ABSTRACT
‘The History of Edward VIII’, the king’s leading biographer has rightly observed, ‘is the history of an Abdication.’ And the history of the abdication is in many respects the history of Edward’s childhood and earliest years. His father’s decision to send him to the Royal Naval College at Osborne in 1907 did not improve things in the least. Without doubt George V was the most significant figure in Edward’s life largely because he tried to stop him from growing up, and he succeeded – with catastrophic results. Edward was instantly attracted by her honesty and frankness. It was the plaintive cry of the battered three-year-old to his implacable yet perversely loving nurse, who spoiled him and then reduced him to tears before presenting him to his mother.
