Free Webinar

Once A King: The Lost Memoir of
Edward VIII

Friday, April 12, 4:00-5:15 p.m. ET

Presented by Jane Tippett

Fifteen years after having abdicated the throne to marry the woman he loved—Wallis Simpson—King Edward VIII, now the Duke of Windsor, published his memoirs. But whilst preparing the manuscript for his published and mostly ghostwritten book, the Duke also produced a private manuscript for posterity. This was written in his own words and with an uninhibited frankness. Once a King: The Lost Memoir of Edward VIII reproduces this uncrowned King's previously unseen writing, including much that he could or would not write for publication in 1951. Jane Marguerite Tippett weaves together Edward's writing alongside newly uncovered interviews with the Duke and Duchess, diary entries from ghostwriter Charles Murphy and other sources. Together this forms an extraordinary new portrait of one of the most famous characters in modern royal history and his recollections and innermost feelings, particularly around the abdication of 1936.

Jane Marguerite Tippett grew up outside Philadelphia and studied at the Universities of Delaware and Oxford. She has worked as a consultant archivist and fine art curator to families and institutions in New York, London and Paris. She lives between London and New York.

Curt DiCamillo, who joined American Ancestors in February of 2016 as the organization’s first Curator of Special Collections, is an internationally recognized authority on British historic houses and the decorative arts.