The Marburg Files

Now known as the Marburg or Windsor Files, as Germany neared surrendered in the spring of 1945, a cache of buried and quite top-secret Nazi documents were unearthed by American troops near the Harz Mountains in Germany, before being catalogued at Marburg Castle by Allied intelligence officers.

400 Tons of Documents

Within the nearly 400 tons of documents recovered, at least 60 were discovered between the Nazi high command—including Hitler—and Duke of Windsor, who had been crowned King of England before abdicating the thrown to marry American divorcée, Wallis Simpson. When Winston Churchill informed King George the VI of their existence, the king insisted that the files be withheld from the British public at large.

Nazi Sympathizer

Beginning in 1937, after the Duke and his wife stayed with Hitler at his mountain retreat, the photographs of the British ex-royals with the Führer created an acute embarrassment for the royal family, followed by the Duke’s May 1939 recorded message from his self-imposed exile in France, where he urged British leaders to do all in their power to come to terms with the Nazis.

BBC Refuses To Air Message

While the Duke’s message was heard around the world, the BBC refused to air the tape, filing it away with a label that read “IMPORTANT: Not to be broadcast.” Yet the Marburg files further illuminated how in bed the Duke of Windsor was with Nazi officials, including a top-secret cable from the German ambassador in Lisbon to Nazi high command, indicating that the Duke was convinced that if had he remained on the throne, war with Germany would have been avoided, but now that war was on, the Duke advocated that continued severe bombing of Britain would ultimately force his country to sue for peace.

First Published in 1957

After rumors broke out about the discovery of classified German documents, the Marburg files were published in 1957, prompting Her Majesty’s Stationary Office to write about the Duke that “His Royal Highness never wavered in his loyalty to the British cause.” In truth, however, historians have agreed that the Duke’s close alliance with the Nazis was motivated by his sense of hurt and rejection by his countrymen and his own royal family. For his part, the Duke of Windsor never lived in England for the remainder of his life.