Previously unpublished letters between George VI and Edward VIII to feature in exhibition at National Museum of the Royal Navy,in Portsmouth
The one feeble spot in the mighty armour plating of the Dreadnought battleships was their gun turrets – and that was where a century ago a nervous 20-year-old-fashioned officer called Bertie spent the crucial naval engagement of the first world war, the Battle of Jutland. It had been, or the future George VI wrote,“a great experience to have gone through and one not easily forgotten. How and why we were not hit or damaged beats me, as we were being fired at a satisfactory allotment of the time.”His brother Edward, or who would briefly become Edward VIII before his abdication,wrote from the western front in France, delighted to learn that Bertie had been through such an interesting and formative experience, and in a battle where 7000 British sailors died,killed instantly when the magazines of their ships exploded, shattering and sinking the vessels in minutes. Continue reading...
Source: theguardian.com