North Essex: revealed at last, the royal fallout that was an early sign of World War One

11:53pm Tuesday 13th May 2008

Comments (1)   Have your say »

A ROYAL fallout ended in fisticuffs between England's future king and his emperor nephew, according to new revelations.

Witnesses from Bright-lingsea saw King Edward VII punch Kaiser Wilhelm of Germany to the ground for laughing at him.

The altercation happened during the prestigious Cowes Week regatta, on the Isle of Wight, and was kept a closely-guarded secret.

It was an early signal of trouble brewing between the two countries, which would lead to the First World War just under a decade later.

William Brasted, from a yachting family of Bright-lingsea, had been second mate on the royal racing cutter Britannia and watched the blue-blooded dispute.

Details of the scuffle have emerged in a letter from his son, Henry, to mariner John Jefferies, also from Brightlingsea.

He said King Edward VII - who was Prince of Wales at the time - had been for a day's racing on Britannia while Kaiser Wilhelm was aboard his yacht, Meteor.

Edward VII challenged the kaiser to see who could get ashore first on the yachts' rowing boats.

Kaiser Wilhelm reached the Royal Yacht Squadron Club's landing stage before the heir to the throne and poked fun at him for losing.

Henry Brasted wrote: "Kaiser Bill jeered King Teddy about the result, where straight away King Teddy hit him in the mouth, knocked him down, then stormed into the club.

"My father watched all this from the beaten rowing cutter.

"That episode was never printed in the papers at that time - imagine the consequences if they had."

The letter was part of a huge archive of yachting history left by Mr Jefferies, who died in March.

Maldwin Drummond, author and honorary archivist for the Royal Yacht Squadron, had never heard about the royal incident but was not surprised by the claim.

He believes it probably happened in 1895 - the last year the kaiser took part in Cowes week.

"That was when the Cowes Incident' happened," said Mr Drummond.

"The kaiser and the Prince of Wales were having dinner with Queen Victoria at Osborne House.

"The kaiser was rather outspoken, to say the least, and he spoke very strongly about a problem over Turkey and the Armenians.

"Lord Salisbury was there and got upset because the kaiser started dressing him down on the subject."

He thought the punch could be linked to the strained atmosphere following the diplomatic gaffe.

Mr Drummond said the sour relationship between the two was well-documented.

He added: "There was certainly a considerable amount of bad blood. They were never pals because the kaiser was always trying to be one up.

"This irritated the Prince of Wales at first but later on it became more annoying, and there was no love lost between them."