Word: duchesses
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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Among those who were conspicuously not invited to Princess Anne's wedding was the widow of her Great-Uncle David, King Edward VIII. Wallis Warfield Spencer Simpson, Duchess of Windsor, whose husband relinquished the British throne for "the woman I love," lives quietly in an elegant French-owned villa on the fringe of Paris' Bois de Boulogne. Charles J. V. Murphy, a former editor of FORTUNE and LIFE and an old friend of the Windsors', recently visited the duchess. His report...
...final hours, the duke was haunted by the realization that all too soon he would no longer be around to shield her. He was right: 17 months after his death, the widow of Windsor, 77, is a bored, lonely and sometimes ailing woman. The duchess continues her usual rounds of the couturiers, hairdressers and restaurants. But more and more she spends her dwindling evening hours with a detective story or TV. She reads the newspapers, French and English, from front to back. ("It is a bombshell world," she says, "full of violence and horror. I no longer understand or like...
...finds it difficult to line up guests who are congenial and interesting and yet not tiring. Many former regulars at her table have died, and others have simply drifted away. Often the duchess dines with either her present or former secretary. The current secretary was once a U.S. Foreign Service officer. The other is a onetime Air France stewardess. Her royal in-laws, numerous enough to fill a banquet hall, never approved of the marriage and have never sat at her table, though Prince Charles and Princess Alexandra come by for tea when they are in Paris. They call...
When the duke died, there were no bequests to church or charity, to relatives, godchildren, lifelong friends or faithful servants. He left his entire estate to his wife, and they agreed before his death how their possessions would be distributed after she goes. Only the duchess and her bankers know the estate's value, which is probably well in excess of $10 million. This does not include the silver services and objets d'art, the superb porcelains, the furniture and paintings. Nor does it take into account such historic treasures as the desk from which he delivered...
...stacked neatly in his bedroom drawers, his suits hang in his dressing room closet. His toilet things are spread in his bathroom. His desk is ready for instant use, with ample supplies of paper clips, pipe cleaners, pens and pencils and different inks. His favorite photographs (23 of the duchess alone) stand on his mantel and bookcases, all exactly as he left them. Every night the duchess comes to his bedroom before retiring to her own. She makes sure that everything is in place, then says aloud: "Good night, David...