Spying and the Crown: The Secret Relationship Between British Intelligence and the Royals

by Rory Cormac

A Daily Mail Book of the Year and a The Times and Sunday Times Best Book of 2021'Monumental.. Authoritative and highly readable.' Ben Macintyre, The Times'A fascinating history of royal espionage.' Sunday Times'Excellent... Compelling' GuardianFor the first time, Spying and the Crown uncovers the remarkable relationship between the Royal Family and the intelligence community, from the reign of Queen Victoria to the death of Princess Diana. In an enthralling narrative, Richard J. Aldrich and Rory Cormac show how the British secret services grew out of persistent attempts to assassinate Victoria and then operated on a private and informal basis, drawing on close personal relationships between senior spies, the aristocracy, and the monarchy. This reached its zenith after the murder of the Romanovs and the Russian revolution when, fearing a similar revolt in Britain, King George V considered using private networks to provide intelligence on the loyalty of the armed forces - and of the broader population.In 1936, the dramatic abdication of Edward VIII formed a turning point in this relationship. What originally started as family feuding over a romantic liaison with the American divorcee Wallis Simpson, escalated into a national security crisis. Fearing the couple's Nazi sympathies as well as domestic instability, British spies turned their attention to the King. During the Second World War, his successor, King George VI gradually restored trust between the secret world and House of Windsor. Thereafter, Queen Elizabeth II regularly enacted her constitutional right to advise and warn, raising her eyebrow knowingly at prime ministers and spymasters alike.Based on original research and new evidence, Spying and the Crown presents the British monarchy in an entirely new light and reveals how far their majesties still call the shots in a hidden world.Previously published as The Secret Royals.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Espionage, British Literature, Audiobook, Politics

945 pages, Kindle Edition

Published October 7, 2021

About the author

Rory Cormac is an Associate Professor of International Relations at the University of Nottingham. A Fellow of the Royal Historical Society and a leading expert among a new generation of intelligence historians, he specialises in British covert operations and the secret pursuit of foreign policy.

Reviews

[Liam Ostermann · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book is vast and some of it is interesting but what it lacks is any perspective to put the information in context. That queen Victoria's daughter Vicki who married their heir to the Prussian and later German imperial thrones sent vast amounts of gossip back to her mother who passed this on to her own government is well known. But Vicki was immensely unpopular in Berlin was distrusted by Bismarck and was a total failure in every possible way at creating any sense of sympathy or co-operation between the UK and Germany. She couldn't even ensure that her children and those of her brother the future Edward VII grew up with any liking for each other. In any case the lack of any alignment between the UK and Germany before WWI had nothing to do with relations between the respective royals. Nor did the growing closeness of the UK with France and Russia. The UK had treaties with France and Russia because they had potential conflicts of interests which could lead to war so it made sense to come to agreements over them. Royalty had nothing to do with it until the treaty were signed and another round of state dinners and medal giving was called for.

Because the UK has a monarch who is informed and consulted and sees a lot of secret information but that doesn't mean they have any influence. King George VI may have been informed about the decision to stop supporting the royalist and switch to the communist partisans in Yugoslavia but even if he had objected it wouldn't have changed anything.

Also there is a belief that the secret services by their very nature must have access to 'the truth'. In fact most of the information gathered up by intelligence operatives is no better than gossip. The author spend a lot of time going through the stories about Rasputin and 'dark forces' and the threat of the tsar making peace with Germany in WWI but we now know that Rasputin's influence on policy was negligible. The weaknesses in the Tsarist state had everything to do with with the poor decision making of the tsar - and that began long before Rasputin ever appeared on the scene. The authors also fully endorse the idea that British intelligence was responsible for Rasputin's assassination even though the so called 'evidence' in the autopsy photographs was dismissed by every reputable ballistic expert as spurious. But ultimately Rasputin's death changed nothing and if Britain did interfere it had nothing to do with George V but Lloyd George (who rightly thought the king of limited intelligence) and the cabinet'.

As for the suspicion of the security services for Edward VIII? Telling us that he was an utter shit and an immensely mediocre man with a ghastly bitch of a wife and that the two of them were loose lipped pro German anti-Semites who were selfish and self absorbed is neither new nor startling.

That is the problem with the book - there isn't much new or much of importance. There are lots of intelligence stories from old memoirs - including a bizarre one that a British naval team intercepted 500 contraband impressionist paintings and deposited them in the national gallery of Canada. Really? Are they still there? The authors claim the hoard included 270 Renoir's, 30 Cezanne's and 12 Gauguin's - how many galleries in the world currently hold 270 Renoir's? The story is typical of all the juiciest tales - utterly without any foundation or verifiable fact.

Spies and royals always guarantee book sales but don't guarantee that anything of importance will be revealed. Nothing in this book reveals anything new or substantial about the history of the UK or its relations with the rest of the world. If anything it should make any intelligent reader question the peculiar institution that makes the UK not a nation but a kingdom.

[Abbi Debelack · Rating 2 out of 5]

Lesson learned: read the description of the book before reading the book🤣This book was not about Royal Secrets, but Royal Secret Service (which is far less interesting)

[Vicuña · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’ve really enjoyed this book which seems thoroughly researched with source material referenced. The early chapters on the Tudor and Elizabethan courts where spies and double agents were keeping the monarch well informed are intriguing.

I really enjoyed the later chapters dealing with more recent times and there’s a new slant on many names that will be familiar; Blunt, Profumo, Burgess, Krushev etc. I had no idea that the late Queen took so much time going through her daily red boxes which included detailed intelligence material. I also founded the concerns about Mountbatten interesting, particularly given his connection to Philip and his influence over the Royal family.

It’s an easy read, packed with trivia and it brought to mind many if the scandals and stories I’ve read about over the last 50 years or so. A cracking slice of modern social history.

[James · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a surprisingly fun and fascinating read. The Secret Royals digs into the weird overlap between British royalty and the world of espionage — from Queen Victoria’s secret letter-writing habits to more serious Cold War drama. It’s packed with interesting stories and a few properly jaw-dropping moments. Some bits get a little dense or heavy on the intel detail, but overall it’s a fresh angle on royal history that makes you see the monarchy in a totally different light.

[Rosalind · Rating 5 out of 5]

A big read but absolutely engrossing. I learned a huge amount even in periods of history that I thought I knew quite well. It's well structured with clear themes for each chapter, which is really helpful, for instance, in following developments through the long reign of Queen Elizabeth. But it's also great fun, with vivid anecdotes and reminiscences. A great achievement if thorough research.

[Keith Johnstone · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great read, some very interesting information across the UK’s foreign engagement history and the role of the royal family in it. Clearly still a great deal we don’t know and I can’t decide if that’s a good or a bad thing.

[Joe · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was really enjoying this but have stopped a third of the way through - too much detail for me and decided I wasn't that interested in spies. But well written and interesting for the parts I read.