George VI was wary of Churchill after Gallipoli and the abdication crisis. But an acclaimed new life of the wartime PM by Andrew Roberts reveals the two became confidants and, finally, close friends
Churchill entrusted the King with key wartime secrets, knowing there would be no leaksHULTON/GETTY
The Sunday Times,
In June 1939 King George VI told William Mackenzie King, the Canadian prime minister, that he “would never wish to appoint Churchill to any office unless it were absolutely necessary in time of war”. He gave the example of Gallipoli, an operation that was one of the great allied disasters of the First World War, as showing Winston Churchill’s lack of judgment.
Churchill’s support for King Edward VIII (later the Duke of Windsor) during the abdication crisis in 1936 may have been another reason for King George’s disdain. Churchill had been the most prominent figure promoting a morganatic (unofficial) marriage between Edward VIII and Wallis Simpson, which most establishment figures had considered impossible under British law and practice.
