Before Wallis: Edward VIII's Other Women

Most people know the story of how King Edward VIII gave up the throne in 1936 for the love of Wallis Simpson and that thereafter the couple became the Duke and Duchess of Windsor.
 
Many books have been written about them, although less is known about the former significant others in the Duke’s life. This book explores the lives of three women, any one of whom could have become his wife and possibly changed the course of British history - or at least given our present Elizabeth II a few more decades of quiet family life before being loaded down with the responsibilities of a monarch.
 
Rosemary Leveson-Gower met the Prince of Wales during World War I when she worked as a nurse in a hospital set up by her mother. Edward fell for her and with an aristocratic background she might have seemed the perfect bride. But his father, King George V, was of the old school who believed the heir to the throne should only marry approved unblemished girls - and preferably princesses from Europe - plus he mostly disapproved of the match due to some of her unconventional relatives. It simply would not do for the future queen to have a mother with multiple marriages and a gambling brother! It seems ludicrous today, given the subsequent doings of the House of Windsor, and so the royal family lost the beautiful and appealing Rosemary who went on to prove her worth in other ways, sadly dying at the same age as Princess Di, only 36, in a plane crash.
 
Edward’s penchant for chic, thin, married women with bossy tendencies began with the next choice, Freda Dudley Ward. Much of his correspondence to her still exists, he was totally besotted with her, writing and phoning her many times a day until he suddenly ditched her for the next woman in a similar mould. Freda’s notoriety as one of Edward’s women overshadows her history of a firm social conscience when she set out to help people during the Great Depression, World War II and later. The Feathers Association she founded still operates today helping disadvantaged youth in the London area.
 
Thelma Furness supplanted Freda. She was American, an identical twin, who snatched herself a British Viscount for her second marriage. Her sister was Gloria Vanderbilt with whom she would eventually start her own fashion label and together they became an item in Hollywood society. The later years for the twins were not so good, having a variety of businesses (ironically including hand-making “princess dolls”) and they dabbled in advertising. Thelma and Gloria wrote a joint memoir in which Thelma wrote that in spite of all her mistakes, she would do it all again except: “The only thing I would NOT do again is introduce Wallis Simpson to the Prince of Wales”.
 
Edward may have had a certain charm, but he was also capricious, impressionable and self-serving. He hated the stuffiness and pomp of royalty and all the duties that involved and he could have never matched the sterling loyal qualities of our present Queen. His loss was ultimately Britain’s gain.
 
While all of these women were involved in the flittering dalliances of their class, they weren’t completely shallow or insensitive to the struggles of Edward's subjects and any one of them would have been more preferable over the acidic and dangerous Wallis Simpson.
 
The book does occasionally divert at length into “then they did this, and then they did that” which can create the odd yawn or a bit of speed-reading, but on the whole it is an interesting study in how the lives of privilege and fame often end up more of a burden than a blessing.
 
Four stars

​
 
Amazon.com (audio version)
 
Amazon.co.uk
 
Booktopia

---