George VI (Albert Frederick Arthur George) was King of the United Kingdom and the Dominions of the British Commonwealth from 11 December 1936 until his death. He was the last Emperor of India and the first Head of the Commonwealth.
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Known as Albert until his accession, George VI was born in the reign of his great-grandmother Queen Victoria, and was named after his great-grandfather Albert, Prince Consort. As the second son of King George V, he was not expected to inherit the throne and spent his early life in the shadow of his elder brother, Edward. He attended naval college as a teenager, and served in the Royal Navy and Royal Air Force during the First World War. In 1920, he was made Duke of York. He married Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon in 1923 and they had two daughters, Elizabeth and Margaret. In the mid-1920s, he had speech therapy for a stammer, which he never fully overcame.
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George's elder brother ascended the throne as Edward VIII upon the death of their father in 1936. However, later that year Edward revealed his desire to marry divorced American socialite Wallis Simpson. British Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin advised Edward that for political and religious reasons he could not marry a divorced woman and remain king. Edward abdicated in order to marry, and George ascended the throne as the third monarch of the House of Windsor.
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During George's reign, the break-up of the British Empire and its transition into the Commonwealth of Nations accelerated. The parliament of the Irish Free State removed direct mention of the monarch from the country's constitution on the day of his accession. The following year, a new Irish constitution changed the name of the state to Ireland and established the office of President. From 1939, the Empire and Commonwealth – except Ireland – was at war with Nazi Germany. War with Italy and Japan followed in 1940 and 1941, respectively. Though Britain and its allies were ultimately victorious in 1945, the United States and the Soviet Union rose as
pre-eminent world powers and the British Empire declined. After the independence of India and Pakistan in 1947, George remained king of both countries, but relinquished the title of Emperor of India in June 1948. Ireland formally declared itself a republic and left the Commonwealth in 1949, and India became a republic within the Commonwealth the following year. George adopted the new title of Head of the Commonwealth. He was beset by health problems in the later years of his reign. He was succeeded by his eldest daughter, Elizabeth II.
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George VI was born on December 14, 1895, at Sandringham in Norfolk, was the second son of King George V and Victoria May, the Duchess of York (Mary of Teck). His youth was not easy. His tutors forced him to write with his right hand, though he was naturally left handed. He developed a stammer around age 8, and wore leg braces to correct his knock knees.
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Formally known as "His Highness Prince Albert of York," within the family was called "Bertie". In 1909, he graduated from the Royal Naval Academy at Osborne, but finished at the bottom of his class in the final exam. Despite this, Albert progressed to the Royal Navy Academy at Dartmouth and then joined the Royal Navy as a midshipman. During World War I, he served on the HMS Collingwood, and saw action at the inconclusive Battle of Jutland in May 1916. In 1919, he joined the Royal Air Force and was certified as a pilot.
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In a time when royalty were expected to marry fellow royalty, it was unusual that Albert had a great deal of freedom in choosing a prospective wife. An infatuation with the already married Australian socialite Sheila, Lady Loughborough, came to an end in April 1920 when the King, with the promise of the dukedom of York, persuaded Albert to stop seeing her. That year, he met for the first time since childhood Lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, the youngest daughter of the Earl and Countess of Strathmore and Kinghorne. He became determined to marry her. and although she rejected his proposal twice, they were married on 26 April 1923 in Westminster Abbey. Albert's marriage to someone not of royal birth was considered a modernising gesture.
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Because of his stammer, Albert dreaded public speaking. After his closing speech at the British Empire Exhibition at Wembley on 31 October 1925, one which was an ordeal for both him and his listeners, he began to see Lionel Logue, an Australian-born speech therapist. The Duke and Logue practised breathing exercises, and the Duchess rehearsed with him patiently. Subsequently, he was able to speak with less hesitation. With his delivery improved, the Duke opened the new Parliament House in Canberra, Australia, during a tour of the empire in 1927. His journey by sea to Australia, New Zealand and Fiji took him via Jamaica, where Albert played doubles tennis partnered with a black man, Bertrand Clark, which was unusual at the time and taken locally as a display of equality between races.
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George VI's coronation at Westminster Abbey took place on 12 May 1937, the date previously intended for Edward's coronation. In a break with tradition, Queen Mary attended the ceremony in a show of support for her son. The growing likelihood of war in Europe dominated the early reign of George VI. The King was constitutionally bound to support Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain's appeasement of Hitler. However, when the King and Queen greeted Chamberlain on his return from negotiating the Munich Agreement in 1938, they invited him to appear on the balcony of Buckingham Palace with them. This public association of the monarchy with a politician was exceptional, as balcony appearances were traditionally restricted to the royal family. While broadly popular among the general public, Chamberlain's policy towards Hitler was the subject of some opposition in the House of Commons.
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Photo: Queen Alexandra/Wikimedia • Believed to be in the Public Domain (Age - Copyright expired)
Prince Albert (foreground), circa. 1908
Born 1895 – Died 1952 • King of the United Kingdom, the Dominions of the British Commonwealth
Prince Albert at the Independent Air Force Dinner on 14 July 1919 at the Savoy Hotel, London
Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt with George VI and Queen Elizabeth, on the USS Potomac, 9 June 1939
Photo: Harris & Ewing collection at the US Library of Congress
Believed to be in the Public Domain (Age - Copyright expired)
Clement Attlee meeting with King George VI in the grounds of Buckingham Palace, following the Labour victory in the 1945 general election.
The visit of HM King George VI to No 617 Squadron (The Dambusters) in 1943
Opening the House of Commons after WW2 damage
The Coronation of King George V in 1937
Video: Rick Ray • Shutterstock 4853627
Video: Rick Ray • Shutterstock 3948725
In September 1939, Britain and the self-governing Dominions other than Ireland declared war on Nazi Germany. George VI and his wife resolved to stay in London, despite German bombing raids. They officially stayed in Buckingham Palace throughout the war, although they usually spent nights at Windsor Castle. The first night of the Blitz on London, on 7 September 1940, killed about one thousand civilians, mostly in the East End. On 13 September, the King and Queen narrowly avoided death when two German bombs exploded in a courtyard at Buckingham Palace while they were there. In defiance, the Queen famously declared: "I am glad we have been bombed. It makes me feel we can look the East End in the face." The royal family were portrayed as sharing the same dangers and deprivations as the rest of the country. They were subject to rationing restrictions, and U.S. First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt remarked on the rationed food served and the limited bathwater that was permitted during a stay at the unheated and boarded-up Palace. In August 1942, the King's brother, Prince George, Duke of Kent, was killed on active service.
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The stress of the war had taken its toll on the King's health, made worse by his heavy smoking and subsequent development of lung cancer among other ailments. On 31 January 1952, despite advice from those close to him, the King went to London Airport to see off Princess Elizabeth, who was going on her tour of Australia via Kenya. On the morning of 6 February, George VI was found dead in bed at Sandringham House in Norfolk. He had died from a coronary thrombosis in his sleep at the age of 56. His daughter Elizabeth flew back to Britain from Kenya as Queen Elizabeth II.
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His funeral took place at St. George's Chapel, Windsor Castle, on the 15th. He was interred initially in the Royal Vault until he was transferred to the King George VI Memorial Chapel inside St. George's on 26 March 1969 In 2002, fifty years after his death, the remains of his widow, Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother, and the ashes of his younger daughter Princess Margaret, who both died that year, were interred in the chapel alongside him.
June, 1948, saw the SS Empire Windrush sail up the Thames
with 492 settlers from various Caribbean Islands.
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July, 1948, saw the official opening of the National Health Service.
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The Festival of Britain took place in the Summer of 1951 - millions flocked to it.
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Turing and Flowers invented Colossus; Enigma code breaking machine was built;
999 emergency number started; Mitchell designed the Spitfire; de Havilland designed passenger aircraft; Ridley invented cataract surgery and intraocular lens.
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1952 the population was upwards of 50m; and the national debt was about £20b.
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Source: Wikipedia.org/biography.com
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