When we think of the British monarchy in the mid-20th century, we usually picture George VI—the reluctant, stuttering King—standing on a balcony while London was bombed. Or maybe his daughter, the late Queen Elizabeth II. But the brothers of George VI? That’s where the real, messy, human drama lives. It’s a story of abdication, Nazi sympathizing, mysterious illnesses, and a tragic plane crash that people are still arguing about today.
Most people know about Edward VIII, the brother who walked away from the throne for Wallis Simpson. He’s the "villain" of the piece. But George VI, or "Bertie" as the family called him, actually had four brothers. Each one lived a life that feels like it was ripped straight out of a prestige TV drama, though the reality was often much bleaker than fiction.
The House of Windsor likes to present a united front. They’re good at it. However, if you look at the sons of King George V and Queen Mary, you see a group of men struggling with immense pressure, varying levels of talent, and some pretty dark secrets. It wasn't just about wearing medals and cutting ribbons.
The King Who Quit: Edward VIII (David)
You can't talk about the brothers of George VI without starting with the eldest. Edward, known to his family as David, was the superstar of the 1920s. He was charming. He was fashionable. He was also, frankly, a bit of a nightmare for the British establishment.
He didn't want to be King. Not really. When he took the throne in 1936, he lasted less than a year before deciding that he couldn't do the job without "the woman I love." That’s the romantic version, anyway. The darker version, which historians like Andrew Lownie have documented extensively, is that Edward was fundamentally unsuited for the role and held deeply concerning political views.
His relationship with George VI was strained, to say the least. When Edward abdicated, he dumped the weight of the crown onto Bertie, a man who never wanted it and was terrified of public speaking. It was a betrayal that the brothers never truly recovered from. Imagine your older brother quitting the family business and leaving you to deal with a global recession and a world war. That’s essentially what happened.
Then there’s the Nazi problem. After he was exiled as the Duke of Windsor, Edward and Wallis visited Germany in 1937. They met Hitler. There are captured German documents—the Marburg Files—suggesting that the Nazis hoped to reinstate Edward as a puppet king if they conquered Britain. While Edward later claimed he was just trying to prevent another war, the optics were catastrophic. He spent the rest of his life in a sort of golden cage in France, bitter about his family’s refusal to give Wallis the "Her Royal Highness" title.
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The "Forgotten" Prince: John
Prince John is the brother you likely haven't heard of. He was the youngest, born in 1905. For a long time, the public barely knew he existed.
John suffered from severe epilepsy. In the early 1900s, epilepsy was deeply misunderstood and carried a heavy social stigma. The royal family’s solution was to essentially hide him away at Wood Farm on the Sandringham Estate. He lived there with his nanny, "Lalla" Bill, away from the prying eyes of the press and the rigidity of court life.
He died at just 13 years old after a severe seizure.
It sounds cruel, and by modern standards, it was. But some historians argue that Wood Farm gave John a degree of freedom his brothers never had. He had his own garden. He played with local children. He wasn't forced into military uniforms or public appearances. When he died, George VI (then Prince Albert) wrote to his mother that the news was a shock, but for John, it was a "release." It’s a heartbreaking window into how the royals viewed "weakness" at the time.
The Tragedy of Prince George, Duke of Kent
If Edward was the rebel and Bertie was the duty-bound soldier, Prince George, the Duke of Kent, was the bohemian. He was arguably the most glamorous of the brothers of George VI. He was also the most scandalous.
George lived a life that would make a modern tabloid editor weep with joy. He was rumored to have had affairs with everyone from socialite Margaret Whigham to cabaret star Florence Mills. There were persistent whispers of drug use—specifically morphine and cocaine—and he was the first member of the royal family to hold a "normal" job in the civil service.
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But the real story is his death. In 1942, during World War II, George died in a plane crash in Scotland. He was on his way to Iceland on a "special mission." The official report blamed pilot error, but conspiracy theories have swirled for decades.
- Was the plane off course? Yes.
- Was there an extra passenger on board who wasn't on the manifest? Possibly.
- Was George actually at the controls? Some think so.
His death devastated the King. George VI was a man who relied heavily on his family for support, and losing his younger brother in the middle of the war was a massive blow. Prince George left behind a young family, including the current Duke of Kent, who has spent his life as a steadfast working royal—a far cry from his father’s wilder days.
The Steady One: Henry, Duke of Gloucester
Prince Henry is often the footnote in the story of the brothers of George VI. He wasn't a King who abdicated, and he didn't die in a mysterious crash. He just... did the work.
Henry was a career soldier. He was a man of limited imagination but immense loyalty. When George VI took the throne, Henry became the "spare" in a very real sense. He served as Governor-General of Australia from 1945 to 1947, a role that was meant to strengthen the ties between the UK and Australia after the war.
Honestly, he hated it. He wasn't a natural politician, and the Australians found him a bit stiff. But he did it because his brother asked him to. That was the dynamic. While Edward was swan-diving into social circles in Paris, Henry was trudging through official duties in Canberra to help Bertie keep the Commonwealth together.
Why the Brothers Mattered to History
You can’t understand George VI’s reign without looking at the men around him. The brothers of George VI represented the different paths the monarchy could have taken.
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Edward represented a dangerous, celebrity-focused monarchy that valued personal whim over duty. George of Kent represented the modern, fast-living aristocracy. John represented the private tragedies the family tried to bury. And Henry represented the old-school, "keep calm and carry on" military tradition.
George VI had to navigate all of this while dealing with a physical disability (his stutter) and the existential threat of Nazi Germany. He was often the mediator. He had to deal with Edward’s constant demands for money and Henry’s occasional lapses in judgment.
The Financial Strain
One thing people rarely realize is that the abdication created a massive financial headache for the brothers. When Edward VIII left, he took a significant amount of "private" royal wealth with him. George VI had to essentially buy Sandringham and Balmoral back from his own brother. It was a messy, private negotiation that left a bad taste in everyone’s mouth.
The Emotional Weight
George VI was never supposed to be King. He was the shy second son. Seeing his brothers live lives of relative freedom (or at least, lives where they weren't the literal embodiment of the state) must have been exhausting. He worked himself to death, dying at just 56. Many people, including his wife the Queen Mother, blamed the stress of the abdication and the lack of support from his eldest brother for his early demise.
How to Explore This History Yourself
If you’re interested in the real stories of the brothers of George VI, don’t just rely on fictionalized versions like The Crown. While entertaining, they take massive liberties with the timeline.
- Read "The Duke of Windsor: The Reluctant King" by Philip Ziegler. It’s the definitive look at Edward’s life and provides context on his relationship with his siblings.
- Visit the National Portrait Gallery's online archives. Look at the photos of the brothers together in the 1920s. You can see the tension even then—Edward always at the center, Bertie slightly to the side.
- Check out the Marburg Files. Many of these documents are now digitized and available through the National Archives. They give a chilling look at the "what if" regarding Edward VIII and the Nazis.
- Look into the Prince John documentary, "The Lost Prince." While it’s a drama, it sparked a lot of conversation about how the family treated John and led to more archival research being released.
The lesson here is that "Royal" doesn't mean "Perfect." The brothers of George VI were a deeply flawed, highly complicated group of men who were caught in the gears of history. Some of them were heroes, some were arguably traitors, and some were just tragic figures. Understanding them makes George VI’s own achievements—holding the country together during its darkest hour—seem even more impressive.
By looking at the siblings, we see the King not as an icon, but as a man who had to step up when everyone else around him was falling apart. That’s the real story. It’s not about the crowns; it’s about the people wearing them.