Edward Mylius

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Edward Mylius
Mylius in 1911
Born(1878-07-04)4 July 1878
Died24 January 1947(1947-01-24) (aged 68)
Other namesEdward J. Boskin
Occupation(s)Clerk, journalist
Known forLibel conviction in England in 1911
Spouse
Lena Boskin
(m. 1944)

Edward Frederick Mylius (4 July 1878 – 24 January 1947) was a Belgian-born journalist jailed in England in 1911 for criminal libel after publishing a report that King George V of the United Kingdom was a bigamist.

Early life

Mylius was born in Belgium in 1878.

socialist meetings.[2] That year, he visited France, where he met Edward Holton James, an American-born socialist living in Paris.[2]

Libel case

Front-page headline in the San Francisco Examiner of 31 December 1910 after the arrest of Mylius
Lord Alverstone
First page of Mylius' 1916 pamphlet

Background

British sovereign on 6 May 1910, upon the death of his father, Edward VII. The king, while still a prince and heir to the throne, had married Mary of Teck
in London on 6 July 1893.

In January 1910, Edward Holton James wrote to Mylius to suggest an article based on an existing rumour[b] that George V had previously married and had children via that marriage. Shortly thereafter, James began publishing a journal called The Liberator.[2][3]: 1  James told Mylius that they had "an opportunity to make a formidable attack on the Monarchy".[2]

Libel publication

In the 19 November 1910 issue of The Liberator, Mylius alleged in an article entitled "Sanctified Bigamy" that in Malta in 1890,[c] George V had married "the daughter" of Admiral Sir Michael Culme-Seymour, and the marriage had produced three children.[2] That would have been not only scandalous but also illegal by contravening the Royal Marriages Act 1772. While The Liberator was published in Paris, police seized about 1,000 copies sent to England for distribution.[2]

Normally, royalty avoid suing over lies told about them, but in a break with precedent, the King decided that in this case, he had no choice. The rumours accused him of the crime of

witness box to disprove the allegations. Attorney-General Sir Rufus Isaacs
, advised the king that it would be unconstitutional for him to give evidence in his own court.

Arrest and trial

Mylius was arrested in London in late December 1910.

Lord Chief Justice of England, Lord Alverstone, and a jury. The prosecution, led by Attorney General Rufus Isaacs and assisted by Richard David Muir,[3]
asserted that the claims about the king were fiction:

Mylius, representing himself, essentially did not mount a defence and asserted that he had been denied the right to face his accuser.[3]: 30–32  He was convicted in a one-day trial on 1 February 1911 and sentenced to a year in prison.[2][5]

George V recorded his feelings on the affair in his diary:

The whole story is a damnable lie and has been in existence now for over twenty years. I trust that this will settle it once and for all.[6]

His mother, Queen Alexandra, wrote to him:

Thank God that vile trial is over and those infamous lies and foul accusations at an end for ever and cleared up before the whole world. To us it was a ridiculous story your having been married before ...! Too silly for words ... My poor Georgie - really it was too bad and must have worried you all the same.[7]

Serving his sentence at Wormwood Scrubs Prison,[2] Mylius was released after 10 months for good conduct.[8]

Additional publication

After Mylius was released from prison, he went to live in the United States. There, beyond the reach of English libel law, he published another version of the claim, which appeared in a 1916 pamphlet, The Morganatic Marriage of George V, printed in Greenwich Village by Guido Bruno.[2] The allegation was bolstered by finding a Hampshire Telegraph and Sussex Chronicle report of Mary Culme-Seymour dancing with the prince at a ball at Portsmouth Town Hall on 21 August 1891.[f] She had testified at the trial that she had not seen the prince between 1879 and 1898.

The king's biographer, Kenneth Rose, acknowledged in his 1983 book that Mary had had "a slip of memory" but judged it "utterly irrelevant to the accusation of bigamy".[10] That inconsistency has been taken up by more recent writers investigating the allegations.[11][12]

Later years

Mylius's immigration to the United States was not without incident. Upon arrival in December 1912 at

US State Department was denied, but he was successful in federal court, a judge ruling in February 1913 that libel was not a crime of moral turpitude.[2] The government appealed that ruling, which was affirmed in Mylius's favor in January 1914.[2]

In New York City, Mylius associated with activists around Greenwich Village, including Max Eastman, Hippolyte Havel, and Margaret Sanger.[2] On his draft registration card of 1918, Mylius listed Sanger as his nearest relative and gave his occupation as "manager and organiser" for The Liberator.[13] At some point, Mylius was the lover of anarchist Christine Ell, whom Eugene O'Neill modeled the title character of Anna Christie on.[2]

In December 1921, it came to light that Mylius had "borrowed" $4,000 from The Liberator (which he had left three months prior)[14] and lost it on stock market speculation.[2][15] Eastman, the editor of the publication, received partial repayment, but after being authorized to collect an additional $1,000 from one of Mylius's accounts, found that Mylius had already withdrawn those funds from the bank.[2][16]

During the 1921 incident, Mylius was using the alias Edward J. Boskin and also used that name in the 1925 New York State Census.[2] A secretary at a company Mylius worked for was named Lena Boskin.[2]

At the time of his April 1942 draft registration, Mylius was unemployed and living in

Kings County Hospital in January 1947 of prostate cancer and was cremated.[2]

See also

  • Guy Aldred, an associate of Mylius found guilty of libel in 1909
  • Ella Rhoads Higginson, an American author who mentioned the George V rumour in a 1910 book

Notes

  1. ^ Some sources refer to Mylius as being French.[1]
  2. ^ The rumour had first been published in the London newspaper The Star in 1893.[2]
  3. Prince Albert Victor
    . However, Albert Victor died of influenza in January 1892.
  4. ^ Laura Culme-Seymour had died, unmarried, in 1895.[2]
  5. ^ Mary Culme-Seymour wed Trevylyan Napier in 1899.[2]
  6. fleet review by Queen Victoria, of the French fleet visiting Portsmouth.[9]

References

  1. ^ "History of Scandal". bbc.co.uk. 7 June 2002.
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z aa Camp, Anthony J. "Edward Mylius: the man who libeled King George V". anthonyjcamp.com. Retrieved 23 November 2022.
  3. ^
    SSRN 2037498. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |agency= ignored (help
    )
  4. ^ "Abused Royal Family". The Buffalo News. 29 December 1910. p. 11. Retrieved 24 November 2022 – via newspapers.com.
  5. ^ "Found Guilty of Defaming the King". The Buffalo Commercial. 1 February 1911. p. 1. Retrieved 24 November 2022 – via newspapers.com.
  6. ^ Harold Nicolson, King George V (Pan, 1967) p.200.
  7. ^ Nicolson, p.201.
  8. ^ "Edward Mylius is Given His Release". Press & Sun-Bulletin. Binghamton, New York. 8 December 1911. p. 15. Retrieved 24 November 2022 – via newspapers.com.
  9. ^ "Dockyard Timeline A history in words and pictures of the Royal Dockyard Portsmouth". Portsmough Dockyard. Retrieved 28 May 2016.
  10. ^ Rose, Kenneth (1983). King George V. p. 86.
  11. ^ Thomas, Donald (2007). Freedom's frontier: censorship in modern Britain. John Murray. p. 400.
  12. ^ Ashdown-Hill, John (2013). Royal Marriage Secrets: Consorts & Concubines, Bigamists & Bastards. The History Press. p. 224.
  13. ^ "Draft Registration Card". Selective Service System. July 1918. Retrieved 24 November 2022 – via fold3.com.
  14. ^ "Mylius Says He Only 'Borrowed' $4,000". The New York Times. 2 December 1921. p. 10. Retrieved 24 November 2022 – via newspapers.com.
  15. ^ "Man Who Libeled George V Robs Paper". The New York Times. 1 December 1921. p. 11. Retrieved 24 November 2022 – via newspapers.com.
  16. ^ "Max Eastman Replies to 'E. F. Mylius' Letter". The New York Times. 3 December 1921. p. 24. Retrieved 24 November 2022 – via newspapers.com.
  17. ^ "Draft Registration Card". Selective Service System. April 1942. Retrieved 24 November 2022 – via fold3.com.

Further reading

  • "The King's Honour: A criminal libel on the sovereign; verdict and sentence". The Times. London. 2 February 1911. pp. 6–7.
    • Excerpt in the Evening Despatch (Birmingham)
  • Mylius, E. F. (1916). The Morganatic Marriage of George V (PDF). New York City.
    OCLC 17552896. Retrieved 24 November 2022 – via upenn.edu.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link
    )