The King is Dead, Long Live the King!: Majesty, Mourning and Modernity in Edwardian Britain

by Martin Williams

The unexpectedness of the King’s death had meant there had been insufficient time to prepare a co-ordinated scheme of mourning for the streets and public buildings. The Graphic saw it as a missed opportunity. ‘The lack of a master-hand was painfully conspicuous,’ it lamented. ‘The mourning decoration of London as a whole was unworthy of the greatness of the occasion.’7 In the West End, banks, hotels, department stores and clubs had draped their portals and balconies in black and purple cloth, and even the smallest shops displayed portraits of Edward in their windows. For the rest, the only consistent decorative motifs were the tall masts hung with white and purple banners and topped with gilded crowns that lined the processional route at intervals. These turned out to be convenient repositories for the mourning wreaths of laurel and evergreen that had been sent to the capital from organisations and private individuals across Britain. Combined, the result was, as even the Graphic conceded, ‘surprisingly effective’.