Although they were contemporaries with only six years between them, Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon and Wallis Warfield were totally unlike in personality and seemed destined to lead very different roles. Elizabeth was the daughter of a Scottish earl and married the Duke of York, second son of King George V. Wallis had emerged from a childhood of financial security in America and had already been through one divorce by the time she met Edward, Prince of Wales, heir to the throne.
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The Duchess of York never trusted Wallis, who became Mrs Simpson on her second marriage, and like the rest of the family she resented her for her increasing domination of Prince Edward. He became King in 1936 on the death of George V, but his refusal to give Mrs Simpson up after her second divorce resulted in his abdication and the succession of the Duke of York as George VI.
Edward and Mrs Simpson were made Duke and Duchess of Windsor, but she was denied the style of Royal Highness – something for which she and the Duke always blamed Queen Elizabeth. The latter always refused to receive the Duchess, and when George VI died at a comparatively early age, the widowed Queen Mother referred to her as ‘the woman who killed my husband'. It was a feud between two determined women which continued until they came face to face in 1967, for the first time in over thirty years.
The review of this Book prepared by John Van der Kiste
