Wallis Simpson's 1936 divorce didn't free her to marry

Wallis Simpson was granted a decree nisi against her second husband, Ernest Simpson, at Ipswich on 27 October 1936, after a hearing that lasted 25 minutes. The decree did not leave her free to marry King Edward VIII. It was provisional: the marriage would be dissolved only if no new evidence came before the court within six months.

She had spent six weeks living in Felixstowe to qualify for the Suffolk court, in the hope that a provincial hearing would attract little attention. It didn’t. Associated Press heard about the case, and the world’s press arrived in Ipswich. Police closed St Helen’s Street and seized the cameras of photographers watching from the buildings along it. The evidence came from hotel staff at Bray-on-Thames, who described Ernest spending the night with another woman. Mr Justice Hawke appeared reluctant but granted the decree.

What the Prime Minister feared

Stanley Baldwin’s statement to the Commons on 10 December 1936 shows how much the pending divorce worried him. On 20 October, a week before the hearing, he went to see the King privately at Fort Belvedere. He was also worried by the flood of gossip in the American press while British papers stayed silent. He warned that a verdict which “left the matter in suspense” for months would be dangerous, because everyone would be talking. By their next meeting, he told MPs, “the decree nisi had been pronounced.”

“You and I must settle this matter together; I will not have anyone interfering.” (Edward VIII to Baldwin, as reported to the House of Commons)

The Royal Household’s own history says the divorce made it plain that Edward meant to marry a woman who, being twice divorced, would not have been acceptable as Queen. He signed the Instrument of Abdication on 10 December, and it took legal effect the next day. In 1937, by then Duke of Windsor, he married Wallis in France.