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Chapters (54)
  1. Cover
  2. The Summer Queen
  3. Dedication Page
  4. Family Tree of King George III
  5. Family Tree of Queen Victoria
  6. PART ONE
  7. Chapter One
  8. Chapter Two
  9. Chapter Three
  10. Chapter Four
  11. Chapter Five
  12. Chapter Six
  13. Chapter Seven
  14. Chapter Eight
  15. Chapter Nine
  16. Chapter Ten
  17. Chapter Eleven
  18. Chapter Twelve
  19. Chapter Thirteen
  20. PART TWO
  21. Chapter Fourteen
  22. Chapter Fifteen
  23. Chapter Sixteen
  24. Chapter Seventeen
  25. Chapter Eighteen
  26. Chapter Nineteen
  27. Chapter Twenty
  28. Chapter Twenty-One
  29. Chapter Twenty-Two
  30. Chapter Twenty-Three
  31. Chapter Twenty-Four
  32. PART THREE
  33. Chapter Twenty-Five
  34. Chapter Twenty-Six
  35. Chapter Twenty-Seven
  36. Chapter Twenty-Eight
  37. Chapter Twenty-Nine
  38. Chapter Thirty
  39. Chapter Thirty-One
  40. Chapter Thirty-Two
  41. PART FOUR
  42. Chapter Thirty-Three
  43. Chapter Thirty-Four
  44. Chapter Thirty-Five
  45. Chapter Thirty-Six
  46. Chapter Thirty-Seven
  47. Chapter Thirty-Eight
  48. Chapter Thirty-Nine
  49. Chapter Forty
  50. Chapter Forty-One
  51. Acknowledgements
  52. Select Bibliography
  53. The Summer Queen
  54. By Margaret Pemberton

Irène and Willy’s sister, Sophie of Greece, had been holidaying together at Eastbourne and were now, she knew, desperately trying to return to the other side of the Channel – Irène to Germany, where her English-loving husband Heinrich was commander of the Baltic Fleet, and Sophie to Athens.

Irène’s sister Vicky, whose husband Louis of Battenberg was First Sea Lord of the Royal Navy, had been visiting Ella in Moscow, and Vicky had sent a cable saying she was now on her way back to England and was praying she would meet with no difficulties when it came to crossing Germany, the land of her birth.

As Grand Duke of Hesse, their brother Ernie had no choice concerning where to place his loyalty.

‘Willy will have him commanding troops within days,’ George had said when May had mentioned Ernie, ‘and the same applies to newly married Ernst. What other choice will either of them have?’

Nicky’s mother was in England visiting her sister, Georgie’s mother, at Sandringham.

Russian Aunt Marie had shocked George deeply by declaring that she was siding with Germany and would be in Coburg for however long the war took, until it was over and everyone regained their senses. This meant her daughter Ducky, married to a Romanov and with homes in St Petersburg and Tsarskoe Selo, was now technically her enemy.

As the crowd of thousands on The Mall began singing the national anthem, May’s mind was full of thoughts of her two eldest children. Twenty-year-old David was already in the Army, having joined the Grenadier Guards in June; and Bertie, who, like his father, had been a naval cadet, was at present serving as an officer aboard HMS Collingwood in the Mediterranean.

‘And our boys will fulfil their duty splendidly, May,’ George had said to her. ‘We shall be able to be proud of both of them.’

As the crowds rousingly and deafeningly roared, ‘God save great George our king! God save our noble king! God save the king!’ tears stung the backs of May’s eyes. Of course she would be proud of David and Bertie. She couldn’t, in a million years, imagine being anything else. But oh, how she wished things were different, for so many of England’s enemies had a place deep in her heart – and always would have.

Chapter Thirty-Nine

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DECEMBER 1916, PETROGRAD

One of the first acts Nicky had taken after war with Germany had been declared had been to change the Germanic-sounding name of St Petersburg to the more Slavic ‘Petrograd’. It had been a change Alicky had fully supported. Half-English and half-German, she had now utterly repudiated the German side of her heritage and had become as fiercely anti-German as every other Russian. All her loyalties were to Russia; all her prayers were for an Allied victory.