The Marburg Files, also known as the Windsor Files or Duke of Windsor Files, are a series of top-secret documents discovered in Germany during May 1945 near the Harz Mountains and compiled at Marburg Castle, Hesse.[1][2]

Discovery

As American troops were traveling through the outskirts of Degenershausen Estate, they found large numbers of abandoned or destroyed German military vehicles scattered along the side roads, with some containing various archives from the Nazi government. First Lieutenant David Silberberg initially discovered documents signed by the foreign minister of Nazi Germany, Joachim von Ribbentrop, and returned to Degenershausen to further the background of his findings. After being advised of the locations of Meisdorf House and Marburg Castle, he escorted intelligence officers to the sites where a number of additional items were discovered.[3] During this time, American troops arrested a German soldier named Karl von Loesch, an assistant to Hitler's personal translator Paul-Otto Schmidt, as he was retreating from Treffurt, near Eisenach.[4] Schmidt had instructed him to destroy all the top-secret papers which he had placed in archives. Von Loesch destroyed the majority, but privately decided to keep some, and interred them in the grounds near the outskirts of Marburg.[3][5] He was subsequently, by chance, introduced to Lieutenant Colonel R. C. Thomson, chief of the British documents team, and offered to lead Thomson's team to the location of the buried correspondence in exchange for immunity from prosecution.[6]

Around 400 tonnes of material was exhumed by the United States military and transported to Marburg Castle for review.[7] Upon inspection, at least 60 documents appeared to contain correspondence between the Duke of Windsor and the Nazi German high command.[7] American diplomats examined the contents before relaying a mix of original drafts and replicas to the British government. UK Prime Minister Winston Churchill discussed the files with King George VI, who insisted the files be suppressed and never released to the public.[8] The entire collection was sent to the United Kingdom in 1948 and housed at Whaddon Hall, Buckinghamshire.[1][6]

Contents

The papers and correspondence discovered are alleged to have further detailed a plot by the Nazis, titled Operation Willi and orchestrated in 1940, to persuade the Duke of Windsor to officially join sides with the Nazis and move him to Germany in a bid to bring the UK to peace negotiations. It proposed convincing the Duke of a fictitious plot by King George VI and Prime Minister Winston Churchill to have him assassinated upon his arrival in The Bahamas, and conspiring with him to stage a kidnapping in the hope of blackmailing the monarchy and the UK into surrender.[9] The papers are also alleged to reveal a plan to reinstate the Duke as king and recognise his wife, Wallis Simpson, as queen, in exchange for Nazi forces being given free movement across Europe.[10][11]

Documents considered the most damning for the British royal family were among his final communications with the Nazis before his departure to the Bahamas, in which it has been alleged the Duke encouraged relentless bombing attacks on the United Kingdom in a bid to force the British government to begin peace negotiations.[12] There is not believed to be any form of evidence that the Duke accepted any terms offered by the Nazis in a bid to co-operate with Operation Willi, with historians stating he was initially more impressed by the encouragement he had from the British government to become Governor of the Bahamas,[13][14] but some documents are alleged to confirm he sympathised with Nazi ideologies.[7][11]

Release

British, French and American historians initially agreed to work together from 1946 in hope of releasing only documents that they felt were essential to release. A small batch was released in 1954, before the entire volume was forced into publication in 1957 with further files released in 1996 at the Public Record Office in Kew.[6][8] The release of the files was reported to have caused the Duke considerable annoyance.[15]

The Marburg Files are the main subject and focus of the episode "Vergangenheit" ("Past") of the Netflix television series The Crown,[16] which depicts Queen Elizabeth II's initial review of the documents. The episode's director Philippa Lowthorpe has stated that replicas of genuine files were used during filming.[11] Despite confirming that Queen Elizabeth did condemn the Duke, historian Hugo Vickers has suggested that the episode falsely implies that the Duke was banished from the royal family upon release of the Marburg Files. He remained in contact with his family and public appearances continued.[15]

See also

References

  1. 1 2 "German Foreign Ministry and Italian documents 1867-1945 captured by the British". The National Archives of the United Kingdom. Retrieved 14 August 2018.
  2. ↑ "M1948 Records Concerning the Central Collecting Points ("Ardella Hall Collection"): Marburg Central Collecting Point, 1945–1949" (PDF). National Archives and Records Administration of the United States. Retrieved 22 August 2019.
  3. 1 2 Beckers, Yuri (9 January 2018). "The Marburg Files: How was the 9th Infantry Division involved?". 9th Infantry Division in WWII. Retrieved 14 August 2018.
  4. ↑ "Arrest of Karl von Loesch (permanent deputy of chief government interpreter, Dr Schmidt)..." The National Archives of the United Kingdom. 1947. Retrieved 14 August 2018.
  5. ↑ "German War Documents Project: German Foreign Ministry and other related Archives: Selection of Documents made by the German War Documents Project: Microfilms and files". The National Archives of the United Kingdom. Retrieved 14 August 2018.
  6. 1 2 3 Kent, George (1961). "The German Foreign Ministry's Archives at Whaddon Hall, 1948-58". American Archivist. 24 (1): 43–54. doi:10.17723/aarc.24.1.w43046451p884252.
  7. 1 2 3 Caroline Redmond (12 November 2018). "The Marburg Files Revealed Former British King Edward VIII's Nazi Ties – And The U.K. Tried To Cover It Up". Retrieved 25 January 2021.
  8. 1 2 Holland, Brynn (20 December 2017). "Watching The Crown? Here Are the Real Facts You Need to Know". History.com. A&E Television Networks.
  9. ↑ Niderost, Eric (8 November 2016). "Operation Willi: The Nazi Plot to Kidnap the Duke Of Windsor". Warfare History Network. Sovereign Media. Retrieved 14 August 2018.
  10. ↑ "Winston Churchill concealed WW2 files showing Nazi plot to restore Edward VIII to throne". Express. 20 July 2017. Retrieved 14 August 2018.
  11. 1 2 3 Fane Saunders, Tristam (14 December 2017). "The Duke, the Nazis, and a very British cover-up: the true story behind The Crown's Marburg Files". The Telegraph.
  12. ↑ Katz, Brigit (21 July 2017). "Newly Released Documents Reveal Churchill's Efforts to Suppress Details of Nazi Plot". Smithsonian Institution. Retrieved 14 August 2018.
  13. ↑ Bloch, pp. 93–94, 98–103, 119
  14. ↑ Harris, Caroline (2 April 2013). "Royalty and the Atlantic World 4: The Duke and Duchess of Windsor's Arrival in the Bahamas in 1940". Royal Historian.
  15. 1 2 Vickers, Hugo (19 December 2017). "How accurate is The Crown? We sort fact from fiction in the royal drama". The Times. Retrieved 17 January 2020.
  16. ↑ Power, Ed (9 December 2017). "The Crown, season 2, episode 6 review: a welcome return from Jared Harris as Edward's Nazi past catches up with him". The Telegraph. Retrieved 14 August 2018.

Bibliography

  • Bloch, Michael (1982). The Duke of Windsor's War. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson. ISBN 0-297-77947-8.
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