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George V - Early Years (1910-1914)

It was purely a curious episode in the history of scandal-mongering that, at the time when King George came to the Throne, a story was current in various charters that he had been secretly married before his marriage with the Queen, and that this earlier wife was alive, though for dynastic purposes the union was ignored. In 1893 this cruel allegation had been privately contradicted, at Queen Victoria's desire, by confidants of the royal family such as Sir Theodore Martin and Canon Dalton, in letters to various people of influence and newspaper editors (including the present writer); but it was revived, to the King's natural annoyance, and with the danger of public misconception and ill-feeling if it were not finally disproved, in 1910. It was hoped that the public contradictions authoritatively given by the Dean of Norwich (Dr. Russell Wakefield) in a speech in July 1910, by Mr. W. T. Stead in the Review of Reviews for that month, and by Sir Arthur Bigge (afterwards Lord Stamfordham) in Reynolds' Newspaper (Oct. 30 1910) would put an end to it: but it was repeated in a definite way by a certain Edward Mylius in Nov. and Dec. 1910 in a "republican" paper called the Liberator, published in Paris and circulated in England under the auspices of the Indian revolutionary Krishnavarma. In this the writer declared that the King, when a midshipman, had in 1890 married at Malta a daughter of Admiral Sir Michael Culme-Seymour; that his subsequent marriage in 1893 was therefore bigamous and shameful, and the Church, by conniving at it, had been guilty of subordinating its own principles to reasons of State.

Copies of the Liberator were seized by the police, and Mylius was arrested and on Feb. 1 1911 tried for criminal libel before the Lord Chief Justice and a special jury. Evidence was given by Sir M. Culme-Seymour and others absolutely contradicting the whole fabrication. The admiral had no daughter whom the King could have married in 1890; one of his daughters did unmarried in 1895 without ever knowing the King, the other (Mrs. Napier) had not met him between 1879 and 1898; the King was not at Malta between 1888 and 1001; the Maltese registers were produced, and contained no record of any such marriage. Mylius refused to give evidence, his claim that the King ought to appear as a witness to be cross-examined by him being overruled; and the jury promptly found him guilty. He was sentenced to the maximum penalty of a year's imprisonment; and the attorney-general then read a statement signed by the King that he had never been married to anyone but the Queen and that he would have attended in person to give evidence if the law officers of the Crown had not insisted that it would be unconstitutional for him to do so.

The whole affair caused naturally a great sensation, but the effect was excellent, and the straightforward action taken by the King — for it was known that the Government doubted the expediency of bringing the matter into court — confirmed public opinion as to the character of the new occupant of the throne. He had insisted on having the truth told, and was not prepared to forgo his rights as a man simply because, as a king, he was above the law. The exposure of this malicious libel may indeed be said to have put an end, once for all, to all forms of personal aspersion on the King's private character; for, coincidently, no less absurd stories had been current that he drank too much, — a charge which was utter nonsense to all his personal friends and acquaintances, who knew him ever to have been the most abstemious of men. Still, in spite of its gross absurdity, the charge was made, and had been publicly denounced as unfounded by the Dean of Norwich in the speech already referred to in July 1910. After the Mylius case this calumny, too, sank into the oblivion it merited.

From the very first, King George and Queen Mary showed in all their actions their earnest desire to use their royal position in the most public-spirited manner. At the death of so active, popular, and influential a sovereign as Edward VII, in the midst of grave parliamentary difficulties and a condition of social-economic unrest which was soon to be fertile in industrial conflict, the country was fortunate at any rate in this, that the Throne had already established itself in the hearts of the people, as a central and unifying force, distinct from all party considerations. The Royal Family, without exception, were known to be active in all that their position enabled them to do for the furtherance of the public welfare; all classes of the community recognized the value of this factor in English social life, and took a proud and affectionate interest in the manifest determination both of the Throne and of individual members of the Royal Family to do their duty and to justify the public trust.

With a less popular sovereign on the throne, the development of the domestic political crisis which was obviously impending when King Edward died might have created more embarrassment than actually was produced in the public mind, as regards the functioning of the Crown in relation to parliamentary government. It was generally felt, indeed, that Mr. Asquith's use of the royal prerogative in 1911, however justifiable on political grounds, in securing the King's assent to the creation of enough new peers, if necessary, for overcoming the resistance of the House of Lords to the Parliament bill, involved a more uncomfortably violent disclosure of the domination of the parliamentary executive than had ever before been regarded as officiallly in the working of English party government. But the responsibility for the use of the royal prerogative for such a purpose was, by common consent, put upon the Government; and the political bearing of the incident on the constitutional position of the Crown was effectively minimized in the controversy between the parties.

The first two years of the new reign made an auspicious start, and it was soon realized that the consolidation of the Monarchy, begun under Queen Victoria and so remarkably continued under Edward VII, was being effectually carried on, with high ideals and in an earnest spirit, under the Sailor-King, whose exhortation "Wake up, England," in his speech at the Guildhall when returning from his Colonial tour as Prince of Wales in 1901, had already made history as a general signal to the nation.

At King Edward's death there were some who thought that, under his successor, the country would have a Court of more severity, less inclined to display, less sympathetic towards the joyous side of life, — high-minded and worthy indeed, but rather dull. In so far as such doubts represented a fear that the new King and Queen, whose pure and happy domestic life was universally recognized and respected, would not enter into the amusements of the people and play a Royal part in the social life of the country, it was soon falsified and disappeared.

As Prince of Wales, George V had indeed shown no particular interest in horse-racing and some other kinds of national sport and amusement, though he was known to be one of the best shots in the country; but as King, he and his Consort, after the period of mourning was over, at once removed any misconception in this respect. Not only did they follow King Edward's example in attending race-meetings (the Royal training-stables entering horses for the principal races) and patronizing the theaters, but in the summer of 1912 for the first time a state visit was paid to a London music-hall (the Palace) and to Henley Regatta, and the King went to Lord's on the occasion of the Test-match between the Australian and South African cricketers, and had the teams presented to him: so that the tradition of Royal interest in national sport and games was amply sustained.

The national inclination for pageantry and display, which King Edward had done so much to gratify, found in King George and Queen Mary sovereigns who were ready, at any cost of personal sacrifice and fatigue, to go even further in making public ceremony, on appropriate occasions, the magnificent expression of important acts of State.

The value of the influence of the Crown as standing above and outside domestic party politics, continued to be emphasized, alike by such incidents as the Buckingham Palace conference in 1914 on the Irish deadlock, though unhappily abortive; by the increased momentum given throughout the British Empire to the progress of its conception as an Imperial Commonwealth of self-governing nations with a common sovereign; and by the events of the World War, during which the King and the royal family in various ways consolidated their hold on the loyal affections of the British people.