The Burdensome Reign of George VI and Elizabeth: Challenges and Triumphs
A revelatory account of how the loving marriage of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon would help them lead the nation and solidify the public’s faith in the monarchy during World War II, and how they raised their daughters, Princess Margaret and Princess Elizabeth who would become the future Queen Elizabeth II.
When King Edward VIII abdicated the throne in 1936, shattering the Crown’s reputation, his younger brother, known as Bertie, assumed his father’s name and became King George VI. Shy, sensitive, and afflicted with a stutter, George VI had never imagined that he would become King. His wife Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, a pretty, confident, and outgoing woman who became known later in life as the Queen Mother, strengthened and advised her husband. With his wife’s support, guidance, and love, George VI was able to overcome his insecurities and become an exceptional leader, navigating the country through World War II, establishing a relationship with Winston Churchill, visiting Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt in Washington and in Hyde Park, and inspiring the British people with his courage and compassion during the Blitz. Simultaneously, George VI and Elizabeth trained their daughter Princess Elizabeth from an early age to be a highly successful future monarch. When King George VI died on February 6, 1952, Princess Elizabeth became Queen Elizabeth II and she would reign for an unprecedented seventy years.
This film gives an inside view of the lives, struggles, hopes, and triumphs of King George VI and his Queen, Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon during a pivotal time in history.
When King Edward VIII abdicated the throne in 1936, shattering the Crown’s reputation, his younger brother, known as Bertie, assumed his father’s name and became King George VI. Shy, sensitive, and afflicted with a stutter, George VI had never imagined that he would become King. His wife Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, a pretty, confident, and outgoing woman who became known later in life as the Queen Mother, strengthened and advised her husband. With his wife’s support, guidance, and love, George VI was able to overcome his insecurities and become an exceptional leader, navigating the country through World War II, establishing a relationship with Winston Churchill, visiting Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt in Washington and in Hyde Park, and inspiring the British people with his courage and compassion during the Blitz. Simultaneously, George VI and Elizabeth trained their daughter Princess Elizabeth from an early age to be a highly successful future monarch. When King George VI died on February 6, 1952, Princess Elizabeth became Queen Elizabeth II and she would reign for an unprecedented seventy years.
This film gives an inside view of the lives, struggles, hopes, and triumphs of King George VI and his Queen, Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon during a pivotal time in history.
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TVTranscript
00:00:00["Pomp and Circumstance"]
00:00:30The story of Britain's King George VI and his Queen Elizabeth is a story of goodness
00:00:37growing to greatness, and a story that proves the old saying, behind every great man is
00:00:43a great woman.
00:00:48In a short reign, just 14 years, George and Elizabeth created an ideal of the British
00:00:54royal family, writing a script, devising a format, that dominated the idea of what the
00:01:00monarchy should be, a model example of family life, lived by a king and queen sharing the
00:01:07hopes and wants of decent ordinary people.
00:01:14Marriage and reign are inseparable, the tale lies decades in the past, yet the legacy of
00:01:20George and Elizabeth lives on in the way that their eldest daughter rules as Elizabeth II.
00:01:27The older Queen Elizabeth would live on for 50 years as the Queen Mother, a central character
00:01:33in the royal story.
00:01:38If today the future of the monarchy is doubted, it's because the scenario imagined by the
00:01:43old king and queen is failing. What they built was strong enough to survive, but not
00:01:49flexible enough to change.
00:01:54In truth, George and Elizabeth did not invent the royal family as an ideal family, rather
00:02:00they perfected the perfect royal family.
00:02:08George VI's great-grandparents, Queen Victoria and her husband Prince Albert, were the very
00:02:13first to be sold to the British people as ordinary. Before Victoria, kings and queens
00:02:20might have been admired, respected and glorified, but the idea that they were an ideal of family
00:02:25life would not have been understood, even thought ludicrous.
00:02:33Even then, it was royal propaganda. Victoria and Albert had difficult times with their
00:02:39children, especially the eldest, who would become King Edward VII.
00:02:46Behind his public image, Edward VII, George VI's grandfather, was an immoral man, someone
00:02:53today we would call a sex addict.
00:02:58George VI's father, George V, while faithful to his wife, Queen Mary, was a cruel and distant
00:03:04parent, in modern terms, emotionally abusive.
00:03:10Early images of the boy who would become George VI shows him, his brothers and sister, drilled
00:03:16like soldiers by their father.
00:03:23Rejecting the image of a man surrounded by children and grandchildren, behind palace
00:03:28doors, George V was a pitiless bully, once saying,
00:03:33My father was frightened of his mother, I was frightened of my father, and I am damn
00:03:39well going to make sure that my children are frightened of me.
00:03:46There were physical beatings, but mainly ruthless criticism and fault-finding. The royal children
00:03:52could do nothing right.
00:04:00George V feared his children would be surrounded with sycophancy, and was determined to compensate
00:04:05for such by cutting them down to size.
00:04:11The development of his children, as emotionally stable and independent, was disrupted by this
00:04:16lack of unconditional love, complicated further by the king's contradictory notion that despite
00:04:23their lack of worth, his children were not to behave like other children.
00:04:31A conflicting notion was ingrained into his children and carried into adulthood. They
00:04:36never knew exactly where they stood. But with King George VI and his Queen Elizabeth, the
00:04:43family you saw was what you really got. George and Elizabeth's story perhaps proves such
00:04:50a thing as destiny.
00:04:55George VI was born Prince Albert, Bertie to his family, the second son of George V and
00:05:02Queen Mary. When Prince Albert was born, few imagined he would be king.
00:05:10Albert's eldest brother, Edward, Prince of Wales, David to the family, was the first
00:05:15in line for the throne. While Edward had his own problems with his father, he had charm,
00:05:21confidence and wit. He was idolised by the press and public, nicknaming him Prince Charming.
00:05:33Bertie got used to being second in everything, just a spare. He was nervous, highly strung
00:05:39and crucified by shyness, a natural left-hander forced to be right-handed. He had a powerful
00:05:47stammer and tormented by nervous twitches and uncontrollable rages.
00:05:52I'm sure that we are all happy to feel the generosity of His Majesty.
00:06:11Struggling with his speech, Albert was viciously taunted by George V. The public speeches the
00:06:17stammering prince had to make were a personal hell.
00:06:25Albert was, however, a natural athlete, a superb shot and good enough tennis player
00:06:31to play at Wimbledon.
00:06:37He joined and loved the British Navy, serving in the Battle of Jutland when the fleets of
00:06:42Germany and Britain clashed in 1915.
00:06:51Those who really knew Bertie saw past the shyness and stammering, finding a man of real
00:06:56courage. King George V grudgingly said of his second son,
00:07:01Bertie has more guts than the rest of them put together.
00:07:07After the First World War, the King created Albert, the Duke of York.
00:07:17Prince Albert married Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon on the 26th of April 1923.
00:07:24When they married, no one ever expected they would become King and Queen.
00:07:30Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon was the daughter of a Scottish aristocrat, the Earl of Strathmore.
00:07:40Born on the 4th of August 1900, Elizabeth enjoyed a childhood unlike her husband's,
00:07:46a time of happiness, fun and a deep sense of security.
00:07:53Elizabeth's mother loved life and encouraged her children's education in culture and the
00:07:58arts. Lady Elizabeth's father was quiet, dignified
00:08:02and conscientious about his position, believing wealth and privilege brought duty and responsibility.
00:08:12While Elizabeth's parents were devoutly religious, they were not joyless Puritans.
00:08:17Regular evening prayers were followed by cocktails before dinner.
00:08:24Elizabeth's childhood home, Glamis Castle in Scotland, was a nursing home for the wounded
00:08:29during the Great War, housing 1,500 soldiers. Elizabeth was just 14.
00:08:37Lady Elizabeth was not fashionable or a great beauty, yet men adored her.
00:08:44She was a petite, dark-haired, blue-eyed debutante, elegant, with a beautiful smile.
00:08:50She was funny, confident, with a powerful personality, an incredible flirt, yet proper
00:08:57at all times.
00:09:04She could have married whomever she liked.
00:09:07The love story began in early 1920. In classic romantic style, Prince Albert
00:09:14fell head over heels in love with Elizabeth across a crowded London ballroom.
00:09:20Far from being swept off her feet, Elizabeth treated this royal attention with great care.
00:09:27She had rejected two proposals from Albert in the spring and autumn of 1921.
00:09:33Royal life offered little to a wealthy aristocrat's daughter.
00:09:40Prince Albert, however, was desperately in love and did not give up.
00:09:45He was in love once and forever, placing her at the centre of his universe.
00:09:53Those around the Duke of York thought it a lost cause.
00:09:57Albert's elder brother wrote,
00:10:05Decisively, Queen Mary, captivated by Elizabeth, became certain that this was the girl to make
00:10:11her distempered son happy.
00:10:15Through Albert's refusal to give up, and gentle, relentless pressure by those around her,
00:10:21Elizabeth's resistance was slowly broken.
00:10:25The rumour that Elizabeth was to marry his eldest brother forced Albert to propose again.
00:10:30This time, she accepted.
00:10:36Elizabeth later told a friend,
00:10:46Elizabeth was honourable. She knew she could help Albert, and despite their different personalities,
00:10:53they shared so much.
00:10:55They were both deeply religious, had a strong sense of duty, and over time, affectionate love for each other.
00:11:04Elizabeth's only mistake was to provide an informal newspaper interview about her engagement,
00:11:11referring to her husband as Bertie.
00:11:14She received a stern telling off by the King, and she was never to speak out again.
00:11:21King George V ruled the wedding should be as quiet and as modest as a marriage in Westminster Abbey could be.
00:11:28The Earl King said,
00:11:36It was second place once again for Albert.
00:11:42The Duke and Duchess of York's marriage was a happy one.
00:11:46Witnesses claim they were deeply engrossed in each other at social occasions, sharing personal jokes.
00:11:53Elizabeth lightened the whole royal family.
00:11:56George V was described as always in good temper whenever Elizabeth was around.
00:12:02George V, a martinet for timekeeping, forgave Elizabeth's lateness, remarking,
00:12:08You are not late, my dear. We must have sat down two minutes early.
00:12:13Elizabeth and Albert brought their first child, Princess Elizabeth, into the world on the 21st of April 1926.
00:12:21The birth of Elizabeth Alexandra Mary was difficult, needing a cesarean section.
00:12:27It had been a long time since there'd been a baby in the royal family,
00:12:31and the birth threw the Duke and Duchess into the media spotlight for the first time.
00:12:38Their second child, Margaret Rose, was born at Glands on the 21st of August 1930.
00:12:45Yet more difficulties meant that the Duchess could not risk a further pregnancy.
00:12:50There would be no more babies.
00:12:58The Duke and Duchess doted on their children.
00:13:01The Duke was close to the young Elizabeth emotionally and in character.
00:13:05They understood each other deeply.
00:13:08She inherited his shyness.
00:13:13Margaret was the delight in her father's life,
00:13:16a playful, affectionate bundle that both embarrassed and pleased him.
00:13:26The Duke and Duchess of York broke the pattern of coldness shaping the royal family's relationships,
00:13:32giving their children warmth and affection.
00:13:35That is not to say they were a normal family.
00:13:38The Duke and Duchess would disappear for months at a time,
00:13:41visiting far-flung parts of the Empire.
00:13:44But the two princesses were brought up knowing that their parents loved them.
00:13:52The little family that the Duke and Duchess of York created,
00:13:55what Albert called Us Four, was a closed little world,
00:13:59where the inhabitants pretended that they were ordinary.
00:14:05Newsreel images of the time show the Duke and Duchess
00:14:08with the young Elizabeth and Margaret on outings like any family.
00:14:16They were never ordinary.
00:14:18An army of staff surrounded the children.
00:14:21They were taught privately by a governess and cared for by nannies,
00:14:25rarely meeting other children.
00:14:30Albert became known in the 1920s and 1930s as the Industrial Prince,
00:14:36busying himself with worthy trade exhibitions and factory visits.
00:14:45He also founded the Duke of York's camps, summer camps,
00:14:49bringing boys of all backgrounds together in healthy outdoor activities.
00:14:54Albert, the sportsman, enjoyed the fun and games,
00:14:58whilst Albert, the shy man, relaxed in simple company.
00:15:03The camps featured community singing,
00:15:05in which he would enthusiastically take part.
00:15:12This small family could have become a sideline of history,
00:15:15with Elizabeth and Margaret obscure members of the royal family,
00:15:20old ladies whose identity television has to explain on rare public appearances.
00:15:26But Prince Edward, Uncle David, would turn it all upside down.
00:15:36On the 20th of January 1936, King George V died,
00:15:41helped on his way by a lethal injection from his doctor, Lord Dawson.
00:15:45On his deathbed, the old king said of his eldest son,
00:15:49After I am gone, the boy will ruin himself in 12 months.
00:15:58George V's bullying made Edward a man of low self-esteem.
00:16:03The new king was of a generation of men scarred by World War I.
00:16:08Edward was a man of high self-esteem.
00:16:11Edward had been forbidden to serve in the front line,
00:16:14forced to watch friends go to their deaths.
00:16:18Edward hated himself.
00:16:21Edward had found it hard to make a stable relationship with women.
00:16:25He had preferred to seduce other men's wives.
00:16:31Yet Britain's new king was stunningly popular.
00:16:34People saw a new king for a modern world.
00:16:37The new king had a secret.
00:16:40He was in love with Wallis Simpson,
00:16:44a divorcee already separated from her second husband.
00:16:49Wallis was chic, American, intelligent, slim,
00:16:54a near anorexic and ruthlessly ambitious.
00:16:59Edward was passionately in love.
00:17:02His low self-esteem drove him to Wallis,
00:17:04a woman some would call a sadistic dominatrix.
00:17:09She would humiliate him in company,
00:17:11forcing him to wait on her every whim.
00:17:16Edward simply could not marry Wallis.
00:17:19The monarch is head of the Church of England,
00:17:21which forbids the divorce to remarry.
00:17:25The royal family and the divorce were divided.
00:17:29The royal family and the British establishment
00:17:32saw it as the king's duty to put the crown
00:17:35before his passionate private life.
00:17:41Edward VIII repeatedly broke the rules.
00:17:44He interfered in politics,
00:17:46and it is a dark secret of royal history
00:17:49that he was probably a Nazi sympathizer.
00:17:53Edward thought himself above the government,
00:17:56declaring in private that he would marry Wallis,
00:17:59that Wallis would be Queen of England
00:18:02and Empress of India.
00:18:06British Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin
00:18:08wanted rid of the king, who he thought dangerous,
00:18:11and tricked the king into asking the government
00:18:14for advice on the proposed marriage,
00:18:16advice that legally the king would have to take.
00:18:19Give up Wallis or abdicate.
00:18:26It was a time of great emotional turmoil
00:18:28for Albert and Elizabeth.
00:18:30Albert was paralyzed with fear of being king,
00:18:33of being in the public eye,
00:18:35having to get important things right all the time.
00:18:38He was terrified for his children,
00:18:41who would be unable to live normal, happy lives.
00:18:44Characteristically, Albert was unable
00:18:46to express his feelings.
00:18:48In a letter to his brother,
00:18:50Albert took an assuring tone,
00:18:52stating that he knew that whatever Edward
00:18:54would decide to do would be in the best interests
00:18:56of his country and empire.
00:19:01Revealingly, Elizabeth also wrote to the king,
00:19:04pleading with her brother-in-law,
00:19:06Darling David,
00:19:08you have made a mistake.
00:19:10Pleading with her brother-in-law,
00:19:12Darling David, you have no idea
00:19:14how hard it has been for Albert lately.
00:19:17I know he is fonder of you than anybody else.
00:19:21I am terrified for him,
00:19:23so do help him,
00:19:25and for God's sake,
00:19:27don't tell him I have written.
00:19:32Despite the royal family's desperate pleas
00:19:34for Edward to see reason
00:19:36and save Albert and Elizabeth,
00:19:38Edward VIII chose the woman he loved
00:19:41and abdicated.
00:19:48Albert was to become king.
00:19:50Close to a complete nervous breakdown,
00:19:52he burst into hysterical tears
00:19:54on the shoulder of his stone-faced mother, Mary.
00:19:57Elizabeth was heard to remark,
00:19:59I feel like the proverbial sheep
00:20:01being led to the slaughter.
00:20:08As always, when the royal family runs into trouble,
00:20:11the future of the monarchy,
00:20:13whether Britain needs kings at all,
00:20:15begins to be questioned.
00:20:19The challenge for the new king,
00:20:21his wife and children, was immense.
00:20:23To save the monarchy.
00:20:33The day and the hour,
00:20:35and almost king's weather for the great occasion.
00:20:39King George VI's coronation
00:20:41took place on the 12th of May, 1937.
00:20:44It was a propaganda set-piece.
00:20:46Although the country was in the depth of economic depression,
00:20:49no expense was spared to save the monarchy
00:20:52and erase Edward VIII from memory.
00:20:55Queen Mary's dress alone
00:20:57was laden in gems worth two million dollars
00:21:00in 1936 prices.
00:21:02The aim was the creation
00:21:04of a theatrical fairy-tale fantasy.
00:21:09Public opinion was such
00:21:11that the new king abandoned his own name
00:21:13to reign as King George VI.
00:21:16King Albert simply sounded like a joke.
00:21:19The royal family was in a state of panic.
00:21:22King George VI,
00:21:24King Albert simply sounded too German.
00:21:29Many, including Albert,
00:21:31feared he was simply not up to being king.
00:21:34City traders were placing bets
00:21:36that the king would not even finish the ceremony.
00:21:42Ordinarily, the king's speeches
00:21:44were written for his disability,
00:21:46with difficult words avoided.
00:21:49The coronation required oaths
00:21:51written in ancient, unchangeable language.
00:21:54The new king repeatedly practiced his signature,
00:21:57fearing he might sign himself Albert,
00:22:00not George R.I.
00:22:05The BBC asked to broadcast the coronation
00:22:08live on primetime television.
00:22:10The Archbishop of Canterbury refused,
00:22:12saying it would be sacrilege
00:22:14as the broadcast might be watched in bars.
00:22:17The real reason was that a live broadcast
00:22:20would be edited to hide the king's twitches,
00:22:23convulsions and stammer.
00:22:25The ceremony did not go entirely smoothly.
00:22:28Words of the speeches,
00:22:30carefully structured by the king's speech therapist,
00:22:33were covered over by fingers of officials
00:22:36holding prompt cards.
00:22:41A marker, used to make sure
00:22:43the crown was placed the right way round,
00:22:46had been removed.
00:22:48The Archbishop of Canterbury was so unwell
00:22:51that a doctor stood by with a hidden syringe of amphetamine
00:22:54to make sure the primate finished the ceremony.
00:23:01George VI was deeply affected
00:23:03by the coronation's religious meaning,
00:23:06the consecration and the dedication before God
00:23:09of an ordinary human.
00:23:11It is a measure of the courage,
00:23:13the guts, his father noted,
00:23:15that the new king got through it successfully.
00:23:23We are so particularly together,
00:23:25leaning on each other,
00:23:27Elizabeth wrote to the Archbishop.
00:23:29We are not afraid.
00:23:31I feel that God has enabled us
00:23:33to face the situation calmly.
00:23:38But behind the scenes,
00:23:40a family feud was spiraling out of control
00:23:43between the two brothers.
00:23:45George was forced to talk with his older brother
00:23:48via the long-distance telephones of the 1930s.
00:23:51Technical inadequacy
00:23:53and David's tendency to talk at his brother,
00:23:56alongside George's inability to respond quickly,
00:23:59placed a great strain upon their relationship.
00:24:05The result was, Bertie simply chose to put an end
00:24:08to seemingly pointless conversations.
00:24:11David, used to having things his way,
00:24:13found the decision unbelievable.
00:24:16It was the beginning of an unshakable hostility.
00:24:22Spurred by Wallace,
00:24:24Edward directed his attention to money,
00:24:26insisting he had nothing to live on.
00:24:29Two of the royal family's favourite houses,
00:24:32Sandringham and Balmoral,
00:24:34did not go with the job of king.
00:24:36They are personal property.
00:24:38Edward kept them,
00:24:40insisting his brother must buy them from him.
00:24:45Edward lied.
00:24:47It came out he had a huge secret fortune
00:24:50built up as the Prince of Wales.
00:24:52The king was distraught by his brother's outrageous deception.
00:24:56Following 12 months of bitter feuding,
00:24:59Bertie chose to pay off his brother
00:25:01with the full sum requested,
00:25:03£25,000 a year.
00:25:10After Edward's abdication,
00:25:12George had created his brother the Duke of Winter.
00:25:16Edward married Wallace shortly after her divorce.
00:25:21Royal relations were not permitted to attend the ceremony
00:25:24and Wallace was denied the title Her Royal Highness.
00:25:28Both George's wife and the new queen and the old queen
00:25:31argued there was every chance the marriage would fail
00:25:35and Wallace, who the royal women thought the lowest of the low,
00:25:38would sell and exploit her royal rank.
00:25:45The effect on the king's brother,
00:25:47unable to provide the honour and dignity for his new wife
00:25:50that she so craved and that he felt she deserved,
00:25:53was overwhelming anger and resentment.
00:25:59Both the Duke and Duchess of Windsor
00:26:01came to hate the growing popularity of the new king and queen
00:26:04and the two princesses.
00:26:09The ultra-chic duchess wrote furiously to her husband,
00:26:13look how much she is enjoying being queen
00:26:16and mocked Elizabeth, calling her cookie,
00:26:20saying the queen resembled their plump Scots cook.
00:26:27The ex-King Edward kept much of his popularity.
00:26:30Cinema audiences cheered his image.
00:26:33George VI feared his brother was plotting a return,
00:26:37perhaps conspiring with Nazi Germany.
00:26:40Edward and Wallace promptly visited Germany and met Hitler.
00:26:44Newsreels were edited to hide the ex-King and his wife
00:26:48giving the Nazis salute.
00:26:51In a newspaper interview,
00:26:53Edward suggested that if a future British government
00:26:56were to create a republic,
00:26:58he would be willing to serve as president.
00:27:01George tried to make his brother's exile legally enforced,
00:27:04but in the end, the law was not needed.
00:27:07George and his queen won the British people over.
00:27:16Before the coronation,
00:27:18the Duke of York had stood out in his ordinariness,
00:27:21his wife nice but dowdy.
00:27:24Following the coronation,
00:27:26the new royal family was hurled into a feverish schedule,
00:27:30taking them to every corner of the British dominion.
00:27:33The royal family began to use the media,
00:27:36newsreels filled with the King, Queen
00:27:38and the two attractive little princesses.
00:27:44It was thought important for the royal family's recovery
00:27:47to be seen doing exactly what royalty always did,
00:27:50without change.
00:27:52The annual visit to Balmoral,
00:27:56the annual Trooping the Colour ceremony
00:27:59and the traditional palace garden parties,
00:28:03all projected onto cinema screens.
00:28:10And always, they included the two children,
00:28:13symbols of continuity of the monarchy
00:28:16and the normality of their family life.
00:28:22Queen Elizabeth gave tremendous strength to George VI
00:28:25to overcome his shyness and he grew as king.
00:28:29The royal family represented Britain abroad,
00:28:32coupling the traditional mystique of royalty
00:28:35with simple family values.
00:28:44It began to be treated more as a show, a drama,
00:28:47in which the characters appeared in costume.
00:28:50Elizabeth simply did not have the figure
00:28:53or the instinct for the fashions of the late 1930s,
00:28:56so she invented her own unique style,
00:28:59wearing fairy-tale dresses,
00:29:01especially designed for her part as queen.
00:29:10George VI continued his work with young people,
00:29:13introducing it to his own children.
00:29:16As this camp was filmed in summer of 1938,
00:29:19the Munich crisis was unfolding.
00:29:24Like most Britons, George and Elizabeth supported
00:29:28Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain's policy of appeasement,
00:29:32giving Hitler what he wanted to avoid a new European war.
00:29:40The king's own diary recalled a time
00:29:43when he was young in the Royal Navy,
00:29:46cheering the declaration of war with Germany.
00:29:49Now he wrote,
00:29:52We were not prepared for what we found a modern war really was.
00:29:56Those of us who had been through the Great War
00:29:59never wanted another.
00:30:05The king opposed and feared Winston Churchill,
00:30:08thought by nearly everyone a near-madman who would bring war.
00:30:14The king honoured Chamberlain,
00:30:16inviting the Prime Minister onto the Buckingham Palace balcony
00:30:19to celebrate the infamous deal with Hitler
00:30:21that gave the dictator Czechoslovakia but promised peace in our time.
00:30:30It was the first time a British premier had stood there,
00:30:33and only one since, Winston Churchill.
00:30:41The little royal family and the love story of the king and queen
00:30:44were part of what the British people wanted and needed,
00:30:48a blanket to wrap against the world.
00:30:54Queen Elizabeth may have been a privileged aristocrat,
00:30:57but could relate to ordinary people.
00:31:00Before the cameras, the queen visited the poorest parts of London,
00:31:04leaving them feeling the queen knew and cared.
00:31:08It was an ability compared in later years with that of Diana Spencer.
00:31:13In 1939, the king and queen undertook a tour of Canada and the United States,
00:31:19a challenge, as many Americans still thought Edward and Wallace
00:31:23the real king and queen.
00:31:29Newsreels showed intimate pictures of the family preparing to depart,
00:31:33simple moments, like the king having his hair brushed aside by his daughter,
00:31:38images unthinkably intrusive only a few years before.
00:31:46The tour of North America was a tremendous success.
00:31:49As the returning king and queen drove through London,
00:31:53a wave of love and adulation spread over the royal family.
00:32:00Soon, the king and queen would be facing the ultimate challenge,
00:32:05Soon, the king and queen would be facing the ultimate trial of their reign.
00:32:10It would also be their greatest triumph.
00:32:13Britain would be at war.
00:32:16The good man was to become a great king.
00:32:23The royal family was to become a weapon of mass destruction in Britain's media war.
00:32:29The king vowed that as long as the war lasted, he would appear in uniform.
00:32:35The king and queen tirelessly visited the armed forces,
00:32:38bombed civilians and war factories.
00:32:42To those with shattered homes and bodies,
00:32:44a royal visit was a symbol that the whole British nation knew and cared.
00:32:53The queen's talent for communication and empathy
00:32:55had strengthened a nervous and anxious king performing his royal duties.
00:32:59In the same way, she strengthened the British people during the war.
00:33:04After the queen's visits to factories, production figures always improved.
00:33:13Not everyone loved Elisabeth.
00:33:15French Prime Minister Edouard Delallier remarked,
00:33:18Elisabeth was an excessively ambitious young woman
00:33:22who would be ready to sacrifice every other country in the world
00:33:26so that she may remain queen.
00:33:33On Christmas Day 1939,
00:33:36George delivered the most memorable broadcast of his reign.
00:33:40He borrowed the words from an obscure poem
00:33:43standing for what George and Elisabeth meant to the British fighting for their way of life.
00:33:48I said to the man who stood at the gate of the yard,
00:33:55Give me a light that I may tread safely into the unknown.
00:34:04And he replied,
00:34:07Go out into the darkness
00:34:13and put your hand into the hand of God.
00:34:18The royal family lived on the same restricted rations as everyone else.
00:34:23Bathtubs were marked with depth lines to limit water use.
00:34:27Palaces were stripped of their grand finery.
00:34:30They became dark and icy.
00:34:32Heating and lighting was limited.
00:34:36Royal parklands were ploughed as the king played his part digging for victory
00:34:41as Britain tried to feed itself.
00:34:48The king and queen's little family was projected as what was good about Britain.
00:34:53The king and his daughters,
00:34:55counterpoint to the strutting dictatorships of Italy and Germany
00:34:59and the tyranny of Soviet Bolshevism.
00:35:03Many British children were evacuated to safety away from air attack.
00:35:08There was talk of sending Elisabeth and Margaret to Canada.
00:35:12But the queen publicly demonstrated the love and dedication of the king for his people
00:35:17by stating,
00:35:18The children will not go without me.
00:35:20I will not leave without the king.
00:35:23The king will stay, come what may.
00:35:26When visiting a bomb site, someone called out above the crowd,
00:35:30Thank God for a good king.
00:35:32To which he replied,
00:35:34Thank God for a good people.
00:35:38There were deliberate attempts by German forces to assassinate the king.
00:35:42The king was of the opinion that the bombing of Buckingham Palace
00:35:45was the work of a German relative in the Nazi air force.
00:35:48The king was of the opinion that the bombing of Buckingham Palace
00:35:51was the work of a German relative in the Nazi air force.
00:35:54The queen looked at the event differently,
00:35:56producing what today would be called a sound bite.
00:36:01At least I can now look the east end in the face.
00:36:08The king and queen also feared a kidnapping attempt by Nazi special forces.
00:36:18Elisabeth is not all soft sympathy.
00:36:21Elisabeth is not all soft sympathy.
00:36:24An army deserter broke into Buckingham Palace
00:36:26hoping to win the queen's sympathy.
00:36:29But she was tough on the man,
00:36:31telling him to take your punishment like a man
00:36:34and serve your country like one.
00:36:41Britain's prime minister meets the sovereign every week.
00:36:44Churchill knew terrible truths about the war,
00:36:47knowledge he could share with no one except the king.
00:36:51One of George VI's greatest wartime services
00:36:54was to be Churchill's confessor,
00:36:56sharing the burden of terrible, fearsome secrets.
00:37:00The king knew when Nazi U-boats were starving Britain to the edge of submission.
00:37:05He knew that allied lives were being sacrificed
00:37:08to hide the breaking of secret German codes.
00:37:11How many RAF planes were really shot down during the Battle of Britain.
00:37:15About the Holocaust.
00:37:17And the king knew about the atomic bomb.
00:37:23George VI had the courage to know and hide the truth
00:37:27when all around were cheerful and optimistic.
00:37:31The king was idolized by his daughter Elisabeth
00:37:35who saw in him a true war hero,
00:37:38sacrificing everything for his country.
00:37:41To understand the relationship between George
00:37:44and his eldest daughter is to understand how the princess
00:37:47would in time do her own duty and judge her own children.
00:37:58The royal family shared in personal tragedy,
00:38:01losing the king's youngest brother George, the Duke of Kent,
00:38:05killed in an air crash whilst serving with the RAF.
00:38:10At the end of the war,
00:38:12George and Elisabeth could rightly share in the victory celebrations.
00:38:16On VE Day, the royal couple stood upon the balcony of Buckingham Palace.
00:38:21Their daughters joined them before secretly wandering the streets
00:38:25and shouting with the crowd for the king to come forth.
00:38:30This is movie time.
00:38:32This is movie time.
00:38:34Leslie Mitchell reporting.
00:38:42GENERAL ISENHOWER
00:38:49Yesterday morning at 2.41 a.m.
00:38:54at General Eisenhower's headquarters,
00:38:57General Jodl, the representative of the German high command
00:39:02and of Grand Admiral Dönitz,
00:39:05the designated head of the German state,
00:39:10signed the act of unconditional surrender
00:39:14of all German land, sea, and air forces in Europe
00:39:21to the Allied expeditionary forces
00:39:24and simultaneously to the Soviet high command.
00:39:30Hostilities will end officially at one minute after midnight tonight,
00:39:37Tuesday, the 8th of May.
00:39:40But in the interest of saving lives,
00:39:43the ceasefire began yesterday to be sounded along all the fronts.
00:39:51The German war is therefore at an end.
00:39:56We may allow ourselves a brief period of rejoicing.
00:40:02Today is Victory in Europe Day.
00:40:06This was the moment we'd all been waiting for.
00:40:09Enormous crowds had gathered outside the house and all over the centre of London
00:40:13to hear the end of the war in Europe officially announced by the Prime Minister.
00:40:17True, VE Day had been anticipated by the people of London
00:40:21who'd done a bit of unofficial celebrating the previous evening.
00:40:24But this was the real moment,
00:40:26and this is how Winston Churchill ended his broadcast.
00:40:30Advance Britannia!
00:40:33Long live the cause of freedom!
00:40:36God save the King!
00:40:42After the Premier had repeated his announcement to the House of Commons,
00:40:45the Speaker led a procession of members headed by Mr Churchill and Mr Greenwood
00:40:49across to St Margaret for a victory thanksgiving service.
00:41:01VE Day
00:41:12Meanwhile, of course, Londoners had begun their non-stop two-day celebration.
00:41:16The end of the German war had come 11 months after the landings in Normandy.
00:41:20VE Day came less than a year after D-Day.
00:41:23But it was the end of nearly six years of war in Europe.
00:41:26No wonder people went a bit crazy.
00:41:29And this was it in the West End.
00:41:34All over the capital, as indeed in towns and cities throughout the country,
00:41:38it was the same story.
00:41:40This was it in Lambeth Walk.
00:41:44Once you leave Lambeth Walk,
00:41:47and you leave everything,
00:41:50you'll find hope
00:41:53in Lambeth Walk.
00:41:57You can always bet when the Lambeth people are back,
00:42:00there'll only be one winner.
00:42:02That's the Lambeth people will fight anybody in the United Kingdom
00:42:06or outside the United Kingdom.
00:42:10Almost right up to the end, London and southern England had been under fire.
00:42:14London certainly had as much right as anywhere to celebrate victory,
00:42:18and London certainly did.
00:42:34Naturally, approaches to Buckingham Palace were almost continually jammed.
00:42:38Vast crowds outside the palace, cheering and waiting.
00:42:41And when the royal family appeared first by themselves
00:42:44and later with Winston Churchill, how they cheered!
00:43:08CHEERING
00:43:39CHEERING
00:43:47We want the King! We want the King!
00:43:50We want the King! We want the King!
00:43:53We want the King! We want the King!
00:43:56We want the King! We want the King!
00:43:59CHEERING
00:44:08CHEERING
00:44:38CHEERING
00:44:56All day long and through most of the night, London's millions kept it up.
00:45:00The real lights of London were not yet on,
00:45:03but that wasn't going to stop the celebration for a second.
00:45:06Everyone realised perfectly well that although the German war was over,
00:45:09the Japanese war was not.
00:45:11But for 48 hours at least, rejoicing was off the ration.
00:45:36CHEERING
00:46:07CHEERING
00:46:11All through the day, the King and Queen had answered call after call,
00:46:14so it was again at night.
00:46:16Thousands upon thousands went to the palace,
00:46:19for this is the way we have in Great Britain.
00:46:21The family and the head of the family rejoiced together.
00:46:24CHEERING
00:46:26It was at nine o'clock on VE Day that the King had broadcast his message
00:46:30to the people of Britain, the British Empire and the Commonwealth of Nations.
00:46:35But today, we give thanks to God for a great deliverance.
00:46:44Speaking from our empire's oldest capital city,
00:46:49war battered but never for one moment daunted or dismayed.
00:46:57Germany, the enemy who drove all Europe into war,
00:47:05has been finally overcome.
00:47:10In the Far East, we have yet to deal with the Japanese,
00:47:16a determined and cruel foe.
00:47:21The Queen and I know of the ordeals which you have endured
00:47:30throughout the Commonwealth and Empire.
00:47:35We are proud to have shared some of them with you.
00:47:42And we know also that we shall all face the future together
00:47:49In the hour of danger, we humbly committed our cause into the hand of God.
00:47:59And he has been our strength and shield.
00:48:04Let us thank him for his mercies, and in this hour of victory,
00:48:12let us commit ourselves and our new task to the guidance of the same strong hand.
00:48:28Triumph hid the truth.
00:48:30The world was changing, and Britain no longer the country and empire of 1939.
00:48:36George and Elizabeth were to be the last King-Emperor and Queen-Empress.
00:48:41The jewel in the imperial crown, India, was to become independent in 1947,
00:48:47ripping the heart out of the British Empire.
00:48:50With India gone, the rest would soon follow.
00:48:55George regretted the loss of his imperial title.
00:48:58He also dreaded losing something more precious, his eldest daughter.
00:49:04Elizabeth first met the man who would become her husband, Prince Philip of Greece, in 1939.
00:49:12She was just 13.
00:49:15Princess Elizabeth had fallen in love once, and forever,
00:49:20writing to Philip throughout the war,
00:49:22making her feel grown up to have a boy in uniform to worry about.
00:49:27The King has been called an overprotective father,
00:49:31The King has been called an overprotective father.
00:49:34His relationship with Elizabeth and Margaret falls into a pattern.
00:49:38Children who lack secure and loving relationships with their parents
00:49:42develop overpossessive relationships with their own children.
00:49:48But many men will know the King simply found it hard to believe his daughter
00:49:51could fall so conclusively in love with the first man she really met.
00:50:00Both King and Queen wanted Elizabeth to make a happy marriage,
00:50:04but the choices were limited.
00:50:06The King believed his daughter must marry a man of royal rank.
00:50:10By law, Elizabeth could not marry a Catholic.
00:50:14Most available Protestant princes were Germans.
00:50:19In the end, the simple fact that his daughter was crazily in love with Philip
00:50:23made up the King's mind.
00:50:27Philip proposed in 1946,
00:50:30but the King forbade making the engagement public until a year later,
00:50:34wanting his family to be together one last time,
00:50:38on a tour of South Africa in 1947.
00:50:44Those thinking the British royal family is not a political force
00:50:48have too simple an idea.
00:50:51The South African trip taken on battleship HMS Vanguard was very political.
00:51:03South Africa was a divided, self-governing dominion of the British Empire.
00:51:08White South Africans of Dutch descent, Afrikaners,
00:51:12hated the British connection after the Boer Wars at the start of the 20th century,
00:51:17forcing them into the British Empire.
00:51:23White South Africans of British ancestry
00:51:26saw themselves as part of British civilization.
00:51:30The British ruled with paternal racism,
00:51:33believing they were looking after what were thought the simple native peoples,
00:51:38but still acknowledged basic human rights.
00:51:41The Empire aimed to bring non-white people to some national adulthood.
00:51:48Afrikaners saw a different world,
00:51:50believing themselves chosen by God to rule,
00:51:54and saw black Africans as sub-human.
00:52:01The King's visit was lending support to the existing government of Jan Schmutz,
00:52:06who, although an Afrikaner,
00:52:08led an alliance between British and Dutch communities.
00:52:15A new hardline Afrikaner movement, the National Party,
00:52:19was threatening to bring a new order.
00:52:24The trip was also intended to give the King a holiday.
00:52:27The war had drained him of his strength,
00:52:30but it was to be no easy break in the sun.
00:52:37The royal family fell into a furious cauldron of politics.
00:52:42They were ruthlessly criticized by a hostile Afrikaner press.
00:52:46The King was openly mocked when speaking the Dutch Afrikaans language
00:52:50in a gesture of reconciliation.
00:52:54The King became angry when he realized that security was not there to protect him,
00:52:59but to stop him from mixing with his black subjects.
00:53:07He bluntly called the South African authorities the Gestapo.
00:53:15The visit failed.
00:53:17The National Party came to power,
00:53:19creating the legal racism of apartheid,
00:53:22and in time, breaking with the empire,
00:53:25rejecting the King, and declaring a republic.
00:53:29The royal family returned to London in the spring of 1947,
00:53:33and the Princess's engagement was announced.
00:53:36The King gave away his daughter the same year,
00:53:39on the 20th of November, at Westminster Abbey.
00:53:47In the years that followed, the King became increasingly unwell.
00:53:51Winston Churchill was to say of these times
00:53:54Winston Churchill was to say of these times
00:53:56that the King walked with death.
00:54:02Throughout the war, the burnt-out King hardly slept,
00:54:06and chain-smoked.
00:54:08A string of smoking-related illnesses struck at the King.
00:54:15The Queen, her daughters, and Philip
00:54:17increasingly appeared without and in place of the King,
00:54:21who saved his strength for events that demanded the Sovereign's presence.
00:54:27At the annual Trooping of the Colour ceremony,
00:54:30the King abandoned riding on horseback and rode in a carriage.
00:54:36In 1951, the truth of the King's condition could not be hidden,
00:54:40as he returned early from a Scottish holiday for treatment.
00:54:44Just 56 years old, he had the appearance of a man 20 years older.
00:54:52Anxious crowds gathered outside the Palace,
00:54:55where news bulletins were posted.
00:55:00Ex-King Edward returned to London.
00:55:03The military bands that marched outside the Palace
00:55:06muffled their instruments.
00:55:09The treatment was officially called a lung resection.
00:55:12The King had lung cancer, and one lung was removed.
00:55:16But the tumour had spread.
00:55:19The King would die.
00:55:25This news was not told to the British people,
00:55:28and the nation shared in the Queen's self-delusion
00:55:31that the King would make a full recovery.
00:55:33I'm very grateful indeed for your welcome,
00:55:37and for your kind reference to the King.
00:55:41I'm glad to say that he continues to make most excellent progress.
00:55:47It was Queen Elizabeth's strength
00:55:50that she was always cheerful and optimistic.
00:55:53It came at a price.
00:55:55She was called an emotional ostrich.
00:55:58Those that know her have said
00:56:00what she doesn't want to see, she doesn't look at.
00:56:04People that needed her couldn't always get her help.
00:56:09When Princess Elizabeth and Philip took the place of the King and Queen
00:56:13on a tour of Canada in 1951,
00:56:16they travelled with black mourning clothes
00:56:19and the papers needed for her to be declared Queen.
00:56:26It is possible to see the seriousness on this trip
00:56:29that made George VI's daughter a target of criticism
00:56:32for not smiling enough.
00:56:35But this young woman knows her father is dying.
00:56:45The King was ill again over the Christmas of 1951.
00:56:53In the new year of 1952,
00:56:55the King was to tour East Africa, Australia and New Zealand.
00:56:59Elizabeth and Philip went to the United Kingdom
00:57:03Elizabeth and Philip went in his stead.
00:57:08On the 31st of January 1952, they flew to Kenya.
00:57:12Those who knew the King
00:57:14said they had never seen the King so distressed at their parting.
00:57:23As he saw Elizabeth turn on the steps of the plane,
00:57:26it was the last time he would ever lay eyes on his beloved daughter.
00:57:30And it was the last time George VI was seen in public.
00:57:34The King died six days later while asleep of a thrombosis.
00:57:39The British people had not been told of his illness.
00:57:43The news was devastating.
00:58:00The King died too young, before his time,
00:58:03adored by his two great passions in life,
00:58:06his family and the British people.
00:58:10As George lay in state,
00:58:12the cues of those wishing to just walk past his coffin
00:58:15were stupefying to the imagination.
00:58:22Ex-King Edward attended the funeral,
00:58:24hoping for reconciliation and a return to the family fold.
00:58:28But the Windsor women closed ranks
00:58:31and he was not even invited to eat with them.
00:58:40Edward spoke with his mother Queen Mary and his brother's widow,
00:58:44now titled Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother.
00:58:47He wrote to Wallace that while there was sugar on the surface,
00:58:51there was granite underneath.
00:58:55George VI's wife would never forgive Edward and Wallace
00:58:59for destroying her family life,
00:59:01both forcing her husband onto the throne and into an early grave.
00:59:07The model of royalty,
00:59:09the leadership that George and Elizabeth gave the British people,
00:59:13took Britain through the darkest times of history.
00:59:16In George and Elizabeth for a short time,
00:59:19the public image of the monarchy met reality
00:59:22and created a royal family that was what Britain wanted and Britain needed.
00:59:30Elizabeth lived on for more than half a century.
00:59:33On her death, people talked of the end of an era,
00:59:37of things never being the same again,
00:59:39of Britain changing forever.
00:59:44The strength and success of what George and Elizabeth built
00:59:47was at the same time a burden to those that followed,
00:59:50a load made heavier by changing times.
00:59:55The model they created,
00:59:57and that was followed by their daughter,
00:59:59was too perfect.
01:00:01It belonged to a time where deference and respect were automatic
01:00:05and the media kept their distance.
01:00:07Without deference and distance, it failed.
01:00:16How George and Elizabeth in old age
01:00:18would have met the challenges of the 1960s and 70s
01:00:21and those of the 1980s
01:00:23when the model of royal family life disintegrated into chaos
01:00:27is pure speculation.
01:00:31Yet the truth remains
01:00:33that George and Elizabeth were in the right place
01:00:36at the right time for the British people.
01:00:41George VI could have passed into history a forgotten king
01:00:45whose reign and life passed quietly by
01:00:48in an unremarkable succession of uneventful years.
01:00:52Fate did not allow him that life.
01:00:55Instead, he is an unforgettable and quite remarkable figure
01:00:59in British history.
01:01:04George VI and his queen were a good king and queen,
01:01:08a great king and queen,
01:01:10and above all, the right king and queen.
01:01:15For their time.