After falling out with Goering in 1941, von Kresse transferred to his old East Prussian regiment and accepted a demotion to colonel in time to participate in the invasion of the Soviet Union. He fought there and in North Africa, where he was wounded and received several additional decorations.
Promoted again to general, he was reassigned to Paris in 1943 as a staff officer. It was at that time that Whitney Ransom de Mornay became his lover.
He was implicated in the 1944 generals’ plot to kill Hitler and found guilty by a Nazi tribunal in absentia, but by that time he and Whitney de Mornay had disappeared. Neither the German nor the allied authorities were ever able to learn of their whereabouts, or their fate.
AUTHOR’S NOTE AND SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY
This is a work of fiction. There never was a Dutch Lage Lander shipping line with a vessel named the Wilhelmina, and in 1935, Edward, Prince of Wales, never made an Atlantic crossing on such a vessel in the company of Mrs. Wallis Warfield Simpson or anyone else in his entourage. The ocean liner and its dire circumstances, like many of the passengers aboard, were created for the purposes of the plot and the story.
But, that accepted, it should be noted that this work of fiction is intended as a historical novel in the fullest sense of that term. Its characters and their circumstances have been drawn as true to life and to their times as years of research can make possible. The goal has been to bring the period preceding and presaging World War II into sharp focus and to provide the reader with a realistic look at some of the people and the events that ultimately propelled the world into the greatest tragedy of modern human history.
Eight of the major characters in this book are fictional. Excepting ship’s company and some of the newsmen depicted in scenes set in Paris, New York, and Madrid, all the others were real people who possessed qualities that have herein been attributed to them.
There were terrible riots in Paris at this time and a woman was killed on the balcony of the Hotel Crillon. Prince Edward and his entourage were touring the continent in the fall of 1935 and the outbreak of the Abyssinian crisis and other unrest in Europe did cause some concern for His Royal Highness’s safety. Though Edward did not make an Atlantic crossing in 1935, he completed one in similar circumstances a decade before with the Mountbattens and others who appear on the Wilhelmina with him in this story. In the company of Mrs. Simpson and others in this cast of characters, Edward did gain considerable notoriety for taking self-indulgent cruises on the Nahlin and other leased or borrowed yachts.
Edward was a hero to his people and demonstrated a deep concern for those victimized by the Great Depression. But he was equally a weak, spoiled, immature, and superficial person whose principal interest was in his own pleasure, whether that meant playing the bagpipes or silly games with wine bottles and matchsticks. His anti-Semitism and attraction to Nazi Germany are well documented. He actually uttered words about freeing Europe from “the tentacles of the Jews” at a dinner party in France in the 1950’s—ten years after Nuremberg!
Mrs. Simpson did have shabby origins. Her mother did run a boarding house in Baltimore and Wallis did support herself in China by playing cards and sponging off friends. There is ample evidence that she did not truly love Prince Edward but became ensnared in a monstrous trap created by her own relentless social ambitions and his selfish folly.
Edwina Mountbatten’s infidelities and Nancy Cunard’s rebelliousness and madness have been well-recorded. The same is true of Duff Cooper’s drinking and philandering. His wife, Lady Diana Cooper, was one of the most written about women of the twentieth century. The character of Chips Channon was drawn largely from his own widely read published diaries. His remarks about Jews in this novel, for example, were taken from his own actual statements.
Charles Lindbergh was away from his home and family at the time this story takes place and did relocate to England and Germany two months later. Though the greatness of his achievements cannot be diminished, he was well known for an immature streak and a penchant for practical jokes.
Hermann Goering was every bit the Nazi monster he’s remembered as, but historians have speculated on his lack of support for a two-front war, and his withdrawal from active military leadership in the major decisions of the conflict after his failure in the Battle of Britain has been well documented.
There was an Alice de Janzé from Chicago. She did shoot her lover and herself in a Paris railroad station and did finally manage to commit suicide in Kenya a decade and a half later.
A substantial amount of the research for this book involved personal interviews and perusals of personal papers and diaries, but other books and published sources were relied upon greatly as well. What follows is a selective bibliography of works that might prove useful to those interested in the period, people, and subjects examined in this novel:
The Abdication of King Edward VIII, by Lord Beaverbrook (Atheneum, 1968).
Ace of the Iron Cross, by Ernst Udet, (Ace Books, 1970).
The Airman and the Carpenter, by Ludovic Kennedy (Viking, 1985).
American Facts and Dates, edited by Gorton Carruth and Associates (Thomas Y. Crowell Company, 1970).
The American Heritage History of World War I (Bonanza Books, 1982).
Atlas of the First World War, by Martin Gilbert (Dorset Press, 1970).
Berlin Diary, by William L. Shirer (Bonanza Books, 1984).
Charles A. Lindbergh: An American Life, edited by Tom D. Crouch (Smithsonian Institution Press, 1977).
Chips: The Diaries of Sir Henry Channon (Penguin, 1970).
Diana Cooper, by Philip Ziegler (Alfred A. Knopf, 1982).
Duchess: The Story of Wallis Warfield Windsor, by Stephen Birmingham (Little, Brown and Company, 1981).
Edwina: Countess Mountbatten of Burma, by Richard Hough (William Morrow, 1984).
Edward VIII: The Road to Abdication, by Frances Donaldson (J. B. Lippincott, 1974).
Ernest Hemingway: Selected Letters, edited by Carlos Baker (Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1981).
Eight Chicago Women and Their Fashions: 1860–1929 (Chicago Historical Society, 1978).
The First War Planes, edited by Andrew Kershaw (Phoebus, 1971).
Fighter, by Bryan Cooper and John Batchelor (Ballantine Books, 1973).
The French Foreign Legion, by John Robert Young (Thames and Hudson, 1984).
The German Army: 1933–1945, by Albert Seaton (St. Martin’s Press, 1982).
Germans, by George Bailey (Avon Books, 1972).
The German Wars, by D. J. Goodspeed (Bonanza Books, 1985).
The Hemingway Women, by Bernice Kert, (W. W. Norton, 1983).
Hitler’s Generals and Their Battles, edited by Christopher Chant (Chartwell Books, 1984).
In War’s Dark Shadow, by W. Bruce Lincoln (Dial Press, 1983).
The Letters of Evelyn Waugh, edited by Mark Amory (Penguin, 1980).
Matriarch, by Anne Edwards (William Morrow, 1984).
Mein Kampf, by Adolf Hitler (Houghton Mifflin, 1971).
Mountbatten: A Biography, by Philip Ziegler (Alfred A. Knopf, 1985).
A Moveable Feast, by Ernest Hemingway (Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1964).
Nancy Cunard, by Anne Chisholm (Penguin Books, 1981).
Nancy Mitford: A Biography, by Selina Hastings (E. P. Dutton, 1985).
Nazi Europe (Marshall Cavendish Books, 1984).
The Nightmare Years: 1930–1940, by William Shirer (Little, Brown and Company, 1984).
On the Continent: 1936 (Fodor’s Travel Guides, 1985).
Once Upon a Time, by Gloria Vanderbilt, Alfred A. Knopf, 1985.
The Only Way to Cross, by John Maxtone-Graham (Collier Books, 1972).
Paris: The Glamour Years, by Tony Allan (Gallery Books, 1977).
The Penguin Dictionary of Modern History, by Alan Palmer (Penguin Books, 1983).
The Prussian Orden Pour le Merite: History of the Blue Max, by David Edkins (Ajay Enterprises, 1981).
Queen Elizabeth: A Portrait of the
Queen Mother, by Penelope Mortimer (St. Martin’s Press, 1986).
Queen Mary: The Cunard White Star Quadruple-Screw Liner (Bonanza Books, 1979).
Return to Albion: Americans in England, 1760–1940, by Richard Kenin (National Portrait Gallery, 1979).
The Red Baron, by Manfred von Richthofen (Ace Books, 1969).
Strange and Fascinating Facts About the Royal Family, by Graham and Heather Fisher (Bell, 1985).
Wind, Sand, and Stars, by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (Harcourt, Brace, 1967).
Winged Warfare, by Lt. Col. William A. Bishop (Ace Books, 1967).
The Wisdom of the Sands, by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry (The University of Chicago Press, 1979).
World War I, by S. L. A. Marshall (American Heritage Press, 1985).
World War II Almanac: 1931–1945, by Robert Goralski (Bonanza Books, 1981).
Wallis and Edward: Letters 1931–1937, edited by Michael Bloch (Summit Books, 1986).
War Within and Without, by Anne Morrow Lindbergh (A Helen and Kurt Wolff Book, 1980).
White Mischief: The Murder of Lord Erroll, by James Fox (Random House, 1982).
Who’s Who in Nazi Germany, by Robert Wistrich (Bonanza Books, 1984).
Who’s Who in the Royal House of Windsor, by Kenneth Rose (Crescent Books, 1985).
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I am most grateful to my friend Cleveland Amory—by far my superior as a journalist and author—for the guidance, anecdotes, character assessments, and encouragement he provided me in the preparation of this book. As he demonstrated in his tour de force Who Killed Society? some years ago, he has preempted this field. The definitive book on the ill-fated Windsors can only be written by Cleveland. I hope someday he will write it.
Marian Probst, Cleveland’s longtime associate and a wonderful friend, provided similar encouragement and help and I am truly thankful.
The research for this novel included a number of very useful and fortuitous conversations with people familiar with the Windsors or other individuals who appear as characters in the book.
I must count among them a short chat with His Royal Highness, Prince Charles of Great Britain, at a private reception in 1986. Though by long-held custom the contents of such conversations cannot be made public, I can say that His Highness proved helpful in clarifying the status of two of the principals in this story with the rest of the Royal Family.
Author Gore Vidal, who like Mr. Amory knew the late Duke and Duchess of Windsor, was also of assistance. Describing the Duke as “radiantly ignorant on almost every subject,” he made it clear he was fonder of her than of him, but Vidal underscored a theme of this book in relating her complaint to him about “how empty and useless were their lives.”
Aline, Countess of Romanones, was perhaps the Duchess’s best friend, and, to this author’s view, is far more the aristocrat, though born an American commoner as well. She would strongly disagree with the portrayal of Mrs. Simpson herein, but did during an afternoon’s conversation give me some very useful guidance on the duke’s conduct and demeanor and helped steer me clear of some inaccuracies derived from other sources.
Mrs. Brooke Astor of New York, who knew many of those in Prince Edward’s entourage, made some keen character observations concerning them and advised on the superior qualities of Duff and Diana Cooper. Lady Diana appeared as a character in Mrs. Astor’s recent novel, The Last Blossom on the Plum Tree. Lady Diana unfortunately died a few weeks after the novel’s publication in 1986.
Andy McElhone, proprietor of the original and legendary Harry’s New York Bar at “Sank Roo Da Noo,” was the source of some wonderful information and anectdotes about Paris in the 1930s, as well as about some of the characters who appear in this novel.
I am also deeply indebted to an old friend, Mme. Christiana Kochert MacDonald of Paris, and a new one, Mlle. Marie-Gabrielle Schecher, for a much deeper and more knowledgeable appreciation of that magic city.
Nicholas Rayner and Diana Leavitt of Sotheby’s were extremely helpful with data about the Duchess of Windsor’s jewels and details about the couple’s courtship and later life.
I am also grateful to Francis Cornish and John Hughes of the British Embassy in Washington for information concerning royal protocol and the ways of British royalty.
Friendship, advice, and support came from many sources: my colleagues Lisa Anderson and James Coates of the Chicago Tribune, Sugar Rautbord of Chicago and Dianne deWitt of New York, Tex and Jean Harris of Washington, and Heather Vickers-Smith of Berryville, Virginia.
I am enormously grateful to my friend and editor Thomas Dunne of St. Martin’s and my friend and literary accomplice Dominick Abel of New York—and to Margaret Schwarzer and Sandy Wolf of St. Martin’s as well. My thanks to Little, Brown and Company publishers for permission to reprint Lady Diana’s remarks as an epigraph.
This book grew out of a conversation fifteen years ago with a wonderful English friend and legendary newsman, Reuter correspondent Ronald Batchelor, and from his subsequent loan of Chips Channon’s diaries. I wish so much he were alive to read Dance on a Sinking Ship today.
As always, I am deeply grateful to my wife, Pamela, and sons, Eric and Colin, as only they can know.
She made him look good, that was her great talent. She made him appear brighter than he was. I got into it because of Wallis—he invited people to Fort Belvedere and on the Nahlin to keep her company. I liked her, but we were never intimate, we never talked about any love affair. In the long run, it’s been a blessing. He would not have been a good king.… We were lucky to get George VI and Elizabeth—they were by far the better loved in the end. Of course all the royal family were pro-German in the beginning. After all, they were German. Old Queen Mary could barely speak English, which most people don’t realize—she was always working with tutors. But the duke was the worst. He’d make terrible anti-Semitic remarks. Sir Ernest Cassel was one of his grandfather’s best friends, but whenever his name came up the duke would say, “What can you expect from the Jews?” And Sir Ernest’s granddaughter was married to Dickie Mountbatten, the duke’s own cousin! Whenever he talked like that, I’d shut my trap. Wallis never talked that way, to give her credit. Yes, in the end it was a blessing that Wallis came along and took him away.
—LADY DIANA COOPER, 1979
The defiant hilarity of a dance on a sinking ship.
—ALEXANDER WOOLLCOTT
All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 1988 by Michael Kilian
Grateful acknowledgement is made for permission to quote from “The Wreathe,” a poem by Nancy Cunard, first published in The Outlaws. Copyright © 1921 by W. H. Allen, Ltd.
Cover design by Mauricio Díaz
ISBN: 978-1-5040-1833-3
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