A Brief History of the House of Windsor

by Michael Paterson

  Though Albert may not have endeared himself greatly to his wife’s subjects, the personal lives led by the royal family struck a distinct chord with the public. This was a time of increased piety. An evangelical revival had swept away the raffish legacy of the Regency. Immorality was out of fashion. The country was ready to be led by upright example, and royalty provided it. As well as a change in morals there was a shift in social and political power. Victoria’s reign was the great age of the bourgeoisie. They, like Prince Albert, despised the self-indulgent hedonism of the aristocracy, and admired the virtues of work and self-improvement. Albert’s interest in science and industry, manifest in his prominent role in the Great Exhibition, endeared him to the people who made and sold British goods. Accustomed to being despised by members of his class, they appreciated his patronage of new technology (railways and photography, to name but two areas), and his interest in them and their values. The queen, though not naturally as intelligent as her husband, shared this interest.

  The British monarchy thus had a ‘makeover’ in the middle decades of the nineteenth century. Victoria and Albert had developed the tastes of the middle class, though they of course lived the life of the high aristocracy and no one expected them to do otherwise. Nevertheless it was appearances that counted. Their blameless natures made the monarchy more generally revered than it had been within living memory. Their mutual devotion and close family life established for the first time the notion – which has remained the case to the present day – that royalty should set a moral example and represent the best of its people’s character.

  Albert died in 1861. His widow, who grew steadily more entrenched in her social and moral conservatism, outlived him by forty years. She mourned him to the extent of disappearing into self-imposed purdah, absenting herself so effectively from national life that republicanism began to stir, and the monarchy sank into an unpopularity greater than it has ever known since. The situation was saved by her gradual reappearance and increasing age, which conferred on her almost mythical status.

  The monarch who followed her to the throne, Edward VII, did not share her retiring nature, but he had an abiding love of splendour and spectacle. After his mother’s reclusive reign he wanted royalty to be once again colourful, popular and visible. For his coronation in 1902, he asked the aristocracy to bring their liveried coaches to London so that these would add to the visual impact of the occasion, and they did. It was to be the last time these vehicles were seen en masse, and the last time a coronation was staged with such magnificence.

  Edward went on as he had begun. The notion of royal spectacle had been given initial impetus by Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee in June 1897. Her funeral, his coronation and his own funeral were in similar vein (the latter occasion was attended by no less than nine other monarchs). He also gave out decorations generously, even carrying some minor ones in his pockets to hand out, and instituting a new award – the Order of Merit. Most importantly, he enhanced the physical surroundings in which state ceremonial took place; he had a new façade put on Buckingham Palace – a simple and dignified, if rather plain and dull affair that was designed to offset the Victoria Memorial, which he also had built. Edward had the Mall remade as a straight and wide triumphal avenue, with Admiralty Arch created at its eastern end, thus forming one of the comparatively few contrived areas in a city that is notoriously unplanned.

  For all his reputation as a playboy, he was a conscientious king. While Victoria had only occasionally conducted the State Opening of Parliament and had not appeared at Trooping the Colour, Edward began to do these things with punctilious regularity, guaranteeing that the events became more popular and that his subjects could expect to see him on at least two occasions every year. In this, of course, he started a tradition that has been followed by his family ever since. His son, who succeeded him as King George V in 1910, combined Victoria’s rectitude and sense of duty with Edward’s feeling of obligation to provide the public with dignified and inspiring royal appearances.

  The British Crown was, as has been suggested, a modest institution by comparison with its neighbours. The French Court, from which other monarchs in Continental Europe tended to take their cue, had been a place of overwhelming magnificence under both the Bourbons and Napoleon. The Court of Spain was known to be the most rigidly protocol-bound and ceremonious of them all. The tsars of Russia lived and governed on a scale that was simply not possible for other monarchs – the size and number of their palaces, the wealth they commanded, the retinue of noblemen, ladies-in-waiting and gorgeously attired bodyguards that accompanied them, was sufficient to humble even the most self-assured foreign observer. The Court of Austria–Hungary, ruled until 1916 by the patriarchal Franz Joseph I who was just as venerable as Queen Victoria, spent far more on ceremony and banquets than its counterpart in Britain. The United Kingdom, whose royal family is now wealthier and more ceremonious that that of any other European monarchy, was a century ago – in an age when kings were thicker on the ground – outshone by several others. With its Yeomen of the Guard, Gentlemen at Arms, Household regiments and its quaint but splendid officials (Silver Stick-in-Waiting) it has always, of course, had the power to impress, but with that understatement that is characteristic of the British it has striven for a certain modesty too. Noisy extravagance did not sit well with the temper of its people or the mood of Parliament, which ran the country and decided, by democratic vote, what the monarch’s income should be.

  In other corners of Europe, the nature of monarchy was changing even before the Age of kings had ended. A turning point of sorts came in 1905 when Norway became independent of Sweden and chose to become a monarchy. In keeping with the new age, however, this king would have no political power, and would be a purely ceremonial figurehead uninvolved in the actual governance of the nation. The country invited a member of Europe’s oldest ruling house, Denmark, to fill the position. Prince Carl, the thirty-three year old who accepted the throne and the title Haakon VII (to suggest continuity with medieval kings), did so on condition that he would live as much as possible like any Norwegian citizen. He was thus the harbinger of the ‘bicycling monarchs’ – the informal royalties that have since come to characterize Scandinavia and the Netherlands. Normality was sometimes relative, of course. (Both Haakon’s son and grandson would be sent to Balliol College, Oxford.) Nevertheless, his son, who reigned as Olaf V (1957–91), devoutly practised this ordinariness too. He was famously photographed taking his skis on a train up to the slopes, apparently alone and unnoticed by other passengers. Olaf’s son, now King Harald V, married a commoner – Sonja Haraldsen, whom he met informally – in 1968, a fact that caused considerable debate even in such a relaxed country. (They actually met in 1959. It took nine years to overcome the objectors.) By this time Britain had seen a royal marry a commoner – Princess Margaret had wed Antony Armstrong-Jones in 1960 – but he moved in Society, was related to the aristocracy and had the educational background of the upper class, while Miss Haraldsen was the daughter of a merchant. This was the first instance of a random romance between royalty and an ordinary member of the public, something that is now so universal as to excite no surprise.

  Understandably, there are often rules that govern the choice of marriage partner for members of royal houses. In Japan, it is taken entirely for granted that any member of the imperial family must marry a Japanese. Public opinion would not stand for anything else. The matter is even more imperative if the spouse is to be the wife of the heir to the throne. There would be no question of Japan having, say, an American consort, as Jordan did with Queen Noor, the wife of King Hussein, or an Australian, as is the case with the crown prince of Denmark.

  In Denmark, in fact, the rules are the exact opposite to Japan’s. The royal family has an understanding that its members will never marry any Danish citizen. Though, as is the case elsewhere, it is entirely possible for them to choose someone of any other social class, feeling against a home-grown consort is intense, and within the
royal family itself opposition is entrenched. In 1994 Crown Prince Frederik wished to marry a beautiful, intelligent and companionable girl called Katja Storkholm. The fact that she had once modelled underwear – which might have been viewed as a fatal handicap – was seen merely as a minor embarrassment. In every way she would have been a highly suitable princess. Most importantly, she and Frederik were genuinely in love. He proposed, she accepted, but the engagement had to remain entirely secret. The implacable disapproval of his parents, and of senior courtiers, killed off the relationship. His mother, Queen Margarethe, who herself had married a French diplomat, simply refused to grant permission, and there was nothing Frederik could do about it. The queen was quoted as saying with regard to a foreign bride: ‘There are many difficulties because of the language. But you come with what the British call “no strings attached”. Of course you have a past, but that past is not walking around the streets among us.’ As if to further emphasize this point, Frederik was eventually to find a wife on the opposite side of the world. He would marry a young woman called Mary Donaldson from Tasmania. They met in a Sydney pub while he was attending the Olympics in 2000. ‘Hi,’ he said, ‘I’m Fred, from Denmark.’ It would be difficult to imagine a monarchy more informal than that.

  In small and easy-going countries, low-profile monarchy has long since become normal. There was no need – in an era before global terrorism – for large numbers of bodyguards, and sovereigns could walk about the streets like anyone else. King Frederik IX of Denmark – Prince Frederik’s grandfather – once visited a public event in a Copenhagen park without a single person in attendance. ‘Who looks after the king?’ an American journalist asked one bystander. ‘We all do,’ was the reply. The lesson from this, doubtless noted in Courts all over Europe, was that monarchy can be informal without necessarily losing dignity. A royal family that is relaxed and accessible can reap immense rewards in popularity.

  A Dutchman once explained that in his country any royal occasion, any state pageantry, would have people asking, ‘But what’s it all for?’ The implication being that there is no point in making too great a fuss over these events. The majority of British people do not ask this question, and do not want this sort of monarchy. Proud of their history and their past status as a world power, they enjoy the monarchy’s regular appearances at public events. They love splendour and they adore the notion – an immensely important national article of faith – that no other country can possibly compete with them in staging state ceremonial. (Ironically many members of the royal family, whose unlooked-for obligation it has been to participate in these events, absolutely hate them. Just like the crowds that line the Mall, they spend long periods of time standing and waiting.) They are proud of having the West’s most elaborate, influential, vibrant and respected royal house. Like the people of Ancient China or Egypt they regard their own ruler as the only one of importance. When ‘the queen’ is spoken of in other parts of the world, the implication is clear that it is Elizabeth II who is being referred to, even though Denmark has had a reigning queen since 1972 and the Netherlands has been ruled by women since 1890.

  Paradoxically, Queen Elizabeth’s subjects like a certain distance in her even as they like the rest of their royal family to be to be less aloof. They expect dignity and, as was seen during the series of scandals that erupted during the 1990s, if they do not get it they feel betrayed and angry. With the resources the family has at its disposal – the advisers and officials who smooth their way and cover up their mistakes, the allowances made for them, the goodwill upon which they can call – their people expect better of them.

  With an extensive family there will be members who can meet different public needs, reflect different qualities. When one or other is out of favour as a result of some misdeed, the others will remain popular and will thus keep up the overall standard. The older ones fit easily into the role of grandparents of the nation. George V, Queen Mary, Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother, the Duke of Edinburgh and the present queen, have all provided a steadying, reassuring presence. It has naturally been for younger members of the family to supply glamour and excitement. The first to do this – the first royal ‘media star’, to use an unfortunate expression – was David, Prince of Wales, who later became Edward VIII. The notion of a member of the royal house being photographed and written about like a film star was entirely new at the beginning of the twenties, though it has become all too familiar in our own time. Coverage of family members is frequently intrusive and often inaccurate, but the mass media have been a benefit as well as a curse to the monarchy in recent decades. Though they have brought considerable anguish to members of the family they have also, for instance, made more widely known the fun-loving side of the queen’s nature.

  William and Harry – and now Kate – are naturally the royals who are identified with youth. They were shown endlessly on television watching the Olympics (the queen and Prince Philip featured only at the Opening Ceremony) in order to demonstrate that royalty is fully engaged with the preoccupations of the nation’s young. William is a supporter of a football team – Aston Villa – that is unambiguously plebeian, and both young men wear chain-store clothing. William’s wife, of course, fascinates many because she is an outsider who has made the transition to the inside. Some observers think her the most interesting of them all. ‘If it weren’t for Kate,’ opines a largely hostile US website, ‘they’d be a sorry lot.’ Americans, as they did with Diana, have a special affection for those who marry into the family, provided they are attractive young women, of course. Neither Mark Phillips nor Timothy Laurence aroused noticeable interest across the Atlantic when they in turn became husband to Princess Anne. Perhaps it is embedded in the American psyche – it is after all a founding concept of their nation – to bestow their greatest admiration on those who have come from relative obscurity and moved upward, rather than those who have always been at the top.

  If insight to the lives of the royal family is easier for the public than it used to be, the present generation is visibly freer and less hidebound than was the case, and they are much more at ease with us. Seeing them today, it seems incredible that within living memory they were forbidden by self-imposed rules from smiling or laughing in public, or injecting humour into speeches.

  It is worth remembering, however, that the rules of society have changed in any case, making the lives of the young in general less hidebound. To cite one example: when William was elected to ‘Pop’ at Eton, the prefectorial society whose most conspicuous symbol is a colourful and self-designed waistcoat, the prince wore one bearing the slogan ‘Groovy Baby’, a reference to the then-fashionable Austin Powers spy films. Nobody raised an eyebrow at this. In the 1970s, when his father had put on a sweatshirt to play polo and it happened to bear the title of the film A Bridge Too Far (a serious war movie, as opposed to a vulgar spoof), he was reprimanded by courtiers on the grounds that ‘royalty don’t advertise’.

  Monarchies need to know – and usually do, by virtue of long practice – when to be formal and when to unbend. In the modern era they must, after all, not only symbolize national virtue but seem like archetypal citizens. The trick is always to tread a fine line between the two. That so many dynasties survive in democratic countries is a testament to their success.

  EPILOGUE

  ‘If people don’t want it, they won’t have it.’

  Prince Charles, on the monarchy

  It is beyond doubt that if you dislike the royal family you have a hard time in Britain, especially if you live in the capital. Their image is everywhere. Not only can you not use a stamp or a coin without being reminded of them, but their faces are on thousands of other items – postcards, crockery, biscuit tins. (This is not their fault. They do not hold copyright regarding their own images, and anyone can thus make these souvenirs.) Their insignia, in the shape of the Royal Warrant, appears on everything from cereal packets to vacuum cleaners. Let there be any hint of a royal celebration and shop windows, magazine covers and p
ublic spaces will be saturated with them. On these high days and holidays the general, widespread hysteria must be positively sickening for those who do not share the enthusiasm, just as the World Cup is for those with no interest in football. There is no corner of the United Kingdom in which you can avoid it. As one critic railed during the jubilee celebrations of 2012, no view was permitted to appear in the media other than that the monarchy was worshipped, enjoyed, appreciated overwhelmingly by the British public.

  And yet this reflects the genuine, uncontrived (fostered, but not contrived) desire of most of the British people, as shown in opinion polls.

  The last major poll, by Mori in May 2012, found that a solid 80 per cent want to keep the monarchy, and while Conservative voters were predictably overwhelming in their support (96 per cent), so were Labour (74 per cent) and Liberal Democrats (84 per cent). The poll was taken just before the Diamond Jubilee, at a high point in the Crown’s fortunes, yet even in its darkest days – in January 1997 a televised debate, The Nation Decides, included a telephone survey – support remained at 66 per cent. With two-thirds of the country in favour, there was little to comfort republicans.