. They liked her so much that soon there was a charming bedroom set aside for her. The prince first got to know her during one of these visits in the spring of 1915. They played golf and enjoyed intense conversations. By the end of her stay the prince wrote: ‘She seems to get sweeter every day: I’m slightly in love there is no doubt!!!’34
After meeting a few times in London, due to his commitments in France, Edward did not see Portia for eight months. When they met again in January 1916 he wrote in his diary that she was ‘most adorable’ and looked ‘more attractive and beautiful than ever!!’35 During his leave, the prince saw her most days and nights. They went to the theatre together with mutual friends and dined and danced the night away.36 However, the best part of the ‘stunt’ for him came at the end of the evening when they drove around St James’s Park half a dozen times. ‘It was divine,’ he enthused in his diary, ‘and we sang and ragged and finally deposited her at Chelsea House at 12.00!! It naturally took a long time to say “good-night” and we didn’t get back till 12.30 after the best night I have had since the war began!!’37 On one occasion, he pretended to walk home after saying goodnight but returned to be let in by her to her parents’ Chelsea house. They then stayed up talking and playing the gramophone until after 1.30 a.m.
Edward was soon, rather self-consciously, confessing to his diary: ‘I’m madly in love with her!! Oh! If only ---!! But I must be careful even in my diary […] She is a perfect darling and no mistake.’38 A few weeks later, they talked for ages and ‘fixed up certain things!!’ Forever taking his emotional temperature and analysing his feelings, he added: ‘I am so desperately in love that I don’t know what to do!! Qu’elle vie!!!!’39 Many society observers thought they would marry, but although in worldly terms it would have been a suitable match, physically Portia was not the prince’s type. He was always attracted to very slim, physically fragile women while Portia was sturdy. It seems that their bond was more romantic than sexual. Reflecting the chaste nature of their relationship, the prince thought it worthy of note in his diary to record when he held ‘an angelic hand’.40 As in all his relationships, talking to Portia was an important part of her appeal. When they were together they ‘talked about every sort of thing: better not to mention what!!’41 When apart, he enjoyed ‘long yarns’ with her on the telephone. Once his leave was over and he was back in France, he wrote to her late at night.42 In his letters, Edward called Portia ‘my angel’ and he recorded with delight receiving a ‘heavenly letter from HER’.43
However, by the beginning of 1917, Edward seemed to be more interested in Marion Coke than Portia Stanley. He admitted to his diary that Lady Coke attracted him ‘more and more’.44 During his leave he would visit Marion at her Devonshire Street townhouse in the afternoon then spend the evening with Portia at Chelsea House, before having a late-night assignation with Lady Coke. Marion Coke’s sister acted as chaperone on these occasions; they would meet at her house and then dance until the early hours of the morning. Edward wrote in his diary: ‘Marion and I sat out a good deal and talked; she is such a little darling and I’m afraid I love her!!’45 Just before the prince went back to France, after one of their late-night dancing sessions, Edward took ‘sweet little Marion’ home, and he noted, ‘She bid me a tender farewell tho we didn’t kiss.’46 It seems that Lady Coke was careful not to compromise her marriage too much. Although she saw the prince frequently their relationship was more about talking than sex. When Edward was back in England in March, the prince wrote about coming back to her house and having ‘a yarn’; he added, ‘Wish to hell it could have been more than a yarn, as I’ve got a letch on Marion and love her!!!!’47
Perhaps, knowing Lady Coke was always in the background, Portia realised that the prince was not the type of husband she wanted. In June 1917, when Portia sent a telegram to her parents telling them, ‘Engaged to Edward’, they presumed that her engagement was to the prince. In fact, she had ended her relationship with the heir to the throne and had agreed to marry his university friend Edward, Lord Stanley. The prince wrote in his diary: ‘How depressed I am!! I suppose its Portia having gone West.’ It seems that Queen Mary talked to him and may have reassured him that there was no rush to get married because he added: ‘Of course that talk with Mama has cheered me up and taken a big weight off my mind.’48 There seems to have been no hard feelings on either side. Queen Mary attended Portia’s wedding and wrote to Edward about it. He wished the newlyweds well, writing to his mother: ‘She is charming and Edward is a very lucky fellow and I’m sure they’ll be very happy.’49 A year later the prince became godfather to their first child. His behaviour suggests that despite his earlier protestations in his diary, his feelings for Portia had never been particularly deep. However, her exit from his life left a vacancy which was soon to be filled by Rosemary.
At this point the prince seemed in no hurry to get married. As he heard about a flurry of his friends walking down the aisle, he wrote to his mother: ‘One’s wedding must be a fearful ordeal, but I suppose I shall have to go through with it one day.’50 At home and abroad, the prince was never short of female company. Alongside his official girlfriends was a secret world of other conquests. He quickly began to distinguish between girls he could marry and women he could sleep with. If the single aristocrats he courted had consummated their relationship with him they would have ruined their future marriage prospects. Prostitutes and courtesans were soon to provide an outlet for his growing sexual appetite.
The prince had been physically slow to mature and at first showed little interest in sex. As late as May 1916 (shortly before his 22nd birthday) he was telling a friend that although he understood sexual hunger he did not actually experience it himself. When he visited a brothel in Calais and saw some naked prostitutes in erotic poses, he was revolted by the sight. However, his attitude changed towards the end of 1916 when his equerries Joey Legh and Claud Hamilton took him to Amiens and introduced him to an experienced French prostitute called Paulette. She was permanently attached to an officer of the Royal Flying Corps, but he loaned her to the prince for a few evenings.51 Apparently, the encounter was a success. Although any material referring to it is cut out of his diary, Edward later told his elderly confidant Lord Esher that she had brushed aside all his shyness.52 Over the next few months he saw Paulette occasionally in Amiens and wrote about her affectionately in his diary, calling her ‘my little Paulette’ and describing her as ‘a heavenly little woman of her kind’.53 It seems that he treated her more like a girlfriend than a prostitute. They would dine in a hotel and then enjoy singing and dancing together before Paulette ‘dragged’ him off for more entertainment elsewhere.54 He described sitting on a seat talking to her by moonlight, and even considered taking her on a trip to Calais.55 Sometimes he would drive to Amiens to try to find her only to discover to his disappointment that she was with her ‘ami’.56
From now on sex became a major preoccupation for the prince. Soon after the fling with Paulette, he began having an affair with a Parisian courtesan called Marguerite Alibert. Known as ‘Maggy’ or ‘Maggie Meller’, this demi-mondaine was very popular at the time, counting among her clients Bendor, Duke of Westminster, a womanising friend of the prince. Having worked in a high-class brothel as a teenager, Maggy was an expert in the arts of love.57 According to her biographer, she enjoyed a reputation as a dominatrix.58 As fiery as she was experienced, Maggy described herself as being ‘a terrible she-devil’.59 By the time the prince met her she had come a long way from her humble roots; she now held court in her own salon in an elegant Parisian apartment. Petite and chic, she was dressed by the leading couturier Paquin. Maggy embodied many of the elements that Edward found alluring. Intoxicated with this newfound intimacy, he wrote indiscreet love letters to his ‘bébé’. Including as they did comments about the conduct of the war, and mocking his father, these letters were to leave him open to blackmail once their affair was over.60
At the same time as the prince had begun to show an interest in Rosemary on his visit to her hospital in July 1917, he was clandestinely meeting Maggy. While Edward was staying with Queen Mary and escorting her to casualty clearing stations, hospitals, ammunition dumps and railway depots, his mistress was waiting for him at the Hotel Normandy in Deauville. After receiving enthusiastic receptions from troops and French civilians wherever he went with his mother, for four consecutive days the prince drove to Deauville in his open Rolls-Royce to see his lover. To cover his tracks, he made sure he was back with his parents by 7 a.m. the next day. It seems this affair continued until the end of the war. Experiencing a regular sex life for the first time, after one interlude with his mistress the prince wrote in his diary: ‘It’s fearful what a change in my habits “48 hours of the married life in Paris” has wrought.’61 However, although he always blurred the lines between suitable and unsuitable women, frequently being more attracted to the latter, he knew that his relationship with Maggy had no long-term future and it was just an exhilarating fling. With his boundless energy, it seems that the prince was often in love, or lust, with more than one woman at a time. Like many of his contemporaries, he saw no inconsistency in the fact that while he was considering marrying Rosemary, he was sleeping with more sexually available women.
4
BAD BLOOD
In the autumn of 1917 the prince went with XIV Army Corps to Italy to support the Italian army as German troops came to the aid of their Austrian allies. It was felt that Edward’s presence would raise the morale of the troops. However, in early 1918 he was given six weeks’ home leave, ostensibly to make a tour of the defence plants. In fact, most of his time was spent socialising and during his leave Rosemary and Edward’s relationship became the talk of society. The prince wrote to a friend about their time together, describing a delightful week at Windsor during which he rode every morning and played golf in the afternoon. He explained that he had seen a great deal of a woman he only identified by her initial ‘R’ but who seems likely to have been Rosemary. He described her as ‘charming’, adding that when he came home on leave he enjoyed being with good-looking women again. After his stay at Windsor the prince motored up to London to see friends.1
To his parents’ disgust, he was soon partying every night at debutante balls. King George V and Queen Mary thought his behaviour was misguided while so many of his contemporaries were still fighting for their king and country abroad. However, Edward refused to be reined in and his presence helped to create a heightened atmosphere of anticipation. Cynthia Asquith described ‘the wild excitement fluttering all the girls over the Prince of Wales’. Every aristocratic mother wanted to ensnare the prince for her daughter. Cynthia Asquith called it the ‘dash for the throne’. She explained: ‘No girl is allowed to leave London during the three weeks of his leave and every mother’s heart beats high.’ 2
Most determined was the Duchess of Rutland. Although Edward was three years younger than her daughter, Lady Diana Manners, her mother thought she would make a perfect queen and that this should be her ambition. However, Diana had other plans and was appalled at the thought. She had no rapport with the prince and she was already deeply involved with Duff Cooper. During Edward’s interlude in London, the Duchess of Rutland was furious with Diana because the prince did not dance with her at Irene Lawley’s ball.3
The Countess of Strathmore, mother of Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, also seemed in with a chance. Lady Elizabeth wrote to a friend that she sat next to the Prince of Wales at a dinner and then had the first dance with him. During the evening, she had two more dances with him.4 However, out of all the matchmaking mothers it seemed that the Duchess of Sutherland was the one most likely to succeed. Cynthia Asquith added: ‘So far he dances most with Rosemary and also motors with her in the daytime.’5
Over those hectic months since they had met again at the Duchess of Sutherland’s hospital, the well-matched couple had grown increasingly fond of each other. Rosemary, like the women who were to come after her, soon realised the strange dynamic that appealed to the prince in his relationships with women. In March 1918, when an Australian socialite, Sheila Loughborough, who was married to Rosemary’s cousin, Lord Loughborough, asked her how she should treat the Prince of Wales and his brother, Rosemary told her to curtsy low, call them sir and treat them like dirt.6
According to Lady Victor Paget, who was a close friend of Rosemary’s, a few months into their relationship the prince proposed. At first, Rosemary had been firmly against accepting him; she was a very independent young woman, and as a duke’s daughter with her own trust fund of £100,000 left to her in her father’s will, she had no need of additional social status or wealth. Apparently the idea of becoming queen appalled her. However, the prince kept asking her and gradually she was won over. She told her friend that she was very fond of the future king, but she was also very aware of his weaknesses, knowing that he was childish and irresponsible. Equally aware of her own strengths, she decided to accept his proposal because she thought that she could ‘make something of him’.7
Friends thought an announcement was imminent, but before an engagement was made public Edward’s parents made a fateful mistake by opposing the marriage. Their reaction was known among a small circle at court. Although she did not name Rosemary, Lady Hardinge of Penshurst – whose husband was assistant private secretary to George V – wrote in her memoirs that the prince had wished to marry a lady from ‘a good English family’ but there was opposition. She claimed that at this time it was still fel
t that Edward should marry a royal princess and the woman he wished to marry was reluctant to become queen. She wondered how the history of the monarchy in the twentieth century would have turned out if Edward had been allowed to have his way in those early days.8 The prince himself later explained what had happened in a letter to Freda Dudley Ward. He wrote: ‘TOI knows how I used to feel about her [Rosemary], that she was the only girl I felt I ever could marry and I knew it was “defendu” [forbidden] by my family!!’9 It seems his parents’ grounds had nothing to do with Rosemary as an individual. In fact, they liked her very much and considered her to be a good moral influence on their son. However, according to Philip Ziegler, Queen Mary wrote to her son that although Rosemary was attractive there was ‘a taint’ in the blood of her mother’s family. It seems her comment related to an alleged strain of madness in the St Clair-Erskine family, which was widely gossiped about at the time.10
Certainly, Millicent Sutherland’s relatives had a racy past and many of them were eccentric. As a friend of the family, Sir Robert Bruce Lockhart, wrote, they had ‘charm, originality, extravagance and weakness’.11 The Duchess of Sutherland was the daughter of the 4th Earl of Rosslyn. Millicent, her sisters and half-sisters were Victorian beauties who over the years attracted many admirers and much scandal. Queen Victoria had wanted Millicent’s half-sister, Frances Maynard, who was known as ‘Daisy’, to marry her haemophiliac son Prince Leopold. However, the headstrong heiress rejected the offer and married instead Francis Greville, Lord Brooke, heir to the Earl of Warwick. As Countess of Warwick, Daisy became the mistress of Leopold’s brother, Bertie, the future Edward VII. He doted on her and called her his ‘little wife’. For almost a decade she dominated his Marlborough House circle. However, Daisy had a reputation for being indiscreet and she soon became known as a ‘babbling brook’.12
Before Wallis Page 5