George V

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 6 May George V
1910 until his death in 1936.

Born during the reign of his grandmother Queen Victoria, George was third in the line
of succession behind his father, Prince Albert Edward, and his own elder brother, Prince
Albert Victor. From 1877 to 1892, George served in the Royal Navy, until the
unexpected death of his elder brother in early 1892 put him directly in line for the
throne. On the death of Victoria in 1901, George's father ascended the throne as Edward
VII, and George was created Prince of Wales. He became king-emperor on his father's
death in 1910.

George V's reign saw the rise of socialism, communism, fascism, Irish republicanism,
and the Indian independence movement, all of which radically changed the political
landscape of the British Empire. The Parliament Act 1911 established the supremacy of
the elected British House of Commons over the unelected House of Lords. As a result
of the First World War (1914–1918), the empires of his first cousins Nicholas II of
Russia and Wilhelm II of Germany fell, while the British Empire expanded to its
greatest effective extent. In 1917, George became the first monarch of the House of
George in 1923
Windsor, which he renamed from the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha as a result of
anti-German public sentiment. King of the United Kingdom
and the British Dominions,
In 1924 he appointed the first Labour ministry and in 1931 the Statute of Westminster Emperor of India (more ...)
recognised the dominions of the Empire as separate, independent states within the Reign 6 May 1910 –
British Commonwealth of Nations. He had smoking-related health problems throughout 20 January 1936
much of his later reign and at his death was succeeded by his eldest son, Edward VIII. Coronation 22 June 1911
Imperial Durbar 12 December 1911
Predecessor Edward VII
Contents
Successor Edward VIII
Early life and education
Born Prince George of
Marriage
Wales
Duke of York 3 June 1865
Prince of Wales Marlborough House,
King and emperor Westminster,
National politics Middlesex
First World War Died 20 January 1936
Postwar reign (aged 70)
Declining health and death Sandringham House,
Norfolk, England
Legacy
Burial 28 January 1936
Titles, styles, honours and arms
St George's Chapel,
Titles and styles
Windsor Castle
British honours
Military appointments Spouse Mary of Teck (m. 1893)
Military ranks and naval appointments Issue Edward VIII
Honorary military appointments Detail George VI
Foreign honours Mary, Princess Royal
Honorary foreign military appointments
Prince Henry, Duke of
Honorary degrees and offices Gloucester
Arms
Prince George, Duke
Issue of Kent
Ancestry Prince John
See also Names
Notes and sources George Frederick Ernest Albert
References House Windsor (from 1917)
Further reading Saxe-Coburg and
External links Gotha (until 1917)
Father Edward VII
Mother Alexandra of Denmark
Early life and education
Signature
George was born on 3 June 1865, in Marlborough House, London. He was the second
son of Albert Edward, Prince of Wales, and Alexandra, Princess of Wales. His father Military career
was the eldest son of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert, and his mother was the eldest
Service Royal Navy
daughter of King Christian IX and Queen Louise of Denmark. He was baptised at
Windsor Castle on 7 July 1865 by the Archbishop of Canterbury, Charles Longley.[1] Years of 1877–1892 (active
service service)
As a younger son of the Prince of Wales, there was
Rank See list
little expectation that George would become king. He
was third in line to the throne, after his father and elder Commands Torpedo Boat 79
brother, Prince Albert Victor. George was only held HMS Thrush
17 months younger than Albert Victor, and the two
princes were educated together. John Neale Dalton was HMS Melampus
appointed as their tutor in 1871. Neither Albert Victor
nor George excelled intellectually.[2] As their father thought that the navy was "the very best possible
training for any boy",[3] in September 1877, when George was 12 years old, both brothers joined the
cadet training ship HMS Britannia at Dartmouth, Devon.[4]

For three years from 1879, the royal brothers served 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 East Asia. In
George as a young boy, 1881 on a visit to Japan, George had a local artist tattoo a blue and red dragon on his arm,[5] and was
1870 received in an audience by the Emperor Meiji; George and his brother presented Empress Haruko
with two wallabies from Australia.[6] Dalton wrote an account of their journey entitled The Cruise of
HMS Bacchante.[7] Between Melbourne and Sydney, Dalton recorded a sighting of the Flying
Dutchman, a mythical ghost ship.[8] When they returned to Britain, the Queen complained that her grandsons could not speak French
or German, and so they spent six months in Lausanne in an ultimately unsuccessful attempt to learn another language.[9] After
Lausanne, the brothers were separated; Albert Victor attended Trinity College, Cambridge, while George continued in the Royal
Navy. He travelled the world, visiting many areas of the British Empire. During his naval career he commanded Torpedo Boat 79 in
home waters, then HMS Thrush on the North America and West Indies Station. His last active service was in command of HMS
Melampus in 1891–92. From then on, his naval rank was largely honorary.[10]

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 cousin, Princess Marie of Edinburgh. His grandmother, father
and uncle all approved the match, but his mother and aunt—the Princess of Wales and Maria
Alexandrovna, Duchess of Edinburgh—opposed it. The Princess of Wales thought the family was
too pro-German, and the Duchess of Edinburgh disliked England. The Duchess, the only daughter of
Alexander II of Russia, resented the fact that, as the wife of a younger son of the British sovereign,
she had to yield precedence to George's mother, the Princess of Wales, whose father had been a
minor German prince before being called unexpectedly to the throne of Denmark. Guided by her
mother, Marie refused George when he proposed to her. She married Ferdinand, the future King of
Romania, in 1893.[11]

George, 1893
In November 1891, George's elder brother, Albert Victor, became engaged to his second cousin once
removed Princess Victoria Mary of Teck, known as "May" within the family.[12] Her parents were
Francis, Duke of Teck (a member of a morganatic, cadet branch of the House of Württemberg), and
Princess Mary Adelaide of Cambridge, a male-line granddaughter of King George III and a first cousin of Queen Victoria.[13]
On 14 January 1892, six weeks after the formal engagement, Albert Victor died of
pneumonia, leaving George second in line to the throne, and likely to succeed after his father.
George had only just recovered from a serious illness himself, after being confined to bed for
six weeks with typhoid fever, the disease that was thought to have killed his grandfather
Prince Albert.[14] Queen Victoria still regarded Princess May as a suitable match for her
grandson, and George and May grew close during their shared period of mourning.[15]

A year after Albert Victor's death, George proposed to May and was accepted. They married
on 6 July 1893 at the Chapel Royal in St James's Palace, London. Throughout their lives,
they remained devoted to each other. George was, on his own admission, unable to express
his feelings easily in speech, but they often exchanged loving letters and notes of
endearment.[16]

Duke of York
The death of his elder brother effectively ended George's naval career, as he was now second
in line to the throne, after his father.[17] George was created Duke of York, Earl of Inverness,
and Baron Killarney by Queen Victoria on 24 May 1892,[18] and received lessons in
constitutional history from J. R. Tanner.[19] George and Mary on their wedding
day
The Duke and Duchess of York had five sons and a daughter. 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 the 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.[20]
Whether this was the case or not, his children did seem to resent his strict nature, Prince
Henry going as far as to describe him as a "terrible father" in later years.[21]

They lived mainly at York Cottage,[22] a relatively small house in Sandringham, Norfolk,
where their way of life mirrored that of a comfortable middle-class family rather than
royalty.[23] George preferred a simple, almost quiet, life, in marked contrast to the lively
social life pursued by his father. His official biographer, Harold Nicolson, later 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."[24] George was an avid stamp collector, which Nicolson
disparaged,[25] but George played a large role in building the Royal Philatelic Collection into
the most comprehensive collection of United Kingdom and Commonwealth stamps in the George with his children, Edward,
world, in some cases setting record purchase prices for items.[26] Albert, and Mary, photographed by
Alexandra in 1899
In October 1894, George's maternal uncle-by-marriage, Tsar Alexander III of Russia, died.
At the request of his father, "out of respect for poor dear Uncle Sasha's memory", George
joined his parents in St Petersburg for the funeral.[27] He and his parents remained in Russia for the wedding a week later of the new
Russian emperor, his cousin Nicholas II, to another one of George's first cousins, Princess Alix of Hesse and by Rhine, who had once
been considered as a potential bride for George's elder brother.[28]

Prince of Wales
As Duke of York, George carried out a wide variety of public duties. On the death of Queen
Victoria on 22 January 1901, George's father ascended the throne as King Edward VII.[29]
George inherited the title of Duke of Cornwall, and for much of the rest of that year, he was
known as the Duke of Cornwall and York.[30]

In 1901, the Duke and Duchess toured the British Empire. Their tour included Gibraltar,
Malta, Port Said, Aden, Ceylon, Singapore, Australia, New Zealand, Mauritius, South
Africa, Canada, and the Colony of Newfoundland. The tour was designed by Colonial
Secretary Joseph Chamberlain with the support of Prime Minister Lord Salisbury to reward
Play media the Dominions for their participation in the South African War of 1899–1902. George
George at Montreal and Quebec, presented thousands of specially designed South African War medals to colonial troops. In
1901 South Africa, the royal party met civic leaders, African leaders, and Boer prisoners, and was
greeted by elaborate decorations, expensive gifts, and fireworks displays. Despite this, not all
residents responded favourably to the tour. Many white Cape Afrikaners resented the display and expense, the war having weakened
their capacity to reconcile their Afrikaner-Dutch culture with their status as British subjects. Critics in the English-language press
decried the enormous cost at a time when families faced severe hardship.[31]

In Australia, the Duke opened the first session of the Australian Parliament upon the creation
of the Commonwealth of Australia.[32] In New Zealand, he praised the military values,
bravery, loyalty, and obedience to duty of New Zealanders, and the tour gave New Zealand a
chance to show off its progress, especially in its adoption of up-to-date British standards in
communications and the processing industries. The implicit goal was to advertise New
Zealand's attractiveness to tourists and potential immigrants, while avoiding news of growing
social tensions, by focusing the attention of the British press on a land few knew about.[33]
On his return to Britain, in a speech at Guildhall, London, George warned of "the impression
Painting by Tom Roberts of the Duke
which seemed to prevail among [our] brethren across the seas, that the Old Country must
opening the first Parliament of
wake up if she intends to maintain her old position of pre-eminence in her colonial trade
Australia on 9 May 1901
against foreign competitors."[34]

On 9 November 1901, George was created Prince of Wales and Earl of Chester.[35][36] King
Edward wished to prepare his son for his future role as king. In contrast to Edward himself, whom Queen Victoria had deliberately
excluded from state affairs, George was given wide access to state documents by his father.[17][37] George in turn allowed his wife
access to his papers,[38] as he valued her counsel and she often helped write her husband's speeches.[39] As Prince of Wales, he
supported reforms in naval training, including cadets being enrolled at the ages of twelve and thirteen, and receiving the same
education, whatever their class and eventual assignments. The reforms were implemented by the then Second (later First) Sea Lord,
Sir John Fisher.[40]

From November 1905 to March 1906, George and May toured British India, where he was disgusted by racial discrimination and
campaigned for greater involvement of Indians in the government of the country.[41] The tour was almost immediately followed by a
trip to Spain for the wedding of King Alfonso XIII to Victoria Eugenie of Battenberg, a first cousin of George, at which the bride and
groom narrowly avoided assassination.[42] A week after returning to Britain, George and May travelled to Norway for the coronation
of King Haakon VII, George's cousin and brother-in-law, and Queen Maud, George's sister.[43]

King and emperor

On 6 May 1910, Edward VII died, and George became king. He wrote in his diary,

I have lost my best friend and the best of fathers ... I never had a [cross] word with him
in my life. I am heart-broken and overwhelmed with grief but God will help me in my
responsibilities and darling May will be my comfort as she has always been. May God
give me strength and guidance in the heavy task which has fallen on me[44]

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. They both thought she should not be called Queen
Victoria, and so she became Queen Mary.[45] Later that year, a radical propagandist, Edward Mylius,
published a lie that George had secretly married in Malta as a young man, and that consequently his Portrait by Fildes, 1911
marriage to Queen Mary was bigamous. The lie had first surfaced in print in 1893, but George had
shrugged it off as a joke. In an effort to kill off rumours, Mylius was arrested, tried and found guilty
of criminal libel, and was sentenced to a year in prison.[46]

George objected to the anti-Catholic wording of the Accession Declaration that he would be required to make at the opening of his
first parliament. He made it known that he would refuse to open parliament unless it was changed. As a result, the Accession
Declaration Act 1910 shortened the declaration and removed the most offensive phrases.[47]

George and Mary's coronation took place at Westminster Abbey on 22 June 1911,[17] and was celebrated by the Festival of Empire in
London. In July, the King and Queen visited Ireland for five days; they received a warm welcome, with thousands of people lining
the route of their procession to cheer.[48][49] 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 on 12 December
1911. George wore the newly created Imperial Crown of India at the ceremony, and declared the shifting of the Indian capital from
Calcutta to Delhi. He was the only Emperor of India to be present at his own Delhi Durbar. They travelled throughout the sub-
continent, and George took the opportunity to indulge in big game hunting in Nepal, shooting 21 tigers, 8 rhinoceroses and a bear
over 10 days.[50] He was a keen and expert marksman.[51] On 18 December 1913, he shot over a thousand pheasants in six hours[52]
at Hall Barn, the home of Lord Burnham, although even George had to acknowledge that "we went a little too far" that day.[53]
 National politics

The King and Queen at the Delhi
Durbar, 1911
George inherited the throne at a politically turbulent time.[54] Lloyd George's People's
Budget had been rejected the previous year by the Conservative and Unionist-dominated
House of Lords, contrary to the normal convention that the Lords did not veto money
bills.[55] Liberal Prime Minister H. H. Asquith had asked the previous king to give an
undertaking that he would create sufficient Liberal peers to force the budget through the
House. Edward had reluctantly agreed, provided the Lords rejected the budget after two
successive general elections. After the January 1910 general election, the Conservative peers
allowed the budget, for which the government now had an electoral mandate, to pass without
a vote.[56]

Asquith attempted to curtail the power of the Lords through constitutional reforms, which were again
blocked by the Upper House. A constitutional conference on the reforms broke down in November
1910 after 21 meetings. Asquith and Lord Crewe, Liberal leader in the Lords, asked George to grant
a dissolution, leading to a second general election, and to promise to create sufficient Liberal peers if
the Lords blocked the legislation again.[57] If George refused, the Liberal government would
otherwise resign, which would have given the appearance that the monarch was taking sides—with
"the peers against the people"—in party politics.[58] The King's two private secretaries, the Liberal
Lord Knollys and the Unionist Lord Stamfordham, gave George conflicting advice.[59][60] Knollys
advised George to accept the Cabinet's demands, while Stamfordham advised George to accept the
resignation.[59] Like his father, George reluctantly agreed to the dissolution and creation of peers,
A George V half-sovereign
although he felt his ministers had taken advantage of his inexperience to browbeat him.[61] After the (Bertram Mackennal,
December 1910 general election, the Lords let the bill pass on hearing of the threat to swamp the sculptor)
house with new peers.[62] The subsequent Parliament Act 1911 permanently removed—with a few
exceptions—the power of the Lords to veto bills. The King later came to feel that Knollys had
withheld information from him about the willingness of the opposition to form a government if the Liberals had resigned.[63]

The 1910 general elections had left the Liberals as a minority government dependent upon the support of the Irish Nationalist Party.
As desired by the Nationalists, Asquith introduced legislation that would give Ireland Home Rule, but the Conservatives and
Unionists opposed it.[17][64] As tempers rose over the Home Rule Bill, which would never have been possible without the Parliament
Act, relations between the elderly Knollys and the Conservatives became poor, and he was pushed into retirement.[65] Desperate to
avoid the prospect of civil war in Ireland between Unionists and Nationalists, George called a meeting of all parties at Buckingham
Palace in July 1914 in an attempt to negotiate a settlement.[66] After four days the conference ended without an agreement.[17][67]
Political developments in Britain and Ireland were overtaken by events in Europe, and the issue of Irish Home Rule was suspended
for the duration of the war.[17][68]

First World War

On 4 August 1914 the King wrote in his diary, "I held a council at 10.45 to declare war with
Germany. It is a terrible catastrophe but it is not our fault. ... Please to God it may soon be over."[69]
From 1914 to 1918, Britain and its allies were at war with the Central Powers, led by the German
Empire. 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. The King's paternal grandfather was Prince Albert of Saxe-
Coburg and Gotha; consequently, the King and his children bore the titles Prince and Princess of
Saxe-Coburg and Gotha and Duke and Duchess of Saxony. Queen Mary, although born in England
like her mother, was the daughter of the Duke of Teck, a descendant of the German Dukes of
Württemberg. 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, and Prince and
Princess of Schleswig-Holstein. When H. G. Wells wrote about Britain's "alien and uninspiring
court", George replied: "I may be uninspiring, but I'll be damned if I'm alien."[70] "A good riddance" — a
cartoon of 1917 shows
On 17 July 1917, George appeased British nationalist feelings by issuing a royal proclamation that George sweeping away his
changed the name of the British royal house from the German-sounding House of Saxe-Coburg and German titles
Gotha to the House of Windsor.[71] He and all his British relatives relinquished their German titles
and styles and adopted British-sounding surnames. George compensated his male relatives by giving
them British peerages. His cousin Prince Louis of Battenberg, who earlier in the war had been forced to resign as First Sea Lord
through anti-German feeling, became Louis Mountbatten, 1st Marquess of Milford Haven, while Queen Mary's brothers became
Adolphus Cambridge, 1st Marquess of Cambridge, and Alexander Cambridge, 1st Earl of Athlone.[72]
 In letters patent gazetted on 11 December 1917, the King restricted the style of "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.[74] 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". George's relatives who fought on the German side, such as
Ernest Augustus, Crown Prince of Hanover, and Charles Edward, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha,
had their British peerages suspended by a 1919 Order in Council under the provisions of the Titles
Deprivation Act 1917. Under pressure from his mother, Queen Alexandra, the King also removed the
Garter flags of his German relations from St George's Chapel, Windsor Castle.[75]

When Tsar Nicholas II of Russia, George's first cousin, was overthrown in the Russian Revolution of
1917, the British government offered political 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
George V (right) and his
cousin Nicholas II of Russia to think that the presence of the Romanovs would be seen as inappropriate.[76] Despite the later
in German uniforms before claims of Lord Mountbatten of Burma that Prime Minister David Lloyd George was opposed to the
the war[73] rescue of the Russian imperial family, the letters of Lord Stamfordham suggest that it was George V
who opposed the idea against the advice of the government.[77] Advance planning for a rescue was
undertaken by MI1, a branch of the British secret service,[78] but because of the strengthening
position of the Bolshevik revolutionaries and wider difficulties with the conduct of the war, the plan was never put into operation.[79]
The Tsar and his immediate family remained in Russia, where they were killed by the Bolsheviks in 1918. George wrote in his diary:
"It was a foul murder. I was devoted to Nicky, who was the kindest of men and thorough gentleman: loved his country and
people."[80] The following year, Nicholas's mother, Marie Feodorovna, and other members of the extended Russian imperial family
were rescued from Crimea by a British warship.[81]

Two months after the end of the war, the King's youngest son, John, died at the age of 13 after a lifetime of ill health. George was
informed of his death by Queen Mary, 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."[82]

In May 1922, the King toured Belgium and northern France, visiting the First World War cemeteries and memorials being constructed
by the Imperial War Graves Commission. The event was described in a poem, The King's Pilgrimage by Rudyard Kipling.[83] The
tour, and one short visit to Italy in 1923, were the only times George agreed to leave the United Kingdom on official business after the
end of the war.[84]

Postwar reign

Before the First World War, most of Europe was ruled by monarchs related to
George, but during and after the war, the monarchies of Austria, Germany, Greece,
and Spain, like Russia, fell to revolution and war. In March 1919, Lieutenant-
Colonel Edward Lisle Strutt was dispatched on the personal authority of the King to
escort the former Emperor Charles I of Austria and his family to safety in
Switzerland.[85] In 1922, a Royal Navy ship was sent to Greece to rescue his
cousins, Prince and Princess Andrew.[86] The British Empire at its territorial peak in 1921

Political turmoil in Ireland continued as the Nationalists fought for independence;

George expressed his horror at government-sanctioned killings and reprisals to Prime Minister Lloyd George.[87] At the opening
session of the Parliament of Northern Ireland on 22 June 1921, the King appealed for conciliation in a speech part drafted by General
Jan Smuts and approved by Lloyd George.[88] A few weeks later, a truce was agreed.[89] Negotiations between Britain and the Irish
secessionists led to the signing of the Anglo-Irish Treaty.[90] By the end of 1922, Ireland was partitioned, the Irish Free State was
established, and Lloyd George was out of office.[91]

The King and his advisers were concerned about the rise of socialism and the growing labour movement, which they mistakenly
associated with republicanism. The socialists no longer believed in their anti-monarchical slogans and were ready to come to terms
with the monarchy if it took the first step. George adopted a more democratic, inclusive stance that crossed class lines and brought the
monarchy closer to the public and the working class—a dramatic change for the King, who was most comfortable with naval officers
and landed gentry. He cultivated friendly relations with moderate Labour Party politicians and trade union officials. His abandonment
of social aloofness conditioned the royal family's behaviour and enhanced its popularity during the economic crises of the 1920s and
for over two generations thereafter.[92][93]

The years between 1922 and 1929 saw frequent changes in government. In 1924, George appointed the first Labour Prime Minister,
Ramsay MacDonald, in the absence of a clear majority for any one of the three major parties. George's tactful and understanding
reception of the first Labour government (which lasted less than a year) allayed the suspicions of the party's sympathisers. During the
General Strike of 1926 the King advised the government of Conservative Stanley Baldwin against taking inflammatory action,[94] and
took exception to suggestions that the strikers were "revolutionaries" saying, "Try living on their wages before you judge them."[95]

In 1926, George hosted an Imperial Conference in London at which the Balfour Declaration
accepted the growth of the British Dominions into self-governing "autonomous Communities
within the British Empire, equal in status, in no way subordinate one to another". The Statute
of Westminster 1931 formalised the Dominions' legislative independence[96] and established
that the succession to the throne could not be changed unless all the Parliaments of the
Dominions as well as the Parliament at Westminster agreed.[17] The Statute's preamble
described the monarch as "the symbol of the free association of the members of the British
Commonwealth of Nations", who were "united by a common allegiance".[97]

In the wake of a world financial crisis, the King encouraged the formation of a National
Government in 1931 led by MacDonald and Baldwin,[98][99] and volunteered to reduce the 1926 Imperial Conference: George V
civil list to help balance the budget.[98] He was concerned by the rise to power in Germany and the prime ministers of the
of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party.[100] In 1934, the King bluntly told the German Empire. Clockwise from centre front:
George V, Baldwin (United Kingdom),
ambassador Leopold von Hoesch that Germany was now the peril of the world, and that
Monroe (Newfoundland), Coates
there was bound to be a war within ten years if Germany went on at the present rate; he
(New Zealand), Bruce (Australia),
warned the British ambassador in Berlin, Eric Phipps, to be suspicious of the Nazis.[101]
Hertzog (South Africa), Cosgrave
(Irish Free State), King (Canada).
In 1932, George agreed to deliver a Royal Christmas
speech on the radio, an event that became annual
thereafter. He was not in favour of the innovation
originally but was persuaded by the argument that it was what his people wanted.[102] By the
Silver Jubilee of his reign in 1935, he had become a well-loved king, saying in response to
the crowd's adulation, "I cannot understand it, after all I am only a very ordinary sort of
fellow."[103]

George's relationship with his eldest son and heir, Edward, deteriorated in these later years.
The King's Christmas broadcast,
George was disappointed in Edward's failure to settle down in life and appalled by his many
1934
affairs with married women.[17] In contrast, he was fond of his second son, Prince Albert
(later George VI), and doted on his eldest granddaughter, Princess Elizabeth; he nicknamed
her "Lilibet", and she affectionately called him "Grandpa England".[104] In 1935, George said of his son Edward: "After I am dead,
the boy will ruin himself within 12 months", and of Albert and Elizabeth: "I pray to God my eldest son will never marry and have
children, and that nothing will come between Bertie and Lilibet and the throne."[105][106]

Declining health and death

The First World War took a toll on George's health: he was seriously injured on 28 October
1915 when thrown by his horse at a troop review in France, and his heavy smoking
exacerbated recurring breathing problems. He suffered from chronic bronchitis. In 1925, on
the instruction of his doctors, he was reluctantly sent on a recuperative private cruise in the
Mediterranean; it was his third trip abroad since the war, and his last.[107] In November 1928,
he fell seriously ill with septicaemia, and for the next two years his son Edward took over
many of his duties.[108] In 1929, the suggestion of a further rest abroad was rejected by the
King "in rather strong language".[109] Instead, he retired for three months to Craigweil
House, Aldwick, in the seaside resort of Bognor, Sussex.[110] As a result of his stay, the
town acquired the suffix "Regis", which is Latin for "of the King". A myth later grew that his
last words, upon being told that he would soon be well enough to revisit the town, were
"Bugger Bognor!"[111][112][113]

George never fully recovered. In his final year, he was occasionally administered
oxygen.[114] The death of his favourite sister, Victoria, in December 1935 depressed him Portrait by Arthur Stockdale Cope,
deeply. On the evening of 15 January 1936, the King took to his bedroom at Sandringham 1933
House complaining of a cold; he remained in the room until his death.[115] He became
gradually weaker, drifting in and out of consciousness. Prime Minister Baldwin later said:

each time he became conscious it was some kind inquiry or kind observation of someone, some words of gratitude for
kindness shown. But he did say to his secretary when he sent for him: "How is the Empire?" An unusual phrase in that
form, and the secretary said: "All is well, sir, with the Empire", and the King gave him a smile and relapsed once more
into unconsciousness.[116]
By 20 January, he was close to death. His physicians, led by Lord Dawson of Penn, issued a bulletin with the words "The King's life
is moving peacefully towards its close."[117][118] Dawson's private diary, unearthed after his death and made public in 1986, reveals
that the King's last words, a mumbled "God damn you!",[119] were addressed to his nurse, Catherine Black, when she gave him a
sedative that night. Dawson, who supported the "gentle growth of euthanasia",[120] admitted in the diary that he hastened the King's
death by injecting him, after 11.00 p.m., with two consecutive lethal injections: 3/4 of a grain of morphine followed shortly afterwards
by a grain of cocaine.[119][121] Dawson wrote that he acted to preserve the King's dignity, to prevent further strain on the family, and
so that the King's death at 11:55 p.m. could be announced in the morning edition of The Times newspaper rather than "less
appropriate ... evening journals".[119][121] Neither Queen Mary, who was intensely religious and might not have sanctioned
euthanasia, nor the Prince of Wales was consulted. The royal family did not want the King to endure pain and suffering and did not
want his life prolonged artificially but neither did they approve Dawson's actions.[122] British Pathé announced the King's death the
following day, in which he was described as "more than a King, a father of a great family".[123]

The German composer Paul Hindemith went to a BBC studio on the morning after the King's death and in six hours wrote
Trauermusik (Mourning Music). It was performed that same evening in a live broadcast by the BBC, with Adrian Boult conducting
the BBC Symphony Orchestra and the composer as soloist.[124]

At the procession to George's lying in state in Westminster Hall part of the Imperial State Crown fell from on top of the coffin and
landed in the gutter as the cortège turned into New Palace Yard. The new king, Edward VIII, saw it fall and wondered whether it was
a bad omen for his new reign.[125][126] As a mark of respect to their father, George's four surviving sons, Edward, Albert, Henry, and
George, mounted the guard, known as the Vigil of the Princes, at the catafalque on the night before the funeral.[127] The vigil was not
repeated until the death of George's daughter-in-law, Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother, in 2002. George V was interred at St
George's Chapel, Windsor Castle, on 28 January 1936.[128] Edward abdicated before the year was out, leaving Albert to ascend the
throne as George VI.

Legacy
George V disliked sitting for portraits[17] and despised modern art; he was so displeased by
one portrait by Charles Sims that he ordered it to be burned.[129] He did admire sculptor
Bertram Mackennal, who created statues of George for display in Madras and Delhi, and
William Reid Dick, whose statue of George V stands outside Westminster Abbey,
London.[17]

George preferred to stay at home pursuing his hobbies of stamp collecting and game
shooting, and he lived a life that later biographers considered dull because of its
conventionality.[130] He was not an intellectual; on returning from one evening at the opera,
he wrote in his journal, "Went to Covent Garden and saw Fidelio and damned dull it
was."[131] Nonetheless, he was earnestly devoted to Britain and its Commonwealth.[132] He
explained, "it has always been my dream to identify myself with the great idea of
Empire."[133] He appeared hard-working and became widely admired by the people of Statue of King George V in King
Britain and the Empire, as well as "the Establishment".[134] In the words of historian David George Square outside Brisbane City
Cannadine, King George V and Queen Mary were an "inseparably devoted couple" who Hall
upheld "character" and "family values".[135]

George established a standard of conduct for British royalty that reflected the values and virtues of the upper middle-class rather than
upper-class lifestyles or vices.[136] Acting within his constitutional bounds, he dealt skilfully with a succession of crises: Ireland, the
First World War, and the first socialist minority government in Britain.[17] He was by temperament a traditionalist who never fully
appreciated or approved the revolutionary changes underway in British society.[137] Nevertheless, he invariably wielded his influence
as a force of neutrality and moderation, seeing his role as mediator rather than final decision-maker.[138]

Titles, styles, honours and arms

Titles and styles

3 June 1865 – 24 May 1892: His Royal Highness Prince George of Wales
24 May 1892 – 22 January 1901: His Royal Highness The Duke of York
22 January – 9 November 1901: His Royal Highness The Duke of Cornwall and York
9 November 1901 – 6 May 1910: His Royal Highness The Prince of Wales
6 May 1910 – 20 January 1936: His Majesty The King
His full style as king was "George V, by the Grace of God, of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and of the British
Dominions beyond the Seas, King, Defender of the Faith, Emperor of India" until the Royal and Parliamentary Titles Act 1927, when
it changed to "George V, by the Grace of God, of Great Britain, Ireland and the British Dominions beyond the Seas, King, Defender
of the Faith, Emperor of India".[139]

British honours
KG: Royal Knight of the Garter, 4 August 1884[140]
KT: Knight of the Thistle, 5 July 1893[140]
Sub-Prior of the Venerable Order of St. John, 1893[141]
PC: Privy Counsellor, 18 July 1894[140]
Privy Counsellor (Ireland), 20 August 1897[140]
GCVO: Knight Grand Cross of the Royal Victorian Order, 30 June 1897[140]
KP: Knight of St Patrick, 20 August 1897[140]
GCMG: Knight Grand Cross of St Michael and St George, 9 March 1901[140][142]
Royal Victorian Chain, 9 August 1902[143]
ISO: Companion of the Imperial Service Order, 31 March 1903[140]
GCSI: Knight Grand Commander of the Star of India, 28 September 1905[140]
GCIE: Knight Grand Commander of the Indian Empire, 28 September 1905[140]
Queen Victoria Golden Jubilee Medal, with 1897 bar[144]

On 4 June 1917, he founded the Order of the British Empire.[145]

Military appointments

Military ranks and naval appointments

September 1877: Cadet, HMS Britannia[146]

8 January 1880: Midshipman, HMS Bacchante and the corvette HMS Canada[140]
3 June 1884: Sub-Lieutenant, Royal Navy[140]
8 October 1885: Lieutenant, HMS Thunderer; HMS Dreadnought; HMS Alexandra; HMS Northumberland[140]
July 1889 I/C HMS Torpedo Boat 79[147]
By May 1890 I/C the gunboat HMS Thrush[148]
24 August 1891: Commander, I/C HMS Melampus[140]
2 January 1893: Captain, Royal Navy[140]
1 January 1901: Rear-Admiral, Royal Navy[140][149]
26 June 1903: Vice-Admiral, Royal Navy[140]
1 March 1907: Admiral, Royal Navy[140][150]
1910: Admiral of the Fleet, Royal Navy[140]
1910: Field Marshal, British Army[150]
1919: Chief of the Royal Air Force (title not rank)[151]

Honorary military appointments

21 June 1887: Personal Aide-de-Camp to the Queen[152]

18 July 1900: Colonel-in-Chief of the Royal Fusiliers (City of London Regiment)[153]
1 January 1901: Colonel-in-Chief of the Royal Marine Forces[154]
25 February 1901: Personal Naval Aide-de-Camp to the King[155]
29 November 1901: Honorary Colonel of the 4th County of London Yeomanry Regiment (King's Colonials)[156]
21 December 1901: Colonel-in-Chief of the Royal Welsh Fusiliers[157]
12 November 1902: Colonel-in-Chief of the Queen's Own Cameron Highlanders[158]
April 1917: Colonel-in-Chief of the Royal Flying Corps (Naval and Military Wings)[159]
Foreign honours
Knight of the Order of the Elephant (Denmark), 11 October 1885[140][160]
Grand Cross of the Saxe-Ernestine House Order (Ernestine duchies), 1885[161]
Grand Cross of the Sash of the Two Orders (Kingdom of Portugal), 20 May 1886[162]
Grand Cross of the Order of Charles III (Spain), 20 May 1888[163]
Knight with Collar of the Order of the Black Eagle (Prussia),[140][164] 8 August 1889[165]
Grand Cross of the Order of the Red Eagle (Prussia),[164] 8 August 1889
Grand Cross of the Order of the Württemberg Crown (Württemberg), 1890[166]
Cross of Honour of the Order of the Dannebrog (Denmark), 9 September 1891[160]
Knight of the Supreme Order of the Most Holy Annunciation (Italy), 28 April 1892[167]
Grand Cross of the Order of the White Falcon (Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach), 1892[168]
Knight of the Order of the Golden Fleece (Spain), 17 July 1893[169]
Grand Cross of the House Order of the Wendish Crown (Mecklenburg), 1893[170]
Knight of the Order of St. Andrew (Russian Empire), 1893[171][172]
Knight of the Order of St. Alexander Nevsky (Russian Empire), 1893[171][172]
Knight of the Order of the White Eagle (Russian Empire), 1893[171][172]
Knight 1st Class of the Order of St. Anna (Russian Empire), 1893[171][172]
Knight 1st Class of the Order of St. Stanislaus (Russian Empire), 1893[171][172]
Grand Cordon of the Supreme Order of the Chrysanthemum (Japan), 13 April 1902[173]
Knight of the Order of the Rue Crown (Saxony), October 1902[140][174]
Grand Cross of the Order of St. Stephen (Austria-Hungary), 1902[175]
Grand Cross of the Legion of Honour (France), July 1903[176]
Knight of the Order of the Seraphim (Sweden), 14 June 1905[140][177]
Grand Cross with Collar of the Order of Charles III (Spain), 30 May 1906[178]
Grand Cross with Collar of the Order of Carol I (Romania), 1910[179]
Collar of the Supreme Order of the Chrysanthemum (Japan), 30 March 1911[180]
Knight of the Order of St. Hubert (Bavaria), 1911[164][181]
Grand Commander of the Order of the Dannebrog (Denmark), 18 April 1913[182]
Grand Commander with Diamonds of the Order of the Dannebrog (Denmark), 9 May 1914[183]
Grand Commander of the Royal House Order of Hohenzollern (Prussia)[164]
Member 1st Class with Diamonds of the Order of Osmanieh (Ottoman Empire)[140]
Grand Cross of the Order of the Redeemer (Greece)[144]
King Christian IX Jubilee Medal (Denmark)[144]
King Christian IX Centenary Medal (Denmark)[160]
King Christian IX and Queen Louise of Denmark Golden Wedding Commemorative Medal (Denmark)[144][160]
Knight 3rd Class of the Order of St. George (Russian Empire), 14 March 1918[184]
Grand Cross of the Sash of the Three Orders (Portuguese Republic), 1919[185]
Knight with Collar of the Order of Muhammad Ali (Egypt), 1920[186]
Cross of Liberty, Grade I Class I (Estonia), 17 June 1925[187]
Grand Cross of the Order of the Colonial Empire (Portuguese Republic), 19 February 1934[188]
Grand Cross of the Order of San Marino (San Marino)[189]
Knight with Collar of the Order of Solomon (Ethiopia), 1935[190]

Honorary foreign military appointments

1 February 1901: À la suite of the Imperial German Navy[191]

26 January 1902: Colonel-in-Chief of the Rhenish Cuirassier Regiment "Count Geßler" No. 8 (Prussia)[192]
24 May 1910: Admiral of the Royal Danish Navy[193]
Honorary Colonel of the Infantry Regiment "Zamora" No. 8 (Spain)[194][195]
1923: Honorary Admiral of the Swedish Navy[196]
Honorary degrees and offices
8 June 1893: Royal Fellow of the Royal Society,[140] installed 6 February 1902[197]
1899: Doctor of Laws (LLD), University of the Cape of Good Hope[198]
1901: Doctor of Laws (LLD), University of Sydney[199]
1901: Doctor of Laws (LLD), University of Toronto[200]
1901: Doctor of Civil Law (DCL), Queen's University, Ontario[201]
1902: Doctor of Laws (LLD), University of Wales[202]
1901: Chancellor of the University of Cape Town[203]
1901–1912: Chancellor of the University of the Cape of Good Hope[198]
1902–1910: Chancellor of the University of Wales[202]

Arms

As Duke of York, George's arms were the royal arms, with an inescutcheon of the arms of Saxony, all differenced with a label of
three points argent, the centre point bearing an anchor azure. The anchor was removed from his coat of arms as the Prince of Wales.
As King, he bore the royal arms. In 1917, he removed, by warrant, the Saxony inescutcheon from the arms of all male-line
descendants of the Prince Consort domiciled in the United Kingdom (although the royal arms themselves had never borne the
shield).[204]

Coat of arms as King of the

Coat of arms as Duke of Coat of arms as Prince of Coat of arms as king in
United Kingdom (except
York Wales Scotland
Scotland)

Issue
Name Birth Death Spouse Children
Edward VIII 28 May 1972 (aged
23 June 1894 Wallis Simpson None
(later Duke of Windsor) 77)
Elizabeth II
14 December 6 February 1952
George VI Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon Princess Margaret, Countess of
1895 (aged 56)
Snowdon
George Lascelles, 7th Earl of
28 March 1965 (aged Henry Lascelles, 6th Earl of
Mary, Princess Royal 25 April 1897 Harewood
67) Harewood
The Hon. Gerald Lascelles
Prince William of Gloucester
Prince Henry, Duke of 10 June 1974 (aged Lady Alice Montagu Douglas
31 March 1900 Prince Richard, Duke of
Gloucester 74) Scott
Gloucester
Prince Edward, Duke of Kent
Prince George, Duke of 20 December 25 August 1942 Princess Marina of Greece and Princess Alexandra, The Hon.
Kent 1902 (aged 39) Denmark Lady Ogilvy
Prince Michael of Kent
18 January 1919
Prince John 12 July 1905 Never married None
(aged 13)

Ancestry
Ancestors of George V[205]
 8. Ernest I, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha
4. Prince Albert of Saxe-Coburg and
Gotha
9. Princess Louise of Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg
2. Edward VII of the United Kingdom
10. Prince Edward, Duke of Kent and Strathearn
5. Victoria of the United Kingdom
11. Princess Victoria of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld
1. George V of the United
Kingdom
12. Frederick William, Duke of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg
6. Christian IX of Denmark
13. Princess Louise Caroline of Hesse-Kassel
3. Princess Alexandra of Denmark
14. Prince William of Hesse-Kassel
7. Princess Louise of Hesse-Kassel
15. Princess Charlotte of Denmark

See also
Household of King George V and Queen Mary
Interwar Britain

Notes and sources

1. His godparents were the King of Hanover (Queen Victoria's cousin, for whom Prince Edward of Saxe-Weimar-
Eisenach stood proxy); the Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (Prince Albert's brother, for whom the Lord President of
the Council, Earl Granville, stood proxy); the Prince of Leiningen (the Prince of Wales's half-cousin); the Crown
Prince of Denmark (the Princess of Wales's brother, for whom the Lord Chamberlain, Viscount Sydney, stood proxy);
the Queen of Denmark (George's maternal grandmother, for whom Queen Victoria stood proxy); the Duke of
Cambridge (Queen Victoria's cousin); the Duchess of Cambridge (Queen Victoria's aunt, for whom George's aunt
Princess Helena stood proxy); and Princess Louis of Hesse and by Rhine (George's aunt, for whom her sister
Princess Louise stood proxy) (The Times (London), Saturday, 8 July 1865, p. 12).
2. Clay, p. 39; Sinclair, pp. 46–47
3. Sinclair, pp. 49–50
4. Clay, p. 71; Rose, p. 7
5. Rose, p. 13
6. Keene, Donald Emperor of Japan: Meiji and His World, 1852–1912 (Columbia University Press, 2002) pp. 350–351
7. Rose, p. 14; Sinclair, p. 55
8. Rose, p. 11
9. Clay, p. 92; Rose, pp. 15–16
10. Sinclair, p. 69
11. Pope-Hennessy, pp. 250–251
12. Rose, pp. 22–23
13. Rose, p. 29
14. Rose, pp. 20–21, 24
15. Pope-Hennessy, pp. 230–231
16. Sinclair, p. 178
17. Matthew, H. C. G. (September 2004; online edition May 2009) "George V (1865–1936)" (http://www.oxforddnb.com/v
iew/article/33369), Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/33369 (ht
tps://doi.org/10.1093%2Fref%3Aodnb%2F33369), retrieved 1 May 2010 (Subscription required)
18. Clay, p. 149
19. Clay, p. 150; Rose, p. 35
20. Rose, pp. 53–57; Sinclair, p. 93 ff
21. Vickers, ch. 18
22. Renamed from Bachelor's Cottage
23. Clay, p. 154; Nicolson, p. 51; Rose, p. 97
24. Harold Nicolson's diary quoted in Sinclair, p. 107
25. Nicolson's Comments 1944–1948, quoted in Rose, p. 42
26. The Royal Philatelic Collection (http://www.royal.gov.uk/The%20Royal%20Collection%20and%20other%20collecti
ons/TheRoyalPhilatelicCollection/History.aspx), Official website of the British Monarchy, retrieved 1 May 2010
27. Clay, p. 167
28. Rose, pp. 22, 208–209
29. Rose, p. 42
30. Rose, pp. 44–45
31. Buckner, Phillip (November 1999), "The Royal Tour of 1901 and the Construction of an Imperial Identity in South
Africa", South African Historical Journal, 41: 324–348, doi:10.1080/02582479908671897 (https://doi.org/10.1080%2
F02582479908671897)
32. Rose, pp. 43–44
33. Bassett, Judith (1987), " 'A Thousand Miles of Loyalty': the Royal Tour of 1901", New Zealand Journal of History, 21
(1): 125–138; Oliver, W. H., ed. (1981), The Oxford History of New Zealand, pp. 206–208
34. Rose, p. 45
35. "No. 27375" (https://www.thegazette.co.uk/London/issue/27375/page/7289). The London Gazette. 9 November
1901. p. 7289.
36. Previous Princes of Wales (https://www.princeofwales.gov.uk/titles-and-heraldry), Household of HRH The Prince of
Wales, retrieved 19 March 2018
37. Clay, p. 244; Rose, p. 52
38. Rose, p. 289
39. Sinclair, p. 107
40. Massie, Robert K. (1991), Dreadnought: Britain, Germany and the Coming of the Great War, Random House,
pp. 449–450
41. Rose, pp. 61–66
42. The driver of their coach and over a dozen spectators were killed by a bomb thrown by an anarchist, Mateu Morral.
43. Rose, pp. 67–68
44. King George V's diary, 6 May 1910, Royal Archives, quoted in Rose, p. 75
45. Pope-Hennessy, p. 421; Rose, pp. 75–76
46. Rose, pp. 82–84
47. Wolffe, John (2010), "Protestantism, Monarchy and the Defence of Christian Britain 1837–2005", in Brown, Callum
G.; Snape, Michael F. (eds.), Secularisation in the Christian World (https://books.google.com/books?id=OXhovNnt76
QC&pg=PA63), Farnham, Surrey: Ashgate Publishing, pp. 63–64, ISBN 978-0-7546-9930-9
48. Rayner, Gordon (10 November 2010) "How George V was received by the Irish in 1911" (https://www.telegraph.co.u
k/news/uknews/theroyalfamily/8121389/How-George-V-was-received-by-the-Irish-in-1911.html), The Telegraph
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50. Rose, p. 136
51. Rose, pp. 39–40
52. About one bird every 20 seconds
53. Rose, p. 87; Windsor, pp. 86–87
54. Rose, p. 115
55. Rose, pp. 112–114
56. Rose, p. 114
57. Rose, pp. 116–121
58. Rose, pp. 121–122
59. Rose, pp. 120, 141
60. Hardy, Frank (May 1970), "The King and the Constitutional Crisis", History Today, 20 (5): 338–347
61. Rose, pp. 121–125
62. Rose, pp. 125–130
63. Rose, p. 123
64. Rose, p. 137
65. Rose, pp. 141–143
66. Rose, pp. 152–153, 156–157
67. Rose, p. 157
68. Rose, p. 158
69. Nicolson, p. 247
70. Nicolson, p. 308
71. "No. 30186" (https://www.thegazette.co.uk/London/issue/30186/page/7119). The London Gazette. 17 July 1917.
p. 7119.
72. Rose, pp. 174–175
73. At George's wedding in 1893, The Times (Friday, 7 July 1893, p. 5) claimed that the crowd may have confused
Nicholas with George, because their beards and dress made them look alike superficially. Their facial features were
only different up close.
74. Nicolson, p. 310
75. Clay, p. 326; Rose, p. 173
76. Nicolson, p. 301; Rose, pp. 210–215; Sinclair, p. 148
77. Rose, p. 210
78. Crossland, John (15 October 2006), "British Spies In Plot To Save Tsar", The Sunday Times
79. Sinclair, p. 149
80. Diary, 25 July 1918, quoted in Clay, p. 344 and Rose, p. 216
81. Clay, pp. 355–356
82. Pope-Hennessy, p. 511
83. Pinney, Thomas (ed.) (1990) The Letters of Rudyard Kipling 1920–30, Vol. 5 (https://archive.org/details/lettersofrudy
ard0006kipl/page/120), University of Iowa Press, note 1, p. 120, ISBN 978-0-87745-898-2
84. Rose, p. 294
85. "Archduke Otto von Habsburg" (https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/royalty-obituaries/8616240/Archduke-O
tto-von-Habsburg.html), The Daily Telegraph, London, 4 July 2011
86. Rose, pp. 347–348
87. Nicolson, p. 347; Rose, pp. 238–241; Sinclair, p. 114
88. Mowat, p. 84
89. Mowat, p. 86
90. Mowat, pp. 89–93
91. Mowat, pp. 106–107, 119
92. Prochaska, Frank (1999), "George V and Republicanism, 1917–1919", Twentieth Century British History, 10 (1): 27–
51, doi:10.1093/tcbh/10.1.27 (https://doi.org/10.1093%2Ftcbh%2F10.1.27)
93. Kirk, Neville (2005), "The Conditions of Royal Rule: Australian and British Socialist and Labour Attitudes to the
Monarchy, 1901–11", Social History, 30 (1): 64–88, doi:10.1080/0307102042000337297 (https://doi.org/10.1080%2
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94. Nicolson, p. 419; Rose, pp. 341–342
95. Rose, p. 340; Sinclair, p. 105
96. Rose, p. 348
97. Statute of Westminster 1931 (http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/Geo5/22-23/4/introduction), legislation.gov.uk,
retrieved 20 July 2017
98. Rose, pp. 373–379
99. Vernon Bogdanor argues that George V played a crucial and active role in the political crisis of August–October
1931, and was a determining influence on Prime Minister MacDonald, in Bogdanor, Vernon (1991), "1931 Revisited:
The Constitutional Aspects", Twentieth Century British History, 2 (1): 1–25, doi:10.1093/tcbh/2.1.1 (https://doi.org/10.
1093%2Ftcbh%2F2.1.1). Philip Williamson disputes Bogdanor, saying the idea of a national government had been
in the minds of party leaders since late 1930 and it was they, not the King, who determined when the time had come
to establish one, in Williamson, Philip (1991), "1931 Revisited: the Political Realities", Twentieth Century British
History, 2 (3): 328–338, doi:10.1093/tcbh/2.3.328 (https://doi.org/10.1093%2Ftcbh%2F2.3.328).
00. Nicolson, pp. 521–522; Owens, pp. 92–93; Rose, p. 388
01. Nicolson, pp. 521–522; Rose, p. 388
02. Sinclair p. 154
03. Sinclair, p. 1
04. Pimlott, Ben (1996), The Queen, John Wiley and Sons, Inc, ISBN 978-0-471-19431-6
05. Ziegler, Philip (1990), King Edward VIII: The Official Biography, London: Collins, p. 199, ISBN 978-0-00-215741-4
06. Rose, p. 392
07. Rose, pp. 301, 344
08. Ziegler, pp. 192–196
09. Arthur Bigge, 1st Baron Stamfordham, to Alexander Cambridge, 1st Earl of Athlone, 9 July 1929, quoted in Nicolson
p. 433 and Rose, p. 359
10. Pope-Hennessy, p. 546; Rose, pp. 359–360
11. Roberts, Andrew (2000), Antonia Fraser (ed.), The House of Windsor, London: Cassell and Co, p. 36, ISBN 978-0-
304-35406-1
12. Ashley, Mike (1998), The Mammoth Book of British Kings and Queens, London: Robinson Publishing, p. 699
13. Rose, pp. 360–361
14. Bradford, Sarah (1989), King George VI, London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, p. 149, ISBN 978-0-297-79667-1
15. Pope-Hennessy, p. 558
16. The Times (London), 22 January 1936, p. 7, col. A
17. The Times (London), 21 January 1936, p. 12, col. A
18. Rose, p. 402
19. Watson, Francis (1986), "The Death of George V", History Today, 36: 21–30, PMID 11645856 (https://pubmed.ncbi.n
lm.nih.gov/11645856)
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1445, doi:10.1136/bmj.308.6941.1445 (https://doi.org/10.1136%2Fbmj.308.6941.1445), PMC 2540387 (https://www.
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24. Steinberg, Michael (2000), The Concerto (https://books.google.com/books?id=t8oXNX2tY8AC&q=werner+reinhart&
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25. Windsor, p. 267
26. The cross surmounting the crown, composed of a sapphire and 200 diamonds, was retrieved by a soldier following
later in the procession.
27. The Times (London), Tuesday, 28 January 1936, p. 10, col. F
28. Rose, pp. 404–405
29. Rose, p. 318
30. For example, Harold Nicolson's diary quoted by Sinclair, p. 107; Best, Nicholas (1995) The Kings and Queens of
England, London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, ISBN 0-297-83487-8, p. 83: "rather a dull man ... liked nothing better than
to sit in his study and look at his stamps"; Lacey, Robert (2002) Royal, London: Little, Brown, ISBN 0-316-85940-0,
p. 54: "the diary of King George V is the journal of a very ordinary man, containing a great deal more about his
hobby of stamp collecting than it does about his personal feelings, with a heavy emphasis on the weather."
31. Andrew Pierce (4 August 2009), "Buckingham Palace is unlikely shrine to the history of jazz" (https://www.telegraph.
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The Telegraph, London, retrieved 11 February 2012
32. Clay, p. 245; Gore, p. 293; Nicolson, pp. 33, 141, 510, 517
33. Harrison, Brian (1996) The Transformation of British Politics, 1860–1995 pp. 320, 337
34. Gore, pp. x, 116
35. Cannadine, David (1998) History in our Time p. 3
36. Harrison, p. 332; American reporters noted that the King "if not himself a characteristic example of the great British
middle class, is so like the characteristic examples of that class that there is no perceptible distinction to be made
between the two." Editors of Fortune, The King of England: George V (1936) p. 33
37. Rose, p. 328
38. Harrison, pp. 51, 327
39. "No. 33274" (https://www.thegazette.co.uk/London/issue/33274/page/3111). The London Gazette. 13 May 1927.
p. 3111.
40. White, Geoffrey H.; Lea, R. S. (eds.) (1959) Complete Peerage, London: St Catherine's Press, vol. XII, pp. 924–925
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References
Clay, Catrine (2006), King, Kaiser, Tsar: Three Royal Cousins Who Led the World to War, London: John Murray,
ISBN 978-0-7195-6537-3
Gore, John (1941), King George V: a personal memoir (https://archive.org/details/kinggeorgevperso0000gore)
Matthew, H. C. G. (September 2004; online edition May 2009) "George V (1865–1936)" (http://www.oxforddnb.com/v
iew/article/33369), Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/33369 (ht
tps://doi.org/10.1093%2Fref%3Aodnb%2F33369), retrieved 1 May 2010 (Subscription required)
Mowat, Charles Loch (1955), Britain Between The Wars 1918–1940, London: Methuen online free to borrow (https://
archive.org/details/britainbetweenwa00mowa)
Nicolson, Sir Harold (1952), King George the Fifth: His Life and Reign, London: Constable and Co
Owens, Edward (2019), "2: 'A man we understand': King George V's radio broadcasts", The Family Firm: monarchy,
mass media and the British public, 1932–53, pp. 91–132, ISBN 9781909646940, JSTOR j.ctvkjb3sr.8 (https://www.j
stor.org/stable/j.ctvkjb3sr.8)
Pope-Hennessy, James (1959), Queen Mary, London: George Allen and Unwin, Ltd
Rose, Kenneth (1983), King George V, London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, ISBN 978-0-297-78245-2
Sinclair, David (1988), Two Georges: The Making of the Modern Monarchy, London: Hodder and Stoughton,
ISBN 978-0-340-33240-5
Vickers, Hugo (2018), The Quest for Queen Mary, London: Zuleika
Windsor, HRH The Duke of (1951), A King's Story, London: Cassell and Co

Further reading
Cannadine, David (2014), George V: The Unexpected King
Mort, Frank (2019), "Safe for Democracy: Constitutional Politics, Popular Spectacle, and the British Monarchy 1910–
1914" (https://www.research.manchester.ac.uk/portal/en/publications/safe-for-democracy(05a94f6d-bafb-42e8-9668-
0a6a64eb19a4).html), Journal of British Studies, 58 (1): 109–141, doi:10.1017/jbr.2018.176 (https://doi.org/10.101
7%2Fjbr.2018.176), S2CID 151146689 (https://api.semanticscholar.org/CorpusID:151146689)
Somervell, D. C. (1936), The Reign of King George V (https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.176466) wide-
ranging political, social and economic coverage, 1910–35
Spender, John A. (1935), "British Foreign Policy in the Reign of HM King George V", International Affairs, 14 (4):
455–479, JSTOR 2603463 (https://www.jstor.org/stable/2603463)

External links
Special issue (http://www.maxschoenherr.de/Archiv/londonNews1936.html) of the Illustrated London News covering
King George V's death
Newsreel footage (http://www.britishpathe.com/video/coronation-of-his-majesty-king-george-v) of King George V's
coronation
Sound recording (http://www.britishpathe.com/video/king-george-v-jubilee-speech-aka-george-5th) of King George
V's Silver Jubilee speech
Portraits of King George V (https://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/person.php?LinkID=mp01752) at the National
Portrait Gallery, London
Newspaper clippings about George V (http://purl.org/pressemappe20/folder/pe/005985) in the 20th Century Press
Archives of the ZBW
 George V
House of Windsor
Cadet branch of the House of Wettin
Born: 3 June 1865 Died: 20 January 1936

Regnal titles
King of the United Kingdom and the British
Preceded by Dominions Succeeded by
Edward VII Emperor of India Edward VIII
6 May 1910 – 20 January 1936

British royalty
Prince of Wales
Preceded by Duke of Cornwall Succeeded by
Albert Edward Duke of Rothesay Edward (VIII)
1901–1910

Honorary titles
Grand Master of the Order of Vacant
Preceded by
St Michael and St George Title next held by
The Duke of Cambridge
1904–1910 The Prince of Wales

Preceded by Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports Succeeded by

The Lord Curzon of Kedleston 1905–1907 The Earl Brassey

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