0:00:02 > 0:00:08In November 1918, King George V and Queen Mary celebrated victory
0:00:08 > 0:00:13with their people after the dark years of the First World War.
0:00:13 > 0:00:16But the newsreel images of a confident king and queen
0:00:16 > 0:00:20amongst a contented people were deceptive.
0:00:22 > 0:00:26Britain had won the war, but for the British monarchy,
0:00:26 > 0:00:30a new battle at home was beginning after the catastrophic conflict.
0:00:32 > 0:00:35With crowned heads falling across Europe,
0:00:35 > 0:00:39revolution in Russia and militant socialism on the march in Britain,
0:00:39 > 0:00:43the monarchy faced one of the most dangerous moments in its history.
0:00:48 > 0:00:51King George V and Queen Mary
0:00:51 > 0:00:54could not have been a more unlikely pair of saviours.
0:00:54 > 0:00:56Born and brought up in the Victorian age,
0:00:56 > 0:00:59they were conservative to their fingertips,
0:00:59 > 0:01:03yet in the face of unstoppable change,
0:01:03 > 0:01:05they created the House of Windsor
0:01:05 > 0:01:08and forged a new relationship with the British people.
0:01:08 > 0:01:11They were innovators, which everyone's forgotten.
0:01:11 > 0:01:14They didn't mind updating the monarchy.
0:01:14 > 0:01:20George and Mary put the Royal Family on a pedestal as an example to be followed,
0:01:20 > 0:01:23and they embraced democratic reform.
0:01:23 > 0:01:26This is really a new take on the monarchy.
0:01:26 > 0:01:30They're having a direct relationship between the monarchy and the people -
0:01:30 > 0:01:33the people's King.
0:01:33 > 0:01:36But as parents, George and Mary were far less successful
0:01:36 > 0:01:40and in their dysfunctional family life, they courted disaster.
0:01:43 > 0:01:46This two-part portrait of King George and Queen Mary
0:01:46 > 0:01:49examines the extraordinary legacy of the king and queen
0:01:49 > 0:01:54who shaped our monarchy and whose influence persists to this day.
0:02:10 > 0:02:14On the face of it, Prince George was hardly the ideal candidate
0:02:14 > 0:02:18for the task of steering the monarchy into the modern age.
0:02:18 > 0:02:23For the first 35 years of his life, George's grandmother,
0:02:23 > 0:02:27Queen Victoria, sat on the throne and dominated the Royal Family.
0:02:30 > 0:02:33As merely the second son of the Prince of Wales,
0:02:33 > 0:02:36George wasn't expected to become king at all.
0:02:38 > 0:02:42And his upbringing did little to equip him for the challenge.
0:02:42 > 0:02:44George was barely educated at all, really.
0:02:44 > 0:02:49In fact, the general feeling was that royalty was above education,
0:02:49 > 0:02:53so education as such, no, culture, no -
0:02:53 > 0:02:59he confused later in life the word "highbrow" with "eyebrow"
0:02:59 > 0:03:04and indeed, his official biographer, Harold Nicolson,
0:03:04 > 0:03:09said that he had the intellectual capacities of a railway porter.
0:03:09 > 0:03:13In keeping with the time-honoured royal tradition,
0:03:13 > 0:03:16George got his education on the high seas.
0:03:20 > 0:03:23At the age of 12, he was packed off with his older brother,
0:03:23 > 0:03:26Prince Eddy, to train as a naval cadet.
0:03:26 > 0:03:30Prince George loved the Navy.
0:03:32 > 0:03:36The structure and order of the Navy sort of gave him a personality
0:03:36 > 0:03:39when he hadn't really had much of one before
0:03:39 > 0:03:42and I think he liked the rules,
0:03:42 > 0:03:45the neatness and the finish of the whole thing.
0:03:45 > 0:03:51Certainly, far from objecting to the restrictions of the naval life,
0:03:51 > 0:03:53he took to it like a duck to water.
0:03:55 > 0:03:59I think he saw a great logic to the way the naval life worked.
0:03:59 > 0:04:02Military training is all about giving people
0:04:02 > 0:04:05a sense of their own responsibility and a clarity
0:04:05 > 0:04:09of how to carry out the duty of delivering it and for the Navy,
0:04:09 > 0:04:12because you're at sea, you're living in confined spaces,
0:04:12 > 0:04:16he went through the gun deck life and it was very regimented,
0:04:16 > 0:04:20very strict and he would have found that reassuring
0:04:20 > 0:04:24and it would have given him a template for how he lived the duty of the whole of his life.
0:04:24 > 0:04:28George emerged from 15 years at sea
0:04:28 > 0:04:31with the common sense outlook of a naval officer
0:04:31 > 0:04:35and a taste for charts, rigid routine and quarterdeck discipline.
0:04:37 > 0:04:39To his family's dismay,
0:04:39 > 0:04:42the same could not be said of George's scandalous older brother,
0:04:42 > 0:04:44Eddy, the Duke of Clarence,
0:04:44 > 0:04:47who stood directly in the line of succession.
0:04:49 > 0:04:52The press certainly had a bit of a field day with the scandal
0:04:52 > 0:04:55and gossip about young Eddy.
0:04:55 > 0:04:57There were rumours that he was Jack the Ripper,
0:04:57 > 0:05:01there were rumours that he was involved in homosexual scandal,
0:05:01 > 0:05:06where he'd dressed up in a homosexual brothel and was known as Victoria.
0:05:06 > 0:05:10These are all unsubstantiated but they give an indication
0:05:10 > 0:05:16of the rakish kind of behaviour that Eddy was generally suspected of.
0:05:18 > 0:05:21To deal with her wasteful grandson, in 1891,
0:05:21 > 0:05:26Queen Victoria arranged to marry Eddy off to a sensible girl of good Anglo-German stock,
0:05:26 > 0:05:28Princess May of Teck.
0:05:30 > 0:05:33But just weeks before the wedding day,
0:05:33 > 0:05:37Eddy, unreliable to the last, caught the flu and died.
0:05:42 > 0:05:45George's world was turned upside down.
0:05:45 > 0:05:50Not for the first or last time in the Royal Family's history,
0:05:50 > 0:05:54a dependable second son was thrust unwillingly into the line of succession
0:05:54 > 0:05:57by the actions of a reckless older brother.
0:05:57 > 0:06:02Eddy's death is an absolute cataclysm for George.
0:06:02 > 0:06:05I think the prospect of becoming the heir
0:06:05 > 0:06:09and eventually becoming king was awful to George.
0:06:09 > 0:06:13I think there was nothing he dreaded more. He hated going out in public.
0:06:13 > 0:06:15He dreaded meeting strangers.
0:06:15 > 0:06:20The whole idea of a huge public role filled him with total dread.
0:06:22 > 0:06:26George had not only taken his brother's place as a future king,
0:06:26 > 0:06:30he also came under pressure to step into Eddy's shoes at the altar
0:06:30 > 0:06:33and marry his brother's intended bride.
0:06:36 > 0:06:38I think he's horrified by this idea.
0:06:38 > 0:06:41You know, his brother is barely cold in his grave and he just
0:06:41 > 0:06:44doesn't want to think about it and he finds the idea very distasteful.
0:06:44 > 0:06:49But Queen Victoria was quite unsentimental about the whole thing
0:06:49 > 0:06:54and she's absolutely in there, right from the start, saying, "Have you seen May?"
0:06:54 > 0:07:00By tradition, the pool of acceptable breeding stock for the British Royal Family
0:07:00 > 0:07:04was limited to a handful of Protestant princesses,
0:07:04 > 0:07:08ideally German ones, and Queen Victoria was determined
0:07:08 > 0:07:11her good work in finding May should not go to waste.
0:07:13 > 0:07:17Princess May of Teck seemed to fit the bill admirably.
0:07:17 > 0:07:19She was only a Serene Highness,
0:07:19 > 0:07:22she wasn't really out of this top-drawer of royals,
0:07:22 > 0:07:26but nevertheless, she seemed a sensible, solid and obedient kind of girl.
0:07:26 > 0:07:30She actually had been rather flattened into submission
0:07:30 > 0:07:35by her gigantic mother, who was a very large lady
0:07:35 > 0:07:39and a very ebullient lady who told her what to do.
0:07:41 > 0:07:44Within six weeks of Prince Eddy's death,
0:07:44 > 0:07:49a new round of courtship rituals got underway.
0:07:49 > 0:07:51In May 1893, a tea was arranged
0:07:51 > 0:07:55at the home of George's sister in Richmond Park.
0:07:55 > 0:07:58Under strict instructions to do the decent thing,
0:07:58 > 0:08:02George and May were bundled into the garden.
0:08:02 > 0:08:05It was presented as a love match
0:08:05 > 0:08:11but it was the most flagrantly dynastic match that you could possibly imagine.
0:08:11 > 0:08:16He did what he was told. In fact, he did absolutely what he was told.
0:08:16 > 0:08:19He was told to take May out to look at the frogs in the garden.
0:08:19 > 0:08:22He took her out and looked at the frogs in the garden
0:08:22 > 0:08:25and duly proposed to her and married her.
0:08:26 > 0:08:31The couple, both buttoned-up and rigidly formal,
0:08:31 > 0:08:34were agonisingly restrained in each other's company.
0:08:34 > 0:08:37But there was at least a spark of genuine feeling.
0:08:39 > 0:08:43"Dear George, I am very sorry I am so shy with you.
0:08:43 > 0:08:46"It is stupid to be so stiff.
0:08:46 > 0:08:49"Really, there is nothing I would not tell you
0:08:49 > 0:08:51"except that I love you more than anybody
0:08:51 > 0:08:57"and this I cannot tell you myself, so I write it to relieve my feelings."
0:08:57 > 0:09:00"Thank God we both understand each other.
0:09:00 > 0:09:05"I feel it unnecessary for me to tell you how deep my love for you is.
0:09:05 > 0:09:08"I feel it growing stronger every time I see you,
0:09:08 > 0:09:10"though I may appear shy and cold."
0:09:13 > 0:09:15In July 1893,
0:09:15 > 0:09:19George and May were married at St James's Palace in London.
0:09:19 > 0:09:21But for the next 17 years,
0:09:21 > 0:09:24their home was to be far from the metropolis,
0:09:24 > 0:09:27at York Cottage on the Sandringham estate,
0:09:27 > 0:09:32a residence perfectly tailored to George's limited requirements.
0:09:32 > 0:09:37They lived in what by royal standards was a very small house.
0:09:37 > 0:09:40People made disparagingly sneering remarks about it
0:09:40 > 0:09:43and described it as "a glum little villa."
0:09:44 > 0:09:47The drawing room was very small.
0:09:47 > 0:09:50You couldn't get more than about two or three people in it.
0:09:50 > 0:09:54George loved this, because he hated entertaining and it was a wonderful excuse
0:09:54 > 0:09:57not to have lots of people to stay and lots of people to dinner.
0:10:00 > 0:10:03A very important part of George V's character
0:10:03 > 0:10:06was that he was a country man living out in Sandringham.
0:10:06 > 0:10:08He genuinely loved those months
0:10:08 > 0:10:11in the freezing East Anglia countryside
0:10:11 > 0:10:14with the wind whistling in from the North Sea.
0:10:14 > 0:10:18He was a very ordinary man.
0:10:18 > 0:10:20You know, you didn't see much of him at the opera.
0:10:22 > 0:10:28The only music George cared for was the roar of his treasured shot guns.
0:10:28 > 0:10:30He absolutely loved shooting.
0:10:30 > 0:10:34He would have been out shooting every day of his life if he could.
0:10:34 > 0:10:37Always shooting the double guns, which means he had two guns,
0:10:37 > 0:10:39went bang, bang, handed over
0:10:39 > 0:10:42and his loader produced another two - bang, bang.
0:10:42 > 0:10:46And he could, in each flush of pheasants, take as many possible birds as he could
0:10:46 > 0:10:48and he generally killed them stone dead.
0:10:53 > 0:10:57Shunning the bright lights and frivolity of London's high society,
0:10:57 > 0:11:03George knuckled down to the dynastic business of creating heirs.
0:11:03 > 0:11:07In just over 10 years, Princess May produced a girl and five boys
0:11:07 > 0:11:14and George set about instilling them with his beloved naval discipline.
0:11:14 > 0:11:18The children lived this very, very strange existence.
0:11:18 > 0:11:20It's almost like a ship, with their father as the captain,
0:11:20 > 0:11:26marching up and down the quarterdeck, and when they got things wrong, he punished them.
0:11:26 > 0:11:32The Windsor librarian said the Windsors themselves make bad parents.
0:11:32 > 0:11:35They're like ducks, they trample on their young.
0:11:35 > 0:11:40To a great extent, I think George did trample on his young.
0:11:42 > 0:11:49He was an authoritarian. Discipline, punctuality were everything.
0:11:49 > 0:11:54And that, of course, included mealtimes.
0:11:54 > 0:11:58So, everybody was mustered well before the clock struck.
0:11:58 > 0:12:02Prince Henry, Harry as he was known,
0:12:02 > 0:12:07arrived at the table just as the clock was striking the hour.
0:12:07 > 0:12:12His father just looked at him and he fainted.
0:12:14 > 0:12:17Prince George liked to spend quality time
0:12:17 > 0:12:20away from his family in the safety of his study,
0:12:20 > 0:12:24amidst the comforting world of the Imperial postal system,
0:12:24 > 0:12:27fixed within the leaves of his stamp albums.
0:12:27 > 0:12:32The red albums consist of 328 albums,
0:12:32 > 0:12:35each of about 50 pages.
0:12:35 > 0:12:38So, you're getting to about 16,000 pages.
0:12:38 > 0:12:41It's not a pastime for people who are impatient.
0:12:41 > 0:12:44You can get a feel for a sense of order.
0:12:44 > 0:12:46He was extremely precise,
0:12:46 > 0:12:50punctilious to a very high degree.
0:12:50 > 0:12:52Most people who are collectors,
0:12:52 > 0:12:55there's perhaps a degree of pedantry about them.
0:12:55 > 0:12:57There's an eye for detail.
0:12:57 > 0:13:00This collection is no different.
0:13:00 > 0:13:03He was an extremely serious collector.
0:13:03 > 0:13:05He focused on Great Britain and Empire.
0:13:05 > 0:13:09Of its kind, the collection is undoubtedly pre-eminent,
0:13:09 > 0:13:12top collection in the world, whatever you want to call it.
0:13:12 > 0:13:16Is it complete? Yes, it is.
0:13:16 > 0:13:21Every stamp issued by every Commonwealth country, the lot.
0:13:29 > 0:13:34In 1910, George's quiet life came to an end.
0:13:34 > 0:13:37With the death of his father, Edward VII,
0:13:37 > 0:13:42the stamp-collecting country squire became King George V.
0:13:47 > 0:13:50"I am heartbroken and overwhelmed with grief.
0:13:50 > 0:13:52"May God give me strength and guidance
0:13:52 > 0:13:55"in the heavy task which has fallen upon me."
0:13:58 > 0:14:02George wasn't only a king. He was also an emperor.
0:14:02 > 0:14:07Shortly after his coronation, he and his Queen Empress
0:14:07 > 0:14:12travelled to India to receive the homage of their imperial subjects.
0:14:12 > 0:14:16The British Empire had at its centre, India.
0:14:16 > 0:14:22The Raj was the jewel in the crown, but the crown had never been.
0:14:22 > 0:14:26Queen Victoria had never gone, and nor had Edward VII.
0:14:26 > 0:14:32Here at last, the newly-crowned King wanted to go to India,
0:14:32 > 0:14:37and he did, because that's what the old imperial tradition was.
0:14:37 > 0:14:41The King Emperor taking possession of the whole thing
0:14:41 > 0:14:44and he went hell for leather to make it a great event.
0:14:47 > 0:14:52It was a magnificent sight, a fantastic spectacle
0:14:52 > 0:14:56such as the Empire and India had never seen before.
0:14:56 > 0:14:59He got a 101-gun salute.
0:14:59 > 0:15:06This huge display of pomp and power was supposed to indicate
0:15:06 > 0:15:10a kind of secular version of the Divine Right of Kings.
0:15:10 > 0:15:16I think George felt that once he had been acclaimed
0:15:16 > 0:15:19in this quite dramatic and spectacular way,
0:15:19 > 0:15:24he really was the most important Royal personage on Earth.
0:15:29 > 0:15:32For George, it was an intoxicating vision
0:15:32 > 0:15:35of Britain's glorious role as the world's greatest power,
0:15:35 > 0:15:39but the world of majesty that he surveyed from his imperial throne
0:15:39 > 0:15:41was about to be torn apart.
0:15:42 > 0:15:47In 1914, the world went to war.
0:15:47 > 0:15:50In the four years of slaughter that followed,
0:15:50 > 0:15:54his Victorian idyll of reassuring certainty was shattered.
0:15:56 > 0:15:59George found himself at war with his own cousin,
0:15:59 > 0:16:02the German Kaiser, Wilhelm II, in a conflict
0:16:02 > 0:16:07that would leave the European system of monarchies in ruin.
0:16:07 > 0:16:10The war was a terrible, terrible shock.
0:16:10 > 0:16:13I think everything about it, he absolutely abhorred.
0:16:13 > 0:16:15It tore his family apart.
0:16:17 > 0:16:19It created this terrible chaos
0:16:19 > 0:16:24but that incredible sense of duty that he always had kicked in.
0:16:24 > 0:16:28I think he felt that it was his duty to be quiet about it.
0:16:28 > 0:16:32Just to be patriotic and he looked worse and worse.
0:16:32 > 0:16:34He got these terrible bags under his eyes.
0:16:34 > 0:16:37People said he looked like a worn out old penny.
0:16:37 > 0:16:41The First World War was a bewildering assault
0:16:41 > 0:16:43upon everything the King held dear.
0:16:45 > 0:16:49But George's problems were just beginning.
0:16:53 > 0:16:58As the casualty lists mounted, the British public's enthusiasm
0:16:58 > 0:17:02for war turned into bitter resentment of all things German.
0:17:02 > 0:17:08There were during the war, of course, huge spy scares,
0:17:08 > 0:17:11there was an enormous amount of jingoism and chauvinism.
0:17:11 > 0:17:15There were attacks on Bechstein pianos and dachshunds
0:17:15 > 0:17:21and Hoch and other German products, and in particular,
0:17:21 > 0:17:26people in high places with German names were frowned upon.
0:17:26 > 0:17:30King George and his advisors feared that anti-German feeling could
0:17:30 > 0:17:34spill over into hostility towards Britain's most well-known German family,
0:17:34 > 0:17:39the Saxe-Coburg-Gothas of Buckingham Palace.
0:17:44 > 0:17:47When the first major bombing raid over London was conducted
0:17:47 > 0:17:51by German aircraft called Gotha bombers, George's Hanoverian roots
0:17:51 > 0:17:57appeared not just an embarrassment but a real liability.
0:17:57 > 0:18:02In the summer of 1917, the King received a bombshell of his own.
0:18:03 > 0:18:07George was at a dinner party at Buckingham Palace
0:18:07 > 0:18:11and a lady-in-waiting, Lady Maud Warrender,
0:18:11 > 0:18:15let slip that it was murmured in certain circles
0:18:15 > 0:18:20that perhaps the King and the Royal Family
0:18:20 > 0:18:24wasn't quite as loyal and patriotic as it might be.
0:18:24 > 0:18:27George was incredibly upset by all this.
0:18:27 > 0:18:30He was described as having turned pale.
0:18:30 > 0:18:33It clearly had an absolutely appalling effect on him.
0:18:35 > 0:18:39Though his family was unequivocally German,
0:18:39 > 0:18:43he did genuinely feel himself to be 100% English.
0:18:43 > 0:18:50I think it was HG Wells who once referred to the King
0:18:50 > 0:18:54as being an uninspiring alien.
0:18:54 > 0:18:57The King was said to have said angrily,
0:18:57 > 0:19:00"Damn it, I may be uninspiring but I'm not an alien."
0:19:00 > 0:19:05For 200 years, the Royal Family's German roots had been central
0:19:05 > 0:19:07to their very identity.
0:19:07 > 0:19:10They spoke German, married Germans
0:19:10 > 0:19:14and had until recently regarded themselves as German.
0:19:14 > 0:19:16To safeguard his future,
0:19:16 > 0:19:20George now turned his back on two centuries of family history.
0:19:22 > 0:19:24"By the King, a proclamation,
0:19:24 > 0:19:28"declaring that the name of Windsor is to be borne by his Royal house
0:19:28 > 0:19:32"and family and relinquishing the use of all German titles."
0:19:35 > 0:19:39By adopting the name Windsor, George had transformed his family name
0:19:39 > 0:19:44from a dangerous liability into a reassuring emblem of Britishness.
0:19:44 > 0:19:48It's an absolutely brilliant name, if you think about it.
0:19:48 > 0:19:51There was this castle which went back to William the Conqueror.
0:19:51 > 0:19:54It was as English as could be.
0:19:54 > 0:19:57It was really a kind of stroke of genius.
0:19:57 > 0:20:02It absolutely pinned the Royal Family
0:20:02 > 0:20:05to something that was quintessentially English.
0:20:05 > 0:20:09As a result, we have the House of Windsor.
0:20:09 > 0:20:12Cutting the family's links with its German roots
0:20:12 > 0:20:15was just the start of the Royal revamp.
0:20:15 > 0:20:19George was determined to give his new dynasty not just a new name
0:20:19 > 0:20:22but entirely new values.
0:20:23 > 0:20:27George's father, King Edward VII, had been a man of many vices.
0:20:31 > 0:20:33He had twice dragged the family name into the mud
0:20:33 > 0:20:35being called upon to give evidence
0:20:35 > 0:20:38in shocking divorce and gambling trials.
0:20:42 > 0:20:47In the court of King George, monogamy was the order of the day.
0:20:47 > 0:20:52We have seen enough of the intrigue and meddling of certain ladies.
0:20:52 > 0:20:56I'm not interested in any wife except my own.
0:20:56 > 0:20:59He's really a throwback in many respects.
0:20:59 > 0:21:02His father was an Edwardian, George was really a Victorian.
0:21:02 > 0:21:05His father had gone out, had lots of mistresses,
0:21:05 > 0:21:08drunk and eaten a very great deal and generally had a very good time.
0:21:08 > 0:21:13George, he's somebody who wants life always to feel safe.
0:21:15 > 0:21:17The court of George V
0:21:17 > 0:21:23and Queen Mary is much more domestic than the court of Edward VII.
0:21:23 > 0:21:28George V liked to go to bed every night at 10 past 11, precisely.
0:21:28 > 0:21:33After dinner, the Queen gets out her knitting needles and knits or sews.
0:21:34 > 0:21:38A lot of people who'd known the old court complain
0:21:38 > 0:21:41that this is domestic, this is very boring.
0:21:41 > 0:21:45George was deliberately turning back the clock
0:21:45 > 0:21:50to the values of his grandmother, Queen Victoria, and woe befell
0:21:50 > 0:21:53anybody who sought to sully the good name of the Windsor dynasty,
0:21:53 > 0:21:58as Daisy Warwick, one of Edward VII's mistresses, found to her cost.
0:21:59 > 0:22:03Daisy Warwick, who was perhaps the most important of Edward VII's
0:22:03 > 0:22:09mistresses, tells the Royal advisors that she is going to publish
0:22:09 > 0:22:10a large amount of letters.
0:22:10 > 0:22:15She was trying to blackmail George V. She wanted to be paid £100,000.
0:22:16 > 0:22:19This provokes total panic amongst the Royal advisors.
0:22:19 > 0:22:23Effectively, what happens is that the Royal solicitor serves her
0:22:23 > 0:22:27with a sort of notice that she's going to be committed
0:22:27 > 0:22:30to Holloway unless she shuts up.
0:22:32 > 0:22:34And so she does shut up.
0:22:34 > 0:22:36She gets very brutal treatment indeed
0:22:36 > 0:22:40and given the fact that she had been a really important person
0:22:40 > 0:22:43in his father's life, I do think it's quite an extreme reaction.
0:22:45 > 0:22:49It does show rather a frightened king, I think.
0:22:49 > 0:22:52George had good reason to feel embattled.
0:22:52 > 0:22:56In 1917, his armies were mired in a seemingly endless war
0:22:56 > 0:23:00with Germany and his own first cousin, the Kaiser.
0:23:04 > 0:23:07And reports from George's other reigning first cousin,
0:23:07 > 0:23:11Tsar Nicholas II in Russia, were even worse.
0:23:13 > 0:23:15"Bad news from Russia.
0:23:15 > 0:23:17"Practically a revolution has broken out
0:23:17 > 0:23:20"and some of the guards regiments have killed their officers.
0:23:20 > 0:23:25"Of course, this rising is against the government and not the Tsar."
0:23:27 > 0:23:30The King was in denial.
0:23:30 > 0:23:32The communist revolution was nothing less than
0:23:32 > 0:23:35a full-blooded assault on the very concept of monarchy.
0:23:35 > 0:23:38Two days later, George's cousin was deposed
0:23:38 > 0:23:42and three centuries of imperial rule were ended.
0:23:42 > 0:23:45George was in despair.
0:23:45 > 0:23:50George had about 50 first cousins all over Europe.
0:23:50 > 0:23:57But of all his cousins, the person he was closest to was Nicholas.
0:23:57 > 0:24:00They both looked incredibly alike.
0:24:00 > 0:24:06Even as children, the servants in the castles in Denmark
0:24:06 > 0:24:09where they went for the holidays would get them muddled up.
0:24:09 > 0:24:12Although in adult life they didn't meet very often,
0:24:12 > 0:24:16I think there was definitely a sort of sense of bond between them.
0:24:16 > 0:24:19George writes very sweet letters to Nicholas.
0:24:19 > 0:24:21He will always say things like,
0:24:21 > 0:24:23"I regard you as one of my closest friends.
0:24:23 > 0:24:28"If there's anything I can ever do for you, I will."
0:24:30 > 0:24:32With revolution raging in Russia,
0:24:32 > 0:24:36in April 1917 Cousin Nicky turned to George for help.
0:24:37 > 0:24:41After an emergency meeting at Buckingham Palace,
0:24:41 > 0:24:44the King agreed that asylum in Britain should be offered
0:24:44 > 0:24:46to the Tsar and his young family.
0:24:46 > 0:24:50A few days later, George thought again.
0:24:51 > 0:24:53His private secretary said, "Look.
0:24:53 > 0:24:56"This could cause a lot of trouble, a lot of dissent,
0:24:56 > 0:24:58"because the Tsar was regarded as a tyrant."
0:24:58 > 0:25:03The Royal cousinhood looked as though it was going to take
0:25:03 > 0:25:06pre-eminence over the concerns of democracy.
0:25:06 > 0:25:08The fact was, though,
0:25:08 > 0:25:13really his sole raison d'etre was to keep the British monarchy in being.
0:25:15 > 0:25:18The King was not going to risk the House of Windsor
0:25:18 > 0:25:22by rescuing the House of Romanov.
0:25:22 > 0:25:26Two weeks after the offer of asylum, the Palace wrote to the Foreign Secretary.
0:25:26 > 0:25:30"Every day, the King is becoming more concerned about the question
0:25:30 > 0:25:33"of the Emperor and Empress coming to this country.
0:25:33 > 0:25:38"It will be very hard on the King and arouse much public comment."
0:25:40 > 0:25:44The Government insisted that it was too late to withdraw their offer.
0:25:44 > 0:25:45George was adamant
0:25:45 > 0:25:49and fired off a volley of increasingly desperate letters.
0:25:49 > 0:25:52Under sustained Royal bombardment, the Government relented.
0:25:52 > 0:25:56The offer of asylum was withdrawn.
0:25:56 > 0:25:59It wasn't that the Government wanted to block it.
0:25:59 > 0:26:02It was George and his private secretary who blocked it, and they
0:26:02 > 0:26:06had to say several times before the Government would actually accept it.
0:26:06 > 0:26:10It is a real example of dynastic ruthlessness.
0:26:10 > 0:26:13You've got to cut your connections with things that are going
0:26:13 > 0:26:15to damage you.
0:26:15 > 0:26:18George had successfully neutralised another threat
0:26:18 > 0:26:22to the monarchy's public image. But his ruthlessness had a cost.
0:26:22 > 0:26:27On 16th July, 1918, George's cousin, his wife
0:26:27 > 0:26:31and their five children were murdered by the Bolsheviks.
0:26:36 > 0:26:41Four months later, King George and his people celebrated victory in the First World War.
0:26:42 > 0:26:45But the festivities masked deep concerns.
0:26:49 > 0:26:51During the war and in its aftermath,
0:26:51 > 0:26:56the crowned heads of 27 Royal houses were deposed or abdicated, including
0:26:56 > 0:27:01the Russian Tsar, the German Kaiser and the Austro-Hungarian Emperor.
0:27:03 > 0:27:07The war was almost the only thing one can conceive of
0:27:07 > 0:27:10which could have changed George and it did change George.
0:27:10 > 0:27:14The monarchs of Europe started falling like ninepins.
0:27:14 > 0:27:20It inspires such a sense of anxiety in him that it really forces him
0:27:20 > 0:27:23to think about what the British monarchy is
0:27:23 > 0:27:25and how it's going to survive.
0:27:27 > 0:27:29In the new democratic age,
0:27:29 > 0:27:35universal suffrage had enshrined the principle of one person, one vote.
0:27:35 > 0:27:39With mass unemployment, chronic industrial unrest
0:27:39 > 0:27:42and militant socialism on the march,
0:27:42 > 0:27:44the outlook for British monarchy was bleak.
0:27:45 > 0:27:47The rupture between the old world
0:27:47 > 0:27:51and the new could not have been more alarming.
0:27:52 > 0:27:54"The King is daily growing more anxious
0:27:54 > 0:27:57"about the question of unemployment.
0:27:57 > 0:28:01"The people grow discontented and agitators seize their opportunities.
0:28:01 > 0:28:05"The police interfere, troops are called out and riot begets riot.
0:28:05 > 0:28:08"And possibly revolution."
0:28:08 > 0:28:12George was infected by this fear and periodically, of course,
0:28:12 > 0:28:17the Labour Party sang "The Red Flag," much to George's chagrin.
0:28:17 > 0:28:23As a result of this, he was always on the lookout for subversion.
0:28:23 > 0:28:27He was very worried that what this presaged was the revolution
0:28:27 > 0:28:30and we all know what that would have led to -
0:28:30 > 0:28:33the guillotine set up in Trafalgar Square, that sort of thing.
0:28:33 > 0:28:36That was the nightmare that he was faced with.
0:28:36 > 0:28:39In a series of secret meetings during and after the war,
0:28:39 > 0:28:44the King and his advisors pondered how to preserve and strengthen the monarchy.
0:28:46 > 0:28:49When you go into the Royal Archives,
0:28:49 > 0:28:54there's a fascinating folder there called Unrest In The Country.
0:28:54 > 0:28:57It's dated 1917.
0:28:57 > 0:29:02It was drawn up by George V's extraordinary private secretary,
0:29:02 > 0:29:05Stamfordham. One of the great strengths of George V was that
0:29:05 > 0:29:09he knew his limitations and he knew that this private secretary,
0:29:09 > 0:29:12Stamfordham, was infinitely more on the ball than he was.
0:29:12 > 0:29:19He let him bring in left-wing clerics, social workers,
0:29:19 > 0:29:23to find out and report what was going on in the country.
0:29:23 > 0:29:27Someone said, "You know, I was in a second-class railway carriage
0:29:27 > 0:29:31the other day and I saw 'Down with the Kaiser and all Kings.'"
0:29:31 > 0:29:34Second-class railway carriages in those days,
0:29:34 > 0:29:36that's the equivalent of business class.
0:29:36 > 0:29:39It was first-class, second-class, third-class -
0:29:39 > 0:29:42so what was in the third-class carriages?
0:29:42 > 0:29:43It was time to find out.
0:29:49 > 0:29:53The King and Queen now set out on a quest, to bring what had once
0:29:53 > 0:29:57been a lofty, remote monarchy into line with the British people.
0:29:58 > 0:30:01The thought of having to go out and talk to people he didn't know,
0:30:01 > 0:30:06and make public speeches, was his idea of hell.
0:30:06 > 0:30:10But he forces himself to go out, travel round the country.
0:30:10 > 0:30:15He goes to depressed areas like South Wales and the north-east,
0:30:15 > 0:30:17and he visits miners' homes.
0:30:19 > 0:30:22Remember, this is a time of great industrial strife.
0:30:22 > 0:30:26The King and Queen don't say this is frightful, send in the army.
0:30:26 > 0:30:29On the contrary, what they are doing is actually going to the mining
0:30:29 > 0:30:33districts and trying to see for themselves and talk to the people.
0:30:33 > 0:30:38What's interesting is this is really a new take on the monarchy.
0:30:38 > 0:30:41It's saying that instead of the role being purely political
0:30:41 > 0:30:44and dealing with parties and politicians, what they are doing
0:30:44 > 0:30:48is having a direct relationship between the monarchy and the people.
0:30:48 > 0:30:51The people's king.
0:30:52 > 0:30:55The people's king even discovered
0:30:55 > 0:31:00a new-found interest in the people's game.
0:31:02 > 0:31:06"I went to a football match at which there were 73,000 people.
0:31:06 > 0:31:10"At the end, they sang the national anthem and cheered tremendously."
0:31:13 > 0:31:14"No Bolsheviks there."
0:31:18 > 0:31:23The King wasn't only dishing out the silverware to sporting heroes.
0:31:23 > 0:31:27Previously, Royal honours had been reserved for the establishment
0:31:27 > 0:31:30and those who could afford them.
0:31:30 > 0:31:33Now, everybody could get a medal on the basis of merit
0:31:33 > 0:31:35in the form of the Order of the British Empire.
0:31:35 > 0:31:40In two years, the King handed out 15,000 of the newly-minted gongs.
0:31:42 > 0:31:49The trick that George V and Queen Mary carried out was to create
0:31:49 > 0:31:53a link between the top, themselves, and the bottom.
0:31:53 > 0:31:56The people.
0:31:56 > 0:31:59To create a reputation that had nothing to do with
0:31:59 > 0:32:03the aristocracy, so that when the social structures got knocked
0:32:03 > 0:32:07sideways in the rest of Europe, the King was quite happy
0:32:07 > 0:32:12because his supporting constituency was the ordinary people.
0:32:14 > 0:32:16It's a strange medieval idea,
0:32:16 > 0:32:20that the King and the people are linked and the aristocracy
0:32:20 > 0:32:22and the middle classes and the rich people don't matter.
0:32:22 > 0:32:26That between the top and the bottom there is an essential unity
0:32:26 > 0:32:29and that is what George V embodied.
0:32:32 > 0:32:36But in the new democratic age, the British Monarchy was not
0:32:36 > 0:32:39the only organisation vying for the loyalty
0:32:39 > 0:32:41of the working man and woman.
0:32:41 > 0:32:45The people's king had a rival for the affections of his subjects
0:32:45 > 0:32:48in the form of the people's party.
0:32:48 > 0:32:52In 1924, Labour formed Britain's first socialist government,
0:32:52 > 0:32:58led by a one-time supporter of Lenin, Ramsay MacDonald.
0:33:00 > 0:33:03For a king who privately abhorred socialism,
0:33:03 > 0:33:06this was to be a major test of constitutional tact.
0:33:08 > 0:33:12"Today, 23 years ago, dear Grandmamma died.
0:33:12 > 0:33:16"I wonder what she would have thought of a Labour Government."
0:33:17 > 0:33:22As George braced himself to meet his ministers, he made clear
0:33:22 > 0:33:25that one thing was not negotiable.
0:33:25 > 0:33:30King George V laid down the law in the most minute way about clothes.
0:33:30 > 0:33:36A gentleman should never appear in a morning suit with a coloured tie.
0:33:36 > 0:33:40Strange rubrics of that kind that George laid down.
0:33:40 > 0:33:44The funny thing about this was that when the socialists eventually
0:33:44 > 0:33:48gained power, as they did in 1924 with a minority government,
0:33:48 > 0:33:53what really preoccupied King George V was the whole business about
0:33:53 > 0:33:56whether they should wear knee-breeches or whether
0:33:56 > 0:34:00they should come to court in ordinary clothes, or what sort
0:34:00 > 0:34:04of concessions they should wear, and he was absolutely obsessed by this.
0:34:06 > 0:34:09With some Labour ministers unable or unwilling to purchase a full
0:34:09 > 0:34:13set of court dress, George's trusted private secretary,
0:34:13 > 0:34:17Lord Stamfordham, as ever, had the answer.
0:34:17 > 0:34:20"I have ascertained from Messrs Moss Bros,
0:34:20 > 0:34:23"which I believe is a well-known and dependable firm, that they
0:34:23 > 0:34:28"have in stock a few suits of regulation dress from £30 complete."
0:34:32 > 0:34:34With his ministers suitably attired,
0:34:34 > 0:34:38the next phase of George's plan was set in motion.
0:34:38 > 0:34:44The victory of the Labour Government of 1923-24 was one of those
0:34:44 > 0:34:48moments when George showed that he'd really learnt something.
0:34:48 > 0:34:54He very smoothly dealt with the accession of these new MPs
0:34:54 > 0:34:59who were far more radical than anybody else he'd previously seen.
0:34:59 > 0:35:02He invited them all to Buckingham Palace.
0:35:02 > 0:35:07His speed and his quickness in welcoming them
0:35:07 > 0:35:12helped to make what could have been a bumpy transition very smooth.
0:35:13 > 0:35:16George's charm offensive worked.
0:35:18 > 0:35:21Labour politicians were actually delighted to come along
0:35:21 > 0:35:24to Buckingham Palace to be spoken to by the King and Queen.
0:35:24 > 0:35:30If you spent half a lifetime struggling against poverty,
0:35:30 > 0:35:33working your way through trade unions,
0:35:33 > 0:35:36working your way through political organisations, and to become
0:35:36 > 0:35:42a power in the land, how is that ratified, how is that confirmed?
0:35:42 > 0:35:44What makes that seem worthwhile?
0:35:44 > 0:35:47It's when you're in the presence of the King and Queen
0:35:47 > 0:35:49and they treat you seriously.
0:35:50 > 0:35:53"If Royalty had given the Labour Government the cold shoulder,
0:35:53 > 0:35:55"we should have returned the call.
0:35:55 > 0:35:57"It has not.
0:35:57 > 0:36:00"The King has never seen me as a minister without making me feel
0:36:00 > 0:36:02"he is also seeing me as a friend."
0:36:04 > 0:36:07In public, the King had bent over backwards to accommodate
0:36:07 > 0:36:10the realities of his role as a constitutional monarch.
0:36:13 > 0:36:18But from the beginning, George ruled his own household with an iron fist.
0:36:20 > 0:36:25George's private views were not that different, in many respects, from
0:36:25 > 0:36:31his autocratic cousins, the Kaiser in Germany and even the Tsar in Russia.
0:36:31 > 0:36:34But the only place he really could be an autocrat was
0:36:34 > 0:36:36in his own household, and he was.
0:36:38 > 0:36:42May was frightened of George, even though he doted on her.
0:36:42 > 0:36:46She was certainly intimidated by him and to such an extent,
0:36:46 > 0:36:50for example, that he laid down the law about what kind of clothes
0:36:50 > 0:36:55she would wear and, therefore, she wore very old-fashioned kinds of clothes.
0:36:55 > 0:37:00She respected him not just as her husband but as the King.
0:37:01 > 0:37:04This is extraordinarily important where she was concerned.
0:37:04 > 0:37:09He was much more than just a husband whom she doted on.
0:37:09 > 0:37:14He was a monarch who was tantamount to a domestic god.
0:37:16 > 0:37:20George was determined that his task of reinventing the monarchy
0:37:20 > 0:37:22was not a one man job.
0:37:22 > 0:37:26The House of Windsor was to be a family concern.
0:37:26 > 0:37:32He appeared on most public occasions with his wife, Mary, by his side.
0:37:32 > 0:37:35A departure from his father who left his Queen at home.
0:37:36 > 0:37:39As his children grew older, the King put them to work
0:37:39 > 0:37:42in the family business.
0:37:43 > 0:37:46What George and Mary wanted to do with their children
0:37:46 > 0:37:50was to clearly put them to work to improve the message of monarchy
0:37:50 > 0:37:52that he wanted to put across
0:37:52 > 0:37:54and they were deployed.
0:38:00 > 0:38:03Edward, Prince of Wales, visited the United States.
0:38:03 > 0:38:06All the American newspapers visited him too.
0:38:06 > 0:38:09They besieged him on the boat and pursued him everywhere.
0:38:09 > 0:38:14In 1924, George dispatched his oldest son, David,
0:38:14 > 0:38:17the Prince of Wales, on a marathon tour of the Empire to cement
0:38:17 > 0:38:22the bonds between his distant peoples and their mother country.
0:38:22 > 0:38:24The effect was sensational.
0:38:24 > 0:38:29David was the most gregarious, enthusiastic, charming prince.
0:38:29 > 0:38:34His debonair character, mixing with the fact that he was
0:38:34 > 0:38:38the future King Emperor, made him really attractive to people.
0:38:39 > 0:38:42The Prince of Wales had devastating charm.
0:38:42 > 0:38:45It's very easy for Royals to have charm -
0:38:45 > 0:38:49all you have to do is smile politely. He was the real thing.
0:38:49 > 0:38:55He had got this kind of amazing star appeal that he could wow a multitude.
0:38:55 > 0:38:57He could go into a room filled with angry coal miners,
0:38:57 > 0:39:01within 10 minutes, he'd be leading them in a sing-song.
0:39:03 > 0:39:06In the years after the First World War, the Prince clocked up
0:39:06 > 0:39:1116 tours of the far-flung Empire in the service of king and country.
0:39:13 > 0:39:15But George wasn't satisfied.
0:39:18 > 0:39:24David didn't much enjoy being pushed around but his scary dad, George,
0:39:24 > 0:39:26is absolutely determined to make sure
0:39:26 > 0:39:29that they get on and do their duty.
0:39:29 > 0:39:34David loathed it and it made him gradually, gradually,
0:39:34 > 0:39:36more and more angry.
0:39:36 > 0:39:38It built and built and it tightened and tightened.
0:39:38 > 0:39:41That burdened him down.
0:39:41 > 0:39:43Getting these endless letters.
0:39:43 > 0:39:48When you're, like any boy is, longing for your father's affirmation,
0:39:48 > 0:39:50and he never got it.
0:39:50 > 0:39:53On his son's work for the monarchy,
0:39:53 > 0:39:57the King was ever-grudging in his praise, but on every other aspect
0:39:57 > 0:40:01of his son's life, the King never failed to offer
0:40:01 > 0:40:03his scathing opinion.
0:40:03 > 0:40:07The King attached enormous importance to outward appearance.
0:40:07 > 0:40:10He would notice with an eagle eye,
0:40:10 > 0:40:15one person in a room had got some detail of his costume wrong
0:40:15 > 0:40:19and he would point it out ruthlessly and ridicule him for it.
0:40:19 > 0:40:23The Prince of Wales didn't give a damn.
0:40:27 > 0:40:30This was the time of flappers and of lipstick and of cocktails
0:40:30 > 0:40:33and of nightclubs and all the sort of things, in fact,
0:40:33 > 0:40:37that his eldest son, David, enjoyed.
0:40:37 > 0:40:42This helped, I think, to focus the antipathy between the two men.
0:40:42 > 0:40:49There was one famous occasion when George V said to David,
0:40:49 > 0:40:53his oldest son, "You dress like a cad.
0:40:53 > 0:40:55"You behave like a cad. You are a cad - get out!"
0:40:58 > 0:41:00Increasingly disillusioned,
0:41:00 > 0:41:04David found comfort in the arms of a series of married women.
0:41:04 > 0:41:07The Prince of Wales seemed to be reverting
0:41:07 > 0:41:10to the ways of his grandfather, King Edward.
0:41:14 > 0:41:18He not only rejected his father's Victorian morality.
0:41:18 > 0:41:22Increasingly, David lacked his father's respect
0:41:22 > 0:41:25for the institution of monarchy itself.
0:41:27 > 0:41:32"It is rotten having to trot around with the King. Such a waste of time.
0:41:32 > 0:41:35"People can't and won't stand for it nowadays
0:41:35 > 0:41:38"and how well do I abhor all that sort of rot."
0:41:42 > 0:41:47He poured out his soul to Freda Dudley Ward in these letters.
0:41:47 > 0:41:52David was absolutely desperate about his relationship with his father
0:41:52 > 0:41:55and he talked about what a tyrant his father was,
0:41:55 > 0:41:59why he was such a bully as far as his children were concerned.
0:41:59 > 0:42:02Another thing that he said in these letters -
0:42:02 > 0:42:04he wrote to Freda that he
0:42:04 > 0:42:09really thought the age of monarchies and princing - this sort of American
0:42:09 > 0:42:12term he'd picked up - the age of monarchies and princing is over.
0:42:15 > 0:42:19As the gulf between the King and his son widened, George turned
0:42:19 > 0:42:22for reassurance to his second son -
0:42:22 > 0:42:24the shy, stammering Albert, Duke of York.
0:42:25 > 0:42:29In his designated role as inspector of factories,
0:42:29 > 0:42:33Albert's job was to connect with the growing class of industrial workers.
0:42:33 > 0:42:37What he lacked in dazzle, he made up for with his dependability.
0:42:37 > 0:42:41This was not the first time in George's family history
0:42:41 > 0:42:45that a dutiful second son had been called into public life to fill
0:42:45 > 0:42:47the void left by a reckless older brother.
0:42:50 > 0:42:54For George, it was really important that the crown would be passed
0:42:54 > 0:42:56safely to his successor.
0:42:56 > 0:43:00David never looked like he had the moral stability to carry it off.
0:43:00 > 0:43:03Yet he could see in his second son, Bertie, great strengths
0:43:03 > 0:43:06and just as he, George, had come to the throne as a second son,
0:43:06 > 0:43:09so he prayed that maybe Bertie could.
0:43:10 > 0:43:14"You have always been so sensible and easy to work with,
0:43:14 > 0:43:19"and so ready to listen to any advice and agree with my opinions that
0:43:19 > 0:43:22"I feel we have always got on well together.
0:43:22 > 0:43:24"Very different to dear David."
0:43:27 > 0:43:31In 1923, Bertie cemented his position as George's favourite son
0:43:31 > 0:43:33by finding a nice unmarried girl.
0:43:33 > 0:43:38Even though she wasn't royal, George's Victorian father
0:43:38 > 0:43:41had the imagination to move with the times.
0:43:41 > 0:43:45It is with the greatest pleasure that the King and Queen announce
0:43:45 > 0:43:49the betrothal of their beloved son, the Duke of York,
0:43:49 > 0:43:52to the Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon,
0:43:52 > 0:43:55daughter of the Earl and Countess of Strathmore.
0:43:58 > 0:44:02He and Queen Mary had made this quite revolutionary decision,
0:44:02 > 0:44:06that their children did not have to marry royal any more.
0:44:06 > 0:44:11There was a lot of newspaper coverage about Catherine Middleton
0:44:11 > 0:44:13marrying the Duke of Cambridge.
0:44:13 > 0:44:15In fact, the decision to allow them
0:44:15 > 0:44:18to marry out of royal families was much more revolutionary.
0:44:18 > 0:44:21It was a much bigger break with the past.
0:44:21 > 0:44:25A lot of people thought they were mad but he knew they weren't mad.
0:44:25 > 0:44:30What is interesting and contradictory about them is that in one way,
0:44:30 > 0:44:34they loved tradition, they loved the way everything had always been done.
0:44:34 > 0:44:37But at the same time, they were innovators,
0:44:37 > 0:44:41which everyone's forgotten. They didn't mind updating the monarchy.
0:44:41 > 0:44:43If the tradition is no longer useful,
0:44:43 > 0:44:46elbow it and invent another tradition.
0:44:49 > 0:44:53While George busied himself reinventing family traditions,
0:44:53 > 0:44:57by the early 1930s, his wider family were facing disaster.
0:44:59 > 0:45:02With the economy reeling from financial meltdown
0:45:02 > 0:45:03in the banking system,
0:45:03 > 0:45:09massive cuts in Government spending seemed the only way out.
0:45:09 > 0:45:12With the parties in Westminster locked in stalemate
0:45:12 > 0:45:15and the Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald unable to command
0:45:15 > 0:45:19the support of his cabinet, the Labour leader headed
0:45:19 > 0:45:22to Buckingham Palace to offer his resignation.
0:45:25 > 0:45:28With the disastrous collapse of political leadership
0:45:28 > 0:45:32seeming inevitable, the King took action.
0:45:32 > 0:45:35George persuaded him that he shouldn't resign,
0:45:35 > 0:45:38that he should become the head of a national government.
0:45:38 > 0:45:41In a way, this was really quite remarkable.
0:45:41 > 0:45:45George actually did this crucial balancing act
0:45:45 > 0:45:47between the left and the right.
0:45:47 > 0:45:51Despite his intellectual limitations,
0:45:51 > 0:45:54what he possessed was a sort of sublime common sense.
0:45:54 > 0:45:56He knew he had to do it and he did it.
0:45:58 > 0:46:03It has been suggested that the King in some way
0:46:03 > 0:46:06overstepped his constitutional role.
0:46:06 > 0:46:10This was something which was potentially very risky
0:46:10 > 0:46:18for the monarchy, but somebody has got to create a situation
0:46:18 > 0:46:23in which the politicians can somehow
0:46:23 > 0:46:26look to the national interest.
0:46:26 > 0:46:28At that point, the King was absolutely vital
0:46:28 > 0:46:32in acting as the broker between the leading politicians
0:46:32 > 0:46:34and bringing them to a solution.
0:46:36 > 0:46:40George's intervention helped to avert political collapse
0:46:40 > 0:46:42at a time of national crisis.
0:46:47 > 0:46:49The sailor king had turned out to be a shrewd
0:46:49 > 0:46:52navigator of the ship of constitutional monarchy.
0:47:02 > 0:47:05His Majesty the King.
0:47:07 > 0:47:11Through one of the marvels of modern science,
0:47:11 > 0:47:16I am enabled this Christmas Day,
0:47:16 > 0:47:22to speak to all my peoples throughout the Empire.
0:47:25 > 0:47:31On Christmas Day 1932, George notched up another Royal first.
0:47:31 > 0:47:33Seizing upon the latest technology,
0:47:33 > 0:47:37the King took the monarchy directly into the nation's living rooms.
0:47:39 > 0:47:41George V had a very good voice.
0:47:41 > 0:47:45It sounded as though it had been marinated in ancient whisky,
0:47:45 > 0:47:47which it probably had.
0:47:47 > 0:47:52It was deep, it had a timbre to it. It came across.
0:47:52 > 0:47:57Your loyalty, your confidence in me
0:47:57 > 0:48:00has been my abundant reward.
0:48:02 > 0:48:06The King was both distant and magical and yet intimate and paternal,
0:48:06 > 0:48:12and he did it absolutely brilliantly and he became ever more revered,
0:48:12 > 0:48:15I think, as the father of his people.
0:48:17 > 0:48:23I speak now from my home and from my heart to you all.
0:48:26 > 0:48:34To all, to each, I wish a happy Christmas. God bless you.
0:48:43 > 0:48:46Over the course of his 25 years on the throne,
0:48:46 > 0:48:49the King had re-energised the monarchy,
0:48:49 > 0:48:52connected it with the British people
0:48:52 > 0:48:55and given it a new relevance for the modern age.
0:48:55 > 0:49:01In 1935, he and his wife Mary celebrated their Silver Jubilee.
0:49:02 > 0:49:07He was enormously popular but he had grown into the hearts of the people.
0:49:07 > 0:49:09The rapturous reception he met
0:49:09 > 0:49:12when he drove around London during those celebrations.
0:49:16 > 0:49:21It profoundly astonished and deeply moved him.
0:49:22 > 0:49:25He is said to have arrived back in Buckingham Palace
0:49:25 > 0:49:29and said almost in a perplexed way to an equerry,
0:49:29 > 0:49:32"I never knew they felt like that about me."
0:49:33 > 0:49:35Not everybody did.
0:49:35 > 0:49:41By 1935, the King's eldest son David was in his 40s, still unmarried,
0:49:41 > 0:49:44and with a new mistress who was guaranteed to set
0:49:44 > 0:49:46his parents' blood pressure soaring.
0:49:46 > 0:49:52Wallis Simpson was brash, American and dripping with emeralds.
0:49:52 > 0:49:55Worse still, she was twice-married.
0:49:57 > 0:50:01Determined to shut Wallis out, the King flexed his muscles over
0:50:01 > 0:50:05the question of the guest list to a reception at Buckingham Palace.
0:50:06 > 0:50:11But the King's eldest son was no longer so easily pushed around.
0:50:11 > 0:50:16David's father, George V, absolutely put his foot down and said
0:50:16 > 0:50:20they were not to be invited and the Prince of Wales was absolutely
0:50:20 > 0:50:24determined that Wallis was going to be invited to this engagement party.
0:50:24 > 0:50:27Somehow, Wallis made a startling entrance.
0:50:27 > 0:50:33She chose for that evening to wear a violet lame dress with a vivid
0:50:33 > 0:50:38green sash, so you can imagine what a stir she made just entering the room.
0:50:38 > 0:50:42George V was absolutely furious because he could already see
0:50:42 > 0:50:46that this woman had so much power over his son,
0:50:46 > 0:50:51so he was overheard saying, "I never again want that woman in my house."
0:50:57 > 0:51:01By Christmas 1935, the King's health was failing.
0:51:02 > 0:51:06Worn down and desperately anxious about the succession,
0:51:06 > 0:51:10George retreated to the security of his Norfolk estate.
0:51:11 > 0:51:15While David entertained himself at a round of New Year balls,
0:51:15 > 0:51:19the King was joined by his loyal second son and a new addition
0:51:19 > 0:51:24to his family - his grand-daughter, the Princess Elizabeth.
0:51:24 > 0:51:29This gruff tyrant of a father
0:51:29 > 0:51:33turned into a pussycat when it came to being a grandfather,
0:51:33 > 0:51:37particularly with his first little Lilibet, as she called herself.
0:51:37 > 0:51:40She couldn't pronounce her name properly.
0:51:40 > 0:51:43He loved that and he always called her Lilibet.
0:51:43 > 0:51:46You read Lilibet in the diaries all the time.
0:51:46 > 0:51:52When, in the early 1930s, he fell ill and had to go to recuperate,
0:51:52 > 0:51:56he pronounced that he couldn't recuperate unless
0:51:56 > 0:51:58the little princess we sent down.
0:52:00 > 0:52:03For George, bringing up his own children was business.
0:52:03 > 0:52:06That was going to be done the way the Navy had done it.
0:52:06 > 0:52:10For his grandchildren, all that changed.
0:52:10 > 0:52:13When he had his grand-daughter, Elizabeth,
0:52:13 > 0:52:16he just lost his heart to her.
0:52:18 > 0:52:24There's a wonderful photograph of George and Mary with a pram
0:52:24 > 0:52:28and in it is Lilibet, the future Queen Elizabeth II.
0:52:28 > 0:52:32That little slightly smudged picture of the girl looking forwards
0:52:32 > 0:52:34to the direction of the pram.
0:52:34 > 0:52:38It's exactly what George thinks is important
0:52:38 > 0:52:41about monarchy and the family -
0:52:41 > 0:52:46this very clear moral clarity, the compass of family life.
0:52:46 > 0:52:50Stability, togetherness, structure, duty.
0:52:53 > 0:52:55On 25th December,
0:52:55 > 0:52:59the King delivered his last Christmas message to his people.
0:53:02 > 0:53:05Three weeks later, he took to his bed
0:53:05 > 0:53:07and drifted into unconsciousness.
0:53:07 > 0:53:13The following bulletin was issued at 9:25.
0:53:14 > 0:53:19The King's life is moving peacefully towards its close.
0:53:21 > 0:53:25Reporters and well-wishers gathered at the palace gates, but even
0:53:25 > 0:53:28to the end, the court of King George found a way to embrace change.
0:53:32 > 0:53:35In 1918, George had become the first monarch
0:53:35 > 0:53:38to appoint a royal press secretary.
0:53:38 > 0:53:40As the end approached,
0:53:40 > 0:53:44George's spin doctors joined forces with the king's physician.
0:53:44 > 0:53:48The role of the media was very important and it was growing.
0:53:49 > 0:53:52They were even concerned to make sure that they managed
0:53:52 > 0:53:54the manner of the King's death.
0:53:54 > 0:53:57In order that it wasn't announced in what was then seen
0:53:57 > 0:54:01as a rather below-brow newspaper,
0:54:01 > 0:54:05they timed his death so that it wasn't announced
0:54:05 > 0:54:08in the Evening Standard or the working-men's papers of the evening
0:54:08 > 0:54:11which weren't considered to be at the higher standard,
0:54:11 > 0:54:14but rather in The Times.
0:54:14 > 0:54:18The right place for a king's death to be announced.
0:54:18 > 0:54:21A decision was taken which now would be terribly controversial,
0:54:21 > 0:54:26to perhaps hasten the death by mixing certain drugs together.
0:54:26 > 0:54:29That very moving announcement on the radio -
0:54:29 > 0:54:34"The King's life is moving peacefully to its close."
0:54:34 > 0:54:38Signed by the various doctors who had been on duty at Sandringham
0:54:38 > 0:54:42at the time and who had probably delivered the coup de gras.
0:54:48 > 0:54:51London is hushed and all over the world,
0:54:51 > 0:54:56countless millions are waiting to take part in spirit
0:54:56 > 0:54:59in the last journey of His Majesty King George V.
0:55:01 > 0:55:06The King died on 20th January, 1936. His body was brought to London.
0:55:10 > 0:55:14At Westminster Hall, a million mourners filed past the coffin
0:55:14 > 0:55:17to pay their respects to the King who had forged
0:55:17 > 0:55:21a new relationship between the crown and the British people.
0:55:30 > 0:55:33The high and mighty
0:55:33 > 0:55:39Prince Edward Albert Christian George Andrew Patrick David...
0:55:42 > 0:55:51..is now become our only lawful and rightful liege Lord Edward VIII.
0:55:51 > 0:55:54God save the King.
0:56:00 > 0:56:05But there was one crucial flaw in King George's master plan.
0:56:07 > 0:56:09As his son, the new King Edward VIII
0:56:09 > 0:56:15watched his own proclamation from a side window at St James's Palace,
0:56:15 > 0:56:19a pale figure in the window beside him was a portent of trouble ahead.
0:56:21 > 0:56:26By reinventing the royal family as exemplars of moral probity,
0:56:26 > 0:56:30George had planted a time bomb within the dynasty.
0:56:31 > 0:56:36And when it exploded, it would fall to George's long-suffering consort
0:56:36 > 0:56:40Queen Mary to rescue the monarchy from disaster.
0:56:45 > 0:56:48Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd
0:56:48 > 0:56:51E-mail subtitling@bbc.co.uk