GEN-MEDIEVAL-L Archives

From: Leo van de Pas <>
Subject: Kitty Kelley
Date: Thu, 22 Jan 1998 11:52:22 +0800

When her book 'The Royals' appeared in Australia, according to
a review people had fed her false information and so I decided
not to bother. However, then an American friend maintained I should
make up my own mind. Well, already regretfully, I bought it and
am up to page 11.

"Eminent historians differ on basic details. Few agree on anything
except how the family spells its name." A few pages later, for dramatic
effect it reads as though the vilified Louis von Battenberg was forced
to change his name and later, as an after thought, George V decided
to do the same. Instead of pursuing unwilling Royal Secretaries she
should have visited a few libraries or the Society of Genealogists.

ON 17 July 1917 the Royal family's name was changed to Windsor.
On 14 July 1917 Louis became Mountbatten and, on 17 July 1917
Marquess of Milford Haven.
On 18 July 1917 Prince Alexander von Battenberg became Marquess of
Carisbrooke
On 14 July the Prince of Teck changed his name to Cambridge and on
16 July became Marquess of Cambridge

Then the remark about supposed illegitimate offspring of British
Royalty contacting her---does she really expect birthcertificates
to exist with the name of a Prince or even king as the father of
an illegitimate child? As late as 1997 when a baby was born, most
likely fathered by the eldest son of Princess Irene of The Netherlands,
the father's name is not entered on that certificate.

Her descriptions of the apartments of Princess Margaret tells me more
about Kitty Kelley than about Prindess Margaret. Diamond studded walls
and floors inlaid with rubies----my God!

Then on page XIV of her author's notes, she gives herself an accolade
by making Lady Rothschild calling her an 'objective American'. I don't
mind bias - for or against - but at least the basics should be correct.

"For expertise on British royalty...page XV of the notes" Did she forget
to ask appropriate questions?

Page 2: ....'the lingering stench of Germany that continued to hang
over her family'. What emontial wringing of bias---Princess Margaret's
father's royal lineage has been in England since 1714, her mother's
Scottish lineage has been in Great Britain since time in memorial.
IN Australia even first generation migrants regard themselves to be
Australians, why should this right to be regarded as British be denied
to the Royal family?

Page 2:....Their secrets of alcoholism, etc. nothing secret about any of the
afflictions mentioned by her. However, insanity? Porphyria is regarded
a physical illness, not a mental disease. What is the difference between
adultery and infidelity (page 3)? Emotional repetition? I think possible
illegitimacy has been covered up pretty well. I don't know of any
accepted illgitimate child of a British Royal....except one child of
Edward VII and we don't even know whether it was a boy or a girl and
this is before the Windsor era.

Page 3: Few people remembered that Margaret's mother and father had been
disinclined to oppose Hitler and preferred Chamberlain----. In a
constitutional monarchy, the monarch usually has little choice but to accept
the policital choice of any moment.

Page 3: Most people had forgotten that the Princess' favorite uncle
had embraced Nazi Germany as Europe's savior.....Had Hitler died in 1937
or 1938 he could have been regarded as one of the best German (not European)
leaders as he he brought Germany from the destruction of WWI to the
position where it could assault all of Europe.

Page 3: And her princeling cousin had run a concentration camp---this
princeling cousin was a German cousin and not a member of the British
Royal House---what about that German princeling cousin apparently
blown up by the Nazis for being against Hitler?

Page 5: Until then, many English kings never spoke the King's English.
What rubbish. George I was a grandfather when he became king of Great
Britain---he may have been the only ONE not to speak English.

Page 5: They only spoke German-----What? Well educated people also spoke
French, let alone English and German. Queen Caroline, wife of George II,
had made great efforts (and succeeded) to speak English.

Page 5: ---George V---Although he was a German from the Saxe-Coburg-
Gotha line-- What makes a German a German? Being born and brought up
in England doesn't seem to me a good start to being a German.

Page 6: That Prince Louis von Battenberg was forced to resign came
through public opinion and George V was in no position to do anything
about it. There was no 'molification' on behalf of the king making him
a Marquess.

Page 7: Next, the king moved to cleanse the rest of his German family.
Nothing 'next' about it----it all happened in the same few days. And in the
next emotional paragraph, error on error is heaped:

Eradicated all traces of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, Hesse and Wettins.

Not one by those names were involved! Mecklenburg-Strelitz? Queen Mary's
mother's sister (!) was Grand Duchess of Mecklenbur-Strelitz and she
belonged to Germany as did her descendants. The king's great-great-grandmother
the wife of George III had been a Mecklenburg-Strelitz, but she had died
ninety-nine years before 1917.

Hesse? Which one? The Battenbergs were Battenbergs BECAUSE they were not
part of the HOUSE of Hessen.

Wettin? That surname has not applied to any person for about 900 years.

Page 7: The royal family's Teutonic dukes, archdukes, and princelings
instantly became English marquises.

Archdukes? Who are the Teuton races, if not the Anglos and the Saxons?

Page 7: as "Bertie", to propose to as sweet-faced Scottish girl, reared as
an Earl's daughter, although her mother had been rumoured to have been one
of the Earl's Welsh servant girls (these rumors, never officially
acknowledged, have yet to be borne out by any evidence).
Here she admits she is rumourmongering -- not acknowledged - no evidence
how objective is that.

Page 8: It was Lord Stamfordham who received the uneviable job of
telling King George V about D.H.Lawrence, who had been hounded into hiding
because he married a German woman. The once revered writer had married the
sister of German military aviator Baron Manfred von Richthofen----

Does Kitty Kelley really think George V could care less about D.H.Lawrence?
Find any biographical encyclopedia: D.H.Lawrence and Mrs.Frieda Weekley
eloped in 1912 and married in 1914---what has this got to do with 1917?
Then, according to Martin Green's book "The von Richthofen sisters",
page 7, In the Great War, Manfred von Richthofen, a distant cousin of the
sisters. Two clangers in two sentences. "Hiding in barns like animals"?
From 1914 till 1917?

Page 8: "This news (about Lawrence) was unsettling to the king, who also had
a German wife." What? Born in Kensington Palace, which happens to be in
London, England, growing up in England and Italy---a German? So what if
she spoke with a slight German accent. My parents came from one part
of Holland but I was born in another, I spoke with my parents accent
but that did not make me belong to the other province.

Page 11: Still, he (Kaiser Wilhelm II) exacted revenge nineteen years
later when the King (George V) died by sending the Duke of Saxe-Coburg-
Gotha to his cousin's funeral in Windsor Castle. The Duke wore his Nazi
uniform.
What kind of revenge is this? Since 1918 Wilhelm II had lived in exile
and by 1936 it was Hitler who allowed the Duke of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha
to go----nothing to do with Wilhelm II's revenge.

Page 11: ---to save his throne and then systematically ostracized his
foreign relatives". What about the Danish relatives, the Spanish, the
Swedish? And did't he send a navy frigate to rescue Prince Andrew
of Greece?

I am only on page 11. Now I understand why I hear so little about this
book.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
>** Leo van de Pas ** Centraal Bureau http://www.cbg.nl
>^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>Home Page : http://www.iinet.net.au/~leovdpas/genealogics.html
>
>
>
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
** Leo van de Pas ** Centraal Bureau http://www.cbg.nl
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Home Page : http://www.iinet.net.au/~leovdpas/genealogics.html

This thread:

• Kitty Kelley by Leo van de Pas <>