Mrs Wallis Simpson example essay topic

American socialite Wallis Simpson, the woman for whom Edward V gave up the throne in 1936, is variously portrayed as a greedy snob, a sexual predator or part of the romance of the century. A complex figure emerges: a strong-willed woman, hungry for independence, but caught up in a situation she could not control. Mrs. Wallis Simpson has become an emotional figure in history. Along with this, many descriptions of her personality and motives for being with Edward have caused some extremely negative descriptions; the nicer ones range from witch to seductress. So who really was Mrs. Wallis Simpson?

Bessie Wallis Warfield, named after her aunt and her father, as she was born in Baltimore, Maryland, was something of a misfit from the start. Her arrival in June 19, 1896 came just seven months after the marriage of her parents, causing some embarrassment to Warfield relatives for whom moral propriety was essential as the elite of Baltimore society. Bessie's father died when she was five months old and throughout her formative years, she and her mother had to rely on irregular handouts from a wealthy relative. Because her father left them with no money so they relied charity from her mother's husband's late brother. As Wallis grew into a young woman, she was not necessarily considered pretty. Yet Wallis had a sense of style and poses that made her distinguished and attractive.

She had radiant eyes, good complexion and fine, smooth black hair, which she kept parted down the middle for most of her life. Bessie discarded her first name - because 'so many cows are called Bessie' - and learned how to flirt. But she was still shut out of the world she regarded as her birthright. Soon after the humiliation of 'coming out' without the usual debutante's celebration ball, she grasped the first means of escape from Baltimore by becoming engaged.

On November 8 1916 she was married to her first husband, at the age of 20 was to a Navy pilot Earl Winfield Spencer. The marriage was reasonably good until the end of World War I when many ex-soldiers became bitter at the inconclusiveness of the war and the difficulty in adapting back to civilian life. After the Armistice, Win began to drink heavily and also became abusive. Wallis eventually left Win and lived six years by herself in Washington. Win and Wallis weren't yet divorced and when Win begged her to rejoin him, this time in China where he had been posted in 1922, she went. Things seemed to be working out until Win started drinking again.

This time Wallis left him for good and sued for a divorce, which was granted in December 1927. After three years of separation divorced, Wallis began an affair with a married man, Ernest Simpson, a British-American businessman. They wed in July 1928. They moved to London, where Wallis established herself as a hostess. Through contacts at the US Embassy she became friendly with Thelma Furness, who was married to an elderly shipping magnate and involved with Prince Edward - the future Edward V. 'I really feel so tired of fighting the world all alone and with no money,' she wrote to her mother. Settled into English society, she met Edward, Prince of Wales, at a house party given by his mistress, Lady Thelma Furness, at Melton Mowbray in Leicestershire.

He was charming, the most eligible bachelor in the world; she was married, at 35 no longer in the first flush of youth and no beauty. But she was seductive. In January 1934, Thelma Furness left England to visit her sister, Gloria Vanderbilt. When she returned three months later, Wallis had taken her place as Edward's closest friend. By 1934, the prince was a frequent visitor to the Simpsons' home, and it has been said their relationship was consummated that year. Wallis told her aunt: 'It requires great tact to manage both men.

I shall try to keep them both". By January 1936, though, the prince had become King and his love for Wallis an obsession. The Simpson marriage cracked under the strain and Wallis sought for a divorce. Despite his several mistresses, Edward has been characterized as Mrs. Simpson's lapdog.

There were two main differences, however. One was the enmity aroused by Wallis, regarded by high society and the British public as a grasping commoner, and American to boot. The other was the overpowering intensity of Edward's devotion: ' He has lost all confidence in himself and follows Wallis around like a dog. 'There must have been some sort of saddening relationship,' says Philip Ziegler, Edward V's official biographer.

'He relished the contempt and bullying she bestowed on him". In November, Edward invited the Simpsons to a Palace function and presented Wallis to the Queen. The King was furious, that woman in my own house; and told Edward that his mistress was not welcome at Court. Edward replied that Wallis was not his mistress.

While this was disbelieved at the time, it may be that Wallis had kept their relationship platonic: 'No man is ever allowed to touch me below the Mason-Dixon line,' she confided to a friend. Edward and Wallis's relationship with the new king became a scandal - although it was kept out of the papers by a gentleman's agreement with press barons Beaverbrook and Rothermere. Wallis suggested that she should 'steal quietly away', but Edward was adamant. In October, the Simpsons began divorce proceedings. However, neither the court nor the government would countenance a twice-divorced American as Queen, and Edward abdicated in December on the 11th after less than a year on the throne. Wallis's divorce became absolute the following May, whereupon she changed her name to Wallis Warfield.

In June, she married Edward, now HRH the Duke of Windsor; she became Duchess of Windsor but was denied 'extra chic' of the title of Her Royal Highness by the Palace. Always strong-willed, Wallis now dominated Edward completely: on one occasion, in front of guests, she thumped the table and forbade him to give instructions to the servants 'in my house'. If anything, this made Edward love her all the more. She does not appear to have influenced him politically, however.

As early as 1934 he was speaking positively of the British Union of Fascists. While Wallis was suspected of fraternizing with Ribbentrop, the German ambassador, this was an indiscretion rather than a serious security risk. Certainly she was not responsible for Edward's visit to Germany in 1937; she complained afterwards of being excluded from his meeting with Hitler. When war broke out, Edward was given a minor Army position and posted to France. When France fell, he and Wallis fled to Spain. Unaware of German plans to kidnap him, but conscious of his right wing views and personal bitterness, the British government hastily offered Edward the governorship of the Bahamas.

He and Wallis remained there until 1945; thereafter, with an income from the British government but no official status, they drifted between Paris, Florida, the south of France and New York. But a document which stayed in the private papers of the then prime minister, Stanley Baldwin, for 13 years before even Buckingham Palace became aware of it, raises doubts about whether Wallis Simpson was a schemer of popular perception. The paper, only released in 2000, is a declaration, signed by Mrs. Simpson in the final days before the abdication, that 'she has abandoned any interest in marrying His Majesty". She found Edward's dependence upon her burdensome and claustrophobic, writing to her uncle: 'How can a woman be a whole empire to a man?" Edward died in 1972. Wallis, who had attended several royal occasions at his side in the previous decade, flew to England for the funeral and stayed at Buckingham Palace.

Afterwards she lived alone in their Paris villa, increasingly confused and finally bedridden, her daily life controlled by the formidable lawyer Ma^it re Blum. She died in 1986, aged 89, and was buried alongside Edward in the royal burial ground at Windsor.

Bibliography

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