Sandringham Days Read online

  For

  Mary

  Colin, Andrew and Nicola

  and their children

  ‘The lights in my life’

  CONTENTS

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Acknowledgements

  Preface

  The Children Of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert

  The Children Of King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra

  The Children Of King George V and Queen Mary

  Chapter One Early Days of a Prince

  Chapter Two Marriage – 1863

  Chapter Three Children

  Chapter Four The House Party

  Chapter Five 1870 – 1871 Years of Crisis

  Chapter Six Marriages

  Chapter Seven Troubled Years

  Chapter Eight Princess May

  Chapter Nine Fallow Years

  Chapter Ten King Edward VII

  Chapter Eleven King in a Cottage

  Chapter Twelve Moving House

  Chapter Thirteen Three Kings in One Year

  Chapter Fourteen King George VI

  Afterword

  Genealogical Table

  Bibliography

  References

  Plate Section

  By the Same Author

  Copyright

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  I warmly acknowledge the permission of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II to use previously published material from the Royal Archives, together with photographs from the Royal Collection, selected with the valuable help of Miss Frances Dimond, MVO. The assistance of Lady de Bellaigue, Registrar of the Royal Archives and more recently, Lady Roberts, and also the staff at the Royal Archives and the Photographic Collection is also much appreciated.

  I am grateful to Sir Julian Loyd, KCVO, until 1991 the Queen’s agent at Sandringham, for the very valuable assistance he gave me, allowing me to see more of York Cottage than would otherwise have been possible, and to visit the reclaimed area of land beyond Wolferton. His successors, Mr John Major, MVO and Mr M. O’Lone, have corrected errors in the preface and afterword and provided me with some useful illustrations of the house. My thanks to Mr R.S. French for helpful advice and information and for a most interesting tour of York Cottage. I appreciate the help offered by Lady Roberts and the staff at the Royal Archives and the Photographic Collection.

  I would like to thank Lord Wigram of Clewer for permission to make use of the letters from his mother and a copy of her portrait by Oswald Birley. His kindness and hospitality made my search for material from that period of King George V’s reign a real pleasure. I am indebted to Mr R. Verner-Jeffreys for the loan of letters from Prince George during his service in the Royal Navy and a copy of a letter from Queen Victoria to George, Duke of Cambridge in 1864 from which extracts have been taken.

  I greatly appreciated the comments of the late C.M. Baker of Wellington College and W.L. Fryer. E.R. Sibbick, MVO has an encyclopaedic knowledge of the period and his advice and criticism have enabled me to avoid a number of pitfalls. Opinions, where not otherwise acknowledged, are my own, as are residual errors and omissions. My wife, Mary, and our daughter, Nicola, have devoted much time to the work in progress and suggested a number of amendments, which are incorporated. Our sons Colin and Andrew have kept the computer running and Lorna Mitchell’s help proved very welcome.

  Mr R. Hedley Walker of the Wolferton Station Museum generously gave me unrestricted access to the exhibits which he and his family collected over many years. This unique display added a valuable dimension to ‘Sandringham life’, enabling us to envisage the reception of Royal and important persons on the ‘Downside’ platform. The letters in this book are reproduced by his kind permission. The present owner, Mr Richard Brown, generously escorted us round his restoration work, including his discovery of Queen Alexandra’s original garden.

  Mrs Diana Coldicott kindly lent me a number of books for a prolonged period, and I am grateful to the librarian and his assistants at the Farnham Branch of the Surrey County Library for their help in obtaining material. Mr D.S. Brooks, librarian at Lord Wandsworth College, read the script and made a number of helpful suggestions. As Librarian he was most accommodating over the matter of prolonged loans. Mr John Moulding, a former shepherd, provided some interesting first-hand information on the estate during the reign of King Edward VII.

  I would also like to thank everyone at The History Press for all their hard work.

  Acknowledgement must be made for the frontispiece and images 1, 13, 14 and 15 in the plate section, copyright is due to Windsor Castle. Royal Archives © 1992, Her Majesty the Queen.

  I acknowledge with thanks the permission of the following for permission to use extracts from works quoted in the Bibliography:

  Battiscombe, G., Queen Alexandra (Constable & Co., 1969)

  Buxton, A., The King in his Country (Longmans, Green & Co., 1955)

  Cathcart, H., Sandringham (W.H. Allen, 1964)

  Donaldson, F., Edward VIII (Widenfeld & Nicholson Ltd., 1974)

  Hepworth, P., Royal Sandringham (Wensum Books Ltd., 1978)

  Gore, J., King George V. A Personal Memoir (John Murray, 1949)

  Airlie, M., Countess of, Thatched with Gold: Memoirs (Hutchinson & Co., 1962)

  Magnus, P., King Edward the Seventh (John Murray, 1964)

  Nicholson, H., King George V (Constable & Co., 1952)

  Ponsonby, A., Henry Ponsonby (Macmillan & Co. Ltd, 1942)

  Pope-Hennessey, J., Queen Mary (George Allen & Unwin, 1959)

  Wheeler-Bennett, J.W., King George VI, His Life and Times (Macmillan & Co. Ltd, 1958)

  PREFACE

  Sandringham, the private property of the Queen, is a large estate in Norfolk of some 20,000 acres comprising woodland, farmland, saltings on the edge of the Wash, and land reclaimed from the sea. Apart from the visitor centre there are a number of prosperous industries – a fruit farm, market garden, sawmill, the Royal Stud, a country park and nature trail. Within the estate are seven villages where about 10,000 acres are farmed by tenants. The house and gardens are opened to the public for much of the summer and provide a glimpse of a Royal and private home.

  Such a visit raises many questions: how did this property come into the possession of the Royal family? How did they spend their time here? What kinds of problems and difficulties beset them over the past 150 years? Until recently the rusty chains of a child’s swing hung from a tree near York Cottage and invited us to wonder about the children who grew up here, and what they did in later life.

  Sandringham was purchased for the then Prince of Wales in 1862 and was, in effect, his creation. King George V was born there and for him it was perhaps more ‘home’ than it had been even for his father. He adopted the lifestyle of a country gentleman and said of Sandringham that it was ‘the place I love best anywhere in the world’. King Edward VII was more cosmopolitan in his tastes than his son and enjoyed the fascinations of London life – in one week he visited the theatre twice, a circus once, spent the next day shooting and then went off to Homburg – and the attractions of Paris, Marienbad and Biarritz almost as much. He was a restless traveller and greatly enjoyed his visits to the continent. How then did he, when Albert Edward, Prince of Wales, come to own such a derelict estate in a region so inhospitable and so remote from those centres of enjoyment?

  York Cottage was given to Prince George by his father on his marriage to Princess Victoria Mary of Teck in 1893. For the first seventeen years of his marriage the Prince lived there happily as a leisured country gentleman. On his accession as King George V in 1910, the Cottage remained his Norfolk home while his mother, Queen Alexandra, lived in the Big House nearby, almost alone in a mansion of 300 rooms, until her death in 1925. What caused this apparent anomaly? />
  It seems a natural progression from these questions to a consideration on the influences that shaped the lives of those who made Sandringham their home. Some of them are to be found here, and perhaps this account of domestic life in Norfolk will encourage readers towards the rewarding biographies of the successive owners, including the current Royal family, but they are beyond the scope of this narrative, which therefore closes with the death of King George VI in 1952. Accounts of the Queen’s inheritance of the estate and the private lives of her family there are best left to other hands.

  Note: It was the wish of King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra that their private correspondence should be destroyed after their death, which was dutifully fulfilled by Viscount Esher. There are many areas, therefore, where their thoughts and feelings can only be surmised. Queen Victoria’s journal exists only in a form edited by her daughters, with passages omitted as they thought fit. Many of her letters, however, have been edited and published and in their characteristically forthright manner of expression there is much evidence of her relationships with her family. The private papers of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth II are, of course, inaccessible.

  Note: Members of the Royal family change their titles in accordance with their rank and situation. For example, Princess Maud of Wales, youngest daughter of King Edward VII and Queen Alexandra, became Maud, Princess Charles of Norway on her marriage and, on her husband’s election to the Norwegian throne, Queen of Norway. Similarly, King Edward’s second son, born Prince George of Wales, became Duke of Cornwall in 1901; and later that year he became Prince of Wales; and on the death of King Edward VII in 1910, King George V. The tables below may be helpful.

  A slight confusion may arise over the use of the name ‘Bertie’. It was Queen Victoria’s family name for Albert Edward, Prince of Wales and used by her until the day of her death and by his siblings. It was also given to Prince Albert (later King George VI), and used by his relatives.

  The Children of Queen

  Victoria and Prince Albert

  1. Princess Victoria (1840-1901). Princess Royal; married Prince Frederick William of Prussia in 1858. She was later Crown Princess of Prussia and Empress Frederick of Germany. Eight children; the eldest became Kaiser Wilhelm II.

  2. Prince Albert Edward, (1841-1910) – known as ‘Bertie’. Prince of Wales. Married Princess Alexandra of Denmark in 1863. Six children: Prince Albert Victor, died in 1892; Prince George, married Princess Victoria Mary of Teck, later King George V, died in 1936; Princess Louise, married Earl of Fife; Victoria; Maud, married Prince Christian of Denmark, later Queen Maud; and Prince Alexander John (died same day). In 1901 he became King Edward VII.

  3. Princess Alice (1843-1878). Married Grand Duke of Hesse-Darmstadt in 1862; two sons and three daughters.

  4. Prince Alfred (1844-1900) – known as ‘Affie’. Duke of Edinburgh. Married in 1874, to Princess Marie of Russia; one son and four daughters.

  5. Princess Helena (1846-1923) – known as ‘Lenchen’. Married in 1866 to Prince Christian of Schleswig Holstein; three sons (two survived) and two daughters.

  6. Princess Louise (1848-1939). Married the Marquis of Lorne in 1871, later Duke of Argyll. No issue.

  7. Prince Arthur (1850-1941). Duke of Connaught; married Princess Louise Margaret of Prussia in 1879; one son and two daughters.

  8. Prince Leopold (1853-1884). Married Helena, Princess of Waldeck-Pyrmont, in 1882. One son and one daughter. He suffered from haemophilia.

  9. Princess Beatrice (1857-1944). Married Prince Henry of Battenberg in 1885; three sons, one daughter.

  The Children of King Edward VII

  and Queen Alexandra

  Albert Victor, (1864-1892), known as Eddy. Born on 8 January at Frogmore, two months premature; died on 14 January 1892.

  George (1865-1936). Born on 3 June at Marlborough House, London, one month premature. Duke of York, 1892; Prince of Wales, 1901; King George V, 1910. He died at Sandringham on 20 January 1936.

  Louise (1867-1931). Born on 20 February at Marlborough House. Married Alexander Duff, Earl of Fife (created Duke) in 1889. Died in January 1931.

  Victoria (1868-1935). Born on 6 July at Marlborough House. Died 3 December 1935.

  Maud (1869-1938). Born on 26 November at Marlborough House. Married Prince Charles of Denmark in 1896. Queen Maud of Norway, 1905. Died 20 November 1938.

  Alexander John (1871). Born on 6 April at Sandringham. Lived one day.

  The Children of King

  George V and Queen Mary

  Edward (1894-1972), known as David. Born 23 June at White Lodge, Richmond. Prince of Wales, 1910; King Edward VIII, January 1936, abdicated December 1936; created Duke of Windsor 1937; married Wallis Simpson 1937; died in Paris 1972.

  Albert (1895-1952), ‘Bertie’. Born on 14 December at Sandringham. Duke of York, 1920; married Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, 1923; King George VI 1936; died at Sandringham 1952.

  Mary, Princess Royal (1897-1965). Born on 25 April at Sandringham. Married Viscount Lascelles, later Earl of Harewood, 1922. Died 1965.

  Henry (1900-1974). Born on 31 March at Sandringham. Created Duke of Gloucester 1928. Married Lady Alice Montagu-Douglas-Scott in 1935. Died in 1974.

  George (1902-1942). Born on 20 December 1902 at Sandringham. Created Duke of Kent in 1934. Married Princess Marina of Greece 1934. Killed on active service in 1942.

  John (1905-1919). Born on 12 July at Sandringham. Died at Wood Farm, Sandringham in 1919.

  CHAPTER ONE

  EARLY DAYS OF A PRINCE

  Shortly before Easter in 1863, a round-faced, slight young man and his bride of less than a month descended from their carriage at the extraordinary brick and stone porch of Sandringham Hall. The porch itself was an incongruent addition to the white stucco front of the house, and around and beyond the building stretched some 7,000 neglected acres of the estate. The young man was Albert Edward, Prince of Wales – and consequently heir to the throne of England – and his lovely bride was Princess Alexandra of Denmark. They were moving into their own home after a week’s honeymoon at Osborne on the Isle of Wight, which had been lent to them by Queen Victoria. This event signalled their entry into an independent lifestyle and by any standards they must be considered a singularly fortunate couple. Yet the Prince’s twenty-one year road to this point in his life had not always been easy and, if we are to understand his feelings as he took up residence at the Hall, we should pause to trace his early life.

  Two years earlier the Prince, then nearly twenty years of age, was completing his education, to which he had displayed a steady resistance to the system devised in his childhood by Baron Stockmar, the confidant of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, the boy’s parents. ‘If he does not like books he must be made to like them,’1 wrote the Baron, who had gained a remarkable ascendancy over the Royal parents. He was convinced that they were too young to direct their eldest son’s education, and that it was their ‘sacred duty’ to consult the most eminent persons in the land. Frivolity of any kind was a corrupting influence: the example of the sons of George III must be avoided at all costs; and Stockmar’s scheme must have satisfied the most anxious parent. Five hours of study a day was to be imposed and ‘an attempt was made to mould him, in isolation from his contemporaries, into a moral and intellectual paragon.’2 Such a system appealed to the parents, who were only too conscious that their son would in all likelihood one day succeed his mother.

  At the age of seven and a half, the Prince of Wales commenced his education under a team of tutors headed by a Mr Henry Birch, and quickly found himself in an atmosphere of unrelenting pressure. He would have enjoyed shorter hours and longer holidays had he been at any normal preparatory school in the country. Relaxation came only on Sundays and birthdays, and when the Court moved from London or Windsor. Mr Birch’s task was unenviable: his pupil’s behaviour was erratic, varying from insolence to apathy, and the tutor noted that ‘the want of contact with other boys’ and lack of competition accounted for many of his
problems. There was little of what might be termed positive encouragement, yet he still had an affectionate and amiable disposition.

  Mr Birch was succeeded by Frederick Gibbs, a fine scholar, who obeyed the first instructions of his Royal employers and increased his charge’s labours to six and even, at one time, seven hours a day. The Queen told Gibbs to observe him closely, noting that he ‘hangs his head and looks at his feet, and invariably within a day or two has one of his fits of nervous and unmanageable temper.’3 That these were signs of acute exhaustion was confirmed by extracts from Gibbs’ diary in 29 January 1852:

  Mr Leitch the drawing master came. P. of W. very angry with P. Alfred and pulled his hair brandishing a paper-knife…

  Feb 28. I had to do some arithmetic with the P. of W. Immediately he became passionate, the pencil was flung to the end of the room, the stool was kicked away and he was hardly able to apply at all… Next day… he became violently angry because I wanted some Latin done.4

  Mr Birch’s diagnosis of the Prince’s problems was not shared by the Queen. Both she and Prince Albert were suspicious of the morality of boys in general. Occasionally, at Windsor, a few very carefully selected pupils from Eton were invited to the Castle where, in Prince Albert’s presence, they would listen to improving talk. Prince Albert, one of these boys noted, seemed ‘a proud, shy, stand-offish man, not calculated to make friends easily with children. I was frightened to death of him.’5 Understandably, Prince Albert’s own early life in Germany had been in sharp contrast to the democratic ways of an English boarding school, and he viewed the pupils of Eton with distrust.