Palace fumes over 1930s Nazi salute clip

USA TODAY

Buckingham Palace is incensed with The Sun after the British tabloid published a 1930s home movie showing the future Queen Elizabeth II practicing the Nazi salute alongside her mother, sister and uncle.

Headlined "Their Royal Heilnesses," the 17-second clip shows Elizabeth (thought to be about seven at the time), giving the raised-right-hand gesture, echoed by Princess Margaret, their mother, Elizabeth Bowles-Lyon, and uncle, Prince Edward, then heir to the throne.

The clip, shot at on the grounds of the royal retreat in Balmoral, Scotland, is thought to have been filmed within a year of Adolf Hitler's 1933 appointment as German chancellor.

"It is disappointing that film, shot eight decades ago and apparently from Her Majesty's personal family archive, has been obtained and exploited in this manner," the palace said.

The Sun's managing editor, Stig Abell, said the footage was obtained legitimately. He told the BBC that the story was "not a criticism of the queen or the Queen Mum."

Instead, the tabloid wrote that they were attempting to offer insight on the "warped prejudices" of Prince Edward, who would ascend to the British throne within the next three years. He would spend a scant 11 months in power before abdicating to marry American divorcée Wallis Simpson.

Why would the British prince be enamored of Hitler? "Edward and a clique of anti-Semitic aristocrats were terrified of a communist revolution stripping them of power and privilege with deadly force, as it had in Russia. Fascism seemed like an answer," The Sun opined in an editorial defending its decision to publish the clip.

By the time it was filmed, they wrote, "The man who briefly became our king was already a fan of Hitler – and remained so as late as 1970, long after the Holocaust's horrors were laid bare."

In 1965, Edward was famously quoted as saying, "I never thought Hitler was such a bad chap."

Contributing: The Associated Press