WORDS MISREPRESENTED

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXIV, Issue 19371, 8 July 1937, Page 3

WORDS MISREPRESENTED

talk on royal funeral

displeasure of duke

LONDON, July I

••] certainly did not mean any,disrespect to the Duke of Windsor,. Nothing was further from my thoughts, said Sir Gerald Wollaston, Garter king of Arms, when explaining how he came to make the remark which evoked from the Duke the exclamation: ”What a ’rotten’ story!’ Sir Gerald was reported as having indicated at a Lyceum Club dinner that the Duke had rushed the funeral of King George. V. • The Duke replied from Austria yesterdav that, his mother haying expressed a wish to have the funeral, on January 28, seven days after death he had called a meeting of all the necessary authorities and told them ol that wish. All except Sir Gerald agreed, and lie. the Duke, had to speak sharply to him. To-day Sir Gerald said; If I have caused any distress to the Duke, 1 most deeply regret it. I was not by any means the only one who objected.” Asked if the Duke had spoken sharply to him. he said he did not wish to discuss that, but the Duke had certainly expressed a desire to have the funeral within a week. As far as Sir Gerald could remember. the Duke had said it was his mother’s wish and lie agreed that the object of the request was to avoid prolonging the distress of Queen Mary and other members of the Royal Family. , .Sir Gerald insisted that ins remarks had been misrepresented in a way that he had never for one moment intended.