Maybe the desire to list and rank everything isn’t that healthy.

How does one put all of the UK’s monarchs in some sort of order?

But, in this case it’s really quite easy.

Because he was the king who never was.

And a love affair, a difficult character, and some questionable political views create what collectors crave.

Rarity.

Perhaps something of Edward's difficult nature shows in this stamp portrait.

Who was King Edward VIII

To someone my age he was Edward of “Edward and Mrs Simpson” fame.

And he had been the Duke of Windsor.

For a generation earlier in the century he had been a very popular Prince of Wales, something of a pioneer in celebrity lifestyles and the gossip press.

He was born with the typically grand set of names: Edward Albert Christian George Andrew Patrick David on June 23, 1894.

And he was destined to be king, the son of King George V and Queen Mary (who were the Duke and Duchess of York when he was born).

He was the great uncle of the UK’s current king, Charles III.

The crux of his legend though is a love affair and an abdication.

Edward was a popular and visible member of the Royal Family as Prince of Wales.

Edward and Mrs Simpson

Edward was destined to become king and he duly did.

On the death of his father he acceeded to the throne from January 20, 1936.

He’d already been relieved of the title king when he spoke to the nation by radio broadcast on December 11 the same year to explain why he was abdicating.

It was a who rather than a why.

Known as Mrs Simpson in the popular imagination, it’s the Mrs that is the problem.

Wallis Simpson was born Warfield and grew up in Baltimore, Maryland in the United States.

She was married three times in all.

First to Win Spencer, a US naval officer.

They divorced.

Then to Ernest Simpson.

While married to Simpson she met the then Prince of Wales.

She was well to do (though much of her personal money had been lost in the Wall Street Crash) and moved easily in international society.

By 1934 she and the Prince were lovers.

Wallis Simpson, the woman who would - not quite - be Queen. 

Edward had had mistresses before but he fell head over heels for Wallis Simpson.

This was not popular, either with the rest of Edward’s family or the British political establishment.

If Edward became king he would be head of the Church of England.

Wallis had one divorce behind her and completed another in order to marry Edward. The first might not be recognised under the Church of England’s then rules. That would make her a bigamist.

Both her former husbands were still alive.

By the time he became king the relationship was well known in British official circles and around the world.

Edward was not an easy man.

He was not popular with the government.

They (and a certain amount of public opinion) considered Simpson to be fairly straight-forwardly bad news. A gold digger at best.

Simpson completed her divorce in October 1936.

In November Edward asked the government for advice on how to marry her and remain king.

The government - and governments around the Empire - would not approve.

By December, the relationship was openly acknowledged in the UK.

Simpson fled to the south of France and offered to leave the king.

But the king chose her.

He abdicated on December 10, 1936, and his brother George became George VI the next day.

Stamps dated for a year in which Edward was no longer king.

A glamorous couple

It may be that Edward was happier away from the throne.

He had been a lively Prince of Wales.

And as the Duke and Duchess of Windsor the couple are usually and definitively described as “socialites”.

There’s also the question of his politics.

In short, were Edward and Wallis Nazis?

Certainly, on abdicating the couple almost immediately toured Hitler’s Germany.

Having served in World War I, Edward always insisted he was pro-peace rather than pro-Nazi.

The Nazis certainly believed he would listen to them, and plans existed to do some sort of deal with him that would take Britain out of the war.

Edward’s views were a concern to the British government before he abdicated.

Stamps and coins of Edward VIII

Edward took an active role in designing the stamps for his reign.

The process of producing official documents is slow.

And Edward’s short reign does mean that fewer stamps were produced than were printed for many British monarchs.

Stamps came out to mark his accession.

A coronation set was planned.

A set to serve through his reign would follow.

Edward VIII stamps are collectible.

But they are not exceptionally rare in general.

One problem is that the public immediately started to collect them.

Edward’s abdication was obviously exceptional.

People kept the stamps. And just as you’ll find many families have an “abdication” newspaper front page among their possessions, you’ll find Edward VIII stamps.

(Perhaps the biggest scandal of the stamps prepared for Edward’s reign is the way the Post Office cheated a schoolboy competition entrant of his credit for contributing to their design.)

So, Edward’s stamp issues are rare in the way that most modern stamps are: specials, errors, and pieces from the design process are the best places to find real value.

The coins are a different matter.

Edward VIII coins: the rarest British coins

This pattern sovereign is in the Royal Collection. Most Edward VIII coins are in museum collections. 

No coins for his reign ever made it into circulation.

It was a close run thing though.

Edward’s abdication broadcast in early December came less than a month before the coins were due to start rolling out of the presses on January 1, 1937.

So the process was quite well advanced.

That means we have pattern coins to look for.

Or rather we don’t.

Because the vast majority of them are in the safe hands of the Royal Mint Musuem.

Some, however, have got out.

Not many though.

So they’re very valuable.

The known examples are:

One penny, 6 sovereigns, 6 double sovereigns, and 6 five pound coins.

A sovereign was sold for £1 million at auction in 2020.

That was then the record for a British coin.

Until a £5 coin made $2,280,000 in 2021.

A penny was sold for £111,000 in 2019, and a full set of pattern coins for £1,350,000 in 2010.

Although he left the throne, the Duke of Windsor, as Edward became lived a highly public life. 

The ex-king’s a celebrity!

When Edward VIII stepped off the British throne he became something new.

He became a royal celebrity.

British royals have private lives, of course, and some - Edward VII for instance - were well known for their semi-secret misbehaviour.

But Edward left for good to become - along with Wallis - a free agent (to a certain extent).

That means more photographs, more autographs, and more personal documents that don’t disappear into the official archiving systems.

So Edward and Wallis, who have been portrayed on screen many times, are somewhere between film stars and official figures.

There’s lots to collect.

Buy Edward VIII collectibles now

We sell stamps from Edward’s reign.

And rare, historic coins, a small selection of which is available here.

Want to see royal memorabilia? Here you are.

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