Queen Mary's Wishes

To use Edward of Windsor as a doormat on which aspersions may be wiped was the risky game started by the Archbishop of Canterbury (TIME, Dec. 21), and up to play it last week stepped a great ceremonial official of the Court of St. James, the Garter Principal King of Arms, Sir Gerald Woods Wollaston. While reading a lecture on ceremonial to the Lyceum Club last week, Sir Gerald digressed to wipe Windsor with the charge that King Edward VIII unduly speeded up the funeral of his father King George V. Nowadays the drawing rooms of Mayfair buzz with tidbits of how Edward is supposed to have been a trial to his mother, and Sir Gerald was only serving up the sort of dish scores of swank Britons pass around their teatables. "Indeed it is a fact," sniffed the Garter King of Arms, with stinging implication, "that less time was allowed for funeral arrangements to be made [for George V] than ever before!"

Later that night a telephone jangled far away at Castle Wasserloenburg in Austria with "London calling.'' When the words of the Garter King of Arms had been repeated to Edward of Windsor he exploded: "What a rotten story!"

Then and there Windsor--although not in living memory had a member of his Royal Family been goaded into doing such a thing--prepared a public reply to a public aspersion. Shortly the London Evening Standard, which strongly opposed abdication during the Constitutional Crises (TIME, Feb. 1), was authorized by Windsor to quote him thus:

"I came up to London from, Sandringham the day after my father's death [Jan. 20, 1936] to convey the express desire of my mother that the funeral should take place on Jan. 28. She was most anxious to avoid a long and painful delay, like that of two weeks which elapsed between the death and burial of my grandfather, King Edward VII.

"There were about 30 people at an informal meeting which was held in my dining room at York House about 5 or 5:30 on the afternoon of Tuesday, Jan. 21. I called the meeting in order to discuss the funeral arrangements, and those present represented all the necessary authorities who would be concerned.

"Among those present were representatives of the three services and of the Police, the Earl Marshal, Sir Gerald Wollaston, and I think, Lord Wigram.

"My brother, the present King, was also there.

"I told the meeting of my mother's desire that the funeral should take place on Jan. 28. "All present, with the exception of Sir Gerald Wollaston, agreed that everything could be arranged for Tuesday, Jan. 28, a week from the day of our meeting.

"Since that date suited the convenience of everyone else, I had to tell Sir Gerald that he must expedite his part of the arrangements, so that the funeral would take place on that day.

"I said, 'I'm very sorry, but if everyone else says it can be arranged, we must do everything we can to follow the Queen's wishes in this matter.'

"I had to speak quite sharply to Sir Gerald on the subject.

"The next day I went back to Sandringham. I told my mother, Queen Mary, that I had arranged the matter as she had wished, and she thanked me for what I had done.

"I know that my mother would confirm the fact that it was her wish that the funeral should take place on that day and that the King would agree that opposition to the proposal was confined to Sir Gerald Wollaston."

In startled London, no effort was made to get the Queen Mother to furnish such confirmation, but neither new King George nor anyone else denied that his elder brother had given history the correct version of who was responsible for expediting his father's funeral, and shame was upon the Garter King of Arms. That night Sir Gerald Wollaston had been slated to attend a dinner at which his place was just across the table from the Duke of Kent. Since Kent is just about Windsor's most loyal friend in the Royal Family, a scene loomed as unavoidable--until suddenly Sir Gerald wilted, sent word that he would be unable to come. Just before the guests sat down, his place card was whisked off the table.

"If any distress has been caused to the Duke, I greatly regret it," winced the Garter King of Arms, when confronted by newshawks. "I recollect that the Duke [when King] did say something to the effect that it was his mother's wish that the funeral should be concluded in a week to avoid prolonged distress to the Royal Family. ... I meant no sort of disrespect to the Duke of Windsor."

Not in disgrace with Their Majesties, the Garter King of Arms next day performed his usual functions in Buckingham Palace at the third and last Court of the present London season. For the first time at one of these Courts, bonny and buxom Queen Elizabeth wore the lower part of her new State Crown placed on her head at the Coronation (TIME, May 24). This blazed with the 106-carat Kohinoor diamond once in the State Crown of Queen Mary who, not present at last week's Court, recently appeared wearing a mortarboard when she graciously laid at Oxford the cornerstone of an extension of the famed Bodleian Library. If she liked, the Queen Mother could sign herself Mary, LL.D., D.C.L., Mus.D. Palace gossip had it that it was excitable Randolph Churchill, journalistic son of Statesman Winston Churchill, who had aroused Edward of Windsor about the Garter King of Arms last week.

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