New BBC Documentary Slammed for Maligning Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother

King George VI and Queen Elizabeth at Toronto City Hall,
May 1939. Source:  Canadian Museum of Science and
Technology, Canadian National Collection
 
The new BBC drama, Royal Wives at War, drew critical backlash for alleging that Queen Elizabeth Queen Mother tried to woo the future Edward VIII before settling for his brother the future George VI has been condemned as a “hurtful fairy tale,” MailOnline reports.

Royal Wives At War documents the relationship between the Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother and Wallis Simpson, the American divorcee whom Edward VIII married and who was the reason why he abdicated the throne in 1936.

Discussions from respected historians Hugo Vickers and John Julius Norwich were featured, but what was the most controversial was the claim made by Lady Colin Campbell. According to her the Queen Mother resented Mrs. Simpson, later, the Duchess of Windsor, for marrying Edward, the man who she really wanted at first.

Watch: The Wedding of the Duke and Duchess of Windsor


Tory MP Andrew Bridgen slammed BBC for hitting “a new low by making salacious slurs against the memory of the much-loved Queen Mother.”

John Julius Norwich said that Lady Collin’s claim was a “perfectly crazy idea.”

“As far as Lady Colin Campbell is concerned, she is putting two and two together and coming up with five,” Historian Christopher Wilson said. “The Queen Mother wasn’t even in his [Edward’s] orbit. She was a do-gooder who was constantly being pushed towards Bertie.”

Tory peer Lord Tebbit considered the BBC documentary a “hurtful” “fairytale. “It’s just that it deposits a story of historical events which was just not so,” he said.


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