Scandalous Love Affairs: Jimmy and the Duchess

(Jimmy Donahue and the Duchess of Windsor at a party in the 1950's)

"You have no idea how hard it is to live out a great romance." the Duchess of Windsor to a friend.

It was a relationship that baffled and mystified their friends, and entertained their enemies. She was one of the most famous women in the world, one half of 'the love story of the century.' He was a rich, handsome, high school drop-out and mama's boy twenty years younger, and gay. They were an odd couple in many ways but despite their differences, the Duchess of Windsor and Jimmy Donahue kept gossips and high society on both sides of the Atlantic agog as they danced and flirted their way from New York to Palm Beach to Europe. Wallis was so enthralled with her young swain and the lifestyle that he offered her that she actually contemplated leaving the Duke for him.


Jimmy Donahue and the Duchess of Windsor had been introduced in the early 1940's when the Duke and Duchess had traveled to Palm Beach from the Bahamas where the Duke was serving as Governor General. The Duke of Windsor's former Lord-in-Waiting, the Earl of Sefton, suggested her as a hostess to the royal visitors. Jimmy's mother Jessie Woolworth Donahue hoped that rubbing shoulders with the royal couple would boost her own social standing. Although she had inherited millions from her father F.W. Woolworth, she was still considered new money to the old guard of Palm Beach Society. Her marriage to James Donahue, whose family had made their money from fat rendering, hadn't burnished her pedigree.

For their part, the Windsors found America more congenial than Europe where the Duke's indiscret behavior, like his meeting with Hitler in Germany, embarrassed the royal family. Here the Windsor's were treated like royalty. Jessie Donahue was thrilled when the Windsors attended lunches and dinners at her palatial Cielito Lindo in Palm Beach or at her triplex in New York. As a kid Jimmy had dreamed of being the best friend of the Duke of Windsor when he was still the Prince of Wales, and now here he was sitting having tea in his mother's living room. The Windsors were equally impressed by the Donahue's money, houses, servants and lifestyle.

Everything changed in 1950, when the Duke and Duchess decided to take the RMS Queen Mary from New York to Cherbourg. It was a trip they had taken many times before but this time Jimmy Donahue was on board. It was there, on the high seas, that Wallis fell in love with Jimmy. He was an old hand at entertaining older women. His mother had often pulled him out of school to accompany her on her travels. He was a brilliant gossip, prankster and jokester. At the start of the trip, Jimmy and Wallis were just friends; by the time they disembarked they were lovers. He was thirty-four and she was fifty-four. Friends say that Wallis did the chasing, that the idea would never have occurred to Jimmy to pursue the Duchess.

By the time the Duchess and Jimmy fell in love, they were both at a cross roads in their lives. The Duchess was bored and vulnerable. It had been 14 years since the Duke had abdicated the English throne for the 'woman I love' and maintaining the love affair of the century was stifling. The Duke may have once been King of England but now he was just an ordinary man. He was needy and childlike, his love smothering. Their love life was unsatisfying, the Duke not only had a foot fetish but he liked to play 'nanny' games which infantilized him, wearing a diaper, with the Duchess punishing him for his being a 'naughty boy.' When she wasn't in the room, the Duke would visibly wilt. Wallis had also suffered her share of health problems, been diagnosed with cancer, and would soon have to have a hysterectomy. Life seemed to be passing her by; ahead of her was a long, lonely, empty road. Not even making the best-dressed list year after year made up for the slights and snubs from the Royal Family.

Her relationship with Jimmy was a diversion from the empty and meaningless life that she had been leading. He was witty and charming, and despite his sexual inclinations, an intense attraction sprang up between them. Jimmy wasn't raised to have a career; he was raised to be rich which gave him ample time to cater to the Duchesses whims. He was the archetypal postwar playboy; he spoke several languages, could fly a plane, play the piano, and had impeccable manners. He was also mischievous, loving to shock high society with his pranks. For instance, the time he dressed up as a nun, pulled up his habit and squatted in the middle of the road, defecating. And all those grand dinner parties when, according to Aileen Plunket, the Guinness heiress, he'd liven things up by unbuttoning his trousers and laying his private parts on his plate among the potatoes and gravy and sauces, "looking like some pink sausage."

Like Wallis, Jimmy was trapped. In his case, it was his wealth and the Woolworth name. He was the quintessential 'poor little rich boy' Jimmy was kept on a tight leash by his mother Jessie, who alternately smothered and neglected her favorite son. She kept such a tight leash on her money that even after her death Jimmy wouldn’t have inherited the Woolworth millions if he had outlived her. Jimmy often had to borrow money from his wealthier cousin Barbara Hutton to fund his expensive lifestyle.

But Jessie was quite willing to open the purse strings now that Jimmy was close chums with Wallis and the Duke. Jimmy treated Wallis to shopping sprees at Mainbocher and Hattie Carnegie where she bought dresses and hats as if they were going out of style. He encouraged her to acquire a substantial wardrobe of furs, which he paid for. The two would lunch together at the Colony and at Le Pavillion, their heads pressed together as they joked and gossiped. At night the trio would hit El Morocco, the Stork Club and '21 with Jimmy picking up the check. When the three of them went out, it was not uncommon for the Duke to leave Wallis and Jimmy to dance the night away while he went home to bed alone. Jimmy would whisk the couple away on pleasure jaunts, cruising the Mediterranean on a private yacht, treats they would never have been able to afford on their own. There was never a dull moment when he was around. But it wasn't just Jimmy's unlimited expense account that kept Wallis happy. According to biographer Christopher Wilson, Jimmy offered Wallis pleasure in the boudoir like she'd never experienced before which boggles the mind.

At first the Duke was pleased with Jimmy's friendship, they would play golf together, but he soon realized that he was becoming the odd man out in the little trio. When the Duke had to go to England for the deaths of his brother King George VI and his mother The Queen Mary, Wallis and Jimmy painted the town red in his absence. The Duke would place frantic phone calls trying to reach her only to be told that she was unavailable, or worse there was no answer at all. The poor Duke watched helplessly as his wife slipped away from him.

But after the idyll couldn't last. Jimmy was tired of having to address the Duke in a courtly fashion, and Wallis had become too possessive. Behind her back, Jimmy told friends, that on the pillow, her face looked like an old sailor. There was also the matter of the Windsors treating Jimmy and his mother like their own personal cash machine. The Windsors gave little in return other than themselves. On Wallis' side, she began to realize that Jimmy was limited intellectually. She was used to hobnobing with politicians, ambassadors, and generals. Friends also warned her that her association with Jimmy was ruining the couple's already tarnished reputation.

The end came while the trio were in Baden-Baden. Jimmy was bored, the atmosphere in the spa town was too full for him. At dinner that night, Wallis remarked that Jimmy reeked of garlic. Jimmy drunk after an several pre-dinner cocktails saw red. He kicked Wallis in the shin hard enough to bleed under the table. After tending to his wife, the Duke turned to Jimmy and said, "We've had enough of you. Jimmy get out."

With those words four years of friendship went down the tubes. Jessie Donahue was devastated, but the door was shut tightly in the Donahues face. The cold front lasted for almost twelve years. Finally the Windsors consented to attend a lunch with Jessie, and later visited Jimmy's house on Long Island but there was no renewal of the special bond that had existed. The relationship with Jimmy in the end brought the Duke and Duchess closer together. In the end, the Duchess realized that she had made her bed and seemed to finally settle into it.

Jimmy's life drifted on in a never ending quest to stave off the boredom in his life, drifting from relationship to relationship until his death in 1966.
Sources:
Wilson, Christopher (2001), Dancing With the Devil: the Windsors and Jimmy Donahue, London: HarperCollins

Wallis Simpson: The woman who might have been Queen

On December 11, 1936, Edward VIII of Great Britain made his now famous abdication speech, saying he could no longer continue to fulfill his duties “without the woman I love.” From then on, the story of Edward VIII and Wallis Warfield Simpson passed into the history books as the love story of the century. In the seventy one years, tons of books have been written about the couple, including their own memoirs. Even today she provokes a strong reaction when you talk about her. What is it about this story and this couple that has kept us fascinated for so many decades?

This was the biggest scandal ever to hit the royal family of England. Bigger than the Prince and Princess of Wale’s divorce. This was bigger than “Squidgy-gate,” or even the infamous “I want to be your tampon,” recording between Prince Charles and the former Camilla Parker-Bowles. Heck it was even bigger than Princess Margaret and her ill-fated love for Group Captain Peter Townsend, her love affair with the gardener, and her divorce from Lord Snowden.

Unlike the Duchess of Cornwall, Wallis Warfield didn’t come from an aristocratic background. She had no historical connections to the Royal Family, her great-great grandmother wasn’t the mistress of Edward VII the way Camilla’s was. Wallis wasn’t even particularly beautiful but she had what the French call ‘je ne sais quois.” Somehow she managed to captivate the future King of England with her irreverence and domineering manner enough that, like his great nephew with Camilla, he felt that he couldn’t live without her.

She was born Bessie Wallis Warfield in either June 1895 or 1896 in Pennsylvania. There is speculation that she was born before her parents were married. In any event, her father died shortly after she was born. For the first few years of her life, she was raised in Baltimore, Maryland, in modest circumstances, having to depend on the charity of her wealthy uncle, Solomon Warfield.

Wallis married her first husband, Earl Winfield Spencer, a naval pilot, at the age of 20, in 1916 after a whirlwind courtship. She soon learned that the man she married was an alcoholic with a reckless streak. They frequently separated and got back together, and Wallis was frequently unfaithful, having affairs with a Argentine diplomat, and Mussolini’s future son-in-law.

By the time, Wallis and her first husband split for good, she had already made the acquaintance of husband number two, Ernest Aldrich Simpson. Simpson was half-English and half-American, mild-mannered and easy going. He divorced his first wife to marry Wallis. They were married on 21 July 1928, at the Chelsea Registry office. Through a friend, Wallis met Thelma Furness, who in turn introduced Wallis to the Prince of Wales. By the time Wallis met the Prince, Ernest was beginning to suffer financial difficulties. The Simpson’s were living well above their means.

"I really feel so tired of fighting the world all alone and with no money," she once wrote to her mother.

So what was the big deal about? Why couldn't Edward marry her? Well, Wallis Warfield Simpson was not married when the Prince of Wales made her acquaintance, but she’d already been married and divorced once already. Divorce was still a taboo; divorced subjects including members of the Queen’s own family for years were not accepted at court. Although there was nothing constitutionally to stop the King from marrying her apart from that whole Defender of the Faith thing as head of the Church of England, Edward also knew that marrying Wallis would topple the government. Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin had already made clear his views on the marriage. He refused to even countenance a morganatic marriage, whereby the King could marry Wallis, but she wouldn't be Queen.

What Edward did next was extraordinary in English history. While Richard II was forced to abdicate, King Charles I was beheaded, and James II and tossed out of England, no King in English history had voluntarily given up their throne. It’s a wonder that hell didn’t freeze over or the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse didn’t come riding up Pall Mall to the doors of Buckingham Palace.

In America, we think of this as a great love story. Heck the King of England fell in love with one of our own. In England, not so much, although given the pro-Nazi sympathies of Edward VIII, Wallis Simpson pretty much did England a favor. Frankly she should probably have gotten a medal. Instead she was denied the title of HRH, something that even Fergie received when she was a member of the Royal Family, and she didn’t dress nearly as well as The Duchess of Windsor. Edward never forgave his brother for not allowing Wallis to have the HRH.

Although Wallis was no beauty, she had charisma, and a belief in her own attractiveness. She knew how to dress to make the most of what she was given. And she apparently treated the Prince of Wales, well not like a Prince. On their first meeting, the King asked her some trivia about being American, to which Wallis replied that she’d been asked the same thing by every English person she’d met. She’d hoped for more originality from the Prince of Wales. Snap! Girlfriend wasn’t cowed by the August presence of the Prince of Wales. Wallis did her homework, when Thelma Furness asked Wallis to look after Edward while she traveled, she had no idea that Wallis would end up replacing her. What do you want to bet that she pumped ole Thelma for whatever information she could about her lover? And then did her one better?

Edward VIII had been a man starved of a mother’s affection. His own mother, Queen Mary, was a pretty cold fish, who left Edward in the hands of a pretty sadistic nanny. His youngest brother who was mentally handicapped was shunted aside, and treated as if he didn’t exist. He was completely scared of his father George V, who boasted that he’d been afraid of his father, and he was damn sure that his children would be afraid of him. All of Edward’s affairs had been with older married women.

There were rumors that Wallis had worked in a brothel in China while her first husband had been stationed in the Far East, where she learned Ancient Asian sex secrets that she used to bind Edward to her. Another rumor was that she was a hermaphrodite, and that Edward was attracted to her for her manly qualities.

Whatever it was, Wallis was smart. While dangling the King on a string, she apparently also had another lover, although this information has now been disputed. Files released by the Government in Britain in 2003 suggested that a man named Guy Trundle was Wallis’s secret lover. Guy was a handsome charmer, a vicar’s son, and a dashing Air Force pilot. He was also an engineer and a car salesman for the Ford Motor Co. He apparently received gifts and money from Wallis. There is a question as to whether this secret lover was working for the intelligence services in a bid to test Wallis’s character which she surely failed. The question is why wasn’t this brought to the Prime Minister and then to Edward? And even if it had been would it have mattered? The King was madly, passionately, devotedly in love. It would probably have taken a crowbar to end the relationship.

I’ve always felt that Wallis enjoyed the attentions of the Prince of Wales, and the social cachet that it gave her to be his intimate friend. I don’t think that she expected initially that he would want to marry her, but when he made it known, she cautiously jumped at the chance. She would be rising higher than any American woman had before or since, not even Consuelo Vanderbilt or Mary Curzon had risen as high. It must have been so tempting. Although in many ways, being a royal mistress was more advantageous than being a royal wife.

In fact she tried to renounce the King. A few days before the abdication, she signed a paper saying that “she has abandoned any interest in marrying His Majesty.” Apparently she found Edward’s dependence on her burdensome and just a tad claustrophobic. She wrote to her uncle, “How can a woman be a whole empire to a man?” But it was too late, the die was cast and Edward had made up his mind. Wallis had no choice now. If she hadn’t married him, after he’d made such a great sacrifice, she really would have been raked over the coals.

The Duke and Duchess were married in June of 1937, in France. An ill-advised trip to Germany after their marriage led them to be suspected of being pro-German. The Duchess was even plagued by rumors that while they were in France before the Germans invaded, she had passed confidential information onto the Germans, through a German lover. During the war, the Duke was appointed Governor of the Bahamas, where George IV felt that he could do the least damange. Wallis bitterly referred to the island as their “Helena,” a reference to the island that Napoleon was exiled to after his defeat in the Battle of Waterloo.

They spent the rest of their lives after the war shuttling between a home in Paris and an apartment in the Waldorf Towers in New York, becoming part of the International jet set, denied any useful role in life other than idleness, a life of parties and making the Best Dressed List. Scandal continued to plague the Windsors. While in the Bahamas, Sir Harry Oakes, a Canadian gold tycoon and the richest man in the islands was murdered. The Duke was suspected of participating in a cover-up, blocking the investigation at every turn. Ann Woodward shot her husband Billy after a dinner party for the Windsors in the 1950’s. And for five years, the Duke and Duchess formed a bizarre ménage a trois with Jimmy Donahue, a Woolworth heir who was gay. In France, they became good friends with Sir Oswald Moseley, leader of the British fascists, and his wife the former Diana Mitford.

Although the Duke had hoped to retire in England, his brother, George VI threatened to cut off his allowance if he set foot in England without an invitation. The King was still steamed that Edward hadn't revealed the extent of his finanical worth when they informally agreed on the amount of sinecure the King would pay him. He was allowed to return for the funeral of George VI in 1952 and again for his mother, Queen Mary in 1953. Wallis didn’t accompany him to either funeral but she was allowed to return for Edward’s funeral in 1972. She outlived him by thirteen years, living alone in their Paris home under the watchful eye of Maitre Suzanne Blum, their lawyer until her death at age 90 in 1986 when she was buried beside her Duke at Windsor. Their home was bought by Mohammed Al-Fayed, who owns Harrods in London who started calling it Villa Windsor. In fact, Dodi brought Diana to the house just before she died. Diana apparently wasn't impressed, she told a journalist that she felt the building was "full of old ghosts" and "more like a museum." In 1998, Fayed put the entire contents of their mansion on the block raising $14 million dollars for charity.

The Duchess summed up her life succinctly in one sentence, “You have no idea how hard it is to live out a great romance.”