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Note: his death in 1936. He was the first British monarch of the House of Windsor, which he created from the British branch of the German House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. From the age of twelve George served in the Royal Navy, but upon the unexpected death of his elder brother, Prince Albert Victor, Duke of Clarence and Avondale, he became heir to the throne and married his brother's fianc�e, Mary of Teck (known as "May" to her family after her birth month). Although they occasionally toured the British Empire, George preferred to stay at home with his stamp collection and lived what later biographers would consider a dull life because of its conventionality.
George became King-Emperor in 1910 on the death of his father, King Edward VII. George was the only Emperor of India to be present at his own Delhi Durbar, where he appeared before his Indian subjects crowned with the Imperial Crown of India, created specially for the occasion. During World War I he relinquished all German titles and styles on behalf of his relatives who were British subjects, and changed the name of the royal house from Saxe-Coburg and Gotha to Windsor. During his reign, the Statute of Westminster separated the crown so that George ruled the dominions as separate kingdoms, preparing the way for the future development of the Commonwealth. His reign also witnessed the rise of socialism, communism, fascism, Irish republicanism, and the first Labour ministry, all of which radically changed the political spectrum.
George was plagued by illness throughout much of his later reign; he was succeeded by his eldest son, Edward.
Early life and education
George was born on 3 June 1865, at Marlborough House, London. His father was the Prince of Wales (later King Edward VII), the eldest son of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha. His mother was the Princess of Wales (later Queen Alexandra), the eldest daughter of King Christian IX of Denmark. As a grandson of Queen Victoria in the male line, George was styled His Royal Highness Prince George of Wales at birth. He was baptised in the private chapel of Windsor Castle on 7 July 1865, by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Charles Thomas Longley.[1] As a younger son of the Prince of Wales, there was no expectation that George would become King as his elder brother, Prince Albert Victor, was second in line to the throne after their father. Given that George was born only fifteen months after his brother, Prince Albert Victor, it was decided to educate both royal princes together. The Prince of Wales appointed John Neale Dalton as their tutor, although neither Albert Victor nor George excelled intellectually.[2] In September 1877, both brothers joined the training ship HMS Britannia at Dartmouth. Their father thought that the navy was "the very best possible training for any boy".[3]
For three years from 1879 the royal brothers served as midshipmen on HMS Bacchante, accompanied by Dalton. They toured the colonies of the British Empire in the Caribbean, South Africa and Australia, and visited Norfolk, Virginia, as well as South America, the Mediterranean, Egypt, and the Far East. In Japan, George had a local artist tattoo a blue and red dragon on his arm.[4] Dalton wrote an account of their journey entitled The Cruise of HMS Bacchante.[5] Between Melbourne and Sydney, Dalton records a sighting of the Flying Dutchman, a mythical ghost ship. When they returned to Britain, the brothers were separated; Albert Victor attended Trinity College, Cambridge, while George continued in the Royal Navy. He travelled the world, visited many areas of the British Empire, and served actively until his last command in 1891. From then on his naval rank was largely honorary.[6]
Marriage
As a young man destined to serve in the navy, Prince George served for many years under the command of his uncle, Prince Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh, who was stationed in Malta. There, he grew close to and fell in love with his uncle's daughter, his first cousin, Marie of Edinburgh. His grandmother, father and uncle all approved the match, but the mothers, the Princess of Wales and the Duchess of Edinburgh, both opposed it. The Princess of Wales thought the family was too pro-German, and the Duchess of Edinburgh disliked England. When George proposed, Marie refused, guided by her mother. She later became Queen of Romania.[7]
In 1891, Albert Victor became engaged to his second cousin once removed, Princess Victoria Mary of Teck (known as "May" to her family, after her birth month), the only daughter of Prince Francis, Duke of Teck and Princess Mary Adelaide of Cambridge. However, Albert Victor died of pneumonia six weeks later, leaving George second in line to the throne and likely to succeed after his father. This effectively ended George's naval career, as he was now expected to assume a more political role.[8]
Queen Victoria still favoured Princess May as a suitable candidate to marry a future king, so she persuaded George to propose to May. George duly proposed and May accepted. The marriage of George and May took place on 6 July 1893 at the Chapel Royal, St. James's Palace in London. The marriage was a success and throughout their lives the couple exchanged notes of endearment and loving letters.[9]
Duke of York
York Cottage at Sandringham House: George V and Queen Mary lived here from 1893 until 1926.On 24 May 1892, Queen Victoria created George, Duke of York, Earl of Inverness and Baron Killarney.[10] After George's marriage to May, she was styled Her Royal Highness The Duchess of York. The Duke and Duchess of York lived mainly at York Cottage,[11] a relatively small house in Sandringham, Norfolk where their way of life mirrored that of a comfortable middle-class family rather than royalty. George preferred the simple, almost quiet, life in marked contrast to his parents. Even his official biographer despaired of George's time as Duke of York, writing: "He may be all right as a young midshipman and a wise old king, but when he was Duke of York ... he did nothing at all but kill [i.e. shoot] animals and stick in stamps."[12]
George was a well-known stamp collector, and played a large role in building the Royal Philatelic Collection into the most comprehensive collection of United Kingdom and Commonwealth stamps in the world, in some cases setting record purchase prices for items.[13] His enthusiasm for stamps was denigrated by the intelligentsia.[14]
Randolph Churchill claimed that George was a strict father, to the extent that his children were terrified of him, and that George had remarked to Edward Stanley, 17th Earl of Derby: "My father was frightened of his mother, I was frightened of my father, and I am damned well going to see to it that my children are frightened of me." In reality there is no direct source for the quotation and it is likely that George's parenting style was little different from that adopted by most people at the time.[15] George and May had five sons and a daughter.
Prince of Wales
As Duke and Duchess of York, George and May carried out a wide variety of public duties. On the death of Queen Victoria on 22 January 1901, George's father, Albert Edward, ascended the throne as King Edward VII. George inherited the titles of Duke of Cornwall and Duke of Rothesay, and for much of the rest of that year, George was styled His Royal Highness The Duke of Cornwall and York. In 1901, George and May toured the British Empire. Their tour included South Africa, Canada, the Colony of Newfoundland and New Zealand, where Cornwall Park in Auckland was named in their honour by its donor, John Logan Campbell, then Mayor of Auckland. In Australia the Duke opened the first session of the Australian Parliament upon the creation of the Commonwealth of Australia.
On 9 November 1901, George was created Prince of Wales and Earl of Chester.[16] King Edward VII wished his son to have more preparation and experience prior to his future role. In contrast to Edward himself, whom Queen Victoria had excluded from state affairs, George was given wide access to state documents and papers by his father.[8] George in turn allowed his wife access to his papers,[17] as he valued her counsel and May often helped write her husband's speeches.[18]
In 1906, he toured British India, where he was disgusted by racial discrimination and campaigned for greater involvement of Indians in the government of the country.[19][20]
King and Emperor
On 6 May 1910, King Edward VII died, and the Prince of Wales ascended to the throne, becoming King George V. George had never liked his wife's habit of signing official documents and letters as "Victoria Mary" and insisted she drop one of those names. Neither thought she should be called Queen Victoria, and so she became Queen Mary.[21] Their coronation took place at Westminster Abbey on 22 June 1911.[8] The coronation was celebrated by the Festival of Empire in London.
Later in 1911, the King and Queen travelled to India for the Delhi Durbar, where they were presented to an assembled audience of Indian dignitaries and princes as the Emperor and Empress of India. George wore the newly-created Imperial Crown of India at the ceremony. Then the Emperor and Empress travelled throughout India, visiting their new subjects. George took the opportunity to indulge in hunting tigers, shooting 21.[22] He was a keen marksman. On 18 December 1913, he shot over a thousand pheasants in six hours[23] at the home of Lord Burnham, although even he had to acknowledge that "we went a little too far" that day.[24]
World War I
From 1914 to 1918 Britain was at war with Germany. The German Kaiser Wilhelm II, who for the British public came to symbolise all the horrors of the war, was the King's first cousin. Queen Mary, although British like her mother, was the daughter of the Duke of Teck, a descendant of the German Royal House of W�rttemberg.
"A good riddance"
A 1917 Punch cartoon depicting King George V sweeping away his German titles.The King's paternal grandfather was Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha; the King and his children bore the titles Prince and Princess of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha and Duke and Duchess of Saxony. The King had brothers-in-law and cousins who were British subjects but who bore German titles such as Duke and Duchess of Teck, Prince and Princess of Battenberg, Prince and Princess of Hesse and by Rhine, and Prince and Princess of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Augustenburg. When H. G. Wells wrote about Britain's "alien and uninspiring court", George famously replied: "I may be uninspiring, but I'll be damned if I'm alien."[25]
On 17 July 1917, George V issued an Order-in-Council that changed the name of the British Royal House from the German-sounding House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha to the House of Windsor, to appease British nationalist feelings. He specifically adopted Windsor as the surname for all descendants of Queen Victoria then living in the United Kingdom, excluding women who married into other families and their descendants.[26]
Finally, he and his various relatives who were British subjects relinquished the use of all German titles and styles, and adopted British-sounding surnames. George compensated several of his male relatives by creating them British peers. Thus, overnight his cousin, Prince Louis of Battenberg, became Louis Mountbatten, 1st Marquess of Milford Haven, while his brother-in-law, the Duke of Teck, became Adolphus Cambridge, 1st Marquess of Cambridge. Others, such as Princess Marie Louise of Schleswig-Holstein and Princess Helena Victoria of Schleswig-Holstein, simply stopped using their territorial designations. In Letters Patent gazetted on 11 December 1917, the King restricted the style "His (or Her) Royal Highness" and the titular dignity of "Prince (or Princess) of Great Britain and Ireland" to the children of the Sovereign, the children of the sons of the Sovereign and the eldest living son of the eldest living son of a Prince of Wales.[27] The Letters Patent also stated that "the titles of Royal Highness, Highness or Serene Highness, and the titular dignity of Prince and Princess shall cease except those titles already granted and remaining unrevoked." Relatives of the British Royal Family who fought on the German side, such as Prince Ernst August of Hanover, 3rd Duke of Cumberland and Teviotdale (the senior male-line great grandson of George III) and Prince Carl Eduard, Duke of Albany and the reigning Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (a male-line grandson of Queen Victoria), were simply cut off; their British peerages were suspended by a 1919 Order-in-Council under the provisions of the Titles Deprivation Act 1917. George also removed their Garter flags from St George's Chapel at Windsor Castle under pressure from his mother, Queen Alexandra.[29]
When Tsar Nicholas II of Russia, George's first cousin (their mothers were sisters), was overthrown in the Russian Revolution of 1917, the British Government offered asylum to the Tsar and his family, but worsening conditions for the British people, and fears that revolution might come to the British Isles, led George to think that the presence of the Romanovs might seem inappropriate under the circumstances.[30] Despite the later claims of Lord Mountbatten of Burma that David Lloyd George, the Prime Minister, was opposed to the rescue of the Romanovs, records of the King's private secretary, Lord Stamfordham, suggest that George V opposed the rescue against the advice of Lloyd George.[31] Advanced planning for a rescue was undertaken by MI1, a branch of the British secret service,[32] but because of the strengthening Bolshevik position and wider difficulties with the conduct of the war, the plan was never put into operation.[33] The Tsar and his immediate family thus remained in Russia and were murdered by Bolshevik revolutionaries in 1918. The following year, Nicholas's mother (George's aunt) Maria Feodorovna (Dagmar of Denmark) and other members of the extended Russian imperial family were rescued from the Crimea by British ships.
Two months after the end of the war, the King's youngest son, John, died aged 13 after a short lifetime of ill-health. George was informed of the death by the Queen who wrote, "[John] had been a great anxiety to us for many years�The first break in the family circle is hard to bear but people have been so kind & sympathetic & this has helped us much."
Note: George V (George Frederick Ernest Albert; 3 June 1865 � 20 January 1936) was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India, from 1910 through World War I (1914�1918) until
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