Queen Bees: Six Brilliant and Extraordinary Society Hostesses Between the Wars – a Spectacle of Celebrity, Talent, and Burning Ambition

by Siân Evans

  One of her swan-song parties in Chelsea was very poignant; on 10 June 1936 Edward VIII and Mrs Simpson were her principal guests, with Harold Nicolson and Robert Bruce Lockhart, Kenneth and Jane Clark, Lord Berners, the socialite Daisy Fellowes and the heiress Princesse de Polignac. Two gifted and powerful men, Sir Robert Vansittart, Permanent Under-Secretary at the Foreign Office, and the American banker Tom Lamont, head of Wall Street behemoths J. P. Morgan, also attended. Lord Berners had been puzzled when Sibyl had phoned him to say she wanted him to come and meet Arthur. ‘But I thought Arthur was dead?’ he queried, perhaps mindful of Mary Borden’s portrayal of the delusional society hostess in To Meet Jesus Christ, allegedly based on Sibyl. ‘Oh, not my Arthur, she replied, as though that were obvious, ‘Artur Rubinstein’, meaning the virtuoso pianist.

  Dinner went smoothly; Robert Vansittart listened politely to the new King’s enthusiasm for rapprochement with Nazi Germany, and his offer to help bring this about. (As monarch, Edward VIII was required to avoid involvement in and comment on the decisions taken by his democratically elected government.) It was after the meal that the evening started to unravel. Sibyl invited her guests to make themselves comfortable around the drawing room grand piano. Pushy Princesse de Polignac bagged a prime position on a stool right by the instrument; ‘I have never seen a woman sit so firmly: there was determination in every line of her bum’8, wrote Harold Nicolson. Sibyl joined the younger guests on the rug, in an attitude of studied informality; Harold observed that she looked incongruous, as though someone had left an inkstand on the floor.

  When everyone was settled, Rubinstein launched into Chopin’s Barcarolle on the piano. The King was at first nonplussed, then irritated – he had expected the better-known Barcarolle from The Tales of Hoffmann. At the first opportunity he rose, thanked the great musician firmly and went to leave. It was only 10.15, a disaster for Sibyl, but just as Edward VIII reached the front door, Winston Churchill arrived, and they exchanged pleasantries in the hall. Meanwhile, Noel Coward leaped to the piano and embarked on his exuberant song, ‘Mad Dogs and Englishmen’. Hearing music more to his taste, the King changed his mind and returned to the party, staying till 1 a.m., and the evening was salvaged.

  With a heavy heart Sibyl put Argyll House and most of its contents up for sale. Virginia Woolf visited her there on 27 October 1936 and was horrified to find that every household item and piece of furniture had been ticketed by the auctioneers, and would-be buyers were picking over the material remains of Sibyl’s former life. The two women sought refuge in the drawing room, and Woolf wrote of Sibyl: ‘She looked old and ill and haggard lines were grooved as if with a chisel on either side of her nose. I felt extremely sorry for her. We were like two survivors clinging to a raft. This was the end of all her parties; we were sitting in the ruins of that magnificent structure which had borne so lately the royal crown on top.’9

  Sibyl moved into a more economical, much smaller house in Lord North Street in Westminster, where she continued to entertain. Now her guests were wedged tightly together on small gilt chairs in the pretty, bijou dining room, elbow to elbow, but the conversation continued to be fascinating, and Sibyl’s ability to trawl for talent was unsurpassed. Most friends were sympathetic about her gallant struggle to keep going in reduced circumstances; at the end of 1936 Harold Nicolson organised a ‘Sibyl fund’ to provide her with an all-expenses-paid three-week trip to New York.

  Wallis Simpson had faintly scandalised ‘Chips’ Channon when, shortly after the death of George V, while the nation was still in mourning, she remarked that the last time she had worn black stockings was while dancing the Can-Can. Lady Astor’s footman Gordon Grimmett recalled the sycophantic crowd who hung on her every word; he offered Wallis a choice of cocktails – one called Paradise, the other a White Lady – at a party. ‘“Huh,” she said, “whoever heard of a white lady being in Paradise?” It was not, I think you’ll agree, the funniest remark of the year, yet the circle around her screamed with laughter and clapped their hands as though she was the greatest wit since Oscar Wilde,’10 he recalled.

  Emerald and Sibyl competed fiercely to be Wallis’s main confidante between 1935 and 1936. Mrs Simpson and the King alternated between the rival hostesses. Very shortly after the death of George V, in February 1936, Wallis wrote to her Aunt Bessie, describing a weekend at the home of the new King; she mentioned in passing Emerald Cunard, ‘who thinks she is the Prime Minister’. Early in April, Wallis held a dinner party at the Simpsons’ apartment at Bryanston Court, and the hostesses’ egos clashed in the confined, enclosed space. Naturally, Wallis’s guest of honour was the King, and she had also invited Margot Asquith (Lady Oxford), Sibyl Colefax and Emerald Cunard, each of whom had apparently anticipated spending a cosy and intimate evening with the monarch and his lady friend, without competition, according to a fellow guest, Harold Nicolson: ‘It is evident that Lady Cunard is incensed by the presence of Lady Colefax, and that Lady Colefax is furious that Lady Cunard should also have been asked. Lady Oxford appears astonished to find either of them at what was to have been a quite intimate party. The King passes brightly from group to group.’11

  In the summer of 1936 Mrs Simpson acted as the King’s hostess at an official dinner, which irritated the guests of honour, the Duke and Duchess of York. Winston Churchill, a guest on this occasion, raised the thorny conversational topic of the mistresses of former kings, and then embarked on a lecture about the Wars of the Roses in the fifteenth century, between the royal houses of York and Lancaster. ‘That was a long time ago!’ snapped the Duchess, but Winston’s point struck home; Elizabeth’s brother-in-law often used the title of the Duke of Lancaster when hoping to pass incognito – in fact, he had chartered the use of a magnificent yacht, the Nahlin, to sail the Mediterranean later that summer, using that name as a disguise.

  The Yorks retreated to Scotland for their summer holiday; meanwhile the King and Mrs Simpson, Emerald Cunard and the Duff Coopers sailed in luxury along the Dalmatian coast, around the Greek islands and to Istanbul; the cruise lasted from 10 August till 6 September. The King even invited a surprised Ernest Simpson to accompany the trip, though he tactfully declined, once again pleading pressure of work. The shipmates spent their time exploring, sunbathing and swimming. They lunched with Edward’s cousin King George of Greece and his British-born lover, Rosemary Brittain-Jones. They were both divorced, and after lunch Wallis asked why they did not marry. She was told that, as Rosemary was a commoner and was still seen as a married woman, because her former husband was still alive, she could not marry the monarch. Rosemary’s situation was not unlike that of Wallis herself.

  The traditional royal visit to Balmoral could not be postponed indefinitely, and the new King arrived there in September. Wallis joined him, and the stoutly conservative royal household was horrified by her proprietorial approach. ‘All this tartan’s gotta go’, she allegedly said, and Edward economised by sacking many of the elderly retainers. The Yorks came over for dinner, and when Wallis approached Elizabeth to welcome her, the Duchess swept past her, announcing loudly, ‘I came to dine with the King’.

  Relations reached a new low between the ‘Yorkists’ and the ‘new Edwardians’. Influential people sided with one faction or the other. The Yorks were not invited to Emerald Cunard’s or Sibyl Colefax’s lunches and dinners, and those who supported them had no expectation of mixing socially with the King. Emerald scoffed at the idea of the Yorks having a ‘set’ of their own to rival those brilliant creatures around the King and Mrs Simpson. However, she was not immune to criticism; ‘Chips’ was shocked when Emerald showed him an anonymous note she had received in the post, which began: ‘You old bitch, trying to make up to Mrs Simpson, in order to curry favour with the King.’

  Lady Londonderry had no personal animosity against Wallis Simpson, but as a member of the British aristocracy and the wife of a senior politician she felt she had to intervene. She had often invited the Duke and Duchess of York to her receptions, and
the Prince of Wales, but had ignored the rumours she heard about Wallis and left the Simpsons off her guest list. It was 3 November 1936 before she received a message from Buckingham Palace asking if Mrs Simpson could be invited to her customary Eve-of-Parliament reception, which was to be held that evening at Londonderry House. She complied, as it was impossible to refuse a direct request that obviously came from the King. A few days later, at a party at Emerald Cunard’s home on 6 November 1936, Edith explained to Wallis that the British public would never accept a divorced woman as the wife of their king. Wallis wrote to her the next day, thanking her for her advice, and promised to speak to ‘a certain person’ along the lines she had suggested. Of course, Edith may have had moral objections too; she was a firm believer in the indissoluble sanctity of marriage, so in 1934, when her daughter Margaret had announced that she intended to marry Alan Muntz, a divorced man, she was appalled; ‘He offers her a soiled life’, she complained.

  Lady Astor also knew the Prince of Wales socially; he appreciated her irreverent, lively style and had admired her resilience and loyalty in dealing with the imprisonment for homosexual offences of her son Bobbie in 1931. In 1933 they publicly competed in a round of golf at a charity event, and she tactfully let him win. At a dull fundraising dinner she livened proceedings and raised a laugh by telling the startled assembly that, if they did not give generously enough to meet that evening’s target, HRH had authorised all the preceding speeches to be repeated. In 1936 she was indignant that for his first official dinner as King, he had invited Lady Cunard and Mr and Mrs Simpson, who she saw as ‘disintegrating influences’, and felt that only the best Virginian families (such as her own) were worthy of being received in the highest circles. She was particularly keen to have Mrs Simpson’s name kept out of the Court Circular, in order to protect the dignity of both the United States and the British Empire. Her maid, Rose, found her attitude surprising; after all, Nancy (like Wallis) had divorced her first husband because he had been a volatile alcoholic, and had subsequently married a titled millionaire. Perhaps she feared British public opinion might turn against ‘pushy’ American divorcées, and so regarded Wallis as a threat to her own standing. Whatever her motives, Nancy Astor was adamant that Mrs Simpson should not become queen.

  By the autumn of 1936 the society photographer Cecil Beaton, who had dismissed Wallis as ‘brawny and raw-boned’ when he met her in 1930, had been engaged to photograph her at his studio. This time he found her ‘bright and witty, improved in looks and chic’12. The reason for his change in attitude was transparent: ‘Today she is sought after as the probable wife of the King. Even the old Edwardians receive her, if she happens to be free to accept their invitations. American newspapers have already announced the engagement and in the highest court circles there is great consternation. It is said that Queen Mary weeps constantly.’

  Most British people were blissfully ignorant of the drama unfolding around the king, but in certain circles gossip was rife. The Simpsons separated, and Wallis sued Ernest for divorce, ironically on the grounds of his infidelity. Her decree nisi was discreetly granted in Ipswich on 27 October; ‘King’s Moll Reno’d in Wolsey’s Home Town’ trumpeted the Chicago Sun–Times. Edith Londonderry and Sibyl Colefax wrote Wallis letters of support. Meanwhile the British press maintained a tight-lipped silence on the topic of the monarch’s love life. One magazine, Cavalcade, profiled Mrs Simpson without mentioning the King. The same publication claimed that an (unnamed) London hostess had imposed a fine of five shillings on any guest discussing the King’s ‘non-state activities’ in front of the servants. Censors excised any articles and photographs in foreign publications destined for Britain if they mentioned the romance. Political pressure was put on the King by Stanley Baldwin to renounce Mrs Simpson; he warned that the government would resign and the press would no longer be restrained from attacking them both. The King refused, saying he was determined to marry her. The King installed Wallis in a decorous mansion in Regent’s Park, where her friends such as ‘Chips’, Sibyl and Emerald would visit for tea. Sibyl tried to persuade Wallis to recommend Colefax & Fowler to the King, as decorators for Fort Belvedere. Wallis, with admirable restraint, was non-committal; both she and the King had other, more pressing, priorities.

  The constitutional position was complicated; in essence, the wife of the King automatically became the Queen on marriage. But could the King, as Defender of the Faith (nominal head of the Church of England), marry a twice-divorced woman? Winston Churchill, whose own mother was the American-born veteran of a number of marriages, wondered aloud why the King could not have his ‘cutie’. Noel Coward succinctly replied: ‘Because the British people will not stand for a Queen Cutie.’

  The American journalist H. L. Mencken described the romance as ‘the greatest story since the Crucifixion’, and inevitably the truth finally erupted. On 1 December the Bishop of Bradford, a Dr Blunt, mildly criticised the King for neglecting his Christian duty. The cleric had meant that the monarch should attend church more often, but that detail was lost in the cacophony, and ‘The Blunt Instrument’, as it was known at the time, opened the floodgates. Baldwin met the King on 2 December, giving him a stark choice: either to renounce Wallis, or else to abdicate. The Duke and Duchess of York returned to London from Scotland early on the morning of 3 December. As they stepped from the train at Euston, they could not miss the newspaper posters trumpeting ‘The King’s Marriage’ in letters 12 inches high. Wallis fled to France the same afternoon, seeking refuge with her old friends Herman and Katherine Rogers in Cannes.

  The startled British public read about their King’s all-consuming love for someone of whom they had never heard. On 5 December the Evening Standard published an article by George Bernard Shaw, who whimsically opined that a twice-married lady would make an excellent wife for a previously unmarried king. So gripping was the crisis that on 5 December the Londonderrys cancelled their weekend house party in County Durham to stay in London. Edith wrote to the Duchess of York, suggesting Queen Mary should make known her opinion on the situation. Elizabeth replied on 7 December thanking her, and admitting she and Bertie felt ‘miserable’, but stating that Queen Mary had to stay calm and impartial.

  The crisis provoked two contrasting reactions in British society, according to Harold Nicolson. The upper classes were unhappy that Mrs Simpson was American, but they tended not to object to her being a divorcée. By contrast the middle and lower classes cared little for her nationality but couldn’t accept the fact she had two husbands still living. The general public response was summed up by that season’s alternative Christmas carol:

  Hark, the herald angels sing,

  Mrs Simpson’s pinched our King

  December 1936 was the lowest point of what had been a turbulent year for the House of Windsor. The Cabinet and Baldwin met on the morning of Friday 4 December and rejected Edward VIII’s proposals to broadcast to the nation announcing his desire for a morganatic marriage to Wallis, which would make her his wife but not the nation’s queen, with the circular argument that, as his advisers, they were obliged to counsel him against making such a speech. The King was now left with two alternatives: renunciation or abdication.

  The same day Duff Cooper lunched with Emerald Cunard, who was excited but had no grasp of the constitutional issues at stake and did not comprehend why Edward and Wallis could not now marry and reign together. However, within days Emerald started to have doubts, and tried to cover up her role in fostering the affair between Edward and Wallis. On 9 December 1936 Harold Nicolson wrote to Vita Sackville-West:

  I forget whether I told you of Emerald’s great betrayal? She came to Maggie Greville and said, ‘Maggie darling, do tell me about this Mrs Simpson – I have only just met her’. That has torn Emerald for me. I would not believe the story if I had not heard it at first hand.13

  Emerald was one of the guests who joined Mrs Greville for lunch at Charles Street on 10 December, along with Lord Berners and the Duchess of Westminster. They
must have had plenty to discuss.

  On 9 December 1936 the Cabinet agreed that the King must go; the following day he signed the Instrument of Abdication and Baldwin presented it to a hushed House of Commons. The Abdication Bill was rushed through both Houses of Parliament on 11 December, and the ex-King broadcast live to the nation the same evening, explaining that he could not continue without the woman he loved, and acclaiming his successor, who had the benefit of a happy marriage and children. In an adjacent tower at Windsor Castle, listening to the radio as her brother-in-law justified his decisions, was Elizabeth, the new Queen. She was in bed with flu, and livid at having her family’s life overturned by ‘that woman’. She had twice refused Bertie’s marriage proposals because she did not want to be a member of the royal family; she had accepted him believing that they and their children would be able to lead largely private lives. Now she was faced with a role that neither she nor her husband wanted, or had been trained for, and their futures were no longer their own.

  The former King Edward VIII shook hands with his aghast brother, the new King George VI, and left immediately for Portsmouth, embarking on the appropriately named HMS Fury with twenty-six suitcases and a Cairn terrier, going into exile. The lovers were obliged to spend the next months apart until Wallis’s divorce became final in April 1937, to avoid any question of collusion in the divorce process, which could threaten her decree absolute. Sibyl Colefax wrote presciently: ‘From being the beloved Prince Charming and the real democrat who could and did understand the people, he goes to live out a life which must become a tragedy, among the gad-abouts of the Riviera and Rio de Janeiro.’14