Prince George, Duke of Kent (George Edward Alexander Edmund; 20 December 1902 – 25 August 1942) was a member of the British royal family, the fourth son of King George V and Queen Mary. He was a younger brother of kings Edward VIII and George VI. Prince George served in the Royal Navy in the 1920s and then briefly as a civil servant. He became Duke of Kent in 1934. In the late 1930s he served as an Royal Air Force officer, initially as a staff officer at RAF Training Command and then, from July 1941, as a staff officer in the Welfare Section of the RAF Inspector General's Staff. He died in the Dunbeath air crash on 25 August 1942, in which fourteen of the fifteen crew and passengers were killed.
Early life
Prince George (far right) with his siblings in 1912
Prince George received his early education from a tutor and then followed his elder brother, Prince Henry, to St Peter's Court, a preparatory school at Broadstairs, Kent. At the age of 13, like his brothers, the Prince of Wales, later King Edward VIII and Prince Albert, later King George VI, before him, he went to naval college, first at Osborne and later, at Dartmouth.[1] He was promoted to sub-lieutenant on 15 February 1924,[3] and was promoted to lieutenant on 15 February 1926.[4] He remained on active service in the Royal Navy until March 1929, serving on HMS Iron Duke and later on the flagship of the Atlantic Fleet (renamed the Home Fleet in 1932), HMS Nelson.[1] He served on the latter as a lieutenant on the admiral's staff before transferring in 1928 to HMS Durban on the America and West Indies Station, based at the Royal Naval Dockyard at Bermuda. His father had previously served at Bermuda on HMS Canada and HMS Thrush, as a watch-keeping lieutenant.[5]
After leaving the navy, he briefly held posts at the Foreign Office and later the Home Office, becoming the first member of the royal family to work as a civil servant.[1] He continued to receive promotions after leaving active service: to commander on 15 February 1934[6] and to captain on 1 January 1937.[7]
From January to April 1931, Prince George and his elder brother the Prince of Wales travelled 18,000 miles on a tour of South America. Their outward voyage was on the ocean liner Oropesa.[8] In Buenos Aires they opened a British Empire Exhibition.[9] They continued from Río de la Plata to Rio de Janeiro on the liner Alcantara and returned from Brazil to Europe on the liner Arlanza, landing at Lisbon.[10] The princes returned via Paris and an Imperial Airways flight from Paris–Le Bourget Airport that landed specially in Windsor Great Park.[11][12]
On 23 June 1936, George was appointed a personal aide-de-camp to his eldest brother, the new king, Edward VIII.[13] Following the abdication of Edward VIII, he was appointed a personal naval aide-de-camp to his elder brother, now George VI.[14] On 12 March 1937, he was commissioned as a colonel in the British Army and in the equivalent rank of group captain in the Royal Air Force (RAF).[15] He was also appointed as the Colonel-in-Chief of the Royal Fusiliers from the same date.[16]
In October 1938 George was appointed Governor-General of Australia in succession to Lord Gowrie with effect from November 1939.[17][18] On 11 September 1939 it was announced that, owing to the outbreak of the Second World War, the appointment was postponed.[19]
On 8 June 1939, George was promoted to the ranks of rear admiral in the Royal Navy, major-general in the British Army and air vice-marshal in the Royal Air Force.[20] At the start of the Second World War, George returned to active naval service with the rank of rear admiral, briefly serving in the Intelligence Division of the Admiralty.
George was also rumoured to have been addicted to drugs, especially morphine and cocaine, an allegation which reputedly originated from his friendship with Kiki Preston (née Alice Gwynne, 1898–1946), whom he first met in the mid-1920s.[30][31][32] Known as "the girl with the silver syringe" due to her addiction to heroin, Preston – a cousin of railroad heiress Gloria Vanderbilt – was married first to Horace R. B. Allen and then, in 1925, to banker Jerome Preston.[33] She died after jumping out of a window of the Stanhope Hotel in New York City.[34]
In an article published in June of 2024, the Daily Telegraph provided a list of the Duke's known and suspected romantic partners, while casting doubt on others who have been named at times. The article specifically called into question the factual accuracy of some elements of the article about the Duke in the English language Wikipedia specifically relating to his private life and romantic relationships.[38]
RAF career
The Duke of Kent before he crossed the Atlantic by air
As a young man the Duke came to the opinion that the future lay in aviation. It became his passion, and in 1929, the Duke earned his pilot's licence. He was the first of the royal family to cross the Atlantic Ocean by air. Before his flying days, he entered the Royal Navy, and was trained in intelligence work while stationed at Rosyth.[39]
In 1939 he returned to active service as a rear admiral in the Royal Navy, but in April 1940, transferred to the Royal Air Force. He temporarily relinquished his rank as an air officer to assume the post of staff officer at RAF Training Command in the rank of group captain,[43] so that he would not be senior to more experienced officers. On 28 July 1941, he assumed the rank of air commodore in the Welfare Section of the RAF Inspector General's Staff.[44] In this role, he went on official visits to RAF bases to help boost wartime morale.[45]
Freemasonry
Prince George was initiated into freemasonry on 12 April 1928 in Navy Lodge No. 2612. He subsequently served as master of Navy Lodge in 1931, and was also a member of Prince of Wales's Lodge No. 259, and Royal Alpha Lodge No. 16, of which he served as master in 1940. He was appointed senior grand warden of the United Grand Lodge of England in 1933, and served as provincial grand master of Wiltshire from 1934, until he was elected grand master of the United Grand Lodge of England in 1939; a position he held until his death in 1942.[46]
On 25 August 1942, George and 14 others took off in a RAF Short Sunderlandflying boat W4026 from Invergordon, Ross and Cromarty, to fly to Iceland on non-operational duties. The aircraft crashed on Eagle's Rock, a hillside near Dunbeath, Caithness, Scotland. George and all but one of those on board were killed. He was 39 years old.[47]
Lynn Picknett and Clive Prince wrote about the crash in their book Double Standards, which was criticised for its "implausible inaccuracy".[48]
They alleged that Kent had a briefcase full of 100 Swedish krona notes, worthless in Iceland, handcuffed to his wrist, leading to speculation the flight was a military mission to Sweden, the only place where Swedish notes were of value.[49]
His death in RAF service marked the first time in more than 450 years that a member of the royal family died on active service.[50] The prince's body was transferred initially to St George's Chapel, Windsor, and he was buried in the Royal Burial Ground, Frogmore, directly behind Queen Victoria's mausoleum.[51] His elder son, six-year-old Prince Edward, succeeded him as Duke of Kent. Princess Marina, his wife, had given birth to their third child, Prince Michael, only seven weeks before Prince George's death. His will was sealed in Llandudno in 1943. His estate was valued at £157,735 (or £8.3 million in 2023 when adjusted for inflation).[52]
One RAF crew member survived the crash: Flight Sergeant Andrew Jack, the Sunderland's rear gunner.[53] Flight Sergeant Jack's niece has claimed that Jack told his brother that the Duke had been at the controls of the plane; that Jack had dragged him from the pilot's seat after the crash; and that there was an additional person on board the plane whose identity has never been revealed.[54]
The Duke's early life is dramatised in Stephen Poliakoff's television serial The Lost Prince (2003), a biography of the life of the Duke's younger brother John. In the film, the teenage Prince 'Georgie' is portrayed as sensitive, intelligent, artistic and almost uniquely sympathetic to his brother's plight. He is shown as detesting his time at the Royal Naval College and as having a difficult relationship with his austere father.
In May 2008, the BBC aired its Radio 4 comedy Hut 33, Series 2, Episode 1, titled "The Royal Visit". The main guest character for this episode was Duke of Kent, played by Michael Fenton-Stevens. The show is set at Bletchley Park with a team of code breakers. The Duke has been chosen to make an impromptu visit, and the code breakers have been told to hide all evidence of their real work and invent a story. "On no account should the Duke be told what really happens at Bletchley because he is a Nazi spy." He is also portrayed as promiscuous and bisexual, as he tries to gain sexual favours from one of the male staff, and one of the female characters recalls a previous liaison with the Duke.[55]
Much of George's later life was outlined in the documentary film The Queen's Lost Uncle.[56] He is a recurring character in the revival of Upstairs, Downstairs (2010/2012), played by Blake Ritson.[57] He is portrayed as a caring brother, terrified of the mistakes that his family is making; later, he is portrayed as an appeaser of the German regime, but also as a supportive friend of Hallam Holland.[57]
George and his eldest brother the Prince of Wales, later Edward VIII, are shown in Stephen Poliakoff's BBC television serial Dancing on the Edge (2013), in which they are portrayed as supporters of jazz and encouragers of Louis Lester's Jazz Band. A sexual attraction to Louis on George's part is also insinuated.[58]
Around the time of his elder brother Prince Henry's twenty-first birthday, Prince George was granted the use of the Royal Arms, differenced by a label argent of three points, each bearing an anchor azure.
^Nicol, Stuart (2001). MacQueen's Legacy; Ships of the Royal Mail Line. Vol. Two. Brimscombe Port and Charleston, SC: Tempus Publishing. p. 130. ISBN0-7524-2119-0.
^Nicol, Stuart (2001). MacQueen's Legacy; A History of the Royal Mail Line. Vol. One. Brimscombe Port and Charleston, SC: Tempus Publishing. p. 158. ISBN0-7524-2118-2.
^"Duke of Kent and Australia", The Times (12 September 1939): 6.
^ ab"No. 34633". The London Gazette (Supplement). 6 June 1939. p. 3851.
^Hugh Murphy & Derek J. Oddy (2010) The Mirror of the Seas; A Centenary History of the Society for Nautical Research London, Society for Nautical Research, p.191. ISBN978-0-902387-01-0
^Rubinstein, William D. (2008). "7: The Mysteries of Rudolf Hess". Shadow Pasts: History's Mysteries. Harlow, England: Pearson/Longman. p. 147. ISBN9780582505971. Retrieved 18 February 2017. ... probably the strangest book ever written on the Hess affair is Double Standards... The thesis of Double Standards is that Rudolf Hess ... died in the plane crash in northern Scotland in August 1942 which also killed the Duke of Kent ... Hess was being transported to neutral Sweden (not Iceland, given in the official story as the plane's destination) to be handed over to the Germans as the first step in a settlement of the war between Britain and Germany. ... Double Standards seems breathtaking in its implausible inaccuracy.
^Bille-Hansen, A. C.; Holck, Harald, eds. (1933) [1st pub.:1801]. Statshaandbog for Kongeriget Danmark for Aaret 1933 [State Manual of the Kingdom of Denmark for the Year 1933] (PDF). Kongelig Dansk Hof- og Statskalender (in Danish). Copenhagen: J.H. Schultz A.-S. Universitetsbogtrykkeri. p. 17. Retrieved 5 March 2020 – via da:DIS Danmark.
^"Den kongelige norske Sanct Olavs Orden", Norges Statskalender for Aaret 1930 (in Norwegian), Oslo: Forlagt av H. Aschehoug & Co. (w. Nygaard), 1930, pp. 995–996 – via runeberg.org
^Per Nordenvall (1998). "Kungl. Maj:ts Orden". Kungliga Serafimerorden: 1748–1998 (in Swedish). Stockholm. ISBN91-630-6744-7.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
^M. & B. Wattel (2009). Les Grand'Croix de la Légion d'honneur de 1805 à nos jours. Titulaires français et étrangers (in French). Paris: Archives & Culture. p. 463. ISBN978-2-35077-135-9.
^The Essex and Kent Scottish, Key Appointments, The Scottish Borderers Foundation, retrieved 15 November 2023
^Cooke, P. (2019). Won by the Spade: How the Royal New Zealand Engineers Built a Nation. Dunedin: Exisle Publishing. p. 233. ISBN9781775593645.
^"No. 34142". The London Gazette. 15 March 1935. p. 1807.
Further reading
Hunt, Leslie (1972). Twenty-one Squadrons: History of the Royal Auxiliary Air Force, 1925–57. London: Garnstone Press. ISBN0-85511-110-0.(New edition in 1992 by Crécy Publishing, ISBN0-947554-26-2.)
Millar, Peter. "The Other Prince". The Sunday Times (26 January 2003).
Warwick, Christopher. George and Marina, Duke and Duchess of Kent. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1988. ISBN0-297-79453-1.
1 Not a British prince by birth, but created Prince Consort. 2 Not a British prince by birth, but created a Prince of the United Kingdom. Princes whose titles were removed and eligible people who do not use the title are shown in italics.
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