What if Edward the VIII Had been allowed to Marry Wallis Simpson And Remain King

[BAYLOR]

What if Stanley Baldwin and the Government had allowed Edward to Marry Wallace Simpson ? He stays on the throne and Baldwin says on as Prime minister . What effect does this have on history timeline going forward?

 

[The Ace]

Elizabeth II becomes Queen in 1972 on the death of her uncle, rather than 1952 on the death of her father.

 

[Ray McCarthy]

Or they are both killed by a bomb / V1 / V2 during WWII and we are back to current time line
Or he decides he hates Kinging ("Reigning" is a bit too strong) and abdicates
Or an enraged subject / Bishop etc assassinates him.

Many things are possible. Real life is often more unlikely than we can imagine.

 

[Ray McCarthy]

Elizabeth II becomes Queen

Isn't she your Lizzie I?

 

[Harpo]

Isn't she your Lizzie I?

 

[The Ace]

Isn't she your Lizzie I?

Only if you still accept James I and II ruled in the 17th Century, rather than the 15th.

The idea is that the highest number is used, and we'll start sticking to it as soon as our Southern neighbours do.

 

[Dinosaur]

The complete irrelevance of the royal family continues slightly ahead of schedule but without the quite so photogenic blitz pictures or of a cute queen to be in uniform.

The current reinvention would be interesting if the heirs were a few steps removed.

 

[BAYLOR]

Okay , this was not the best idea for a thread.

 

[AnyaKimlin]

Hitler would have had more support during the war? Or is that just malicious gossip. Also my grandfather on my dad's side would have had a far tougher war instead of protecting the Duke of Windsor on a Carribean Island.

 

[BAYLOR]

Hitler would have had more support during the war? Or is that just malicious gossip. Also my grandfather on my dad's side would have had a far tougher war instead of protecting the Duke of Windsor on a Carribean Island.

As King, Edward would have been an even bigger headache for Churchill and his government. There is also the possibility that Baldwin not resigning might have meant Churchill never becomes Primes Minister.

 

[BAYLOR]

Elizabeth II becomes Queen in 1972 on the death of her uncle, rather than 1952 on the death of her father.

Unless Edward and Wallace Simpson had somehow produced an heir of their own.

 

[The Ace]

Unless Edward and Wallace Simpson somehow produced an heir of their own.

While History points out that they didn't.

 

[BAYLOR]

While History points out that they didn't.

This is a what if thread.

When they got married Simpson was about 37 years old, so it might have been a possibility.

From a historical standpoint Edward's abdication in favor of his younger brother George was a good thing for Britain.

 

[Ursa major]

I can't help thinking that a more interesting possibility would be that Edward VIII didn't abdicate and didn't marry Wallis Simpson. There'd be all the possibilities of subtle (and not so subtle) changes in the run up to and duration of the War, with a cherry on top: a bitter monarch blaming the political establishment for forcing him to dump the love of his life.

 

[Foxbat]

It would have been a bit awkward having a bitter monarch on the throne. I think a possible scenario would be a bitter monarch unwilling to go out and show his face to boost morale during the war, a British public turning against a monarch who is more or less absent in a time of need, and a growing resentment towards the whole idea of monarchy. Edward VIII may have been the last British king.

 

[Cat's Cradle]

Unless Edward and Wallace Simpson had somehow produced an heir of their own.

While History points out that they didn't.

As an exercise in the grand old game of "What if?" I think Baylor's was a valid and interesting suggestion when he mentioned the historical changes that would have occurred if the pair had had children (with the assumption of course that Edward and Wallis were physically able to have a child). There would have been a lot of pressure on them to produce an heir if they were the King and Queen; they were under no such pressure as Duke and Duchess. My 2cents, CC

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

There would have been a lot of pressure on them to produce an heir if they were the King and Queen

Would there have been, though? He had no shortage of heirs; he had three brothers.

 

[Cat's Cradle]

Hello Teresa...my (admittedly limited) understanding of the succession in royal families has always been that it can be an untidy, messy thing when the line of succession changes from the nuclear family of the ruling king/queen to another family that is more distantly related to that currently-ruling nuclear family. It seems--especially in more modern times--that the preference is for the line of succession to stay true...parent to child, rather than parent to sibling, or cousin, etc.

From what I understand of this line of succession, there has been pressure on the oldest child-in-waiting to have children, or for that oldest child to produce an heir once they ascend to the throne. I believe there have been many instances in history where countries have had a fair bit of turmoil when a ruling monarch did not produce children, and when other family members fought to then acquire the throne for themselves or their children; this was usually avoided (though not always avoided) by the then currently ruling royal producing an heir, so the line of succession was true, and clear.

I think we accept that there were options in this particular case because we know what happened, and how well it turned out. I believe at the time that this all occurred it was a tremendous source of difficulty for the nation, that the line of succession was being broken, and for the reasons it all happened.

All of that said, it's possible my understanding of these things has been greatly influenced by the way movies portray these sorts of issues! Really though I was just trying to say that in "What if?" games, most suggestions/queries are valid ones. CC

 

[Foxbat]

The question of succession is probably why royal couples are usually expected to have at least two children (heir and spare).

 

[The Ace]

The question of succession is probably why royal couples are usually expected to have at least two children (heir and spare).

Yup.

When the line descended from Charles I died out with his grand-daughter, Queen Anne (Her brother James Edward was disbarred from the succession due to his Catholic faith - a conflict of interest in the Head of the Church of England), the line of his sister, Elizabeth, took over in the person of her grandson, George I.

There were other claimants, all of whom refused to renounce Catholicism, and therefore couldn't claim the English crown, but the Act of Settlement (by which the monarch could neither be, nor marry, a Catholic) did not apply in Scotland, and the Scottish Parliament would be perfectly entitled to choose its own candidate as King of Scots, and dissolve the Union - that's why the Scottish Parliament was suspended in 1707 (it didn't reconvene until 1999).

I need hardly remind anyone of the Jacobite attempts to reclaim the crown. Although the House of Stuart is virtually extinct, the King of Bavaria (stripped of his titles, but still very much alive) is the present holder. He's about as interested in the British crown as he is in his great-grandfather's Bavarian one but.....