Andrew Morton - 17 Carnations: The Royals, the Nazis and the Biggest Cover-Up in History

A few years ago a passage in historian Sarah Bradfords penetrating and occasionally acerbic biography of King George VI caught my eye. It concerned the flight, just weeks after the end of World War Two, to a German castle by two royal courtiers, one later revealed as a Soviet spy. They were tasked by George VI to pick up a bundle of correspondence, ostensibly relating to Queen Victoria and her eldest daughter. It soon became clear that there may have been other, more self-serving motives behind the flight.

Bradford explained how a buried battered metal canister, protected by a tatty raincoat, had been dug up by advancing Allied troops. It contained vital documents relating to German foreign policy, including a volume on the Duke and Duchess of Windsor, whose pro-Nazi views before and during the war had made them targets for suspicion and distrust among the Allies. Once the cache of papers was secretly analyzed, powerful political documents men decided that this material was so incendiary it required Anglo-American co-operation at the highest level to prevent it from leaking. This was an intriguing story ripe for further investigation.

There was one problem. Most of the action took place in Europe, and I had recently married an American interior designer and was living for part of the year in Los Angeles, California. Sometimes, though, things are destined. Professor Jonathan Petropoulos, whose book Royals and the Reich is an absorbing and comprehensive study of the links between European royalty and Hitlers Third Reich, lived just thirty minutes down the road at Claremont McKenna College. He has been hugely generous with his time, academic contacts, and advice, a constant source of encouragement, insight, and inspiration who has also become a good friend. In the land of soccer, we even speak the same language: football.

He put me in touch with Astrid Eckert, a specialist in modern German history. Her fascinating and meticulously researched book The Struggle for the Files reveals the diplomatic machinations behind the capture and subsequent return of Germanys soulthe nations official archives. Not only has she kindly given me hitherto unseen official documents, she also suggested many fresh lines of inquiry.

Destiny played a part too in tracking down sources. It soon became clear that some largely unseen archives in the United States were as important as, if not more so than, the more familiar dossiers in Britain and Europe. At the Hoover Institution at Stanford University in California were papers relating to, among others, David Harris and Paul Sweet, two of the feisty academics who traded blows with those who wanted to destroy or conceal the damning files about the Duke and Duchess of Windsor. The library also held documents for others involved in the story, notably Princess Stephanie von Hohenlohe, dubbed Hitlers spy princess and a neighbor in London of Wallis Simpson.

When the research moved on to Moscow it seemed that Lady Luck was also smiling. There were two elusive lines of inquiry: the role of Soviet spy and kings courtier Anthony Blunt in this royal detective story and the possible existence in Russian archival custody of hidden correspondence between the Duke of Windsor, Hitler, and the Nazi hierarchy. My thanks, then, to journalist Will Stewart for tracking down and having translated an obscure Russian biography of Blunt written by former ambassador to London Vicktor Popov, who had been given special access to KGB files.

Even more tantalizing was the work of researcher Dr. Sebastian Panwitz, who agreed to take a sweep through the Special Archive (Sonder Archiv) in Moscow on the last day of August, just before they closed for the winter. He emerged with a battered file with the barely legible words Ribbentrop and Herzog von Windsor handwritten on the outside. Was this the smoking gun, the documentary connection between Hitler, Ribbentrop, and the Duke of Windsor that proved his treason? Unfortunately the majority of the contents were in shorthand, and German shorthand at that. In the 1930s they used a system called Stolze-Schrey, but thanks to the good offices of Manfred Duerhammer, the Lucerne-based stenography expert Erich Werner agreed to take on the job of translation. My heartfelt appreciation for his strenuous efforts in teasing out the language from the hieroglyphics.

Less convoluted was the uncorking of a bottle of chardonnay in a Chelsea wine bar and reflecting on the dissonance between George VI and his older brother, the Duke of Windsor, with Sarah Bradford, the historian who inspired this whole journey. As ever, her insights and observations were telling.

Wallis Simpsons biographer Anne Sebba, who triumphantly transformed an ogre into a human being, was especially helpful and thoughtful, generously giving me the opportunity to take my investigation in a different and original direction.

My grateful thanks too to Barbara Mason, a descendant of Herman Rogers, who was a great friend and counsellor to both the Duke and Duchess of Windsor. As the unofficial family archivist, she kindly gave permission to use previously unpublished correspondence between Herman, the Duke of Windsor, President Roosevelt, and others in the book. She also granted access to the photographs and movie footage taken by Herman during some of the most historic events of King Edward VIIIs short reign. They are seen on these pages for the first time. Barbara has been a great supporter of this project, her encouragement and enthusiasm unstinting and much appreciated.