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4
Windsor War
‘She says that she would like to make Windsor her home, since all the happiest memories of childhood are
associated with the castle…’
Queen Elizabeth II in a reported conversation
The countdown to the Second World War had already begun by the time the royal
family left for Balmoral on 6 August buoyed up by confident assurances from
Chamberlain that Hitler understood that ‘Britain meant business’ and would not risk a
major war over Danzig, the latest crisis he had precipitated. On 16 March, speaking
from the ancient Hradschin Castle in Prague, Hitler had dissolved what remained of the
Czech state and announced a German Protectorate over Bohemia and Moravia; the city
of Memel was next, surrendered by the Lithuanian Government on 21 March. On the
same day Ribben-trop, the German Foreign Minister, had reopened negotiations aimed
at forcing the Polish Government to cede the port of Danzig and ten days later
Chamberlain had given the Polish Government the public guarantee that would lead to
Britain’s eventual declaration of war on Germany. Chamberlain, convinced that he had
frightened Hitler off, went for his usual salmon-fishing holiday early in August.
At Balmoral the King lunched with the boys at the Duke of York’s camp beside the Dee
and took them for strenuous climbs up Lochnagar. On 9 August he broke his holiday for
a visit of inspection to the Reserve Fleet at Weymouth, after which he wrote confidently
to Queen Mary, ‘I feel sure it will be a deterrent factor in Hitler’s mind to start a war.’
He should, perhaps, have remembered that a similar display by the Grand Fleet, which
he had witnessed in July 1914, had not prevented the outbreak of the First World War a
few weeks later. On 22 August news that Germany and Russia had signed the Nazi-
Soviet Pact destroyed the peace at Balmoral. The King, informed by Chamberlain on the
23rd that Parliament was to meet the next day, immediately took the train for London,
leaving the Queen and the Princesses behind.
‘Who is this Hitler spoiling everything?’ Margaret reportedly asked Crawfie. At
Buckingham Palace her father spoke of the German dictator in much the same terms,
complaining to Sir Miles Lampson about Hitler’s disruption of his sporting holiday much
as his father had at the outbreak of the previous war. ‘He had never had so many grouse
up there as this year. He had got 1,600 brace in six days and had been much looking
forward to this week’s shoot. It was utterly damnable that the villain Hitler had upset