On 4th July 1940, with the possible threat of a German invasion, Winston Churchill drafted a memo to the prime ministers of the Dominions: ‘The activities of the Duke of Windsor on the Continent in recent months have been causing HM and myself grave uneasiness as his inclinations are well known to be pro-Nazi and he may become a centre of intrigue.’
As a result, the new Prime Minister had decided to offer the former king the Governorship of the Bahamas – he had not mentioned in his memo that the alternative was a court martial.
And so the Duke and Duchess of Windsor were exiled to the Caribbean for the duration of the war.
The Duke and Duchess of Windsor outside Government House in Nassau in 1942
It was announced that the Duke was going to be Governor of Bahamas in July 1940
The new Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, had decided to offer the Governorship of the Bahamas to the Duke of Windsor. The alternative was a court martial
There was grave uneasiness as the Duke’s inclinations were known to be pro-Nazi. The Duke and Duchess are pictured alongside Adolf Hitler in 1937
Duke and Duchess of Windsor enter the government building in Nassau in 1940
Busy at work at Government House in the Bahamas – a picture taken around 1940
Their time there has been little examined until now.
Tomorrow sees the broadcast of a Channel 5 documentary ‘Edward & Wallis: The Bahamas Scandal – Revealed’ based on my book Traitor King and a tranche of newly-discovered documents, many from the Duke’s confidential file in the Royal Archives opened for me.
On some points, the Windsors emerge better than expected. The duke fought to improve the lot of the majority black population, for example. Wallis was a volunteer at children’s clinics.
But when it comes to the loyalty of the Windsors, the picture is deeply unflattering.
This is a couple who continued to maintain contacts with known German agents and lobbied to keep America out of the war.
The programme reveals how Peter Russell – later Professor of Spanish studies at Oxford – was charged to monitor the couple prior to their coming to the Bahamas and was ‘under orders to shoot them’ if they agreed to German overtures to become a puppet British king.
A newly-discovered ‘Most Secret’ telegram describes the extensive and meticulous German plans to help the Windsors retrieve their belongings from their Paris home and how Wallis’s favourite Nile-green swimsuit was repatriated from their home in the South of France under what came to be called Operation Cleopatra Whim.
It also describes their extravagant spending at a time of rationing: they insisted on Government House being redecorated at the height of the Battle of Britain when every penny of government spending was going into aircraft production – and how British officials questioned how the couple financed their lavish lifestyle.
A ‘Most Secret’ Foreign Office telegram, which I recently discovered in the British National Archives, asks how the couple’s American bank account had suddenly in one year grown from $1,197 to $29,931, especially given wartime exchange control regulations.
There is new information on how the Duke attempted to shut down the murder of Harry Oakes, was complicit in trying to send an innocent man to the gallows, and reveals that an FBI report and Scotland Yard file on the murder remain closed to this day.
FBI files show not only the huge extent of surveillance of the couple – personally ordered by Roosevelt – and suspicions of their continuing links to the Nazi regime, but also how Windsor was being blackmailed by a former mistress and how the duke persuaded the FBI to investigate a journalist who had written a critical portrait of the couple.
The Duke and Duchess at the Waldorf Astoria in New York, two months before America joined the war
The Duke and Duchess host the annual inspection of the Bahamas branch of the Red Cross, of which the Duchess was president. Wallis volunteered at children’s clinics
Preparing to enter magistrate’s court for the preliminary hearing in the case of Alfred de Mariog, charged with murdering Sir Harry Oakes, are Captain Edward Melchen and Captain James Barker, both of the Miami Police department
Author and historian Andrew Lownie
But the programme also produces fresh information on the governor’s attempts to improve the economic and social conditions of the 90 per cent black population against opposition from the white business cabal that ran the island and his successful handling of a 1943 riot.
And a much more attractive picture of Wallis is presented showing how she rose to the challenge of being given a job, working tirelessly in children’s clinics and serving in the canteen of the local air base.
The Windsors’ little-known wartime years in the Bahamas have been hitherto over shadowed by the Abdication Crisis but, as the documentary shows, these were also years of scandal.
- Edward & Wallis: The Bahamas Scandal – Revealed, Saturday March 23, 9:15pm – 10:40pm on Channel 5
- Traitor King by Andrew Lownie (Bonnier Books Ltd, £10.99 and £25). To order a copy at special promotional prices of £9.89 (paperback) or £22.50 (hardback) go to www.mailshop.co.uk/books or call 020 3176 2937. Free UK delivery on orders over £25. Promotional price valid until 06/04/2024