0:00:02 > 0:00:05In January 1901,
0:00:05 > 0:00:09Britain and the Empire mourned the passing of an era.
0:00:12 > 0:00:14For more than six decades,
0:00:14 > 0:00:17Queen Victoria had stamped her presence on the throne
0:00:17 > 0:00:19with a dignified and sober authority.
0:00:19 > 0:00:23Now, few could imagine life without her.
0:00:24 > 0:00:28People were dreading the death of Queen Victoria.
0:00:28 > 0:00:32Partly because she was a fixture of everybody's lives,
0:00:32 > 0:00:34but also because they were rather worried
0:00:34 > 0:00:37about the kind of king her son would make.
0:00:37 > 0:00:40You know, would this man be a worthy successor?
0:00:40 > 0:00:44There had been very little evidence that he would.
0:00:44 > 0:00:47There was a very strong feeling that he wasn't up to much.
0:00:47 > 0:00:51He was nicknamed Edward the Caresser as opposed to Edward the Confessor.
0:00:51 > 0:00:55There was a lot of talk that he was a vulgar philistine
0:00:55 > 0:01:01and he would be quite incapable of the gravitas and the mastery
0:01:01 > 0:01:03that you needed to be king.
0:01:03 > 0:01:07King Edward VII, known to the family as Bertie,
0:01:07 > 0:01:11couldn't have had a more different public image from that of his mother.
0:01:13 > 0:01:19Fat, 59 years old, and with a reputation for frivolity,
0:01:19 > 0:01:21Bertie had been pursued by scandal
0:01:21 > 0:01:24and written off as an idle, playboy Prince.
0:01:25 > 0:01:29Basically, nobody thought he was going to be a good king.
0:01:29 > 0:01:31Not even Bertie, actually -
0:01:31 > 0:01:36it's widely attested that he was depressed at the time he became king,
0:01:36 > 0:01:40because he thought nobody would respect him and he wasn't going to manage.
0:01:40 > 0:01:43So it was a very inauspicious start.
0:01:43 > 0:01:48Before he'd even been crowned, it seemed the new king was on the verge of a nervous breakdown.
0:01:48 > 0:01:53But Edward VII's popular touch would turn out to be his secret weapon.
0:01:53 > 0:01:55The man of whom many predicted disaster
0:01:55 > 0:01:58turned out to be the king who reinvented monarchy
0:01:58 > 0:02:00for the modern age.
0:02:17 > 0:02:21In the 1840s, Queen Victoria and her consort Prince Albert
0:02:21 > 0:02:22embarked on a mission.
0:02:24 > 0:02:26Under the reign of their predecessors,
0:02:26 > 0:02:28the high-living Hanoverians,
0:02:28 > 0:02:32the monarchy had become a byword for corruption and immorality.
0:02:34 > 0:02:39Victoria and Albert believed that if it was to survive in an era of revolution,
0:02:39 > 0:02:45the Royal Family must become a model of public duty and immaculate private morality.
0:02:47 > 0:02:53Albert and Victoria were very aware of this sort of Hanoverian hangover,
0:02:53 > 0:02:57this moral legacy from the Regency days.
0:02:57 > 0:03:01The irony was, Victoria was a highly sexed individual
0:03:01 > 0:03:02and enjoyed her sex life,
0:03:02 > 0:03:07and revelled in it and explored it and wrote about it.
0:03:07 > 0:03:10But they knew that the symbol of monarchy
0:03:10 > 0:03:12had to be a far more moral endeavour.
0:03:14 > 0:03:17Central to Victoria and Albert's plans
0:03:17 > 0:03:21was their first son and heir, Bertie, Prince of Wales.
0:03:21 > 0:03:23To groom the boy for kingship,
0:03:23 > 0:03:29they subjected him to a gruelling programme of moral and intellectual enlightenment.
0:03:29 > 0:03:32Prince Albert had an idea
0:03:32 > 0:03:35that princes had to be kind of super-people.
0:03:35 > 0:03:39And he developed this educational regime for his children,
0:03:39 > 0:03:42whereby pretty much every waking moment
0:03:42 > 0:03:46was stuffed with improving educational experiences
0:03:46 > 0:03:48from the age of about three.
0:03:48 > 0:03:52Constantly impressed on Bertie was the fact that he was going to be king
0:03:52 > 0:03:55and he had to be good and he had to achieve
0:03:55 > 0:03:57and everything had to be improving.
0:03:57 > 0:03:59And it was suffocating.
0:03:59 > 0:04:04His whole day was parcelled out half hour by half hour into lessons
0:04:04 > 0:04:09from early in the morning until six o'clock at night.
0:04:09 > 0:04:11And he behaved appallingly.
0:04:11 > 0:04:14He behaved like the sort of legendary naughty boy.
0:04:14 > 0:04:17He stood in the corner and stamped and screamed,
0:04:17 > 0:04:20he behaved as abominably as he possibly could. He refused to work.
0:04:22 > 0:04:26"Today I had to do some arithmetic with the Prince of Wales.
0:04:26 > 0:04:29"Immediately the pencil was flung to the end of the room.
0:04:29 > 0:04:31"The stool was kicked away.
0:04:31 > 0:04:35"The Prince was very rude, throwing stones in my face."
0:04:38 > 0:04:41Bertie's parents were in despair.
0:04:42 > 0:04:47"I never in my life met such a thorough and cunning lazybones.
0:04:47 > 0:04:50"It does grieve me when it is my own son,
0:04:50 > 0:04:52"and that he might be called upon at any moment
0:04:53 > 0:04:56"to take over the reins of a country where the sun never sets.
0:04:58 > 0:05:01"His intellect, alas, is weak.
0:05:01 > 0:05:07"He listens to nothing you tell him, but seems in a sort of dreaminess,
0:05:07 > 0:05:10"which alarms us for his brain."
0:05:10 > 0:05:14Victoria and Albert are pretty upset, anxious and confused
0:05:14 > 0:05:19by their son's refusal to respond to this educational plan.
0:05:21 > 0:05:26They bring in a phrenologist, a man called George Coombe.
0:05:26 > 0:05:30Phrenology was this sort of mid-19th century pseudo-science
0:05:30 > 0:05:34that declared that if you felt the bumps on a person's head,
0:05:34 > 0:05:37then you could determine something about their character,
0:05:37 > 0:05:39about the way they were put together.
0:05:40 > 0:05:44Now, Combe felt all over young Bertie's head
0:05:44 > 0:05:48and declared that his centres of self esteem were too highly developed.
0:05:52 > 0:05:56"The boy is a nervous and excitable child with little power of endurance
0:05:56 > 0:06:00"or sustained action in any direction."
0:06:00 > 0:06:02"The brain is feeble and abnormal,
0:06:02 > 0:06:07"making him liable to fits of passion and obstinacy.
0:06:10 > 0:06:13Despite Bertie's lack of academic promise,
0:06:13 > 0:06:16at the age of 17 he was packed off to university.
0:06:18 > 0:06:22The Prince took every opportunity to give his royal minders the slip
0:06:22 > 0:06:24and applied himself enthusiastically
0:06:24 > 0:06:29to the study of gambling, horses and strong cigars.
0:06:30 > 0:06:32Bertie desperately wanted friends.
0:06:32 > 0:06:37He really wanted to meet boys of his own age.
0:06:37 > 0:06:39That's what he really wanted, he wanted friendship.
0:06:39 > 0:06:43He's not ever allowed to sort of rub shoulders with people
0:06:43 > 0:06:48as equals of his own age. He never goes anywhere near a school.
0:06:48 > 0:06:52And even when he goes to university, Albert is terribly careful to ensure
0:06:52 > 0:06:56that he is secluded, so he is brought up very much in isolation.
0:06:56 > 0:06:58And this for him was really difficult,
0:06:58 > 0:07:00because he was by nature an incredible extrovert.
0:07:06 > 0:07:11Despairing of his son's academic abilities, in 1861 Prince Albert
0:07:11 > 0:07:15decided to knock his son into shape with a taste of military life.
0:07:18 > 0:07:22Bertie was ordered to attend an army camp in Ireland.
0:07:28 > 0:07:32But if Albert hoped boot camp would be the making of his son,
0:07:32 > 0:07:33he was to be disappointed.
0:07:35 > 0:07:37Soon after Bertie's arrival,
0:07:37 > 0:07:43fellow officers smuggled a friendly young actress by the name of Nellie Clifden into his sleeping quarters.
0:07:46 > 0:07:51The Prince recorded the momentous event in his personal diary.
0:07:51 > 0:07:55"6th September, NC, first time.
0:07:55 > 0:08:00"9th September, NC, second time.
0:08:00 > 0:08:06"10th September, NC, third time."
0:08:06 > 0:08:09Temptation comes, and he's ready for it.
0:08:09 > 0:08:14He is brimming over with the desire to share the delights
0:08:14 > 0:08:19of this beautiful woman that pretty well is put in his bed.
0:08:19 > 0:08:24And when his father hears about this, of course horror strikes him.
0:08:24 > 0:08:26Bertie is weak in spirit and flesh
0:08:26 > 0:08:32and you have this terrible tension between the ideals of monarchy
0:08:32 > 0:08:39and this ideal of this bourgeois, mid-Victorian industrious, dutiful monarchy
0:08:39 > 0:08:43and what Bertie likes to get up to in the barracks.
0:08:44 > 0:08:50It's both an attack upon on their ideal of family but also crucially, I think,
0:08:50 > 0:08:56Albert is very worried that it is undermining politically of the monarchy.
0:08:57 > 0:08:59"I write to you with heavy heart
0:08:59 > 0:09:03"on a subject that has caused me the deepest pain.
0:09:05 > 0:09:07"I knew that you were thoughtless and weak,
0:09:07 > 0:09:09"but I could not think you depraved."
0:09:13 > 0:09:17Bertie couldn't have chosen a worse time to be caught in the act.
0:09:17 > 0:09:19His father, Prince Albert,
0:09:19 > 0:09:25already suffering the early symptoms of typhoid fever, was crushed with worry.
0:09:25 > 0:09:31When he died soon afterwards at Windsor castle, it was Bertie who took the blame.
0:09:31 > 0:09:33In the Queen's eyes he was a martyr
0:09:33 > 0:09:36who had died because of the wickedness of his son.
0:09:36 > 0:09:39He'd sacrificed his life
0:09:39 > 0:09:43and she never altogether forgave the Prince of Wales
0:09:43 > 0:09:47for what she saw as this appalling misdemeanour
0:09:47 > 0:09:50which led to the death of her beloved Albert.
0:09:50 > 0:09:54Albert's death has a profoundly negative affect
0:09:54 > 0:09:58on the relationship between Bertie and Victoria.
0:09:58 > 0:10:01Victoria was completely, well, shocked,
0:10:01 > 0:10:04and blames Bertie for Albert's death.
0:10:04 > 0:10:09Victoria, she says, "Whenever I see Bertie, I shudder.
0:10:09 > 0:10:12"I can't bear to have him in the room. I can't bear to be near him".
0:10:14 > 0:10:18The Prince had never enjoyed a warm relationship with his mother.
0:10:18 > 0:10:22For the next 40 years it would be positively frosty.
0:10:23 > 0:10:26To keep her son and heir from further trouble,
0:10:26 > 0:10:29the Queen now resorted to a desperate remedy - marriage.
0:10:30 > 0:10:35The royal houses of Europe were scoured for a suitable partner.
0:10:35 > 0:10:39The winning candidate was the beautiful, albeit penniless,
0:10:39 > 0:10:42Alexandra of Denmark.
0:10:42 > 0:10:45In the 18-year-old princess,
0:10:45 > 0:10:49it seemed the matchmakers had found the perfect bride.
0:10:49 > 0:10:54Alexandra was in fact an ideal wife for the Prince of Wales.
0:10:54 > 0:10:59Compared with the starchy correctness and the infinite tedium
0:10:59 > 0:11:01of Victoria's court,
0:11:01 > 0:11:06the Danish Royal court was a delight for the Prince of Wales
0:11:06 > 0:11:08because they took everything cheerfully.
0:11:08 > 0:11:14Their idea of relaxation was romps and practical jokes and jolly songs.
0:11:15 > 0:11:17It was said about the Danish Royal Family
0:11:17 > 0:11:20that nobody was ever allowed to read a book,
0:11:20 > 0:11:23and if they saw you reading a book in the sitting room
0:11:23 > 0:11:26they'd all run up after you and go, "boo!"
0:11:26 > 0:11:31And that was really not all right, they wanted to be galloping around
0:11:31 > 0:11:35and playing parlour games and throwing wet towels at each other.
0:11:37 > 0:11:40In 1863 the 21-year-old Prince of Wales
0:11:40 > 0:11:43married his fun-loving Danish bride.
0:11:43 > 0:11:45For the wedding photograph,
0:11:45 > 0:11:48Queen Victoria arranged for Albert to join them,
0:11:48 > 0:11:51to make sure that nobody had too much fun.
0:11:53 > 0:11:56Installed in their opulent marital home, Marlborough House,
0:11:56 > 0:12:00the newlyweds quickly became the centre of London's high society.
0:12:02 > 0:12:07Amid a ceaseless round of dances, dinner parties and entertainments,
0:12:07 > 0:12:11Bertie's true personality could now flourish.
0:12:11 > 0:12:15He knew that he wasn't clever like his father.
0:12:15 > 0:12:18He knew that he wasn't authoritative like his mother.
0:12:18 > 0:12:23What he had was a charm, an easy way of dealing with people.
0:12:23 > 0:12:26People found him good company.
0:12:26 > 0:12:28He was well behaved, he knew what to say.
0:12:28 > 0:12:31He was a good person to be sitting next to at dinner.
0:12:33 > 0:12:37It was an arranged marriage, and that was made completely plain.
0:12:37 > 0:12:39But I think that Alex, right from the start,
0:12:39 > 0:12:40fell in love with him,
0:12:40 > 0:12:44and in a way she remained in love with him for the rest of her life.
0:12:44 > 0:12:46She said to one of Bertie's sisters,
0:12:46 > 0:12:49"You think I'm marrying your brother because of his position,
0:12:49 > 0:12:52"but if he was a cowboy, I'd marry him just the same."
0:12:54 > 0:12:59The once lonely, isolated youth now had what he'd always craved,
0:12:59 > 0:13:03friendship, fun and the unquestioning devotion of a beautiful woman.
0:13:03 > 0:13:08But as the Royal Family's most senior male representative,
0:13:08 > 0:13:11he also had unfulfilled ambitions.
0:13:11 > 0:13:14The Prince of Wales felt, as the heir to the throne,
0:13:14 > 0:13:19he ought to be playing a prominent part in the affairs of state.
0:13:19 > 0:13:23And he was in fact very ready to do so. He was a man of considerable ability, great energy.
0:13:23 > 0:13:28The trouble was that his mother felt that he was irresponsible,
0:13:28 > 0:13:32frivolous and incapable a playing a serious role.
0:13:32 > 0:13:35Bertie thought what he wanted to do
0:13:35 > 0:13:41was to have access to government papers, particularly to Foreign Office dispatches,
0:13:41 > 0:13:45because he was always interested in foreign policy and saw that as his special area.
0:13:45 > 0:13:50Every time he asked for access to dispatches, what he always asked for was the key.
0:13:50 > 0:13:54There was a particular gold key that opened the box of secret papers
0:13:54 > 0:13:57from the Foreign Office, and that's what he wanted.
0:13:57 > 0:14:00And Queen Victoria, whenever he asked, Queen Victoria would say no,
0:14:00 > 0:14:04he can't have access, he's too indiscreet.
0:14:04 > 0:14:10Edward said late in his mother's life that everyone had an eternal father,
0:14:10 > 0:14:14but he himself was blessed with an eternal mother.
0:14:14 > 0:14:16The sort of remark, in fact,
0:14:16 > 0:14:20that the present Prince of Wales might actually make.
0:14:20 > 0:14:24And, of course, there is this permanent tension between the Prince of Wales,
0:14:24 > 0:14:28who is heir to the throne, and the person who's actually occupying it.
0:14:29 > 0:14:32Frustrated in his ambition by his mother,
0:14:32 > 0:14:34relations between Bertie and his wife
0:14:34 > 0:14:36also began to come under pressure.
0:14:36 > 0:14:40Three children in the first four years of marriage
0:14:40 > 0:14:44had taken the early sparkle out of married life.
0:14:44 > 0:14:46Eight months into her third pregnancy,
0:14:46 > 0:14:51the Princess fell gravely ill with rheumatic fever.
0:14:51 > 0:14:55The crisis was a turning point in the marriage.
0:14:55 > 0:15:00It really played, I think, to his worst, his least likeable qualities.
0:15:00 > 0:15:02It's said that they had to send three telegrams
0:15:02 > 0:15:06to get him to come away from the races to come to her sickbed,
0:15:06 > 0:15:08and when he did come he didn't want to stay.
0:15:10 > 0:15:13Bertie's reaction is not good.
0:15:13 > 0:15:16And he goes out night after night,
0:15:16 > 0:15:20saying he'd be back and she waits up and waits up
0:15:20 > 0:15:24and he says he'll be back at midnight, but he doesn't come back until three,
0:15:24 > 0:15:28and she's meanwhile weeping. You know, very dependent on him.
0:15:28 > 0:15:34The illness took a heavy physical toll on the Princess, leaving her lame and increasingly deaf.
0:15:36 > 0:15:41It had also opened up deep, underlying tensions in her relationship with the Prince.
0:15:41 > 0:15:48I think that he was mixed up, selfish and perhaps a self-obsessed figure.
0:15:48 > 0:15:52I think the trouble partly was that Bertie's conflicted
0:15:52 > 0:15:56because he was forced to marry her and he resented that.
0:15:56 > 0:15:58I mean, 21, forced into an arranged marriage,
0:15:58 > 0:16:01no time sow his wild oats, all of that kind of stuff.
0:16:01 > 0:16:06But on the other hand, he actually is very fond of her,
0:16:06 > 0:16:10so that he treats her badly but at the same time he loves her.
0:16:10 > 0:16:12It's quite complicated, I think.
0:16:14 > 0:16:18Over the coming years, Alexandra would increasingly retreat from society life
0:16:18 > 0:16:21behind the gates of her Sandringham home...
0:16:22 > 0:16:28..While Bertie turned elsewhere to satisfy his emotional and physical needs.
0:16:28 > 0:16:31There's no doubt he liked the company of women,
0:16:31 > 0:16:33and there's no doubt he had lots of mistresses.
0:16:33 > 0:16:37There are all these stories about him going off to Paris
0:16:37 > 0:16:39and going to brothels where there were lovely ladies.
0:16:45 > 0:16:49He would haunt the Cafe Anglais, where orgies were said to occur.
0:16:49 > 0:16:54He would visit the Moulin Rouge, where one of the dancers said...
0:16:54 > 0:16:57"Hello Wales, will you pay for my champagne?"
0:16:57 > 0:16:59And he did pay for her champagne.
0:17:00 > 0:17:06There was this very celebrated brothel called Le Chabanais, where Bertie visited.
0:17:06 > 0:17:11There is a chair that was in that brothel
0:17:11 > 0:17:15that was displayed to people as Bertie's chair.
0:17:16 > 0:17:22And it's something that has been designed to allow a man
0:17:22 > 0:17:26to indulge in the sexual practices that he wanted to
0:17:26 > 0:17:29without breaking into a sweat really.
0:17:29 > 0:17:32He was at one point known as Kingky,
0:17:32 > 0:17:35which is kind of awful, isn't it?
0:17:35 > 0:17:38He would sit in this most incredible bath
0:17:38 > 0:17:43that had this sort of swan-necked, mythological figure
0:17:43 > 0:17:48and he would sit in this bath with a with a lady of his choice,
0:17:48 > 0:17:51not with water in there, but with champagne.
0:17:51 > 0:17:54And I guess they would both sit there and listen to the sound
0:17:54 > 0:17:56of his father spinning in his grave.
0:17:58 > 0:18:03Bertie's frequent trips to the Continent allowed him to indulge his peccadilloes
0:18:03 > 0:18:06at a safe distance from his wife, his mother
0:18:06 > 0:18:08and the prying eyes of the British press.
0:18:10 > 0:18:15But the Prince had also begun to play dangerous games closer to home.
0:18:15 > 0:18:17And in 1870,
0:18:17 > 0:18:21his secret life was exposed in a most shocking public manner.
0:18:23 > 0:18:25My great-great-grandmother
0:18:25 > 0:18:28was rather bubbly and rather frivolous,
0:18:28 > 0:18:32but obviously rather amusing company.
0:18:32 > 0:18:34Everyone seems to have loved her.
0:18:34 > 0:18:35She was very popular.
0:18:37 > 0:18:40In 1869, the Prince of Wales began a flirtation
0:18:40 > 0:18:43with the 21-year-old Lady Harriet Mordaunt,
0:18:43 > 0:18:46wife of a prominent Member of Parliament.
0:18:46 > 0:18:49He would pay her these afternoon visits.
0:18:49 > 0:18:51He would arrive in a hansom cab.
0:18:51 > 0:18:56He didn't come in his own carriage, so he obviously wanted to be discreet.
0:18:56 > 0:19:01Instructions were given to the servants that no-one else was to be admitted if they came to call.
0:19:01 > 0:19:05The visits usually lasted for about an hour and a half.
0:19:05 > 0:19:09There was certainly time to get up to mischief, if that's what they wanted to do.
0:19:11 > 0:19:13In the summer of 1869,
0:19:13 > 0:19:18Harriet's husband, a keen sportsman, went on a fishing trip to Norway.
0:19:19 > 0:19:21Bertie took the opportunity
0:19:21 > 0:19:26to enjoy Harriet's company at her country residence, Walton Hall.
0:19:27 > 0:19:29What they couldn't have known
0:19:29 > 0:19:33was that 1869 was a miserable year for the Norwegian salmon.
0:19:35 > 0:19:37Sir Charles was back.
0:19:37 > 0:19:42Sir Charles cuts short his holiday, arrives back unexpectedly
0:19:42 > 0:19:47he sees his wife driving around two white ponies,
0:19:47 > 0:19:51which Sir Charles had actually earlier bought from the Prince of Wales.
0:19:51 > 0:19:55And watching as they sort of prance around
0:19:55 > 0:19:57is the Prince of Wales himself.
0:19:57 > 0:20:01Sir Charles flies into the most appalling rage
0:20:01 > 0:20:05and instructs his gardener to take off these beautiful white ponies
0:20:05 > 0:20:06and shoot them,
0:20:06 > 0:20:10and he forces his wife to watch as they're shot.
0:20:10 > 0:20:13GUNSHOTS
0:20:14 > 0:20:16Bertie beat a hasty retreat.
0:20:16 > 0:20:20Soon afterwards, a tearful Harriet confessed
0:20:20 > 0:20:25to "sinning with the Prince of Wales and other men, often and in open day."
0:20:26 > 0:20:31Sir Charles was furious and vowed to divorce her.
0:20:31 > 0:20:36Bertie faced disgrace in the witness box of a public divorce trial.
0:20:36 > 0:20:39The case was front page news.
0:20:39 > 0:20:42But the Prince still had one supporter.
0:20:42 > 0:20:47Recently discovered letters reveal Princess Alexandra, at least,
0:20:47 > 0:20:50refused to see any ill in her husband.
0:20:53 > 0:20:58"My sweet Minny, I have to mention to you a terrible scandal
0:20:58 > 0:21:01"which has shocked everybody here more than words can tell.
0:21:01 > 0:21:05"It is a man, Charles Mordaunt, a terrible brute,
0:21:05 > 0:21:07"who wants to be separated from his wife,
0:21:07 > 0:21:12"who accused herself to be unfaithful, and mentioned my Bertie as her lover!
0:21:12 > 0:21:17"To see one's husband being accused in such a scandalous, mean way
0:21:17 > 0:21:19"is nearly more than one can bear."
0:21:21 > 0:21:23This was the first time for many centuries
0:21:23 > 0:21:28that the heir to the throne had appeared in court.
0:21:28 > 0:21:30I mean, this in itself was shocking,
0:21:30 > 0:21:33and the nature of the case was shocking, too.
0:21:33 > 0:21:37It opened a window. It was a revelation to the public
0:21:37 > 0:21:40of the goings on in the Prince of Wales's circles.
0:21:40 > 0:21:43I think it was a real crisis to Victorian public opinion,
0:21:43 > 0:21:45and it really did threaten the monarchy.
0:21:45 > 0:21:49The Tory politician Lord Stanley noted:
0:21:49 > 0:21:53"Another trial like that would create a Republican Party
0:21:53 > 0:21:55"bent on putting an end to the monarchy.
0:21:55 > 0:21:58"His folly almost amounts to insanity.
0:21:58 > 0:22:01"No warning seems to have any effect."
0:22:04 > 0:22:09On 23rd February 1870, a packed courtroom heard the Prince deny
0:22:09 > 0:22:13any impropriety with Lady Mordaunt.
0:22:13 > 0:22:18But the damage to the Prince and the Crown's reputation had been done.
0:22:19 > 0:22:23As for Harriet, a worse fate awaited her.
0:22:23 > 0:22:26Her family are thrown into a complete panic
0:22:26 > 0:22:30by the prospect of this sort of very lurid case.
0:22:30 > 0:22:33But her father decides that the thing to do
0:22:33 > 0:22:35is to say that Harriet's insane.
0:22:37 > 0:22:41They were very keen to preserve the family honour,
0:22:41 > 0:22:44and although you might think that it's a rather odd way to go about it
0:22:44 > 0:22:47by establishing you've got a lunatic in the family,
0:22:47 > 0:22:51somehow that was considered preferable to the fact
0:22:51 > 0:22:54that you had this very promiscuous young woman.
0:22:55 > 0:22:59Lady Harriet was committed to a lunatic asylum.
0:22:59 > 0:23:03She died there 36 years later.
0:23:03 > 0:23:05It's an absolutely appalling story.
0:23:05 > 0:23:09It is like something straight out of Wilkie Collins,
0:23:09 > 0:23:11a true gothic horror story.
0:23:11 > 0:23:16The fate of a young woman who steps out of line was very grim indeed,
0:23:16 > 0:23:22if that suited society and the men around her.
0:23:23 > 0:23:27Bertie's reckless behaviour had contributed to the ruin of a young woman
0:23:27 > 0:23:32and tarnished of the monarchy's image at a time of growing Republican sentiment.
0:23:34 > 0:23:37The jeers Bertie suffered in public
0:23:37 > 0:23:40were as nothing to the roasting he was about to receive
0:23:40 > 0:23:41from his mother.
0:23:42 > 0:23:46"He really is more and more careless,
0:23:46 > 0:23:49"being dragged into the dirt and mixed up
0:23:49 > 0:23:53"in one of the most disgusting and scandalous trials on record."
0:23:55 > 0:24:00Victoria was appalled to learn that the Prince of Wales was behaving badly.
0:24:00 > 0:24:03But on the other hand, the other side of it
0:24:03 > 0:24:08was that the more intelligence she could accumulate of Bertie's bad behaviour,
0:24:08 > 0:24:12the more she could say, well, he's absolutely not fit to be King.
0:24:12 > 0:24:14You know, he's a wastrel, he's completely no good.
0:24:14 > 0:24:18I must stay with all the power, he cannot be trusted.
0:24:18 > 0:24:21Queen Victoria wasn't very good at sharing responsibility.
0:24:21 > 0:24:24She didn't even like doing it with Albert very much,
0:24:24 > 0:24:26who she absolutely adored.
0:24:26 > 0:24:31So, she really did her best to try and prevent him from having
0:24:31 > 0:24:36any kind of serious duty, and some of the heads of the administrations
0:24:36 > 0:24:38that she dealt with agreed.
0:24:38 > 0:24:42Disraeli didn't want a sensitive document of any sort
0:24:42 > 0:24:44to be put into Bertie's hands, and he was probably right.
0:24:44 > 0:24:49Because when he was given things, he had the tendency to kind of pass them around at dinner parties
0:24:49 > 0:24:51and ask the guests what they thought.
0:24:51 > 0:24:54You know, this wasn't really very useful behaviour.
0:24:56 > 0:24:58Bertie grew increasingly disgruntled
0:24:58 > 0:25:01at his mother's refusal to share power.
0:25:01 > 0:25:05He poured out his anger in a letter to his private secretary.
0:25:06 > 0:25:11"The game is not to let me see any interesting or important dispatches.
0:25:11 > 0:25:15"This has been going on for years under successive governments
0:25:15 > 0:25:19"and it would be far better if the Foreign Office sent me no more,
0:25:19 > 0:25:22"which is preferable to the rubbish they do send."
0:25:26 > 0:25:29Because he's not trusted with this kind of material,
0:25:29 > 0:25:31he is more or less infantilised.
0:25:31 > 0:25:37Cartoons of the period will depict him as a baby in a pram.
0:25:37 > 0:25:41He's not going to be allowed to involve himself much
0:25:41 > 0:25:43in the serious business of state,
0:25:43 > 0:25:46so he turns pleasure into a serious business
0:25:46 > 0:25:48and commits himself to that.
0:25:48 > 0:25:51So that the complexities of his social diary
0:25:51 > 0:25:54and what parties he's going to
0:25:54 > 0:25:56actually in a way take the place
0:25:56 > 0:26:00of sitting there with a red box going through the documents.
0:26:00 > 0:26:06And it's almost as if his energies are diverted into that.
0:26:09 > 0:26:13As youth gave way to an increasingly corpulent middle age,
0:26:13 > 0:26:17the Prince threw himself body and soul into a life of leisure.
0:26:19 > 0:26:22He lived an extraordinary raffish existence.
0:26:22 > 0:26:27First of all there was the food, and he had... I mean, by modern standards
0:26:27 > 0:26:30Edwardian gluttony was simply something to amaze you.
0:26:30 > 0:26:35Huge breakfasts, mid-morning meals,
0:26:35 > 0:26:38eight-course lunches, tea,
0:26:38 > 0:26:43and 12-course dinners, and then sandwiches before you go to bed.
0:26:43 > 0:26:49But in the meantime, he would go out and he would attend the music hall.
0:26:49 > 0:26:55He would go to cockpits, he would go to billiard rooms that were showing pornographic photographs.
0:26:55 > 0:26:57He would go to brothels.
0:26:57 > 0:27:01A moment would not go by when he was not diverted.
0:27:01 > 0:27:05Bertie did have this sort of gargantuan appetite for everything.
0:27:05 > 0:27:09I think a lot of it does come out of having this miserable childhood
0:27:09 > 0:27:12where he feels that things are constantly denied him.
0:27:14 > 0:27:18When he wasn't devouring a favourite midnight feast of cold roast chicken,
0:27:18 > 0:27:22Bertie continued to work his way through a series of mistresses,
0:27:22 > 0:27:27including model turned actress, Lily Langtree, and Jennie Churchill,
0:27:27 > 0:27:30mother of a pushy young lad named Winston.
0:27:32 > 0:27:36Then, at the age of 48, something odd happened.
0:27:36 > 0:27:40Perhaps for the first time in his life, Bertie fell in love.
0:27:42 > 0:27:45Daisy Warwick was the original It girl.
0:27:45 > 0:27:50A combination of beauty and charm all rolled into one.
0:27:50 > 0:27:55She was one of those society beauties that had their likeness
0:27:55 > 0:27:59put onto these little cards, and you could buy them in the shops.
0:27:59 > 0:28:03Daisy, Countess of Warwick was 20 years younger than the Prince of Wales,
0:28:03 > 0:28:07fabulously rich and thoroughly scandalous.
0:28:07 > 0:28:11At her grand homes, Warwick Castle and Easton Lodge in Essex,
0:28:11 > 0:28:15she was famous for hosting lavish entertainments.
0:28:15 > 0:28:20Daisy Warwick was incredibly extravagant. She spent money like there was no tomorrow.
0:28:20 > 0:28:27She had her own railway branch built to bring guests to her house, luxury everywhere,
0:28:27 > 0:28:34and these were the famously racy house parties where Daisy sort of organised adultery really.
0:28:34 > 0:28:37There would be flowers on your dressing table,
0:28:37 > 0:28:40there were buttonholes for the men,
0:28:40 > 0:28:43there were printed lists of who was there for dinner,
0:28:43 > 0:28:45and who you were to take in to dinner.
0:28:45 > 0:28:47You didn't touch each other,
0:28:47 > 0:28:51but there were ways of little notes being left by the candles
0:28:51 > 0:28:55saying, "Come and see me, I'm in room...whatever."
0:28:55 > 0:29:02It was at one such house party in 1886 that Bertie was introduced to the Countess.
0:29:04 > 0:29:07Although their 10-year affair would become common knowledge,
0:29:07 > 0:29:12documentary evidence of the relationship has been scarce.
0:29:12 > 0:29:13Until now.
0:29:13 > 0:29:17The affair with Daisy Warwick was incredibly intense,
0:29:17 > 0:29:22but until recently nobody actually knew what went on between them.
0:29:22 > 0:29:27It was a puzzle because there was absolutely no evidence at all.
0:29:27 > 0:29:31But then, looking at the diary that Bertie kept,
0:29:31 > 0:29:35I suddenly realised there was a symbol that I didn't understand
0:29:35 > 0:29:39which seems to be occurring increasingly frequently,
0:29:39 > 0:29:41sometimes twice a day.
0:29:43 > 0:29:45Bertie's diaries reveal the philandering Prince
0:29:45 > 0:29:48was using code to cover his tracks.
0:29:48 > 0:29:50A letter D written backwards,
0:29:50 > 0:29:54signifying his increasingly frequent liaisons with Daisy.
0:29:56 > 0:29:59It's possible to see from this to see very clearly
0:29:59 > 0:30:01that this was an incredibly intense relationship.
0:30:01 > 0:30:03He would meet Daisy twice a day.
0:30:03 > 0:30:06He'd have tea with her every day when she was in London.
0:30:06 > 0:30:10He'd meet her in the morning, they'd have intimate suppers in the evening.
0:30:10 > 0:30:14He called her, "My darling Daisy wife." It was a sort of second marriage.
0:30:17 > 0:30:21I think she could fairly be described as the the love of his life.
0:30:21 > 0:30:24He wrote to her several times a day,
0:30:24 > 0:30:27he saw her all the time and went to stay with her.
0:30:27 > 0:30:31I think he was strongly, strongly devoted to her.
0:30:35 > 0:30:39"My own lovely little Daisy, tomorrow I go to the races.
0:30:39 > 0:30:43"I have two horses running, but I fear they are not any good.
0:30:43 > 0:30:46"Don't forget, my darling, to expect me from five on Sunday next.
0:30:46 > 0:30:48"I only wish it could be before.
0:30:48 > 0:30:53"Goodnight and God keep you, my adored little Daisy."
0:30:55 > 0:30:58Bertie's wife, Princess Alexandra
0:30:58 > 0:31:00had long since learned to turn a blind eye
0:31:00 > 0:31:04to her husband's stable of mistresses.
0:31:04 > 0:31:09But in the Countess of Warwick, she had come up against a real rival.
0:31:11 > 0:31:12Daisy Warwick
0:31:12 > 0:31:16was unlike the professional beauties and slightly marginal society ladies.
0:31:16 > 0:31:21Daisy Warwick was right in the middle of the court, a court insider.
0:31:21 > 0:31:25She was the mistress with whom Alex couldn't cope
0:31:25 > 0:31:28because she threatened Alex's whole world.
0:31:28 > 0:31:33Alexandra becomes increasingly distant and she punishes Bertie
0:31:33 > 0:31:35by going abroad and by staying abroad.
0:31:35 > 0:31:36She goes and stays with her family.
0:31:36 > 0:31:42She cables back laconically, "I'm so sorry, have got delayed."
0:31:42 > 0:31:48Doesn't show any indication of coming back. This was public humiliation for Bertie.
0:31:48 > 0:31:52Bertie had brought his relationship with the Princess to breaking point.
0:31:52 > 0:31:55Alexandra needn't have worried.
0:31:55 > 0:31:59The Prince's prodigious energies had begun to fail him
0:31:59 > 0:32:01in one crucial area.
0:32:01 > 0:32:04We know Bertie's health was poor at the time of his relationship
0:32:04 > 0:32:05with Daisy Warwick.
0:32:05 > 0:32:09And it's also true that in his diary,
0:32:09 > 0:32:13Bertie does talk about electrical treatment.
0:32:15 > 0:32:18Now what could this be?
0:32:18 > 0:32:24One of the things that a male patient might have visited a doctorto be cured for
0:32:24 > 0:32:27was impotence problems.
0:32:27 > 0:32:30Because it was thought that a shock of electricity
0:32:30 > 0:32:35could restore the body's sort of vital energy.
0:32:36 > 0:32:39For Daisy, I think the physical side of their relationship
0:32:39 > 0:32:40was hugely important.
0:32:40 > 0:32:42I think that she loved sex.
0:32:42 > 0:32:48She always worrying about it and wanting to meet people.
0:32:48 > 0:32:53I found a draft of her letters that said she "mated naturally
0:32:53 > 0:32:55"with physical strength or beauty."
0:32:57 > 0:33:01Beauty had never been an attribute Bertie could lay claim to.
0:33:01 > 0:33:04Now his strength was in question.
0:33:04 > 0:33:08In 1898, the still highly-charged Countess
0:33:08 > 0:33:11fell pregnant by another man.
0:33:11 > 0:33:13To Alexandra's delight,
0:33:13 > 0:33:17Daisy wrote to the Prince, ending the 10-year affair.
0:33:17 > 0:33:19Her letter is long-since destroyed.
0:33:19 > 0:33:23But Bertie's reply is on record.
0:33:24 > 0:33:29"My lovely little Daisy, you could not help, my loved one,
0:33:29 > 0:33:32"writing to me as you did, though it gave me a pang.
0:33:32 > 0:33:35"I gave your letter to the Princess.
0:33:35 > 0:33:37"She was moved to tears,
0:33:37 > 0:33:40"and said that out of evil, good would come."
0:33:43 > 0:33:48The Prince of Wales once again faced an empty existence,
0:33:48 > 0:33:50but all that was about to end.
0:33:52 > 0:33:55The Queen's health was failing.
0:33:57 > 0:33:58In January 1901,
0:33:58 > 0:34:02Bertie was summoned to Osborne House on the Isle of Wight.
0:34:02 > 0:34:07For the first time in his life, he entered his mother's bedroom.
0:34:08 > 0:34:11When she saw Bertie, her eldest son,
0:34:11 > 0:34:16in whom for a great deal of her life she had not been best pleased,
0:34:16 > 0:34:19I don't think he expected to receive
0:34:19 > 0:34:23quite the warmth that some of his siblings got.
0:34:23 > 0:34:25But she completely opened her arms to him,
0:34:25 > 0:34:29by saying "Bertie" and pulling him forward and hugging him.
0:34:29 > 0:34:31And he was reduced to tears.
0:34:33 > 0:34:36The reconciliation had come too late.
0:34:36 > 0:34:40Minutes later his mother lapsed into unconsciousness and died.
0:34:40 > 0:34:45The moment Bertie had been waiting for all his life had arrived.
0:34:52 > 0:34:55The accession of an overweight 59-year-old philanderer
0:34:55 > 0:34:59hardly thrilled the public imagination.
0:35:00 > 0:35:05Few sovereigns have come to the throne with lower expectations.
0:35:05 > 0:35:07But from his first command as King,
0:35:07 > 0:35:12Bertie was determined to send a signal of intent to his doubters.
0:35:14 > 0:35:18He must have recognised that his sense of insecurity
0:35:18 > 0:35:23was also reflected by the whole nation's and Empire's view
0:35:23 > 0:35:27that he was not quite up to job as she, his mother, had been.
0:35:28 > 0:35:32And when he went down to join the yachts that were lined up
0:35:32 > 0:35:36to take Queen Victoria's body back from the Isle of Wight to Portsmouth,
0:35:36 > 0:35:38he looked up in the rigging
0:35:38 > 0:35:41and saw that the Royal Standard was flying at half mast.
0:35:41 > 0:35:44And he asked the captain why that was the case,
0:35:44 > 0:35:48and the captain, perplexed, said, "Well, the Queen is dead."
0:35:48 > 0:35:51And he said "No, the King is alive."
0:35:52 > 0:35:56And I think that was a sort of florid way where,
0:35:56 > 0:36:01with the spectacular nature of using a symbol,
0:36:01 > 0:36:04he was able to show that no, this show goes on.
0:36:09 > 0:36:11On January 21st, 1901,
0:36:11 > 0:36:14Bertie followed the late Queen's funeral cortege
0:36:14 > 0:36:19on its journey towards its final resting place at Windsor.
0:36:19 > 0:36:23But even as the King bade farewell to his mother, Bertie was determined
0:36:23 > 0:36:30to break with the traditions of her reign and forge his own distinctive brand of monarchy.
0:36:31 > 0:36:33After the death of Prince Albert,
0:36:33 > 0:36:36Queen Victoria had led an increasingly reclusive existence
0:36:36 > 0:36:38behind the walls of Windsor Castle
0:36:38 > 0:36:41and her forbidding Highland retreat, Balmoral.
0:36:45 > 0:36:48These 20 seconds of film footage,
0:36:48 > 0:36:52showing Victoria taking a carriage ride at Balmoral,
0:36:52 > 0:36:55are one of the rare glimpses into royal life
0:36:55 > 0:36:57the Queen was prepared to allow.
0:36:59 > 0:37:04There was great and growing deal of concern about Victoria's withdrawal from public life.
0:37:04 > 0:37:09Obviously, her mourning was profound and everyone respected that,
0:37:09 > 0:37:11but when it went on, and on, and on
0:37:11 > 0:37:14and she didn't open Parliament, she didn't appear,
0:37:14 > 0:37:19it fed into a growing Republican move within Britain.
0:37:19 > 0:37:24There were these royals taking salaries and not doing the job.
0:37:24 > 0:37:30In the 1870s, Britain came closer to becoming a Republic than at any time
0:37:30 > 0:37:34in the 18th, 19th or 20th centuries.
0:37:34 > 0:37:37The Queen had become extremely unpopular.
0:37:37 > 0:37:41She was viewed as being a kind of selfish, extravagant figure,
0:37:41 > 0:37:45just sulking in her castle, doing nothing for the country.
0:37:48 > 0:37:53In stark contrast to his mother, the Prince of Wales couldn't have been more visible.
0:37:55 > 0:38:01Bertie's response to this criticism was basically to say that the monarch needs to be seen in public.
0:38:01 > 0:38:07To go and open hospitals, lay foundation stones, to cut tapes,
0:38:07 > 0:38:11to launch ships - all of the things that members of the Royal Family do today.
0:38:11 > 0:38:16By doing these things, I think Bertie was conscious that he was fighting back.
0:38:16 > 0:38:19That this was a new role that the monarchy must perform.
0:38:21 > 0:38:23Installed in Buckingham Palace,
0:38:23 > 0:38:26and free from his mother's apron strings,
0:38:26 > 0:38:28the new King threw himself into preparations
0:38:28 > 0:38:30for a dazzling coronation
0:38:30 > 0:38:34that would put the Royal Family back at heart of national life.
0:38:37 > 0:38:41But Bertie's lack of experience in dealing with affairs of state
0:38:41 > 0:38:42soon began to tell.
0:38:46 > 0:38:51He was completely overwhelmed with all the things, all his projects, all the things that he wanted to do.
0:38:51 > 0:38:53The work itself was something completely new.
0:38:53 > 0:38:57All these boxes full of documents that he had no training of going through.
0:38:57 > 0:39:01He read everything. He hadn't learnt how to delegate at all.
0:39:01 > 0:39:05All the sort of detail, even down to what tune the soldiers played
0:39:05 > 0:39:09outside his window at Windsor Castle, he had to decide everything.
0:39:09 > 0:39:13He is overwhelmed by all this responsibility.
0:39:16 > 0:39:19Dangerously overweight, and chain smoking cigars,
0:39:19 > 0:39:24the King appeared to be sinking beneath the burden of responsibility.
0:39:24 > 0:39:28Doctors began to fear for his health.
0:39:28 > 0:39:31"I saw the King every morning in his bedroom at nine.
0:39:31 > 0:39:35"I found him surrounded by letters, telegrams and papers
0:39:35 > 0:39:37"which covered the whole bed.
0:39:37 > 0:39:39"He was evidently greatly perturbed
0:39:39 > 0:39:44"and drew attention to the litter around him with a gesture of despair."
0:39:46 > 0:39:50He begins to do things like eating far too much.
0:39:50 > 0:39:55I mean, he'd always eaten far too much, but to eat in a sort of bulimic way, sort of stuff.
0:39:55 > 0:39:58Alexandra complained that at meals he just stuffed.
0:39:58 > 0:40:02He never sort of chewed, he just stuffed himself with food.
0:40:02 > 0:40:07So he does seem at the beginning to be going through a kind of mental crisis.
0:40:08 > 0:40:13The King's mental crisis was about to trigger a national drama.
0:40:14 > 0:40:17A few days before the coronation ceremony,
0:40:17 > 0:40:21the King collapsed with abdominal pains.
0:40:21 > 0:40:24Doctors diagnosed acute appendicitis,
0:40:24 > 0:40:28a potentially fatal condition at the turn of the 20th century.
0:40:28 > 0:40:31The top doctors are called in to deal with it.
0:40:31 > 0:40:34It's a guy called Frederick Treves,
0:40:34 > 0:40:40the man who looked after the Elephant Man at the hospital in Whitechapel.
0:40:40 > 0:40:45Here, called in to deal with another sort of 19th century monster,
0:40:45 > 0:40:52Bertie, who is lumbering around in pain, in this sort of dyspeptic agony.
0:40:52 > 0:40:57You know, this organ is swelling inside him and demanding attention
0:40:57 > 0:41:00and causing him the most exquisite pain.
0:41:00 > 0:41:05The royal surgeon insisted that the coronation be delayed.
0:41:05 > 0:41:07The King raged.
0:41:07 > 0:41:10"The coronation cannot be postponed.
0:41:10 > 0:41:13"I cannot and will not disappoint the people.
0:41:13 > 0:41:16"I will go the Abbey at any cost.
0:41:16 > 0:41:20"I will go to the Abbey if I die there."
0:41:20 > 0:41:23Being crowned, having the holy oil poured on him,
0:41:23 > 0:41:26this was an enormously important event for him.
0:41:26 > 0:41:30The thing that he had been waiting for all his life,
0:41:30 > 0:41:35much as Prince Charles has been waiting for his mother to depart this life so that he can become King.
0:41:35 > 0:41:41This was the purpose in life, and so when he got ill and the coronation,
0:41:41 > 0:41:45all the plans had been made, all the invitations had been sent,
0:41:45 > 0:41:47all the china had been produced,
0:41:47 > 0:41:52the dishcloths, everything had been ready, and he got ill.
0:41:52 > 0:41:54And so he was determined to try and keep it up.
0:41:56 > 0:41:58The assumption of power,
0:41:58 > 0:42:02after having waited for so long, is incredibly important to him.
0:42:02 > 0:42:05But Treves presents him with an ultimatum.
0:42:05 > 0:42:08He says, if you don't postpone the coronation
0:42:08 > 0:42:11you will be going to Westminster Abbey in a box.
0:42:12 > 0:42:15Finally the King gave way.
0:42:15 > 0:42:17At noon on 24th June,
0:42:17 > 0:42:20he climbed onto an operating table in Buckingham Palace
0:42:20 > 0:42:23and submitted to the surgeon's knife.
0:42:26 > 0:42:28The flags are all up, it's all been paid for
0:42:28 > 0:42:31and everybody is made to wait while the King undergoes
0:42:31 > 0:42:34this very difficult and dangerous operation.
0:42:34 > 0:42:38You know, a lot of people died of appendicitis in this period.
0:42:38 > 0:42:42This is a new procedure, and it doesn't go well.
0:42:44 > 0:42:48The King stops breathing. The King turns blue in the face.
0:42:50 > 0:42:55And you can imagine the whole Empire holding its breath at this moment,
0:42:55 > 0:43:00because this man has been waiting for decades to be the king of this country
0:43:00 > 0:43:03and it looks as if he's not going to get his chance
0:43:03 > 0:43:06to prove what he's capable of doing.
0:43:13 > 0:43:15The doctors did their job.
0:43:15 > 0:43:17Bertie WOULD go to the Abbey,
0:43:17 > 0:43:19not in a box,
0:43:19 > 0:43:22but the golden state coach of his ancestor, King George III.
0:43:24 > 0:43:27On 9th August 1902,
0:43:27 > 0:43:30the one-time prodigal prince was crowned King Edward VII
0:43:30 > 0:43:33in a dazzling display of pomp and pageantry.
0:43:36 > 0:43:41Edward VII expected the ceremony to be delivered absolutely perfectly.
0:43:41 > 0:43:45He watched every detail of it with care and concern.
0:43:45 > 0:43:48He wanted to send a message to the whole Empire
0:43:48 > 0:43:52that they had a new emperor with all the panoply he could muster.
0:43:52 > 0:43:56And he looked into the great dressing-up box of British history
0:43:56 > 0:44:00and he opened all the files and papers going back in time
0:44:00 > 0:44:04to conjure a coronation of fabulous splendour
0:44:04 > 0:44:07in order to deliver utter impact.
0:44:11 > 0:44:16Bertie was very much ahead of his time as monarch because he was one of the first to understand
0:44:16 > 0:44:20that if the monarchy was to survive in the 20th century,
0:44:20 > 0:44:21it must be ornamental.
0:44:21 > 0:44:26It must be something that people could identify with, that they could see.
0:44:26 > 0:44:28He is becoming the kind of monarch
0:44:28 > 0:44:31that England needed in the 20th century.
0:44:32 > 0:44:34Almost overnight,
0:44:34 > 0:44:37Edward VII transformed the public face of the monarchy.
0:44:37 > 0:44:40Now he set about sweeping away the physical evidence
0:44:40 > 0:44:42of Queen Victoria's reign.
0:44:44 > 0:44:48Determined to bring light into his mother's fusty apartments,
0:44:48 > 0:44:51he hired technicians to install electric lights
0:44:51 > 0:44:55and theatre designers to transform Buckingham Palace
0:44:55 > 0:44:57into a sea of white and gold.
0:44:59 > 0:45:03Bertie embarks on a full scale clear-out.
0:45:03 > 0:45:05He marches around,
0:45:05 > 0:45:09pictures of Albert, pictures of her dogs, all of it is swept aside.
0:45:09 > 0:45:14All the old clutter that Victoria had accumulated is swept aside
0:45:14 > 0:45:17and the place is made into a palace.
0:45:20 > 0:45:24This was a statement about what he thought the monarchy should be.
0:45:28 > 0:45:33That it must be grandly, some people would say slightly vulgarly,
0:45:33 > 0:45:37but it must be grand, and it must give a sense of theatre.
0:45:38 > 0:45:41Edward VII realised that, on its own,
0:45:41 > 0:45:43the restoration of traditional ceremonial
0:45:43 > 0:45:46wasn't enough to preserve the monarchy.
0:45:50 > 0:45:52In an era of rapid social change,
0:45:52 > 0:45:56Bertie believed the Crown should move with the times.
0:46:03 > 0:46:06Edward VII was very much aware
0:46:06 > 0:46:12that the monarchy needed to reach out beyond the aristocracy to other classes.
0:46:12 > 0:46:15In a way, he is the first democratic king.
0:46:15 > 0:46:21He didn't judge people on the basis of your position in Burke's Peerage.
0:46:21 > 0:46:27He was somebody who invited Americans, Jews, people like that
0:46:27 > 0:46:31who might not have been welcomed in the most blue blooded circles.
0:46:34 > 0:46:37With trades unions and the Labour movement on the march,
0:46:37 > 0:46:43the People's King even extended the hand of friendship to sworn enemies of the Crown.
0:46:43 > 0:46:45He wants to be a symbol of unity.
0:46:45 > 0:46:51For example, there's a story about him meeting Keir Hardie, the Labour MP,
0:46:51 > 0:46:55who at the time was the absolute bete noire of all royalty
0:46:55 > 0:46:58and all the aristocracy and the Tory Party,
0:46:58 > 0:47:02because he was highly critical of privilege and very vociferous about saying so.
0:47:02 > 0:47:04And Edward VII meets Keir Hardie
0:47:04 > 0:47:09and he is extraordinarily charming and polite to this class enemy.
0:47:09 > 0:47:13And one of his friends looks at him and says rather sarcastically,
0:47:13 > 0:47:15"Well, you were very nice to him."
0:47:15 > 0:47:18And Edward turns to him very quickly and very sharply says,
0:47:18 > 0:47:22"No, you don't understand. I mean to be King of all the people."
0:47:24 > 0:47:28To the surprise of many of his contemporaries,
0:47:28 > 0:47:32Edward VII was proving himself a more than capable monarch.
0:47:32 > 0:47:36But much as he relished his new public responsibilities,
0:47:36 > 0:47:40the King saw no reason to change the private habits of a lifetime.
0:47:40 > 0:47:44Even at the sacred moment of his coronation,
0:47:44 > 0:47:49the King signalled his intent with his unconventional choice of guests.
0:47:49 > 0:47:52Pride of place in the Abbey was given to a special box
0:47:52 > 0:47:59for his lady friends past and present, including new mistress Alice Keppel.
0:47:59 > 0:48:03He made sure that all the women who were important to him,
0:48:03 > 0:48:05some of whom he slept with,
0:48:05 > 0:48:10were close at hand at this prime moment of his life.
0:48:10 > 0:48:13He made sure that those women,
0:48:13 > 0:48:16without trying put out his wife in any way,
0:48:16 > 0:48:21were accorded a position around him whenever he could provide that.
0:48:21 > 0:48:25And no less so than at the coronation.
0:48:25 > 0:48:29Edward VII was made like that. He loved his Queen,
0:48:29 > 0:48:33he adored his children, but he just needed a little bit of extra.
0:48:34 > 0:48:40Edward VII worked out for himself a new style of monarchy
0:48:40 > 0:48:46which involved a lot of public appearances, doing the ceremonial job perfectly.
0:48:46 > 0:48:53And yet at the same time, he drew a very, very strict line between that and his private life.
0:48:53 > 0:48:55I think he had this very realistic idea,
0:48:55 > 0:49:00in a way much more realistic than putting the whole Royal Family on show,
0:49:00 > 0:49:03of saying, "I'm King, I will do my job as King,
0:49:03 > 0:49:06"but the deal is that I'm allowed a private life."
0:49:08 > 0:49:11For the rest of his life, the King continued to enjoy
0:49:11 > 0:49:17all the luxuries of his position, with Mrs Keppel never far from his side.
0:49:17 > 0:49:21Queen Alexandra had little choice but to put up with her husband's behaviour.
0:49:21 > 0:49:24But nobody else seemed to mind much,
0:49:24 > 0:49:28and in 1903 the King's passion for beautiful women
0:49:28 > 0:49:32would even prove the key to his greatest political triumph.
0:49:34 > 0:49:41In the early years of the 20th century, one issue dominated British foreign policy over all others.
0:49:41 > 0:49:46Germany under the King's troublesome nephew, Kaiser Wilhelm,
0:49:46 > 0:49:49was building up its armed forces at terrifying speed.
0:49:53 > 0:49:59As Prince of Wales, Bertie had been blocked in his ambition to influence foreign and military affairs.
0:49:59 > 0:50:05Now he was determined to put his inside family knowledge to good use.
0:50:05 > 0:50:10The Kaiser is a very difficult man and very paranoid.
0:50:10 > 0:50:14Bertie understood that in a kind of intuitive way.
0:50:14 > 0:50:17Bertie understood very clearly it was not going to be possible for him
0:50:17 > 0:50:20to restrain Germany, or anybody to restrain Germany.
0:50:20 > 0:50:22And he also understood
0:50:22 > 0:50:26that the Kaiser was never going to be a reliable friend,
0:50:26 > 0:50:28so he saw,
0:50:28 > 0:50:33and saw incredibly clearly that war was a real danger.
0:50:33 > 0:50:34He didn't want war.
0:50:34 > 0:50:38But he felt if war was going to come, Britain must be prepared.
0:50:40 > 0:50:42Britain needed allies.
0:50:42 > 0:50:45Finding them wasn't going to be easy.
0:50:45 > 0:50:51The recent war in South Africa against the Boers had made Britain highly unpopular in Europe.
0:50:54 > 0:50:55But the King had a plan.
0:50:56 > 0:51:04In May 1903, he set out on a mission of diplomacy to one of the favourite haunts of his youth, Paris.
0:51:08 > 0:51:10Bertie didn't tell them his plans.
0:51:10 > 0:51:15He makes this a completely secret agenda.
0:51:15 > 0:51:17He didn't even tell his secretaries.
0:51:17 > 0:51:22And when the Royal train arrives and Bertie gets out at the station,
0:51:22 > 0:51:25he's met with incredibly hostile French crowds.
0:51:25 > 0:51:29Bertie turns up in Paris, a place where the British
0:51:29 > 0:51:34are incredibly unpopular at the time, and when he arrives he's booed.
0:51:35 > 0:51:39There are newspaper editorials saying "Go back to England"
0:51:39 > 0:51:45and basically listing every English insult since the burning of Joan of Arc.
0:51:46 > 0:51:55Faced with a French mob, the English King's love of Parisian culture and women was about to pay dividends.
0:51:55 > 0:52:02He goes to the theatre, and the audience in the theatre is incredibly unfriendly and sullen.
0:52:02 > 0:52:09And to the dismay of the French police, the King insists during the interval on going into the foyer
0:52:09 > 0:52:13and he spots an actress, and he goes up to her.
0:52:13 > 0:52:16And kisses her hand and says,
0:52:16 > 0:52:21"Mademoiselle, when I last saw you in London you were superb."
0:52:23 > 0:52:27Edward really does have a magic touch.
0:52:27 > 0:52:31Immediately the rumour mill in Paris puts this about,
0:52:31 > 0:52:34he'd been incredibly charming to this famous actress.
0:52:34 > 0:52:38The next day he walks out into the crowds, he shakes hands,
0:52:38 > 0:52:42he says how he loves Paris, he looks happy,
0:52:42 > 0:52:46and he charms the pants off the French.
0:52:46 > 0:52:50The mood changes like this, you know, it just flips.
0:52:52 > 0:52:55Suddenly, there's outbursts of cheering wherever he goes.
0:52:55 > 0:53:00There's a real sense that he is one of them.
0:53:00 > 0:53:02You need to remember,
0:53:02 > 0:53:05no English politician spoke French like that.
0:53:05 > 0:53:09none of them knew Paris like that and that is critically important
0:53:09 > 0:53:12in causing a huge change in French opinion.
0:53:12 > 0:53:15The King's weakness for French wine, women and song
0:53:15 > 0:53:20had helped him pave the way for a crucial strategic alliance with the old enemy.
0:53:22 > 0:53:25There's a sort of French love of an English Milord,
0:53:25 > 0:53:32I mean, Milord is what they called English, upper class aristocrats who came to Paris to have a good time.
0:53:32 > 0:53:38And as Prince of Wales, Edward VII had come a lot in the '80s and '60s and '70s
0:53:38 > 0:53:42and was famous for his great enjoyment of the theatre,
0:53:42 > 0:53:45and also his use of French brothels.
0:53:45 > 0:53:50And I'm sure that Milord reputation
0:53:50 > 0:53:54didn't do him any harm when he came back in 1903 as King.
0:53:55 > 0:54:00Next, Bertie threw his support behind admirals arguing
0:54:00 > 0:54:06for a new generation of warships, the Dreadnoughts, to keep pace with the German naval threat.
0:54:10 > 0:54:13The King was, if anything, ahead of his ministers
0:54:13 > 0:54:20in realising how vitally important it was that the British Navy must, at all costs, be built up.
0:54:20 > 0:54:24And I think that the King made a very serious contribution
0:54:24 > 0:54:28in pressing his ministers to build new, better ships,
0:54:28 > 0:54:29to look to the future.
0:54:31 > 0:54:37It was a future the 69-year-old King would not live to see.
0:54:37 > 0:54:41The 12-course dinners and the trademark cigars were catching up with him.
0:54:43 > 0:54:46Already seriously ill with chronic emphysema,
0:54:46 > 0:54:50in 1910 the King suffered a series of heart attacks.
0:54:52 > 0:54:56As he slipped in and out of consciousness at Buckingham Palace,
0:54:56 > 0:54:58he was joined by two women -
0:54:58 > 0:55:02his long-suffering wife, Queen Alexandra,
0:55:02 > 0:55:05and his mistress, Alice Keppel.
0:55:11 > 0:55:18Alexandra remained devoted to Bertie, very close to him throughout his life.
0:55:18 > 0:55:20After Bertie's death,
0:55:20 > 0:55:23the undertakers were always making appointments
0:55:23 > 0:55:25to come and put the body into a coffin
0:55:25 > 0:55:29and it was always announced in The Times that this was going to happen.
0:55:29 > 0:55:33And day after day, Alexandra would say, "No, I can't bear to part with him."
0:55:33 > 0:55:39People who came said that for the first time she had Bertie to herself.
0:55:41 > 0:55:45For eight days the Queen clung to her husband.
0:55:45 > 0:55:48But even in death, Bertie was a People's King.
0:55:50 > 0:55:52In recognition of his unique popularity,
0:55:52 > 0:55:56it was decided that his body would lie in state at Westminster
0:55:56 > 0:55:58for the public to pay its respects.
0:55:58 > 0:56:01The first British Monarch ever to do so.
0:56:03 > 0:56:08I think only when King Edward VII died
0:56:08 > 0:56:13did the British people realise how much they liked having him around.
0:56:15 > 0:56:18He'd been around for so long,
0:56:18 > 0:56:20and then suddenly he'd gone,
0:56:20 > 0:56:24and so they surged out in their hundreds of thousands
0:56:24 > 0:56:27to show they mourned his passing.
0:56:32 > 0:56:36Queues of people, humble people, poor people,
0:56:36 > 0:56:40they snaked round Westminster, something like seven mile queues.
0:56:42 > 0:56:46This really does show to a much greater extent than when Queen Victoria died,
0:56:46 > 0:56:51just how successful he had been in making this connection
0:56:51 > 0:56:54between the monarchy and the people.
0:56:57 > 0:57:04He is this sort of libertine figure. He does seem like a fragment of an earlier age.
0:57:04 > 0:57:07You can imagine him careering about 18th century London
0:57:07 > 0:57:09with a big wig on and a beauty spot.
0:57:09 > 0:57:15And I think in a way, although he seems to be the absolute opposite of his father,
0:57:15 > 0:57:20he also seems like the right man for the job in the early part of the 20th century.
0:57:22 > 0:57:28Edward VII's creation of a modern public monarchy, together with his fast-living lifestyle,
0:57:28 > 0:57:34earned him the affection of his people, and raised the Royal Family to new levels of popularity.
0:57:36 > 0:57:40His vision of monarchy as a showy theatre of pageantry
0:57:40 > 0:57:42continues to this day.
0:57:51 > 0:57:56But the example the King set in his personal life would be rejected.
0:57:56 > 0:58:01Bertie's descendants would attempt, with mixed results,
0:58:01 > 0:58:05to return to the family values of his mother, Queen Victoria.
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