CHURCHILL
OF WINSTON
THE JOURNAL
NUMBER 142
SPRING 2009 •
THE CHURCHILL CENTRE & CHURCHILL MUSEUM
CabINET WaR RooMS, LoNdoN
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aT THE
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CONTENTS
The Journal of
Winston Churchill
,
Number 142
SPRING 2009
Cover: An illuminated presentation to Alderman Charles Ross, President of the Early
Closing Association, photographed from his stock by Mark Weber (The Churchill Book
Specaliast, www.wscbooks.com). Mr. Weber considers this remarkable item the most beautiful autograph he has ever encountered. Story by Paul Courtenay on page 6.
Tolppannen, 16
CHURCHILL, CALIFORNIA AND HOLLYWOOD
16/ Winston Churchill and Charlie Chaplin
Perfect Combination or the Original Odd Couple? • Bradley P. Tolppannen
22/ Chaplin: Everybody’s Language:
He Made the Whole World Laugh • Winston S. Churchill
28/ Nature’s Panorama in California
Impressions of a Traveller, Eighty Years Ago • Winston S. Churchill
33/ Churchill and Orwell
A Gentle Accoldate from One Giant to Another • Robert Pilpel
35/ Leading Churchill Myths: “Churchill Caused the 1943-45 Bengal Famine”
Fact: The Blame Rests with the Japanese • Richard M. Langworth
Churchill, 28
CHURCHILL PROCEEDINGS
36/ Sheriffs and Constables:
Churchill’s and Roosevelt’s Postwar World • Warren F. Kimball
BOOKS, ARTS & CURIOSITIES
48/ Churchill as a Literary Character • Michael McMenamin
49/ Reviews: Churchill by Himself • The Last Thousand Days of the British Empire
‘Blinker’ Hall, Spymaster • Best Little Stories from the Life and Times of
Winston Churchill • Churchill: The Greatest Briton Unmasked
• Reviewed by Manfred Weidhorn, David Freeman, Antoine Capet,
Christopher H. Sterling and Michael McMenamin
Pilpel, 33
DEPARTMENTS
2/ Churchill Centre Administration • 4/ Despatch Box • 5/ Editor’s Essay
6/ Datelines • 8/ Around & About • 10/ Leading Churchill Myths (16)
11/ Official Biography • 12/ Riddles, Mysteries, Enigmas • 14/ Action This Day
20/ Wit & Wisdom • 32/ History Detectives • 47/ Churchill Quiz
54/ Eminent Churchillians: Jay Piper • 62/ Ampersand • 63/ Regional Directory
C
FINEST HoUR 142 / 3
DESPATCH BOX
FORTY YEARS OF FH
Number 142 • Spring 2009
ISSN 0882-3715
www.winstonchurchill.org
____________________________
Barbara F. Langworth, Publisher
[email protected]
Richard M. Langworth CBE, Editor
[email protected]
Post Office Box 740
Moultonborough, NH 03254 USA
Tel. (603) 253-8900
Dec.-March Tel. (242) 335-0615
___________________________
Editor Emeritus:
Ron Cynewulf Robbins
I have read the thick Fortieth
Anniversary issue number 140, truly a
magnum opus. First, it is a review of a
great journal. Second, it is a review of a
great man. Third, but no less important,
it is a tribute to a great editor. We
members of The Churchill Centre and
Churchill Museum owe our editor a
tremendous debt of gratitude.
DR. CYRIL MAZANSKY, NEWTON CENTRE, MASS.
Forty years, and at the helm for
most of them! That’s one grand accomplishment, and a huge gift to the
literature over the years. So glad my
favorite cartoonist is on the cover. I was
surprised and tickled to see I’d even
made the top hundred articles list. Kudos
to you and Barbara for all your efforts
over the years.
PROF. CHRISTOPHER H. STERLING
Senior Editors:
Paul H. Courtenay
James R. Lancaster
James W. Muller
News Editor:
Michael Richards
Contributors
Alfred James, Australia
Terry Reardon, Canada
Antoine Capet, France
Inder Dan Ratnu, India
Paul Addison, Winston S. Churchill,
Robert A. Courts,
Sir Martin Gilbert CBE,
Allen Packwood, United Kingdom
David Freeman, Ted Hutchinson,
Warren F. Kimball,
Michael McMenamin,
Don Pieper, Christopher Sterling,
Manfred Weidhorn, United States
GEORGE WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY, D.C.
Thank you for yet another fabulous issue of Finest Hour.
__________________________________
Finest Hour is made possible in part through
the generous support of members of The
Churchill Centre and Museum, the Number
Ten Club, and an endowment created by the
Churchill Centre Associates (page 2).
___________________________________
Published quarterly by The Churchill Centre,
offering subscriptions from the appropriate
offices on page 2. Permission to mail at nonprofit rates in USA granted by the United
States Postal Service, Concord, NH, permit
no. 1524. Copyright 2009. All rights reserved.
Produced by Dragonwyck Publishing Inc.
GARY GARRISON, MARIETTA, GA.
In the list of contributors on page
78 you indeed forgot a name. (See FH
107: 29-33, “Toy Troopers, Small
Statesmen.”) Also, I held together the
Omaha chapter with time, talent and
treasure until deterioration of my health
began to limit my activities recently, dues
and contributions continuing. Keep up
the good work.
EDWARD W. FITZGERALD, OMAHA, NEB.
Edward, our net slipped when it
came to “Books, Arts & Curiosities,”
since those articles weren’t indexed individually. So sorry. We appreciate your
support. RML
DAN BORINSKY, LAKE RIDGE, VA.
I just enjoyed a few hours with the
40th Anniversary issue of Finest Hour,
and all the memories you recalled
therein. Another fine piece of writing
and editing. It has been ages since I revisited the story of the mysterious
double-fleet of trolleys at the 1995
Boston conference (page 47). We never
solved that mystery, but we also never
missed a beat that evening.
All this looking back made me also
recall our many accomplishments, such
as the Churchill Centre Founding
Member campaign, the Associates
program, the Gregory Peck video to
name a few. I cannot imagine Finest
Hour without you, so for now, I will not.
The incomparable Finest Hour
140 provokes many thoughts. First, as
lots of us watch with glee as President
Bush vacates the White House, let’s consider Churchill’s valediction to Neville
Chamberlain, quoted in this issue: “In
one phase men seem to have been right,
in another they seem to have been
wrong. Then again, a few years later,
when the perspective of time has lengthened, all stands in a different setting.”
Second, many hands will have
been wrung by the close of the interregnum between 4 November and 20
January. Cooperation between the not yet
old and the not yet new is seemingly
unprecedented. But not really.
As noted by Gordon Walker in
“Election 1945: Why Winston Churchill
Lost,” even when Churchill was facing
the voters he brought his opponent (and
Deputy Prime Minister) Clement Attlee
to the Potsdam conference. The vote
count was sandwiched within the conference. When the votes were counted, it
was Attlee not Churchill who concluded
the conference, and then the war. The
brutally tough issues of that day were
handed off seamlessly—and quickly—to
a new administration. Winston
Churchill’s statesmanship continues to
provide a ready guide.
,
PARKER H. LEE III, LYNCHBURG, VA.
SHANIN SPECTER, GLADWYNE, PENNA.
Best Finest Hour ever. The fact
that you mentioned me proves it!
AL LURIE, NEW YORK, N.Y.
Awesome: a great issue with many
fine contributors. Our man would be
proud. Thank you for the photo and
acknowledgements of Naomi and me.
May the cognac and cigar at your appearance in Dallas November 30th be
memorable. I’ll be with you and the
North Texas Churchillians in spirit.
LARRY KRYSKE, PLANO, TEX.
___________________________
• Address changes: Help us keep your copies
coming! Please update your membership office
when you move. All offices for The Churchill
Centre and Allied national organizations are
listed on the inside front cover.
I spent two days reading Finest
Hour 140 cover-to-cover. My personal
congratulations on the greatest issue yet.
The content was not only uniformly
interesting, but what I would describe as
“smashing!” The issue will be saved
amongst my most important publications
and memorabilia.
FINEST HoUR 142 / 4
E D I T O R ’ S E S S AY
A
Sheet Anchor in “Sterner Days”
Churchillian born in Niagara Falls, New York asked if we knew what Winston Churchill was doing on New
Year’s Eve, 31 December 1941. Surprisingly—because we don’t have many accounts of his ninety New
Year’s Eves—we did.
On that evening, Churchill was hurtling past Niagara Falls itself, en route from Ottawa, where he’d
described Britain as a chicken with an unwringable neck, to Washington, where he would resume urgent conversations
with President Roosevelt in the wake of Japan’s onslaught in Asia and the Pacific.
As the sweep second hand of “The Turnip,” his beloved pocket watch, counted down the remaining moments
of 1941, Churchill called his staff and accompanying newspaper reporters to the dining car of his train. Then, raising
his glass, as the train rocked and swayed over the tracks, he made this toast:
“Here’s to 1942, here’s to a year of toil—a year of struggle and peril, and a long step forward towards victory.
May we all come through safe and with honour.”
How apposite those words are right now. No, there is no Third Reich, no Imperial Japan—but there are stateless enemies who seek our ruin; there is economic chaos of epic proportions. As our chairman Laurence Geller writes:
“People are holding back for fear of the unknown. Unemployment will soon double. This quarter most G-8 economies
will experience a negative GDP. For the year it will almost certainly be negative and next year at best will be flat or
insipid. People are frightened, inventories are diminished, business and consumer confidence is at an all-time low.”
What a time for Churchill. And there he is, still hoping we will all come through safe and with honour.
How often Churchill knew exactly what to say! True, he insisted that the British people had the “lion heart,”
that he had merely provided the roar; that he had always earned his living by his pen and tongue. What else did they
expect? Makes no difference. His incandescent words remain. Vivre à jamais dans l’esprit des gens, n’est-ce pas l’immortalité? To live forever in the minds of men, is not that immortality? “When men said to each other, ‘There is no
answer,’” wrote the poet Maxwell Anderson, “You spoke for Trafalgar, and for the sombre lions in the Square.”
I cast around for a Churchill “quotation of the season” to lead off this edition of Finest Hour: in this season to
mark the largest peacetime expansion of government in history, and the arguments swirling around it. I found more
than one. (See next page.)
We never proclaim what Churchill would think about a modern Act of Congress or Parliament. We haven’t
the foggiest. But we have his words, and as always his words are worth the attention of thoughtful people.
Leaders of parties or governments, like Mr. David Cameron, will often inevitably be influenced and encouraged by Churchill’s experience: his triumphs and tragedies, his mistakes and failures, for it diminishes Churchill to
regard him as superhuman. Yet there was nobody like him when it came to communicating the unchanging verities by
which, as he put it, “we mean to make our way.”
We are right to worry over events. And right to remember Churchill’s optimism, his determination, his
unswerving faith in the English-Speaking Peoples, in their capacity to come through, safe and with honour.
Churchill was a fatalist, but never troubled by what he could not control. “One only has to look at Nature,” he
wrote his mother from India at the age of 24, “to see how very little store she sets by life. Its sanctity is entirely a
human idea. You may think of a beautiful butterfly: 12 million feathers on his wings, 16,000 lenses in his eye; a
mouthful for a bird. Let us laugh at Fate. It might please her.”
Mr. Cameron will likely conclude with Winston Churchill: “For myself I am an optimist—it does not seem to
be much use being anything else.” There certainly does not seem to be much use in pessimism if you are charged with
the leadership or a country, or a party, or a company, or an institution.
And we know Mr. Cameron would agree with the Harrow Old Boy who, on his first visit there since his
schooldays, substituted “sterner days” for “darker days” in a Harrow song verse written for him:
“Do not let us speak of darker days; let us rather speak of sterner days. These are not dark days; these are great
days—the greatest days our country has ever lived; and we must all thank God that we have been allowed, each of us
RML
according to our stations, to play a part in making these days memorable in the history of our race.”
From a programme note in a Churchill Centre dinner in London for the Rt. Hon. David Cameron MP.
FINEST HoUR 142 / 5
DateLines
SEASON’S QUOTES:
WSC ON THE “STIMULUS”
MARCH 20TH— No, Sir Winston has
not interrupted his first million
years painting to comment (right)
on the U.S. government’s “fiscal
stimulus package.” And we’re not
going to suggest what he would
think of it—heaven forbid. Our
“Quotations of the Season” are
ranged without comment in
chronological order. Draw your
own conclusions.
“NOT MUCH IN THAT...”
From John
Charmley to Pat Buchanan, we’ve read
the same story: Churchill destroyed the
British Empire and laid the way for
Russo-American hegemony by rejecting
Realpolitik and refusing to “do a deal” to
wind down the war with Hitler after the
Fall of France.
We were reminded that Churchill
himself was asked that question—after
his retirement in 1955 while re-reading
private secretary Sir Anthony Montague
Browne’s book, Long Sunset (London:
Cassell, 1995, 200).
Churchill’s answer: “You’re only
saying that to be provocative. You know
very well we couldn’t have made peace
on the heels of a terrible defeat. The
country wouldn’t have stood for it. And
what makes you think that we could
have trusted Hitler’s word—particularly
as he could soon have had Russian
resources behind him? At best we would
have been a German client state, and
there’s not much in that.” Exactly.
LONDON, MARCH 1ST—
Quotations of the Season
“Y
ou may, by the arbitrary and sterile act of Government—for, remember, Governments create nothing and have nothing to give but what
they have first taken away—you may put money in the pocket of one set
of Englishmen, but it will be money taken from the pockets of another set
of Englishmen, and the greater part will be spilled on the way.”
—WSC, BIRMINGHAM, 11 NOVEMBER 1903
“Where you find that State enterprise is likely to be ineffective, then
utilise private enterprises, and do not grudge them their profits.”
—WSC, GLASGOW, 11 OCTOBER 1906
“Every new administration, not excluding ourselves, arrives in power with bright
and benevolent ideas of using public money to do good. The more
frequent the changes of Government, the more numerous are the bright ideas;
and the more frequent the elections, the more benevolent they become.”
—WSC, HOUSE OF COMMONS, 11 APRIL 1927
“There are two ways in which a gigantic debt may be spread over new
decades and future generations. There is the right and healthy way; and
there is the wrong and morbid way. The wrong way is to fail to make the
utmost provision for amortisation which prudence allows, to aggravate the
burden of the debts by fresh borrowings, to live from hand to mouth and
from year to year, and to exclaim with Louis XV: ‘After me, the deluge!’”
—WSC, HOUSE OF COMMONS, 11 APRIL 1927
“Squandermania…is the policy which used to be stigmatised by the late
Mr. Thomas Gibson Bowles as the policy of buying a biscuit early in the
morning and walking about all day looking for a dog to give it to.”
—WSC, HOUSE OF COMMONS, 15 APRIL 1929
“Democratic governments drift along the line of least resistance, taking
short views, paying their way with sops and doles, and smoothing their
path with pleasant-sounding platitudes. Never was there less continuity or
design in their affairs, and yet toward them are coming swiftly changes
which will revolutionize for good or ill not only the whole economic structure of the world but the social habits and moral outlook of every family.”
—WSC, “FIFTY YEARS HENCE,” STRAND, DECEMBER 1931
“I do not think America is going to smash. On the contrary I believe that
they will quite soon begin to recover. As a country descends the ladder of
values many grievances arise, bankruptcies and so forth. But one must
never forget that at the same time all sorts of correctives are being applied,
COVER STORY
Readers may wonder why Winston
Churchill signed this particular presentation to Alderman Charles J. Ross,
President of the Early Closing
Association, 1923-26.
When President of the Board of
Trade (12 April 1908 to 18 February
1910) Churchill was very active in promoting better conditions for shop
workers; among them was “one early
closing day a week.” WSC must have
been inducted by the Early Closing
Association (established 1842) in recognition of his initiative over this matter.
“Albert” is undoubtedly HRH
The Duke of York (later King George
VI), who interested himself in industrial
relations; but he would not have been
involved with such an Association until
FINEST HoUR 142 / 6
much later than 1910, and most probably from about 1923 until 1936.
“Sutherland” is likely the Fifth
Duke of Sutherland (1888-1963), who
was contemporaneously involved with
The Duke of York. He succeeded his
father in 1913 and was very active in
public life, holding various government
posts. He was a member of Baldwin’s
1924-29 government while WSC was
Chancellor of the Exchequer, serving as
Paymaster General (1925-28) and
Under-Secretary of State for War (192829). Churchill and Sutherland knew each
other well socially. See Mary Soames,
Speaking for Themselves, WSC’s letter
from the Duke’s Scottish estate
Dunrobin Castle, dated 19 [18]
September 1921; also the link passage
about Marigold immediately above.
Edmund Ashworth Radford
(1881-1944) was a Unionist MP for two
Manchester seats (Salford, South 192429, Rusholme from 1933). The only
other detail I can find is that he was a
chartered accountant who became senior
partner of his own firm of chartered
and adjustments being made by millions of people and thousands of firms. If
the whole world except the United States sank under the ocean that community could get its living. They carved it out of the prairie and the forests. They
are going to have a strong national resurgence in the near future. Therefore I
wish to buy sound low priced stocks. I cannot afford any others.”
—WSC TO HIS STOCKBROKER, H.C. VICKERS. 21 JUNE 1932
“Change is agreeable to the human mind, and gives satisfaction, sometimes short-lived, to ardent and anxious public opinion.”
—WSC, HOUSE OF COMMONS, 29 JULY 1941
“Nothing would be more dangerous than for people to feel cheated because they had been led to expect attractive schemes which turn out to be
economically impossible.”
—WSC TO FOREIGN SECRETARY AND OTHERS, 17 DECEMBER 1942
I do not believe in looking about for some panacea or cure-all on which
we should stake our credit and fortunes trying to sell it like a patent
medicine to all and sundry. It is easy to win applause by talking in an
airy way about great new departures in policy, especially if all detailed
proposals are avoided.
—WSC, BLACKPOOL, 5 OCTOBER 1946
“The idea that a nation can tax itself into prosperity is one of the crudest
delusions which has ever fuddled the human mind.”
—WSC, ROYAL ALBERT HALL, 21 APRIL 1948
“Socialism is the philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the
gospel of envy.”
—WSC, PERTH, 28 MAY 1948
“The choice is between two ways of life: between individual liberty and
State domination; between concentration of ownership in the hands of the
State and the extension of ownership over the widest number of individuals; between the dead hand of monopoly and the stimulus of competition;
between a policy of increasing restraint and a policy of liberating energy
and ingenuity; between a policy of levelling down and a policy of opportunity for all to rise upwards from a basic standard.
—WSC, WOLVERHAMPTON, 23 JULY 1949
“In America, when they elect a President they want more than a skilful
politician. They are seeking a personality: something that will make the
President a good substitute for a monarch.”
,
—WSC TO LORD MORAN, 19 MAY 1955
FINEST HoUR 142 / 7
accountants; whether this involved him
with the Early Closing Association is
unclear. —PAUL H. COURTENAY
WINSTON IS BACK:
(IN EIGHT VOLUMES)
LONDON, JANUARY 23RD— The
BBC
announced that President Obama sent
George W. Bush’s Jacob Epstein bust of
Churchill packing from the Oval Office
(while retaining a bust of Abraham
Lincoln), producing a buzz of speculation
over the implied symbolism.
The bust is one of four or five
copies sculpted by Jacob Epstein, and
regarded as the most valuable of its kind
ever commissioned. Bush’s was from the
British government collection at
Cockburn Street, London; another is at
Windsor and others are in private hands.
In 2001 President Bush explained: “My
friend the Prime Minister of Great
Britain heard me say that I greatly
admired Winston Churchill and so he
saw to it that the government loaned me
this and I am most honored to have this
Jacob Epstein bust....”
But zealots soon urged us to
demand its return, since in their view
Bush was undeserving, or using it to proclaim himself a Churchill. In fact, he was
simply an admirer, like most of us.
Plus ça change....Now that the bust
has been returned, we are encouraged to
protest its removal.
The BBC speculated that Obama
was “looking forward not backward,”
while The Daily Telegraph ventured that
there might be personal reasons: “It was
during Churchill’s second premiership
that Britain suppressed Kenya’s Mau
Mau rebellion. Among Kenyans allegedly
tortured by the colonial regime included
one Hussein Onyango Obama, the
President’s grandfather.”
Diana West exploded that theory
on Townhall.com (http://xrl.us/beipaj) by
explaining that this allegation stems from
Obama’s “Granny Sarah” (who also
claims that he was born in Kenya, which
would make him ineligible to be
President). In Obama’s Dreams of My
Father, West wrote, the President
“describes his grandfather’s detention as
lasting ‘over six months’ before he was
found innocent (no mention of torture).
Whatever the case, Churchill didn’t
become prime minister for the second
time until the end of 1951. The Mau
Mau Rebellion didn’t begin until the >>
D AT E L I N E S
bleakest of hours....It is also worth a
moment’s reflection on how Churchill
viewed the duty of a leader in a time of
crisis, for Obama, perhaps unconsciously,
is working within that tradition.”
The editor’s own amusement on
this business is in the sidebar below.
A CHURCHILL IS BACK
OVAL OFFICE CHURCHILLIANA: The Epstein bust has bitten the dust, but the Official
Biography has taken its place. The White House now has more Churchilliana than ever.
end of 1952, one year after Obama’s
grandfather’s release.”
But President Obama now has
more Churchilliana than President Bush
had: in a March visit to Washington,
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown
presented him with “a first edition of Sir
Martin Gilbert’s seven-volume biography
of Winston Churchill.” (Yes, “seven
volumes”—Sir Martin was short Volume
V, but Chartwell Booksellers in New
York City helped him out, and the full
eight volumes were delivered.)
Asked for comment by Newsweek,
FH’s editor said he read little into the
controversy: “Mr. Obama admires
Lincoln, and it seems perfectly reasonable
that he should have a the bronze totem
of his choice in his office. Since the
Epstein bust was a loan to a previous
President, it is unremarkable that a new
President would wish to return it.
President Obama, an intelligent man,
probably appreciates that the
Parliamentary forms finally emerging in
Kenya stem from the colonial British, as
they do in much of the old Empire,
notably India and what Churchill called
the ‘Great Dominions.’ To paraphrase
Mark Steyn (whose bust will never adorn
the Oval Office either), imagine how
Kenya might have developed if it had
been colonized by, say, the Germans,
Japanese or Russians.”
This will not prevent the media
from using Churchill to promote sundry
political viewpoints. But in the March
2nd issue of Newsweek, editor Jon
Meacham (a fair and balanced Churchill
Centre trustee) struck what we believe is
the right note: “A long-dead foreign
leader, then, has become a kind of partisan figure. This is unfortunate, for
Churchill offers one of the great case
studies for any leader in how to build
and maintain public confidence in the
LONDON, MARCH 20TH— A Churchill will
once again hold dominion over Westminster. Duncan Sandys, Sir Winston’s affable 35-year-old great grandson who sits as
a Conservative councillor on the city
council, is a shoo-in as the next Lord
Mayor of Westminster, after he was put
forward as the official Tory candidate for
the election in May. Sandys, who serves
BUST-OUT, 2013
In March an American writer claimed that Obama said of the
Churchill bust: “Get that blank-blank thing out of here” (but offered no
attribution). And a British writer snipped that the cheap CD Obama
gave British Prime Minister Gordon Brown doesn’t work on British TV.
The media just demonstrates its degenerate irresponsibility in
fanning non-issues. Fifty years ago a different media would have published thoughtful pieces on the future of the US-UK relationship. We are
witnessing the triumph of Britney Spearsthought.
The President has more pressing matters of concern, as do
we. So, with acknowledgement to the Daily Telegraph, here is a pastiche on a future “Bust-Out” which might well erupt four years hence.
HHH
WASHINGTON, FEBRUARY 15, 2013— A bust
of Abraham Lincoln, loaned to
President Obama from the State of Illinois art collection after his inauguration four years ago, has now been formally handed back.
Where has the Lincoln bust gone? Reporters have tracked it to
the palatial Springfield, Illinois residence of Rod Blagojevich, who was
reinstated as Governor in 2011 after the State Supreme Court ruled
that his 2009 impeachment was unconstitutional, following Blagojevich’s two-year campaign for redemption on Oprah and Larry King.
Lincoln is no hero to Mr. Calhoun, who prefers to quote Winston Churchill, author of the famous alternative history, “If Lee Had Not
Won the Battle of Gettysburg.” (FH 103, http://xrl.us/beipam). Now a
bust of Churchill, retrieved from storage at the British Embassy in
Washington, has replaced Lincoln’s in the Oval Office.
Lincoln, remember, sent General Sherman marching through
Calhoun’s home state of Georgia to defeat the Confederacy. Among
Confederates allegedly imprisoned by the Federals was one Aloysius
Beauregard Calhoun, the President’s great-great grandfather.
Governor Blagojevich says he will offer another evidence of
Illinois’ esteem to the new President when he meets Mr. Calhoun in
Washington this month. One state senator has suggested that, given
President Calhoun’s interest in the Civil War era, Mr. Blagojevich
should offer a bust of Stephen A. Douglas, Abraham Lincoln’s leading
opponent during the 1860 Presidential Election.
,
FINEST HoUR 142 / 8
on the Churchill Memorial Trust Council
and is a grandson of Lord Duncan-Sandys,
the former cabinet minister, will be the
youngest person to occupy the role.
—TIM WALKER, DAILY TELEGRAPH
FREE DEPLORABLE SPEECH
Centre
chairman Laurence Geller spoke on
CNBC of the “McCarthyism” being
directed by politicians against conventions (http://xrl.us/beiohf ): “The
hyperbole and rhetoric was notched up
to gigantic levels during this recent political debate season.....We’ve lost an awful
lot of major businesses, and it’s not just
those receiving government bailouts that
are affected, but there’s a general fear of
criticism by people not only making the
bookings but people attending these conference....The hotel industry lost 200,000
jobs last year. We thought if things went
the same way we’d lose 240,000. This
year, since the hyperbole got ratcheted up
to these levels, we’re on track to lose
350,000, 400,000 jobs. The ripple
through the economy is gigantic,
touching 15 million jobs; lodging and
tourism is the third largest retail business
in the country. A colleague and I
attended a conference last week, and we
were joking in the car to the hotel,
saying: ‘If the CNBC van is out front,
keep driving!’”
What has this to do with Winston
Churchill? It reminds us what he said
about free speech, including class warfare
against the convention business (House
of Commons, 18 June 1951):
“One cannot say that the man or
the woman in the street can be brought
up violently and called to account
because of expressing some opinion on
something or other which is sub judice.
They are perfectly entitled to do that.
They may say things that are
deplorable—many deplorable things are
said under free speech.”
CHICAGO, MARCH 6TH— Churchill
BEST BOOKS: ADDENDUM
In our “Fifty Best Books [About
Churchill] in the Last Forty Years” (FH
140:22) we inadvertently left out two of
Professor Paul Addison’s picks of his
favorites in FH 128. (We also left out
My Early Life because it was by not
about Churchill.) Since we warned that
you omit Addison’s choices at your disadvantage, we hasten to list the two we
omitted, along with his remarks:
AROUND & ABOUT
T
he 2009 Finest Hour Re-Rat Award (issued
infrequently) goes to Senator Judd Gregg
(R.-N.H.), who, after accepting nomination as
President Obama’s Secretary of Commerce, withdrew,
saying he could not balance “being in the Cabinet versus myself as an
individual doing my job.” Gregg’s nomination had sewn fear among Republicans who learned that New Hampshire’s Democratic Governor,
John Lynch, would appoint a (liberal) Republican in his place. Thus
Judd re-rats. (WSC to private secretary John Colville, 26 January 1941:
“Anyone can rat, but it takes a certain amount of ingenuity to re-rat.”
kkkkk
Alfred James of Churchill Centre Australia reports that (moving right
along) the 1911 Census has just been released in England (www.ancestry.com). No address was “private” in those days: Churchill is listed at 33
Eccleston Square (17 rooms) with Clementine, Diana and eight servants (cook, nurse, lady’s maid, housemaid, parlourmaid, under-parlourmaid, kitchen maid and hall boy). Ah for the days when help was cheap. I
once tried Churchill’s method of getting two days out of one by copying
his Chartwell routine: an hour of sound sleep in mid-afternoon, bath, dinner, cinema, work from 11pm to 3am, bed, breakfast at 8am, work in bed
all morning, bath #2, lunch, afternoon amble and start over again. Works
fine if you have a staff of fifteen. Barbara Langworth was not amused.
kkkkk
Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, dismissed overtures to
his country from President Obama, saying Teheran did not see any
change in policy under the new U.S. administration. “They chant the
slogan of change but no change is seen in practice,” Khamenei said in
his speech, broadcast live on state television. “We haven’t seen any
change.” In his video message, Obama said the U.S. wanted to engage
Iran and improve decades of strained relations.
We hear echoes in this of Harold Nicolson’s note to his wife, Vita
Sackville-West, 1 March 1938 (Nicolson Diaries, I, 328). Churchill, he
said, “spoke of ‘this great country nosing from door to door like a cow
that has lost its calf, mooing dolefully now in Berlin and now in Rome—
when all the time the tiger and the alligator wait for its undoing.’” ,
• Harbutt, Fraser J. The Iron
Curtain: Churchill, America and the
Origins of the Cold War, 1986, 370
pages: “It is no secret that Churchill is
revered by many Americans as a philosopher-king and role model for leadership.
Whereas in Britain we see him as a man
of the past, he is admired in the U.S. as a
guide to the present and the future. His
unique stature on the western side of the
Atlantic owes something his wartime
alliance with Roosevelt, but as Fraser
Harbutt shows in a powerfully argued
book, the decisive factor was the part
Churchill played, while he was out of
office, in facilitating the entry of the
United States into the Cold War. The
tipping point was his ‘Iron Curtain’
FINEST HoUR 142 / 9
speech at Fulton, Missouri in 1946.”
• Taylor, A.J.P., editor. Churchill:
Four Faces and the Man (Churchill
Revised in USA), 1969, 274 pages: “This
sparkling collection of essays anatomised
Churchill’s qualities as a statesman (A.J.P.
Taylor), politician (Robert Rhodes
James), historian (J.H. Plumb), military
strategist (Basil Liddell Hart) and depressive human being (Anthony Storr).
Research has moved on since then, but as
an analysis of the essential Churchill it
has never been surpassed. It founded the
British school of Churchillians who
admire him “warts and all.”
Many disagree with Anthony Storr
that WSC was “depressive,” except in
very old age, since the troubles he saw >>
D AT E L I N E S
BEST BOOKS...
would depress anybody; or that
Churchill’s relevance and leadership are
not appreciated outside America. We also
doubt that Winston Churchill had as
much influence on the U.S. plunge into
the Cold War as Harbutt suggests. (On
this subject, see the compelling essays in
James W. Muller, editor: Churchill’s
“Iron Curtain” Speech Fifty Years Later,
1999, 180 pages.)
A’BLOGGING
WE SHALL GO
FEBRUARY 15TH— We
were amused by a
Churchill-derived comment describing
the new digital activity known as “blogging” (personal web logs) and Internet
chatrooms: “Never have so many people
with so little to say said so much to so
few.” However, some bloggers have interesting angles.
Take for example “Amazing Ben”
(www.badassoftheweek.com): a 28-yearold college administrator, whose style is,
well, different.
Churchill, Ben says, was known
“for his unyielding tenaciousness and his
awesome ability to train killer attack
hounds to run up and bite Fascists in the
jugular when they weren’t looking…one
of the most badass world leaders of the
modern era. This dude was a totally
righteous asskicker who enjoyed puffing
on Cuban cigars, shooting guns, drinking
copious amounts of booze, and kicking
Nazis in the ___ ___ with a Size 10
steel-toed boot, and he didn’t give a crap
about anything that didn’t further his
goal of accomplishing one of those four
tasks. He fought hard, partied hard, wore
a lot of totally awesome suits, and pretty
much always looked like he’d just
stepped out of a badass 1930s pulp
fiction detective story.”
We linked this on our website. We
were going to reprint Ben’s essay, but we
are not so badass. However, we’re glad to
see the use of profanity in Churchill’s
favor for a change.
ERRATA, FH 140
Page 15: Paul Alkon is a Professor
of English and American (not French)
Literature. Page 48: The photo of Martin
Gilbert’s walking tour is 1996 (not
1999), during the previous Churchill
Centre Tour of England.
PORTSMOUTH, 2001: Patrick Kinna (left) aboard USS Winston S. Churchill, with thencommanding officer Capt. Mike Franken, USN, at the International Festival of the Sea.
PATRICK KINNA
Churchill was
flying home from the Continent late in
World War II when his Dakota began to
lose power and altitude, and passengers
joked over what to jettison. “It’s no use
throwing you out,” Churchill grinned at
Patrick Kinna. “There’s not enough of
you to make a ham sandwich.”
Kinna, one of Churchill’s key
wartime secretaries, and had many fond
memories (see “Eminent Churchillians,”
FH 115, Summer 2002; the above was
related to Paul Courtenay by Kinna’s
nephew at the funeral). He was recommended to Churchill by the Duke of
Windsor, whom he had served while the
Duke was with the British military
mission in Paris. From 1940 to 1945 his
tiny, trim figure rarely left the Prime
Minister’s side. Kinna was present when
President Roosevelt unexpectedly
encountered Churchill emerging from his
bath at the White House. (WSC later
remarked to the King, “Sir, I believe I am
the only man in the world to have
received the head of a nation naked.”)
Patrick Francis Kinna was born in
south London on 5 September 1913. His
father had been decorated for his part in
the relief of Ladysmith during the Boer
War. After leaving school Patrick took a
course in shorthand and typing, then
joined Barclay’s Bank as a clerk while
deliberating whether to be a journalist or
a skating instructor (he had trained with
the ice-skating star Belita).
BRIGHTON, MARCH 14TH—
FINEST HoUR 142 / 10
In 1939, Kinna joined the reserves,
but because of his skills (he had won the
All-England championship for secretarial
speeds), he was quickly assigned to the
Intelligence Corps and sent to Paris as
clerk to the Duke of Windsor.
As the Germans drew near they
were ordered to evacuate. After a day
destroying secret documents, the Duke
was spirited to safety while Kinna hitchhiked to the coast to find a ship home.
Back in England, Kinna got a telephone call from 10 Downing Street and
joined Churchill aboard HMS Prince of
Wales, sailing to Newfoundland for the
Atlantic Charter meeting with Roosevelt.
Kinna’s duties included trying to discourage sailors from whistling—a noise
Churchill could never abide. But once
Churchill and Roosevelt got down to
business in Argentia Bay there was no letup: “I was terribly busy all the time. I
spent days and days typing.”
Churchill was so impressed with
Kinna’s work that he wanted him to join
his staff. One reason was because, in the
early part of the war, women were not
allowed to travel on warships. Kinna was
substituted, often taking along the work
normally done by Elizabeth Layton,
Kathleen Hill and others. From then on,
Kinna accompanied Churchill on all
WSC’s trips abroad.
Some accounts suggest that
Churchill was initially charmed by Stalin,
but that was not Kinna’s impression.
After their first encounter in Moscow,
Kinna recalled Churchill storming back
to the British Embassy: “I have just had a
most terrible meeting with this terrible
man Stalin...evil and dreadful,” he began.
The British Ambassador interrupted:
“May I remind you, Prime Minister, that
all these rooms have been wired and
Stalin will hear every word you said.”
The next morning, though it was
obvious that Stalin had heard, he was
“very nice and polite and sweet,” Kinna
recalled: “He couldn’t afford to tell Mr.
Churchill to buzz off.” Later on, after
WSC’s return from the Yalta conference,
Kinna recalled that WSC asked to have
his clothes fumigated, suspecting they
had acquired some unwelcome residents.
Churchill had a reputation for
being brusque and inconsiderate with his
staff, but Kinna recalled him as “basically
very kind,” though if he was in full flight
“nothing else mattered and politeness
didn’t come into it.” Secretaries were
instructed never to ask WSC to repeat
himself. As his dictation was fast and
fluent, this was difficult, but Kinna made
sure repeats were kept to a minimum.
After the 1945 election, Churchill,
now Leader of the Opposition, asked
Patrick to stay on, but Kinna had had
enough of long hours—Churchill habitually worked past midnight—and
declined. Ever magnanimous, Churchill
wrote a glowing testimonial (“He is a
man of exceptional diligence, firmness of
character and fidelity”) and nominated
Kinna for an MBE (Member of the Most
Excellent Order of the British Empire).
The two men kept in touch and
always exchanged white pelargoniums on
their birthdays. After Churchill died,
Lady Churchill sent a chauffeur to
Kinna’s home with a present of a set of
elegant tea tables used by her husband.
News of Kinna’s skills reached the
ears of Ernest Bevin, foreign secretary in
the postwar Labour government. “If he
was good enough for Winston, he’s good
enough for me,” Bevin is supposed to
have said. Kinna worked with him until
Bevin’s death in 1951, and in 1991 he
presented a Douglas Robertson Bisset
bronze bust of his former boss to the
Foreign Office, where it has pride of
place on the grand staircase.
Kinna’s subsequent career was a
“bit of an anticlimax.” In the early 1950s
he joined the timber firm Montague
Meyer, rising to personnel director. He
retired in his sixtieth year and went to
live with his sister Gladys in Brighton,
making occasional outings to events
commemorating the lives of the great
men for whom he had worked. In 2000
he was welcomed on board the USS
Winston S. Churchill at the International
Festival of the Sea in Portsmouth. In
2005 he stood alongside HM the Queen
at the opening ceremony of the Churchill
Museum at the Cabinet War Rooms. He
also lectured, donating the fees to charity.
SOME EXERPTS ARE FROM THE
DAILY TELEGRAPH, 18 MARCH 2009.
JOAN BRIGHT ASTLEY
“MISS MONEYPENNY”
LONDON— Joan
Bright Astley
bore unique
witness to the
inner workings
of the British
High Command
during World War II, as a key secretary
on Winston Churchill’s staff.
From 1941 she was responsible for
a special information centre in the
Cabinet War Rooms, supplying confiden-
tial information to British commandersin-chief. From 1943, she accompanied
British delegations to the key conferences
of the “Big Three.”
Her memoir, The Inner Circle
(1971), contained eloquent portraits of
Allied leaders. And she was one of three
or four women Ian Fleming used to form
a composite Miss Moneypenny, a central
character in his James Bond series.
Bright Astley was born in
Argentina, one of seven children of an
English accountant working for a railway
company and his Scottish governess wife.
After a period in Spain, Penelope Joan
McKerrow Bright finished her education
in Bristol, did a secretarial course in
London and worked as a cipher clerk at
the British legation in Mexico City.
In 1936 she declined an offer to
teach English to the family of the Nazi
leader Rudolf Hess, in Munich; she also
passed on a job with Duff Cooper,
working on his biography of Talleyrand.
On the eve of war, she became personal assistant to Colonel Jo Holland,
head of MI(R), a secret war office department exploring ways of causing trouble
inside enemy-occupied countries.
Holland’s staff was small and
mostly amateur, but included Colin
Gubbins, the future head of the Special
Operations Executive. With Sir Peter
Wilkinson, another MI(R) recruit, Bright
Astley would publish the biography
Gubbins & SOE (1993). When SOE
replaced MI(R) in 1940, she remained at
the War Office, assigned to Churchill’s
joint planning committee secretariat in
the Cabinet War Rooms beneath
Whitehall, London. Calling the rooms
“quiet dungeon galleries,” she wrote: “A
noticeboard showed us if it was ‘fine,’
‘wet’ or ‘windy’ outside, red or green >>
AVAILABLE AGAIN! THE OFFICIAL BIOGRAPHY
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Not only are these books affordable (Biographic volumes $45, Companions $35)
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FINEST HoUR 142 / 11
D AT E L I N E S
JOAN BRIGHT ASTLEY...
lights if an air raid was ‘on’ or ‘off.’
From 1941, she ran, for General
Sir Hastings Ismay, Churchill’s defence
chief, an underground information room
where commanders-in-chief could peruse
vital briefing papers in confidence and
seclusion.
General Archibald Wavell, who
became a friend, asked in 1942 that
Bright Astley go to India to establish a
secretariat on the London model.
(Wavell, promoted to Field Marshal, was
appointed Viceroy of India in 1943.)
Ismay refused and, in 1943, made her an
administrative officer for the British delegation meeting the Americans in
Washington. By the end of the war she
had attended six conferences, including
those attended by Roosevelt, Stalin and
Churchill at Teheran and Yalta.
Accommodation had to be
arranged, offices equipped, passes issued.
At Yalta she also had to cope with Soviet
officialdom—and snow. On the journey
to Quebec, General Sir Alan Brooke was
peeved at being allocated a train compartment above the wheels; Wing
Commander Guy Gibson complained:
“They’ve taken away my name. It’s
Dambuster here and Dambuster there.”
During the final conference at Potsdam,
Joan visited the shattered ruins of Hitler’s
chancellery in Berlin: “In one passage
there were hundreds of new Iron Cross
medals strewn about the floor....a grim
and macabre place, its evil spirit hanging
over the grim city it had destroyed.”
Joan Astley was appointed OBE
(Officer of the Most Excellent Order of
the British Empire) in 1946. She attributed her singular war career to solid
training, shorthand skills and luck.
But she also possessed independence, integrity and a warm and disarming
personality. “For Joan,” wrote General
Ismay inside her copy of his memoirs,
“who was loved by admirals and liftmen
alike—and who made a far bigger contribution to the successful working of the
defence machinery than has ever been
recognised.”
In 1949, she married Philip Astley,
a retired army officer who was divorced
from the actress Madeleine Carroll. He
died in 1958. Her son, three grandchildren and a sister survive her.
—THE GUARDIAN
REPRINTED BY KIND PERMISSION, WITH
THANKS TO ALFRED JAMES.
GOSLING UP: “Retire to stud?” Churchill
later joked. “And have it said that the
Prime Minister of Great Britain is living off
the immoral earnings of a horse?”
TOMMY GOSLING
1926-2008
Jockey Tommy
Gosling will forever be linked with two
other indefatigables of the 20th Century:
Churchill and his battling grey thoroughbred, Colonist II, the most popular
English racehorse of the postwar era.
The Scottish jockey rode Winston
Churchill’s colt, then a four-year-old, to
an astonishing eight victories, six in succession, in the 1950 racing season, to the
delight of WSC and the racing public.
(See Fred Glueckstein, “Winston
Churchill and Colonist II,” Finest Hour
125, Winter 2004-05).
Churchill found himself somewhat
in the doldrums as Opposition leader,
and in 1949 his son-in-law, Christopher
Soames, persuaded him to try the avocation of thoroughbreds, despite the doubts
of WSC’s wife. Clementine wrote to a
friend of “a queer new facet in Winston’s
variegated life. I must say I don’t find it
madly amusing.”
Churchill forked out £2000 for the
French-bred thoroughbred and the following year, 1950, Churchill’s trainer
Walter Nightingall enlisted the gritty
Gosling, who had been UK joint champion apprentice jockey of the year in
1945. An injury in 1951 forced the battling grey’s early retirement to stud.
Some political commentators suggested that the horse’s popularity helped
Churchill return to power in 1951, after
having suffered a shock defeat to Labour
in 1945. Friends thought Colonist II’s
success revitalized the Prime Minister,
who was 75 when he bought him. Seeing
the great man cheering Colonist home
reminded ordinary Britons of his human
side, they believed.
Shortly before Gosling died in his
TREMONT, NORMANDY—
FINEST HoUR 142 / 12
retirement home in Normandy, France,
he said one of his proudest possessions
was a painting by Churchill, with a note
of appreciation for what the jockey and
Colonist (“II” had long since been
dropped by the general public) had done
to brighten his twilight years. Churchill,
a great admirer of the Scottish regiments
during the war, said he believed the
Gosling’s will to win had transmitted
itself through the saddle to a horse of the
same nature.
In 1956, Churchill was one of the
first to send a message of support to
Gosling after the jockey’s career almost
ended in both victory and tragedy on the
turf at Leicester Racecourse. He had just
won on a horse called Edison when he
was thrown from the saddle and kicked
in the head. There were fears for his life
but he was back in the saddle within
months and his accident was the catalyst
for the introduction by the Jockey Club
(of which Churchill was by then a
member) of mandatory hard hats under
the traditional silk caps.
Hounded by weight problems,
Gosling retired relatively young in 1963
at the age of 37, having won 363 of more
than 3000 races he rode. But he went on
to become a successful trainer, based at
the Priam Lodge stables in Epsom, for
the next 20 years.
He saddled 129 winners, most
memorably Ardent Dancer in the 1965
Irish 1000 Guineas, his only “classic” win
as a trainer. As a rider, he had won the
same race on Lady Senator in 1961, his
one “classic” success in the saddle. In
1960, he came third in the last “classic”
of the season, the St. Leger at Doncaster,
on Churchill’s horse, Vienna.
Thomas Gosling was born in the
cotton mill village of New Lanark on the
river Clyde on 24 July 1926. After
working as a grocers’ message boy and a
petrol pump attendant, he followed his
dream of becoming a jockey and was
taken on as an apprentice at Lambourn,
Berkshire, known as the “Valley of
Horseracing.” Gosling retired as a trainer
in 1983, going first to Dorking, Surrey,
then to Trémont, Normandy, where he
bred horses until he died on Churchill’s
birthday, aged 82. He is survived by his
second wife, Valerie (née Vickery), and
three sons.
—PHIL DAVISON IN THE FINANCIAL
TIMES; REPRINTED BY KIND PERMISSION. ,
RIDDLES, MYSTERIES, ENIGMAS
Past It After 1945?
Q
I’d be interested in your opinion on the final years of Winston
Churchill’s life, from the end of World War II in 1945 to 1965. My
British friends think little of them. —Arnold Foster, New York City
A
Churchill was a hero and iconic figure
ain America, but in Britain he
remained a politician, and as such as not
uniformly admired. David Stafford wrote
about the relatively equable view of
Churchill among British citizens in “True
Humanity,” Finest Hour 140:50.
Many believe Churchill was “past it”
after the war, or by his second administration (1951-55). Sir Martin Gilbert has
argued convincingly that WSC’s efforts to
build a permanent peace were not those of
a senile has-been.
Douglas Hall in “Churchill the
Great? Why the Vote will not be
Unanimous” (Finest Hour 104) noted: “By
transferring his allegiance from the
Conservatives to the Liberals and back
again he was successively at odds with all of
the people for at least some of the time”
(www.winstonchurchill.org/i4a/pages/index
.cfm?pageid=822).
Some think of Churchill’s last
twenty years as a coda to his prior life: after
World War II, anything would be. The last
ten years were a sad time of aging and
decline—but not 1945-55.
Churchill began as a scintillating
Leader of the Opposition, one of the most
effective in postwar history. But the main
thing that engaged his interest was a quest
for peace in a troubled age. The “Iron
Curtain” speech at Fulton in 1946 was a
decisive moment; so were his speeches on
European reunification at Zurich and The
Hague. In the early 1950s, the irony of
Eisenhower resisting his proposals for a
meeting with Stalin’s successors, and then
immediately meeting with them once WSC
had resigned, is a sad story.
Recommended reading: Martin
Gilbert, Churchill and America for the
Eisenhower-and-Russians controversies;
Anthony Montague Browne, Long Sunset
for the personal side; Anthony Seldon,
Churchill’s Indian Summer, for the most
thorough treatment of the 1951-55 premiership; Martin Gilbert, Winston S.
Churchill, vol. 8, “Never Despair” 19451965 for complete detail on everything.
Be careful of Lord Moran’s
Churchill: The Struggle for Survival.
Martin Gilbert found that much of what
Moran wrote was not in his diary at the
time. It could only have been made up
later. Jock Colville said: “Lord Moran was
never present when history was made, but
he was sometimes invited to lunch afterward,” which is perhaps too harsh, but
nevertheless succinct.
Speaking of Churchill’s health, a very
good but often overlooked piece on his first
stroke by Michael Wardell is “Churchill’s
Dagger: A Memoir of La Capponcina”
(winstonchurchill.org, pageid=1225).
Q
aI am an undergraduate composing a
apaper in my British literature class
about the influences of Winston Churchill.
I have found that he quoted Tennyson in a
number of speeches and writings and am
curious to know if any other authors come
to mind when you think of Churchill.
Namely when Churchill himself wrote in
reference to particular styles or quotations
of other authors.
—ALLISON HAY, UNIVERSITY OF OKLAHOMA
A
aYou ask a good question. He had no
aUniversity training and educated
himself by devouring books his mother sent
him when he was stationed in India in
1896-97: all of the above authors along
with Malthus, Darwin and many more.
You will find those books enumerated in
our “Action This Day” website page
(www.winstonchurchill.org, pageid=176.)
You can access many sources on our
website “search” engine. As a boy WSC
read Walter Scott, George Alfred Henty
and Robert Louis Stevenson. His chief
inspirations were the King James Bible,
Shakespeare, Gibbon, Macaulay, Plato,
Darwin and Malthus. If you enter these
words in “search,” on our home page, you
will be led to numerous references.
Poets: right about Tennyson--there
are seven “hits” on our site. Also try
Clough, Milton, Keats, Byron, Burns,
Blake, Thomas Moore, Emerson, Kipling.
Also enter “Kinglake” (Alexander
William Kinglake, 1809–91). When asked
how to excel at writing history, Churchill
once replied, “Read Kinglake.” There are
FINEST HoUR 142 / 13
Send your questions to the editor
lines in Kinglake’s The
Invasion of the Crimea (1863)
which closely prefigure
Churchill’s style. In an 1898
article on British frontier policy in
India Churchill wrote: “I shall
take refuge in Kinglake’s celebrated
remark, that ‘a scrutiny so minute as to
bring a subject under a false angle of vision
is a poorer guide to a man’s judgment than
the most rapid glance that sees things in
their true proportions.’”
“Churchill and the Art of the
Statesman-Writer,” shows how he strung all
this background together: (winstonchurchill.org, pageid=813).
Check the new book of quotations,
Churchill by Himself. Many quotes of
these authors are included in Churchill’s
remarks.
Finally, Darrell Holley’s Churchill’s
Literary Allusions (MacFarland, 1987) is an
invaluable compendium of hundreds of
Churchill’s sources, organized by subject,
including Shakespeare, Romantic
Literature, Victorian Poets, Macaulay, 19th
and 20th century literature, etc. There are
many copies on www.bookfinder.co: the
cheapest are listed on Amazon. Although
pricey, this is an important work.
Holley’s largest chapter is on the
King James Bible, which he considers
Churchill’s “primary source of interesting
illustrations, descriptive images, and stirring
phrase....For him it is the magnum opus of
Western civilization.” This is an interesting
point, because Winston Churchill was not
a devout observer. Yet he admired the Bible
for its eternal truths and literary quality.
Note: Miss Hays’ paper will shortly
appear in Finest Hour. —Ed.
HILLSDALE’S
OFFICIAL BIOGRAPHY
Q
aWhy did volume IV of the new
edition of Winston S. Churchill
change its title from The Stricken World to
World in Torment?
A
The titles of all volumes in the new
aedition, both narrative and document, are determined by Sir Martin
Gilbert. It was also Martin’s idea to contrive a new and less confusing numbering
system for the document volumes.
—DOUGLAS JEFFREY, EDITOR, HILLSDALE
COLLEGE PRESS, HILLSDALE, MICHIGAN ,
125-100-75-50 YEARS AGO
125 YEARS AGO:
Spring 1884 • Age 9
“Cannot be trusted to behave...”
by Michael McMenamin
W
inston was in what was to be his
last term at St. George’s school
and his record was not improving. His
report for March shows the low regard in
which he was held by the Headmaster:
“Diligence. Conduct has been exceedingly bad. He is not to be trusted to do
any one thing. He has however notwithstanding made decided progress. General
Conduct. Very bad—is a constant
trouble to everybody and is always in
some scrape or other. Headmaster’s
Remarks. He cannot be trusted to behave
himself anywhere.”
By 20 June the Headmaster’s
review was only slightly improved.
“General Conduct. Better—but still troublesome. Headmaster’s Remarks. He has
no ambition—if he were really to exert
himself he might yet be first at the end of
the Term.” Churchill left St. George’s at
the end of the Summer Term in 1884,
never to return.
100 YEARS AGO:
Spring 1909 • Age 34
“A mind that has influenced...”
I
n early April 1909, Churchill had a
sharp exchange of letters with the
Conservative MP Alfred Lyttelton, who
he believed had publicly accused him of
leaking Cabinet secrets. Lyttelton denied
the accusation and claimed in a letter to
Churchill that newspaper reports
improperly juxtaposed his comments to
give an inaccurate impression. Churchill
replied that Lyttelton’s comments
“might, without the sacrifice of any argumentative advantage, have been couched
in a more gracious style. Still since it
clearly & specifically repudiates any
intention to make a personal charge
against the Ministers whose names you
mentioned, I express my thanks for it, &
my regrets to have put you to any
trouble.” Churchill, however, couldn’t
resist a final jab at his former
Conservative Party colleagues: “Had it
not been for the sentence to which I have
referred, I should certainly not have
written to you about your speech. I know
how hard it is sometimes to find things
to say....”
During this period, Churchill’s
letters kept his wife informed in some
detail about parliamentary proceedings.
On 27 April 1909, when the bill to raise
his salary as President of the Board of
Trade was under consideration, he wrote
to her that “the debate last night was poisonous.” The next night went better: “I
write this line from the Bench. The Trade
Boards Bill has been beautifully received
& will be passed without division.
A[rthur] Balfour & Alfred Lyttelton were
most friendly to it, & all opposition has
faded away.” Then Churchill turned to
domestic matters—the library in their
new home: “You certainly have made a
most judicious selection of carpets & I
entirely approve it. I am not quite convinced upon the stained boards in the
Library—but it does not press. The work
is going on vy well. The bookshelves are
being put in the cases & the colour is
being most attractively polished.”
On 30 May 1909, Churchill
attended Army maneuvers with his regiment and, to Clementine, was critical of
what he had observed, noting how much
better he could have done:
I daresay you read in the papers about
the Field day. My poor face was roasted
like a chestnut and burns dreadfully.
We had an amusing day. There were
lots of soldiers & pseudo soldiers galloping about, & the 8 regiments of
yeomanry made a brave show. But the
field day was not in my judgment well
carried out – for on one side the
infantry force was so widely extended
FINEST HoUR 142 / 14
that it could not have been used with
any real effect, & on the other the
mounted men failed to profit by this
dangerous error. These military men vy
often fail altogether to see the simple
truths underlying the relationships of
all armed forces, & how the levers of
power can be used upon them. Do you
know I would greatly like to have some
practice in the handling of large forces.
Later in the same letter, he invited
her to meet his mentor:
Bourke Cockran—a great friend of
mine—has just arrived in England
from U.S.A. He is a remarkable
fellow—perhaps the finest orator in
America, with a gigantic C. J. Fox
head—& a mind that has influenced
my thought in more than one important direction. I have asked him to
lunch on Friday at H of C & shall go
to London that day to get my Money
Resolution on the Trade Boards Bill.
But what do you say to coming up too
& giving us both (& his pretty young
wife) lunch at Eccleston?
75 YEARS AGO:
Spring 1934 • Age 59
“We might learn something from
your German friends.”
Churchill was preoccupied almost exclusively during the spring of 1934 with the
Committee of Privileges investigation
into the question he had raised against
the Secretary of State for India, Samuel
Hoare, and Lord Derby, for improperly
pressuring the Manchester Chamber of
Commerce to revise evidence it had submitted to the Joint Select Committee on
Indian Constitutional Reform. The bulk
of the correspondence for this period in
Winston S. Churchill, Companion
Volume V, Part 2, the official biography
by Sir Martin Gilbert, is concerned with
this subject.
Notwithstanding this preoccupation, Churchill gave a speech in the
Commons on 14 March, highly critical
of Prime Minister Ramsay MacDonald’s
failed policy of disarmament:
False ideas have been spread about the
country that disarmament means
peace. The Disarmament Conference
has brought us steadily nearer—I will
not say to war because I share the
repulsion from using that word, but
nearer to a pronounced state of ill-will
than anything that could be imagined.
So in the end what have we got? We
have not got disarmament. We have
the rearmament of Germany.
Churchill then went on to explain how
an alliance with a France that had disarmed, as the British government had
urged. would have made it more likely to
involve Britain in a European conflict:
Suppose France had taken the advice
which we have tendered during the last
four or five years, and had yielded to
the pressure of the two great Englishspeaking nations to set an example of
disarmament....what would be the
position today? Where should we be?
I honour the French for their resolute
determination to preserve the freedom
and security of their country from
invasion of any kind; I earnestly hope
that we, in arranging our forces, shall
not fall below their example....The
Romans had a maxim, “Shorten your
weapons and lengthen your frontiers.”
But our maxim seems to be, “Diminish
your weapons and increase your obligations.” Aye, and diminish the weapons
of your friends.
On 21 March, Churchill addressed
the necessity of creating a Ministry of
Defense over the three services of the
Army, Navy and the Air Force. Ironically,
in doing so, he held up the new Nazi
regime in Germany as a model to follow:
In organizing industry, not only actually but prospectively, surely we might
learn something from our German
friends, who are building up an
entirely new army and other fighting
Services, and who have the advantage
of building them up from what is
called a clean-swept table—starting fair
in the respect, unhampered indeed. I
have been told that they have created
what is called a ‘weapon office,’ or
Waffenamt, which makes for all the
three arms of the Service which they
are so busily developing. It seems to
me that this expression, ‘weapon
office,’ is pregnant, and that it might
well enter into and be incorporated in
our thought at the present time.
During this period, Churchill was
also adding to his reputation as one of
England’s most prolific and well-paid
journalists. A list of his published articles
during the spring of 1934 demonstrates
the range of his interests:
“Singapore—Key to the Pacific,”
Pictorial Weekly, 24 March 1934.
“Penny-in-the-Slot Politics,”
Answers, 31 March 1934.
“The Greatest Half-Hour in Our
History,” Daily Mail,13 April 1934.
“Fill Up The Empire!,” Pictorial
Weekly, 14 April 1934.
“Have You A Hobby?,” Answers,
21 April 1934.
“Let’s Boost Britain,” Answers, 28
April 1934.
“A Silent Toast To William Willet,”
Pictorial Weekly, 28 April 1934. (See
Finest Hour 114 or our website.)
“What’s Wrong with Parliament?,”
Answers, 5 May 1934.
“This Year’s Royal Academy Is
Exhilarating,.” Daily Mail, 16 May 1934.
“Great Deeds that Gave Us the
Empire,” Daily Mail, 24 May 1934.
50 YEARS AGO:
Spring 1959 • Age 84
“The President is a real friend”
C
hurchill made plans to visit America.
His private secretary, Anthony
Montague Browne, wrote to Bernard
Baruch: “I should tell you for your
strictly private information that Sir
Winston has not been very well, and we
were in doubt as to whether he should
go. However, he is determined to visit
America again, so that is that! I know
that you will safeguard him from fatigue
as much as possible.”
From Washington, Churchill wrote
to his wife on 5 May:
Here I am. All goes well & the President
is a real friend. We had a most pleasant
dinner last night, & I caught up my
arrears of sleep in eleven hours. I am
FINEST HoUR 142 / 15
Churchill, Montague Browne and President Eisenhower, May 1959.
invited to stay in bed all the morning &
am going to see Mr. Dulles after
luncheon. Anthony will send you more
news. I send my fondest love darling.
The visit went well and, in a report to
the Foreign Office, Montague Browne
wrote: that during the three days spent in
the White House Eisenhower showed an
affectionate care and consideration for Sir
Winston and spent a great deal of time
with him: “He looked well and seemed
alert. He said that he is troubled by deafness, but this was not apparent.”
Montague Brown continued:
His working day seems to be from
about half-past eight in the morning
until luncheon. In the afternoon, when
he was not with Sir Winston, he
seemed either to be resting or taking
light exercise.
The President spoke with what seemed
relief of the approach of the end of his
tenure. I do not think that this was
assumed. In general he seemed rather
less than optimistic….At one point he
concluded his remarks about the future
of NATO with approximately these
words: ‘The big question is, will the
West have the endurance and the
tenacity and the courage to keep up
the struggle long enough?’ (Mr.
McElroy spoke in rather similar terms
to Sir Winston and hinted to him that
Great Britain was not pulling its
weight in defence matters. I did not
hear this conversation, but Sir Winston
said that the sense of it was quite
clear.)
To sum up, the President seemed
relaxed, healthy and following a régime
that was light enough to keep him so.
His outlook seemed on the melancholy
side, and it did not appear that his
mind was receptive to ideas differing
,
from those he already held.
GREAT CONTEMPORARIES
CHARTWELL, 19 SEPTEMBER 1931. From left: Mr. Punch, Mary Churchill’s pug (known for “committing
indiscretions” on the carpet), The Hon Tom Mitford, Clementine’s cousin and great friend of Diana and Randolph, the only
brother of the Mitford sisters, killed in Burma in 1945; Freddie Birkenhead (Second Earl of Birkenhead) who had
succeeded his father, Churchill’s best friend, the previous year and became a historian and his father’s
biographer; Winston Churchill; Clementine Churchill (then aged 46), Diana (22), Randolph (20), Charlie Chaplin (46).
Churchill and Chaplin
A PERFECT COMBINATION OR THE ORIGINAL ODD COUPLE?
CHAPLIN FIRST THOUGHT CHURCHILL ABRUPT, BUT AFTER A DEBATE ABOUT THE
NEW LABOUR GOVERNMENT THEY STAYED UP TALKING UNTIL 3 AM.
CHURCHILL THOUGHT CHAPLIN “BOLSHY IN POLITICS & DELIGHTFUL IN
CONVERSATION,” AND WAS CERTAIN HE SHOULD PLAY THE LEAD IN THE NEXT FILM
ABOUT NAPOLEON—AND IF HE WOULD, WSC PROMISED TO WRITE THE SCRIPT.
BRADLEY P. TOLPPANEN
Mr. Tolppanen ([email protected]) is a librarian and history bibliographer at Booth Library, Eastern Illinois University, Charleston, Illinois.
FINEST HoUR 142 / 16
O
n 14 December 1940, as Britain struggled alone
against a triumphant Nazi Germany, the British
Prime Minister briefly set aside his heavy
responsibilities to watch “The Great Dictator”
with his family and advisers. They were at
Ditchley Park, Oxfordshire, placed at his disposal by its
owner, Ronald Tree MP, on nights when the full moon
made Chequers, the PM’s official country house in
Buckinghamshire, too inviting a target.
An avid film lover, Churchill enjoyed this pre-release
viewing of a production that not only lampooned Hitler
but starred and was directed by his friend Charlie
Chaplin. He laughed through it, especially the scene
where two dictators threw food at each other. It ended,
and he returned to his immense workload, composing
another secret cable to President Franklin D. Roosevelt.1
Churchill had met Chaplin over a decade earlier,
during WSC’s tour of North America, shortly after the
Conservatives had been defeated in the 1929 election and
Churchill had resigned as Chancellor of the Exchequer.
Despite sharp political differences, he and Chaplin had
come to admire and appreciate each others’ qualities, and
Chaplin had twice been Churchill’s guest at Chartwell.
Churchill in 1929 was a world renowned soldier,
war correspondent, historian, author, journalist and
Member of Parliament, not to mention painter, bricklayer
and traveler. Accompanying him on his trip were his 18year old son Randolph, his brother Jack, and his
20-year-old nephew Johnny. WSC dubbed the party the
“Churchill Troupe.”
Welcoming them in Los Angeles was newspaper
magnate William Randolph Hearst, their host in southern
California. Hearst introduced the Churchills to the city’s
film industry, which Winston later called “a strange and
an amusing world.”2 They attended receptions in their
honor, toured movie studios, and met several film stars,
including the actress Marion Davies, Hearst’s long-time
mistress and a former chorus-girl.
Davies, whose parties were legendary, quickly
arranged for the Churchills to be entertained at a starstudded festivity. It was probably she who convinced her
close friend Charlie Chaplin to come; the other celebrities
were delivered by Hearst, who had told Randolph and
Johnny to prepare a list of all the stars they wished to meet
and leave it to him. The only notable to elude him was the
reclusive Greta Garbo.3
On September 21st, after a day of touring Los
Angeles, the “Churchill Troupe” motored north to Ocean
House, Davies’ opulent mansion in Santa Monica. Hearst
had spent $7,000,000 expanding the villa to 110 rooms,
importing furnishings from European castles.4 Eighteen
columns lined its beach façade, prompting Chaplin to
quip that there were “more columns than the Supreme
Court building.” An impressed Churchill called it a
“palace on the ocean.”5
After bathing in Davies’ heated Italian marble swimming pool, Winston and his party dressed for dinner with
sixty glitterati, including Mary Brian, Billie Dove, Bessie
Love, Bebe Daniels, Dorothy Mackaill, Wallace Beery,
Harold Lloyd and Pola Negri.6 The most famous guest
was certainly Chaplin. After a Dickensian childhood in
London he had built a long career as a comedian and filmmaker, and was declared by some newspapers the most
famous figure in the world, known to millions through
his unforgettable performances as the “Little Tramp.”
Chaplin was milling about with other guests when
Churchill arrived, accompanied by Hearst. Chaplin
recalled the future prime minister standing apart,
“Napoleon-like with his hand in his waistcoat” as he
watched the dancing.7 He seemed lost and out of place, so
Hearst waved Chaplin over and introduced him to the
English statesman.
At first Chaplin found Churchill abrupt in manner,
but when he started talking about Britain’s new Labour
government Churchill brightened. “What I don’t understand is that in England the election of a socialist
government does not alter the status of a King and
Queen,” Chaplin remarked.
“Of course not,” Churchill replied with a quick
glance that Chaplin thought “humorously challenging.”
“I thought socialists were opposed to a monarchy,”
Chaplin persisted.
“If you were in England we’d cut your head off for
that remark,” Churchill countered with a laugh.8
The dinner party was a great success. Davies persuaded Chaplin to join her in impersonations. She did
Sarah Bernhardt and Lillian Gish, he played Napoleon,
Uriah Heep, Henry Irving, and John Barrymore as
Hamlet.9 The Davies-Chaplin duo then performed a
complicated dance, during which Johnny Churchill
noticed that Charlie’s feet were small enough to fit into
Marion’s shoes.10
In a sure sign of favor, Churchill kept Chaplin up
until three in the morning. He wanted Chaplin to take on
the role of a young Napoleon as his next film; if Chaplin
would do it, Churchill promised to write the script.
“You must do it,” Churchill pressed, describing the
opportunities the role presented for drama and comedy.
“Think of its possibilities for humour. Napoleon in his
bathtub arguing with his imperious brother who’s all
dressed up, bedecked in gold braid, and using this opportunity to place Napoleon in a position of inferiority. But
Napoleon, in his rage, deliberately splashes water over his
brother’s fine uniform and he has to exit ignominiously
from him. This is not alone clever psychology. It is action
and fun.”11
Randolph Churchill had not immediately recognized Chaplin, but wrote in his diary that the actor was
“absolutely superb and enchanted everyone.”12 Chaplin in
turn was impressed by Randolph’s father, who he >>
FINEST HoUR 142 / 17
GREAT CONTEMPORARIES
SUNSET BOULEVARD, LOS ANGELES, 24 SEPTEMBER 1929: Chaplin played host to Winston, Jack, Randolph and Johnny Churchill at
his studio, where he presented three private film showings including the rushes for Chaplin’s upcoming silent film “City Lights.” The great
actor hoped that the silent film was not dead; Churchill said that if anybody could keep it alive it was Charlie Chaplin.
CHURCHILL AND CHAPLIN...
thought dynamic with “a thirst for accomplishment” as
well as a wonderful talker who could “rattle off brilliant
epigrams.”13
Chaplin met Churchill several more times during
the visit to Los Angeles, including an evening when he
dined with the Churchills in their suite at the Biltmore
Hotel. The actor spent a delightful evening listening to
Winston and Randolph pleasantly bantering.14
On September 24th, Chaplin hosted the Churchill
party at his studio at Sunset Boulevard and La Brea
Avenue. After lunch, Chaplin showed them around and
provided a private screening of his 1918 film “Shoulder
Arms,” one of his great movies, followed by the rushes for
his upcoming silent classic, “City Lights.”15
Churchill and Chaplin discussed the revolution in
progress by the introduction of “talkies.” Chaplin
acknowledged the popularity of the new form but was
unwilling to concede the demise of the silent film, which
he called the true “genius of drama.”16 Churchill said
“City Lights” was Chaplin’s attempt to prove silent films
superior to talkies, and predicted an “easy victory” for the
production.17
“City Lights” was followed by film from Chaplin’s
archives that had never been produced. Johnny
Churchill, in his memoirs, described one scene considered particularly unsuitable. Chaplin had wanted to film
the rapid harnessing of a horse-drawn fire engine, but
found that putting a harness on a horse took too much
time; so he filmed the harness being taken off (a quicker
process), intending then to reverse the film. Alas the
horse relieved itself while the scene was being filmed,
and when the footage was reversed Johnny saw “the
horse’s matter” leap off the ground and disappear back
inside the animal!18
That evening the Churchills and Chaplin accompanied Marion Davies to the premiere of “Cock-Eyed
World” at Grauman’s Chinese Theatre, where a crowd
including an array of film stars had gathered for hours.
The hoopla did not prevent Randolph Churchill from
loudly denouncing the film as the worst he had ever seen.
Davies apparently forgave him, hosting a dinner at the
Roosevelt Hotel where sherry and champagne were served
despite the strictures of Prohibition.19
A few days later, after leaving Los Angeles, Churchill
recounted his, Randolph’s and Johnny’s fascination with
Chaplin: “a marvelous comedian—bolshy in politics &
delightful in conversation.”(Although a common enough
expression, this is the only occurrence of “bolshy” in
Churchill’s 15 million published words.)20
FINEST HoUR 142 / 18
I
n February 1931 Chaplin came to England for the
premiere of “City Lights,” the first leg of a world
tour. Welcomed by excited crowds, he met a host
of public figures, and lunched at Chequers with
Labour Prime Minister Ramsay Macdonald.21
Inevitably Chaplin was invited to Chartwell, on
February 25th; Churchill asked his onetime Parliamentary
Private Secretary Robert Boothby MP, to accompany the
actor from London.22 Chaplin was accompanied by his
friend Ralph Barton, an artist and cartoonist who had
joined him for the early part of his tour.
They arrived on a bitterly cold evening, but Chaplin
thought Chartwell a beautiful country residence, “modestly furnished, but in good taste with a family feeling
about it.”23 He bathed and dressed in Churchill’s own
bedroom, noticing that it was piled high with papers and
had books stacked against every wall. Among the volumes
were a set of Plutarch’s Lives, the Parliamentary Debates
(Hansard), and several books on Napoleon. Chaplin mentioned the latter to Churchill, who replied, “Yes. I am a
great admirer of his.”24 Probably they again discussed
Chaplin’s prospective role as the young Emperor, though
Churchill never wrote the script, which he had hoped to
do for the producer Alexander Korda.
Along with Boothby, Churchill had invited Brendan
Bracken, another young MP and loyal follower. Though
Clementine Churchill was away, Winston’s brother Jack
and nephew Johnny were on hand, along with two of
Winston’s daughters: 21-year-old Diana and eight-yearold Mary, who was allowed to stay up for the occasion by
what WSC termed a “special arrangement.”25
The evening had a difficult start when Chaplin
remarked that Britain’s return to the Gold Standard in
1925 (under Churchill as Chancellor) had been a great
mistake, and then launched into a long soliloquy which
Johnny Churchill deemed “pacifist and communist.”26
Winston fell into a moody silence and Johnny felt badly
for Chaplin.
But the actor was himself no mean judge of human
reactions. Suddenly changing course, he began to
perform. Sticking forks into two bread rolls, he did a
dance from his film “Gold Rush”; the ice melted,
everyone relaxed, and an enjoyable dinner ensued.27
Chaplin thought the evening “dialectic,” as Churchill
harangued his guests with humor and wit.
In a momentary lapse back into contentious subjects, Bracken declared Gandhi a “menace” to the peace in
India. Chaplin replied forcefully that “Gandhis or Lenins”
do not start revolutions, but are forced up by the masses
and usually voice the want of a people. (Later in the year,
Chapin would visit Gandhi in London.)
“You should run for Parliament,” Churchill said
with a laugh.
“No, sir, I prefer to be a motion picture actor these
days,” Chaplin replied. “However, I believe we should go
with evolution to avoid revolution, and there’s every evidence that the world needs a drastic change.” He later
noted that both he and Churchill were all for progressive
government, and that even Churchill believed much had
to be done to preserve civilization and guide it safely back
to normal after the Depression ended.28
To his wife, Churchill wrote that Chaplin had been
“most agreeable” and had performed “various droll
tricks.” Both Churchill daughters enjoyed the actor’s performances, young Mary being “absolutely thrilled.”29
Two nights later Chaplin premiered “City Lights” in
London at the Dominion Theatre. Churchill probably did
not attend the film, but was present at a party for 200
guests afterwards at the Carlton Hotel. Here Churchill
proposed the toast, saying Chaplin was “a lad from across
the river” who had “achieved the world’s affection.”
Speaking in reply, Chaplin stumbled by referring to
Churchill as “my friend, the late Chancellor of the
Exchequer.” Churchill laughed: “The late, the late! I like
that—the late.” Embarrassed, Chaplin replied: “Pardon
me. I mean the Ex—the Ex-Chancellor of the
Exchequer.” Amid laughs he started over again with the
more appropriate, “My friend, Mr. Winston Churchill.”30
Eric Whelpton, a Conservative back-bencher, told a
whimsical story that must have occurred during Chaplin’s
London visit. He was approaching the St. Stephen’s >>
CARLTON HOTEL, 27 FEBRUARY 1931: Churchill toasts Chaplin
(seated) as “a lad from across the river” who had “achieved the world’s
affection” following the premiere of “City Lights.” Seated next to Chaplin
(at left in photo) was his co-star Virginia Cherrill. Flustered by WSC’s
praise, Chaplin thanked “the late Chancellor of the Exchequer.”
FINEST HoUR 142 / 19
GREAT CONTEMPORARIES
CHURCHILL AND CHAPLIN...
entrance to Parliament when he was approached by an
interesting trio, arms linked. Churchill was in the centre,
Chaplin on one flank and Bracken on the other.
“Apparently oblivious of bystanders, they were in high
spirits, as if someone had just told a droll story,” wrote a
Bracken biographer.
Whelpton, who had been with Bracken at their
public school, Sedbergh, smiled across in recognition as
the trio sauntered past. “It was then that the unexpected
happened. Without releasing his arm from Churchill’s,
Bracken looked across at Whelpton and said tersely and
without a hint of amusement, ‘I don’t wish to know you,
so kindly bugger off.’”
Evidently Bracken, the arch-Conservative, had
fallen like Churchill for Chaplin’s charms. Whelpton
dined out on that story for weeks.31
From London, Charlie Chaplin made a triumphal
tour across Europe, opening “City Lights” to enthusiastic
crowds in Vienna, Berlin and Paris. He probably met and
lunched with Churchill at Biarritz in August, where
Churchill had arrived on a research trip for his biography
of John Churchill, First Duke of Marlborough.
The following month, with both of them back in
England, Chaplin again visited Chartwell, probably
arriving on Friday, September 18th, and staying through
Sunday. Clementine was present, along with all their children. Bracken, Winston’s brother Jack, the young Lord
Birkenhead, Tom Mitford, Venetia Montagu, Rudolf
Kommer, and Gabrielle L’Honore also signed the visitors
book.32 Sarah Churchill said she and her siblings were surprised by the actor’s appearance: a “rather good-looking,
desperately serious man with almost white hair.”33
At lunch that weekend Churchill attempted to talk
about films and acting, but Chaplin was again eager to
discuss politics, a disappointment to the others at
Churchill’s so-often-political table. Eventually WSC
asked what Chaplin’s next role would be. “Jesus Christ,”
Chaplin replied with all seriousness.
After a pause Churchill asked, “Have you cleared
the rights?” There was a silent pause before Clementine
returned the conversation to politics.34
Chaplin was amused by Churchill’s family sitting
unmoved at the table while WSC held forth, despite being
interrupted by telephone calls from Lord Beaverbrook,
and other demands.35
During the visit, Chaplin expressed interest in
Churchill’s hobbies, painting and bricklaying. Examining
one of his host’s paintings over the fireplace in the dining
room, Chaplin said, “But how remarkable.” Churchill
replied: “Nothing to it—saw a man painting a landscape
in the South of France and said, ‘I can do that.’”36
On a stroll along the brick walls Churchill had constructed, Chaplin remarked that bricklaying must be
“
Then there was the great day
when Charlie Chaplin arrived. We
children adored his films, and were in
a fever of excitement....Just as he
was about to leave he said: ‘Is there a
walking stick?’—’Yes,’ we said and
pointed to the hall cupboard. He disappeared into it and emerged with a
bowler hat and a stick. In a twinkling
of an eye there was the little figure
that had endeared itself to us and to
millions all over the world. And this
wasn’t the only thing he did, he gave
some very amusing mimicry of other
actors. The day was made for us
and we were sorry to see him go.
“
—Sarah Churchill
A Thread in the Tapestry
New York: Dodd Mead, 1967
difficult. “I’ll show you how and you’ll do it in five
minutes,” said his host. And he did.
Just before Chaplin left, he asked, “Is there a
FINEST HoUR 142 / 20
walking stick?” He was directed to a cupboard, only to
emerge moments later with a bowler hat and stick,
instantly transformed from the serious guest to the
endearing “Little Tramp.” His “enchanting performance”
impersonating other actors included his John Barrymore
in Hamlet’s “To Be or Not To Be”—while picking his
nose! “The day was made for us,” Sarah wrote, “and we
were sorry to see him go.”37
Chaplin, who had really come to know Churchill on
this visit, concluded that WSC had charming family, lived
well and had more fun than most people. Although poles
apart politically, Chaplin considered him a “sincere
patriot” who had played for the highest stakes and had
sometimes won, though his friend’s political future was at
that time doubtful.
That weekend visit was the last substantial meeting
between Churchill and Chaplin. They remained friendly,
but at a distance. In 1932 Chaplin joined Bracken and
other Churchill friends in contributing to a gift for WSC
after his car injury in New York City: a new Daimler,
which had cost £2000, and presented to Churchill upon
his return from America.38
Churchill made use of his personal knowledge to
pen an article on Chaplin in 1935, writing of the actor’s
film-making brilliance.39 The following year Randolph
Churchill visited Hollywood and had tea with Chaplin
and Paulette Goddard. They had long been rumored to be
secretly married and Randolph was apparently given permission to reveal this was indeed true. The scoop was
transmitted worldwide with Randolph Churchill’s name
attached. Randolph’s sister, Sarah became an actress
herself, and visited Chaplin after World War II.40
A final, brief meeting between Chaplin and
Churchill occurred on 25 April 1956, after Churchill had
retired and Chaplin was living in Switzerland, having
been barred from reentering the United States at the
height of the McCarthy era in 1952. They met at the
Savoy Grill in London: a rather strained encounter,
Chaplin said, because he had failed to respond to a letter
Churchill had sent congratulating him on his film
“Limelight” two years before.
Chaplin told WSC he thought his letter was
charming but did not think it required a reply. Somewhat
mollified, Churchill accepted his explanation, adding, “…
I always enjoy your pictures.”41
Endnotes
1. John Colville, The Fringes of Power, 2 vols.
(Sevenoaks, Kent: Sceptre Publishing, 1986-87), I: 375.
2. Winston S. Churchill, “Peter Pan Township of
the Films,” Daily Telegraph, 30 December 1929, 8.
3. John Spencer Churchill, A Churchill Canvas
(Boston: Little, Brown, 1962), 90.
4. Anne Edwards, “Marion Davies’ Ocean House,”
Architectural Digest 51:4, April 1994, 171-72.
5. Martin Gilbert, editor,Winston S. Churchill,
Companion Volume V Part 2, The Wilderness Years
1929-1935 (London: Heinemann, Boston: Houghton
Mifflin, 1981), 97.
6. Randolph S. Churchill, Twenty-One Years
(Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1965), 89. John Spencer
Churchill, 91.
7. Charlie Chaplin, My Autobiography (New York:
Simon and Schuster, 1964), 339.
8. Ibid. 339.
9. Randolph S. Churchill, 89-90.
10. John Spencer Churchill, 91.
11. Charles Chaplin, “A Comedian Sees the
World,” Woman’s Home Companion, 60:10, October
1933, 15.
12. Randolph S. Churchill, 90.
13. Chaplin, “A Comedian Sees the World,” 15.
14. Chaplin, My Autobiography, 340.
15. Randolph S. Churchill, 90.
16. Winston Churchill, “Peter Pan Township,” 8.
17. Gilbert, 97.
18. John Spencer Churchill, 92-93.
19. Randolph Churchill, 90.
20. Richard M. Langworth, Churchill by Himself
(London: Ebury Press, 2008), 331.
21. “Mr. Charles Chaplin: A Visit To Chequers,”
The Times, 23 February 1931, 9.
22. Robert Boothby, Recollections of a Rebel
(London: Hutchinson, 1978), 51.
23. Chaplin, My Autobiography, 340.
24. Ibid. 341.
25. Gilbert, 282.
26. Boothby, 51. John Spencer Churchill, 133.
27. Boothby, 51.
28. Chaplin, “A Comedian Sees the World,” 15.
29. Gilbert, 282.
30. Chaplin, “A Comedian Sees the World,” 15.
31. Andrew Boyle, Poor, Dear Brendan (London:
Hutchinson, 1974), 174.
32. Chartwell Visitors Book.
33. Sarah Churchill, A Thread in the Tapestry
(New York: Dodd, Mead, 1967), 35.
34. Ibid. 35.
35. Chaplin, My Autobiography, 341.
36. Ibid. 340.
37. Sarah Churchill, A Thread in the Tapestry, 3536.
38. Gilbert, 394.
39. Winston S. Churchill, “Everybody’s Language,”
Collier’s, 26 October 1935, 24.
40. “Randolph Churchill Says Chaplin is Wed,”
The New York Times, 11 November 1936, 55. Sarah
Churchill, Keep on Dancing: An Autobiography
(London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1981), 130.
41. Chaplin, My Autobiography, 484.
,
FINEST HoUR 142 / 21
FROM THE CANON
I
n a room in St. Thomas’
Hospital, London, a
man lay dying. He had
had a good life—a full
life. He had been a
favourite in the music halls.
He had tasted the triumphs
of the stage. He had won a
measure of fame as a singer.
His home life had been
happy. And now death had
come for him. While he was
yet in the prime of manhood,
with success still sweet in his
mouth, the curtain was
falling—and forever.
The other windows of
the hospital were dark. In this
one alone a light burned. And
below it, outside in the darkness, shivering with cold and
numbed with fear, a child
stood sobbing. He had been
told that there was no hope,
but his wild heart prayed for
the miracle that could not
happen, even while he waited
for the light to go out and the
compassionate hesitations
that would tell him his father
Everybody’s Language
“HAD THEIR PRODUCERS AND STARS LEARNED FROM CHAPLIN AND THE
EUROPEANS, THE SILENT SCREEN MIGHT HAVE DEFIED THE TALKIES.
PANTOMIME IS THE TRUE UNIVERSAL LANGUAGE.
WINSTON S. CHURCHILL
was no more. The dying man and the child outside the
window both bore the same name—Charles Chaplin.
Destiny shifts us here and there upon the chequerboard of life, and we know not the purpose behind the
moves. His father’s death brought a safe, comfortable world
First published in Collier’s, 26 October, 1935; later published as “He
Has Made the Whole World Richer” (Sunday Chronicle, London, 9
February, 1936); and “Chaplin—The Man Who Has Made the World
Rich with Laughter” (Screen Pictorial, May 1936). Reprinted by kind
permission of Winston S. Churchill. Cohen C480.
crashing about Charlie Chaplin’s head, and plunged his
mother, his brother and himself into poverty. But poverty is
not a life sentence. It is a challenge. To some it is more—it is
an opportunity. It was so to this child of the theatre. In the
kaleidoscopic life of London’s mean streets he found tragedy
and comedy—and learned that their springs lie side by side.
He knew the problems of the poor, not from the aloof
angle of the social investigator, but at first hand. They were
his mother’s problems—and his own. But the very struggle
of life gave a new zest to common things. And upon the
margin of subsistence human nature has few reticences. It
FINEST HoUR 142 / 22
reveals itself far more clearly and fully than in more sheltered surroundings. So daily Charlie’s keen eyes noted some
new aspect of the exposed expanse of life around him.
In somewhat similar circumstances, many years before,
another boy had found, amid the rank luxuriance of
London life, a key to fame and fortune. He also had been
desperately poor. He also had missed much that should be
the birthright of every child. But the alchemy of genius
transmuted bitterness and suffering into the gold of great
literature and gave us the novels of Charles Dickens.
Between these two there is, I think, an essential similarity. Both knew hardness in childhood. Both made their
misfortunes stepping-stones to success. They developed
along different lines, chose different mediums of expression, but both quarried in the same rich mine of common
life and found there treasure of laughter and drama for the
delight of all mankind.
Mark Twain, left fatherless at twelve, had substantially the same experience, though in a different setting. He
would never have written Huckleberry Finn had life been
kinder in his youth. So we need not regret the shadows that
fell over Charlie Chaplin’s early life. Without them his gifts
might have shone less brightly, and the whole world would
have been poorer. Genius is essentially a hardy plant. It
thrives in the east wind. It withers in a hothouse. That is, I
believe, true in every walk of life.
The reason the historic English families have produced so many men of distinction is that, on the whole,
they have borne great responsibilities rather than enjoyed
great wealth. Their younger sons, especially, have usually
had to make their own way in the world, to stand on their
own feet, to rely on their own merits and their own efforts.
I am glad that I had to earn my living from the time that I
was a young man. Had I been born heir to millions I
should certainly have had a less interesting life.
Naturally and inevitably, once school days were over,
the youthful Charlie Chaplin found his way on to the
stage. And when he was twenty-one he signed a contract
which took him to the United States and Canada with the
Fred Karno Comedy Company. This American tour was, in
some ways, as important to the development of the
Chaplin that we know as were his early days in London. It
was one of the great formative experiences of his career. We
in England like to think of Charlie Chaplin as an
Englishman, but America gave a new direction, a new edge
to his quality. It opened to him new fields of character and
circumstance.
Twenty-five years ago, when the young actor crossed
the Atlantic, life in the States was more fluid than in
England—more fluid perhaps than it is today. Its forms
had not set. Personalities were more important than conventions. Democracy was not only a political institution
but a social fact. Class distinctions mattered comparatively
little when the hired hand of today was so often the
employer of tomorrow, and the majority of professional
men had paid for their university training with the work of
their hands.
Tramps and Hobos
Even poverty wore a different face in America. It was
not the bitter, grinding destitution Charlie had encountered in the London slums and which has now, thanks to
the extension of social services, largely disappeared. In
many cases it was a poverty deliberately chosen, rather than
imposed from without.
Every cinema-goer is familiar with the Chaplin
tramps, but I wonder how many of them have reflected
how characteristically American are these homeless wanderers. In the dwindling ranks of the English tramps one
finds all sorts of people—from varsity graduate whose
career has ended in ruin and disgrace, to the half-imbecile
illiterate who has been unemployable since boyhood. But
they all have one thing in common—they belong to the
great army of the defeated. They still maintain the pretence
of looking for work—but they do not expect to find it.
They are spiritless and hopeless.
The American hobo of the early 1900s was of an
entirely different type. Often he was not so much an
outcast from society as a rebel against it. He could not
settle down, either in a home or a job. He hated the
routine of regular employment and loved the changes and
chances of the road. Behind his wanderings was something
of the old adventurous urge that sent the covered wagons
lumbering across the prairie towards the sunset.
There were also upon the highways of America, in
the days of prosperity, many men who were not tramps at
all in the ordinary sense of the term. They were travelling
craftsmen, who would work in one place for a few weeks or
months, and then move on to look for another job elsewhere. Even today, when work is no longer easy to secure,
the American wanderer still refuses to acknowledge defeat.
That indomitable spirit is an integral part of the make-up
of the screen Charlie Chaplin. His portrayal of the
underdog is definitely American rather than British. The
English working man has courage in plenty, but those
whom prolonged unemployment has forced on the road are
nowadays usually broke and despairing. The Chaplin tramp
has a quality of defiance and disdain.
But the American scene as a whole has influenced
Chaplin—its variety, its colour, its animation, its strange
and spectacular contrasts. And the States did more than
this for the little English actor; they provided the opportunity for which, without knowing it, he had been waiting.
They introduced him to the ideal medium for his genius,
the motion picture.
The Break
It was a sultry day in July, 1913. A bored film
magnate, Mr. A. Kessel, was strolling along Broadway.
Pausing at Hammerstein’s Music Hall to chat with the
manager, he heard roar upon roar of laughter. The sound
interested him. It had been a long time since anyone had
made him laugh. “I expect it’s that young Chaplin that’s
causing the cackle,” said the manager. “He’s pretty good.” >>
FINEST HoUR 142 / 23
FROM THE CANON
EVERYBODY’S LANGUAGE....
So in went Mr Kessel to see the Fred Karno Comedy
Company perform “A Night in a London Music Hall” and
to investigate young Chaplin.
Soon he was laughing with the rest of the audience.
But when Mr. Kessel laughed in a place of public entertainment, his mirth meant business. Round he went to the
back, was ushered into Chaplin’s tiny dressing-room, and
at once proceeded to offer the Englishman seventy-five
dollars a week to play in Keystone comedies. It was more
money than he had ever earned before, but Charlie said
“No.” That only made Mr. Kessel more determined. He
raised his bid to one hundred dollars a week. Still Charlie
said “No.” For the moment the film magnate left it at that.
But now he was no longer bored. He had a new interest in
life. He wanted Chaplin.
Presently he returned to the attack. This time his
offer was one hundred and fifty dollars. Charlie still hesitated, but in the end he accepted. And so to Hollywood
and the beginning of the most astounding career in cinema
history.
The Chaplin Persona
It is Mr. Chaplin’s dream to play tragic roles as well as
comic ones. The man whose glorious fooling made
“Shoulder Arms” a favourite with war-weary veterans of the
trenches wants to re-interpret Napoleon to the world. There
are other characters, as far removed from those in which he
won pre-eminence, which he desires to portray. Those who
smile at these ambitions have not appreciated Chaplin’s
genius at its true worth. No mere clown, however brilliant,
could ever have captured so completely the affections of the
great public. He owes his unrivalled position as a star to the
fact that he is a great actor, who can tug at our heartstrings
as surely as he compels our laughter. There are moments, in
some of his films, of an almost unbearable poignancy.
It is a great achievement, and one possible only to a
consummate actor, to command at once tears and laughter.
But it is the laughter which predominates, and Mr. Chaplin
is perfectly right in desiring an opportunity of playing
straight tragedy. Until he does so, his pathos will be
regarded as merely a by-product of his toothbrush moustache and the ludicrous Chaplin walk.
I believe that, had it not been for the coming of the
talkies, we would already have seen this great star in a
serious role. He is the one figure of the old silent screen to
whom the triumph of the spoken word has meant neither
speech nor extinction. He relies, as of old, upon a pantomime that is more expressive than talk. But while the
silence of Charlie Chaplin has lost none of its former
magic, would Mr. Charles Chaplin, in a role of a kind
completely unfamiliar to his audiences, and of which they
would almost certainly be highly critical, be able to “get
away with it”?
Frankly, I do not wonder that he hesitates, just as he
did when Mr. Kessel offered him his first film contract. But
he would be taking no greater risk now than he did then.
SCREEN PICTORIAL, MAY 1936 (COHEN C380c): Last periodical appearance prior to Finest Hour, unknown until publication of
Ronald Cohen’s Churchill bibliography. R.I. Cohen collection.
So I do not think that he will hesitate forever. Pantomime,
of which he is a master, is capable of expressing every
emotion, of communicating the subtlest shades of meaning.
A man who can act with his whole body has no need of
words, whatever part he plays.
It is the supreme achievement of Mr. Chaplin that he
has revived in modern times one of the great arts of the
ancient world—an art the secret of which was as completely and, apparently, as irrevocably lost as that of those
glowing colours, fresh and vivid today as when they were
first applied, which were the glory of the van Eycks.
The golden age of pantomime was under the early
Caesars. Augustus himself, the first of the Roman
emperors, is sometimes credited with its invention. Nero
practiced it, as he wrote poetry, as a relaxation from the
more serious pursuits of lust, incendiarism and gluttony.
But the greatest pantomimes—the name in Ancient Rome
denoted the performers, and not the art of which they were
the exponents—gave their whole lives to acting in dumb
show, till they had mastered the last potentialities of expression in movement and gesture.
When Christianity triumphed, the pantomimes fled.
FINEST HoUR 142 / 24
Their favourite subjects were too frankly physical for the
Fathers of the Church, and they were not sufficiently
adaptable to seek new ones in the shadow of the Cross. But
the subjects were there, had they realized it. Chaplin
showed that in “The Pilgrim.” You remember the sequence
in which, as an escaped convict disguised in clerical attire,
he finds himself in the pulpit, and tells the story of David
and Goliath? It is a wonderful piece of miming, in which
we follow every detail of the drama.
Pantomime Revival
It was by accident that Chaplin rediscovered the art
which, 1900 years ago, cast its spell over the City of the
Seven Hills. As a youth he was a member of a variety
company touring the Channel Islands, home of a sturdy
race to whom the King of England is still the Duke of
Normandy. The islanders, speaking mainly the NormanFrench patois of their ancestors, could not understand the
Cockney phrases of the players, whose best jokes fell flat.
At last, in desperation, the company decided to try to
get their effects by action and gesture. A single performance
under the new conditions revealed Charles as a mime of
genius and also showed him how powerful was the spell
which this acting without words could cast over an audience.
From that time he developed his natural gift for pantomimic
expression and so unconsciously prepared himself for the day
when the whole world should be his audience.
But the full flowering of his art came only after he
was launched on his film career. He adapted his technique
to the cinema and as he grew to appreciate at once the limitations and the possibilities of the screen, his mastery of
the new mode of acting was perfected. He had realized
that, as he himself had put it, “People can be moved more
intensely by a gesture than by a voice.”
American films generally were then in a highly
favourable position. They were simpler, more direct than
the best of the continental pictures, and consequently met
the needs of a far wider audience. Had their producers and
stars learned from Chaplin and the Europeans, the silent
screen might have defied the talkies. The sound picture
would have come just the same, but it would not have
scooped the pool.
If we are ever to realize to the full the art of the
cinema, I believe that it may be necessary deliberately to
limit the mechanical aids we now employ so freely. I should
like to see films without voices being made once more, but
this time by producers who are alive to the potentialities of
pantomime. Such pictures would be worth making, if only
for this reason, that the audience for a talkie is necessarily
limited by the factor of language, while the silent film can
tell its story to the whole of the human race. Pantomime is
the true universal tongue.
There are thousands of cinemas throughout the world
which have never been wired for sound, and which constitute a market for non-talking pictures. Nor is it safe to
assume that this is a shrinking market. There are many
countries which lack the resources to make their own
“IF WE ARE EVER TO REALIZE TO THE
FULL THE ART OF THE CINEMA, I
BELIEVE THAT IT MAY BE NECESSARY
DELIBERATELY TO LIMIT THE MECHANICAL AIDS WE NOW EMPLOY SO
FREELY....THE AUDIENCE FOR A TALKIE
IS NECESASRILY LIMITED BY THE
FACTOR OF LANGUAGE.”
talkies. There are millions of people whose mother tongue
will never be heard in any cinema and who understand
thoroughly no other speech. As the standard of life rises
throughout Asia and Africa, new cinemas will be built and
a new film public will be created—a public which can be
served most effectively by means of pantomime.
The English-speaking nations have here a great
opportunity—and a great responsibility. The primitive
mind thinks more easily in pictures than in words. The
thing seen means more than the thing heard. The films
which are shown amid the stillness of the African tropical
night or under the skies of Asia may determine, in the long
run, the fate of empires and of civilizations. They will
promote, or destroy, the prestige by which the white man
maintains his precarious supremacy amid the teeming multitudes of black and brown and yellow.
To Play Napoleon
I hope that we shall not have to wait another four
years for the next Chaplin picture. But it would be worth
waiting for if he built up a team of actors and actresses who
could use pantomime effectively. He has already shown his
power of inspiring others by his production of “A Woman
of Paris” and the grim realism with which the hardships of
the Klondike pioneers were portrayed in “The Gold Rush.”
And I see no reason why, if he can train such a company,
he should not realize his ambition of playing the victor of
Arcola. I think he might give us a picture of the young
Napoleon that would be one of the most memorable things
in the cinema.
Our difficulty in visualizing him in such a role is that
we think of him as he appears on the screen. We think
especially of his feet. Napoleon never had feet like that.
Neither has Chaplin. The feet are a “property”—the
famous walk is the trick of a clever actor to suggest character and atmosphere. They are, in fact, the feet and walk
of an ancient cabman, whom the youthful Charlie Chaplin
encountered occasionally in the Kensington Road in
London. To their original owner they were not at all
humorous. But the boy saw the comic possibilities of that
uneasy progress. He watched the old man and copied his
movements until he had mastered every step in the dismal
repertoire and turned it into mirth.
The same power of observation, the same patient >>
FINEST HoUR 142 / 25
FROM THE CANON
COLLLIER’S, 26 OCTOBER 1935 (COHEN C380a): First appearance of Churchill’s article (“Can silent movies ever come back?”), which
appeared in volume form only in the limited edition Collected Essays of Sir Winston Churchill (1975). Courtesy Ronald Cohen collection.
thoroughness, could be used—and would be used—to give
us convincing characterizations of serious roles. Charlie
Chaplin’s feet are not a handicap; they represent an asset—
the power to convert the thing seen into the thing shown.
And the real Chaplin is a man of character and culture. As
Sidney Earle Chaplin put it, when interviewed at the
tender age of five, “People get a wrong impression of Dad.
It’s not good style to throw pies, but he only does it in the
films. He never throws pies at home.”
I believe, therefore, that the future of Charlie Chaplin
may lie mainly in the portrayal of serious roles in silent, or
rather, non-talking films, and in the development of a universal cinema.
He need not ignore sound entirely. His pictures can
be wedded to music. Natural sounds may be introduced.
But these effects would be accessories only; the films could
be shown, without any serious weakening of their appeal,
in cinemas which were not wired for sound.
If Mr. Chaplin makes pictures of this kind, I think
that he will not only increase his already great reputation,
but he will blaze a trail which others will follow, and add
enormously to the range of cinematic art.
It is a favourite cliché of film critics, in discussing
talking pictures, to say that we cannot go back. In effect,
they suggest that, because technical progress has given us
sound, all films must be talkies and will continue to be so
for ever. Such statements reveal a radical misconception of
the nature of progress and the nature of art. As well say
that, because there is painting in oils, there must be no
etchings; or that because speech is an integral part of a
stage play, dialogue must be added to ballet. To explore the
possibilities of the
nontalking
film, to
make of it
a new and
individual
art form,
would not
be a retrograde step,
but an
advance.
There
are many
brilliant
and
original
minds
associated
with the
cinema today. But there is no one so well equipped for this
experiment as Mr. Chaplin. Possibly no one else would
dare to make it. I wish him good luck—and the courage of
his own convictions and his own magnificent powers. But I
hope also that he will not forget the world’s need of
laughter. Let him play in tragedy by all means. Let him
display to us the full extent of his histrionic genius. But let
him come back—at least occasionally—to the vein of
comedy that has been the world’s delight for many years. ,
FINEST HoUR 142 / 26
Contemplating China
Wit & Wisdom
“There is another Chinese saying...’The tail of China
is large and will not be wagged.’ I like that one. The
British democracy approves the principle of movable
heads and unwaggable national tails.”
A
reader asks, “Why was
Churchill so down on China as
a fourth member of the Big
Four in World War II and a
Security Council permanent
member afterward?” Before we adopt any
sweeping conclusions, consider
Churchill’s statements on China, which
express considerable balance of thought:
• “If the Chinese now suffer the
cruel malice and oppression of their
enemies, it is the fault of the base and
perverted conception of pacifism their
rulers have ingrained for two or three
thousand years in their people....China,
as the years pass, is being eaten by Japan
like an artichoke, leaf by leaf.”
—”The Wounded Dragon,”
Evening Standard, 3 September 1937,
reprinted in Step by Step, 1939.
• “I was very much astonished
when I came over here after Pearl Harbor
to find the estimate of values which
seemed to prevail in high American quarters, even in the highest, about China.
Some of them thought that China would
make as great a contribution to victory in
the war as the whole British Empire
together. Well, that astonished me very
much. Nothing that I picked up afterwards led me to think that my
astonishment was ill-founded....I think
on the whole you will not find a large
profit item entered on that side of the
ledger, but that doesn’t alter our regard
for the Chinese people.”
—Ritz-Carlton Hotel, New York,
25 March 1949, published in
In the Balance, 1951, 34
• “Ought we to recognise them
[Communist China] or not? Recognising
a person is not necessarily an act of
approval. I will not be personal, or give
instance. One has to recognise lots of
things and people in this world of sin
and woe that one does not like. The
reason for having diplomatic relations is
not to confer a compliment, but to
secure a convenience.”
—House of Commons, 17
November 1949
“[Invading China
from Korea] would be the
greatest folly. It would be
like flies invading fly-paper.”
—1951, Anthony Montague Browne,
Long Sunset, 1995, 317.
• “...I am by no means sure that
China will remain for generations in the
communist grip. The Chinese said of
themselves several thousand years ago:
‘China is a sea that salts all the waters
that flow into it.’ There is another
Chinese saying about their country
which dates only from the fourth
century: ‘The tail of China is large and
will not be wagged.’ I like that one. The
British democracy approves the principle
of movable heads and unwaggable
national tails.”
—U.S. Congress, Washington, 17
January 1952, published in Stemming
the Tide (1953), 223.
• “To hear some people talk,
however, one would think that the way
to win the war is to make sure that every
Power contributing armed forces and
branches of these armed forces is represented on all the councils and
organisations which have to be set up,
and that everybody is fully consulted
before anything is done. That is, in fact,
the most sure way to lose a war.”
—House of Commons, 27 January 1942
During World War II (emphasis
ours), Churchill saw no reason to include
China in the Security Council because he
doubted China’s status as a first-rate
power, based on her internal divisions
and performance against Japan. China
had been engaged with Japan, not very
successfully, long before World War II.
But Churchill supported recognizing
China after the communist takeover, and
believed Chinese communism would not
prevail—as it probably will not.
MASTERS OF OUR FATE
One of Churchill’s immortal passages came in the House of Commons on
FINEST HoUR 142 / 27
9 September 1941: “The mood of
Britain is wisely and rightly averse from
every form of shallow or premature exultation. This is no time for boasts or
glowing prophecies, but there is this—a
year ago our position looked forlorn and
well nigh desperate to all eyes but our
own. Today we may say aloud before an
awe-struck world, ‘We are still masters of
our fate. We still are captain of our
souls.’”
A reader in England wrote to ask:
“Did Churchill place ‘We are still
masters of our fate’ etc. in quotemarks as
a rhetorical flourish, or was he quoting
someone else, and if so, whom? I’m
studying World War II. My great uncle
was a pathfinder for the Dambusters and
still alive today. Would you recommend?” ([email protected])
The Dambusters were among the
heroes of the war. The book to start is
Churchill’s six volume memoir, The
Second World War. Next, try one of
Geoffrey Best’s books, Churchill at War
or Churchill: A Study in Greatness, or
Paul Addison’s Churchill: The
Unexpected Hero.
“Masters of our Fate” sounded
very familiar but offhand we couldn’t
place it, and asked our friend Ralph
Keyes, author of The Quote Verifier
(http:// ralphkeyes.com). Ralph first
thought Kipling, but then found it in
the Yale Book of Quotations (a very
good book, incidentally). It is from one
of Churchill’s favorite poems, “Invictus,”
by W.E. Henley, English poet and playwright (1849-1903):
It matters not how strait the gate
How charged with punishments the
scroll,
I am master of my fate:
I am captain of my soul.
—”Invictus” l.13 (1888)
,
FROM THE CANON II
A
S WE GATHER IN
CALIFORNIA FOR
OUR TWENTY-SIXTH INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE IN
SEPTEMBER, IT IS
AGREEABLE TO RECALL WINSTON
CHURCHILL’S BEAMING
IMPRESSIONS OF THE
STATE EIGHTY YEARS
AGO THIS YEAR—AND
HIS REFLECTIONS ON
PROHIBITION, WITH
WHICH, HAPPILY, WE
NEED NOT CONTEND.
Nature’s Panorama
in California
WINSTON S. CHURCHILL
T
he State of California has a coastline nearly 1000
miles long, and I was assured that its whole population—man, woman, and child—could get into
the motor cars they own and drive from one end of
it to the other at any time they had the inclination.
They would certainly be well advised to try the experiment,
for a more beautiful region I have hardly ever seen.
The long strip of hilly or undulating country, rising often
into mountain ranges, presents, through fifteen degrees of latitude, a smiling and varied fertility. Forests, vineyards, orange
groves, olives, and every other form of cultivation that the natives
desire, crowns or clothes the sunbathed peaks and valleys.
The Pacific laps the long-drawn shores,
and assures at all seasons of the year an
equable and temperate climate. The cool
ocean and the warm land create in their contact a misty
curtain which veils and mitigates the vigour of the sun. By a
strange inversion you ascend the mountain to get warm, and
descend to the sea level to get cool. Take it for all in all, the
western slopes of the Rocky Mountains offer a spacious,
delectable land, where we may work or play on every day in
the year.
The prosperity arising from the calm fruitfulness of
agriculture has been stimulated and multiplied by the
flashing apparition of gold and oil, and is adorned by the gay
tinsel of the Hollywood filmland. The people who have
established themselves and are dominant in these thriving
scenes represent what is perhaps the finest Anglo-Saxon
FINEST HoUR 142 / 28
stock to be found in the American Union. Blest with abundant food and pleasing dwellings, spread as widely as they
may wish in garden cities, along the motor roads, or in their
farms, the Californians have at their disposal all the natural
and economic conditions necessary for health, happiness and
culture.
Their easily gathered foods afford a diet in which milk,
fruit, vegetables, and chicken predominate; while endless
vineyards offer grape juice in unfermented, or even sometimes accidentally fermented, forms. A buoyancy of
temperament, a geniality of manner, an unbounded hospitality, and a marked friendliness and respect towards Old
England, her institutions and Empire, are the characteristics
most easily discerned among them. Poverty as we know it in
Europe, slums, congestion, and the gloomy abodes of concentrated industrialism, are nowhere to be seen.
It was my good fortune to spend nearly a month in
these agreeable surroundings and conditions, motoring
through the country from end to end; and certainly it would
be easy to write whole chapters upon the closely packed procession of scenes and sensations which saluted
the journey. Here I can only give a few thumbnail sketches
on which, however, the reader may care to cast an eye.
repeat themselves at intervals for perhaps 80 or 100 miles.
Suddenly we reach a notice with a finger-point: “The
Big Tree.” We turn off the well-oiled turnpike and jolt and
bump eight miles through sandy tracks, surrounded by enormous trunks and ceilinged by broodingfoliage. We walk
gingerly across a river bed on a bridge formed by one fallen
monster, and here at last is “The Big Tree.” They tell us it is
more than 400 feet high. At its base some hospitable
Californians are entertaining the petty officers from a British
cruiser. We all join hands around the tree. It takes fifteen of
us stretched to the full to compass it!
>>
Heart of the Redwoods
Entering California from the north, we travel along
the celebrated Redwood Highway. The road undulates and
serpentines ceaselessly. On either side from time to time are
groves and forests of what one would call large fir trees. As
we go on they get taller. The sense that each hour finds one
amid larger trees only grows gradually. At length we stop to
take stock of the scene, and one is surprised to see how small
a car approaching round a bend 100 yards away appears in
relation to the trunks which rise, close together, in vast
numbers on either side. Still full realization does not come.
Another hour of swift progression! Now we are in the heart
of the Redwoods. There is no mistake about it this time.
The road is an aisle in a cathedral of trees. Enormous
pillars of timber tower up 200 feet without leaf or twig to a
tapering vault of sombre green and purple. So close are they
together that the eye is arrested at a hundred yards’ distance
by solid walls of timber. It is astonishing that so many vast
growing organisms find in so small a space of air and soil the
nourishment on which to dwell and thrive together. If a
battle were fought in such a forest every bullet would be
stopped within 200 yards, embedded in impenetrable stems.
At the bases of these monsters men look like ants and motor
cars look like beetles. Far above, the daylight twinkles
through triangular and star-shaped openings. On the ground
is vivid green or yellow bloom and leafage. These scenes
AUGUST 1929: With the Conservatives turned out by Labour in the
spring General Election, Churchill resisnged as Chancellor of the Exchequer and had time on his hands. On August 3rd he sailed for
America with his brother Jack (above left) and their two sons. “I do
not want to have too close an itinerary,” he had written in July. “One
must have time to feel a country and nibble some of the grass.” But
great and ambitious writer that he was, WSC could not resist penning
articles about his journey. The Great Crash of 1929 was less than two
months away, and WSC would witness it personally in New York.
Below, in California, he stopped for a picnic and fed a chipmunk.
This text comprises the sixth and seventh in a series of twelve essays
entitled “What I Saw and Heard in America,” first published in The
Daily Telegraph, 23 and 30 December 1929; later in The Collected
Essays of Sir Winston Churchill (London: Library of Imperial History,
1975). Reprinted by kind permission of Winston S. Churchill.
FINEST HoUR 142 / 29
FROM THE CANON II
NATURE’S PANORAMA...
After compliments, jokes, and photographs, the guide
remarks that this tree is certainly 4000 years old. It has been
growing all this time and is still full of life and vigour.
Devastating fires have swept through the forest scores of
times during its existence, and have licked up the undergrowth and all ordinary trees and vegetation, but they could
not harm the giants. Sometimes a large ring of burnt wood
from flames extinguished a thousand years ago is found
when Redwood trees are cut down. They can survive everything and heal every wound they receive.
These trees were already old “when the smoke of sacrifice
arose from the Pantheon and camelopards bounded in the
Flavian amphitheatre,”* and, but for the timber companies,
they may “still continue in undiminished vigour” when
Macaulay’s traveller from New Zealand “takes his stand upon a
broken arch of London Bridge to sketch the ruins of St Paul’s.”
They will grow as long as the Californians allow them to grow.
Lick Observatory
Let me turn another page of my scrap book. I am at
the top of the tallest building in San Francisco. Dizzy depths
yawn beneath the window-sills. The Chairman of the
Telephone Company has invited me to have ten minutes’
talk with my wife in England. I take up the instrument. My
wife speaks to me across one ocean and one continent—one
of each. We hear each other as easily as if we were in the same
room, or, not to exaggerate, say about half as well again as on
an ordinary London telephone. I picture a well-known scene
far off in Kent, 7000 miles away. The children come to the
telephone. I talk to them through New York and Rugby.
They reply through Scotland and Canada. Why say the age
of miracles is past? It is just beginning.
Turn over. We are in the Lick Observatory. A broad,
squat cupola has been built by the munificence of a private
citizen at the summit of a conical mountain 4000 feet high.
All is dark within the Observatory. The telescope, its girth
not unworthy of the giant trees, peers through a slit of pale
but darkening sky. The dome rotates, the floor sinks, then
rises slightly.
I sit upon a ladder. The planet Saturn is about to set; but
there is just time to observe him. Of course I know about the
rings around Saturn. Pictures of them were shown in all the
schools where I was educated. But I was sceptical. We all know
how astronomers have mapped the heavens out in the shape of
animals. We can most of us—by a stretch of the imagination—recognize the Great Bear, but still one quite sympathizes
with those who call it The Plough. Bear or Plough—one is as
like it as the other. So I expected to see, when I looked at
Saturn, a bright star with some smudges round it, which
astronomers had dignified by the name of rings.
In this mood I applied myself to the eye-piece. I received
the impression that some powerful electric light had been
*Churchill is quoting Thomas Babington Macaulay, most likely his
Lays of Ancient Rome, which WSC absorbed and partly memorized
as a youth. “Camelopard” is Middle English term for a giraffe.
switched on by mistake in
the observatory and was
in some way reflected in
the telescope. I was about
to turn and ask that it
might be extinguished,
when I realized that what
I saw was indeed Saturn
himself. A perfectly modelled globe, instinct with
rotundity, with a clear-cut
LICK OBSERVATORY: Churchill undoubtedly
did not have as good a view of Saturn as that of
life buoy around its
the Cassini orbiter. Wikipedia Commons photos.
middle, all glowing with
serene radiance. I gazed
with awe and delight
upon this sublime spectacle of a world 800
million miles away.
Again the dome
rotates, and the floor
rises or falls. I am told to
look at the heavens with
the naked eye. Can I see a
very faint star amid
several bright ones? It is
very far off and quite an
achievement to discern it.
I see the faintest speck or
rather blur of light. Now
look through the telescope. Two pairs of lovely
PEBBLE BEACH: Painting in a chill Pacific fog
diamonds, dazzling in
accompanied by his hostess, Helen Russell.
their limpid beauty,
gleam on either side of the field of vision. “You are looking,”
says the astronomer, “at one of our best multiple stars. That
faint speck you saw with the eye consists of these double
twins, the stars in each pair revolving around the other pair!”
Celestial jewellery! I forget how long they take to
revolve, if indeed, it is yet known to man, or how far they are
apart. Perhaps the light would pass from one to the other in
four or five years. But it is all in the books.
Then we return swifter than light across the gulfs of
space, and come to the moon, where dawn has just risen on
the mountains, tipping them with flame, and casting their
silhouettes in violet shadows upon the lunar craters.
Thereafter for some time we talk about the heavens and my
kindly teachers explain all—or perhaps not all—about
nebulae and spiral nebulae.
It appears that outside our own universe, with its thousands of million suns, there are at least two million other
universes, all gyrating and coursing through the heavens like
dancers upon a stage. I had not heard of this before, and was
inspired to many thoughts sufficiently commonplace to be
omitted here. I was disturbed to think of all these universes
which had not previously been brought to my attention. I
hoped that nothing had gone wrong with them.
It is sixty miles from the Lick Observatory to
FINEST HoUR 142 / 30
Burlingame, the garden suburb of the San Francisco notables,
where we were sheltered for the night. It was a relief, after
thinking about two million universes and countless millions of
suns, many complete with planets, moons, comets, meteoric
streams, etc. and the incomprehensible distances which separate them, to take up the morning paper (which, according to
American custom, is always published the evening before),
and to read that the stock markets were still booming, that Mr
J.H. Thomas* had a new idea (which he was keeping secret)
about the unemployed, and that Mr. Snowden,** by his firm
stand for Britain, had surrendered only half a million more of
the taxpayers’ money. And so to bed!
Fermented! Do Not Be Alarmed...
We follow from north to south the great road which
runs the entire length of California. Our stages are sometimes as long as 250 miles. Night in the Redwoods is
impressive. Every dozen miles or so rest camps—”motels,” as
they are called—have been built for the motorist population.
Here simple and cheap accommodation is provided in clusters of detached cabins, and the carefree wanderers upon
wheels gather round great fires singing or listening to the
ubiquitous wireless music.
Great numbers motor for amusement, travelling very
light, usually in couples, and thinking nothing of a thousand
miles in their little cars. Continuous streams of vehicles flow
up and down at speeds which rarely fall below forty miles an
hour. The road by day recalls the Corniche roads in character
and beauty of scenery, but is often more crowded. Its ribbon
surface follows in the main the mountainous coastline, now
rising to a thousand feet or more, with awful gulfs and
hairpin turns, now spinning along almost in the ocean spray.
What with the traffic, the precipices, the turns, the ups and
downs, and the high speeds, the journey is not dull, and the
scenery is splendid.
As we progress the vegetation changes. The giant
Redwoods die away; oak and other English-looking trees
succeed them; and we flash across trout streams and rivers,
much attenuated by the summer, and some even reduced to
chains of pools. From the town of Eureka onwards I noticed
the palm, and a hundred miles further south the vegetation
and aspect of the landscape became Italian. We now come
into the land of grapes and pause for luncheon at an
immense wine factory. I forget how many millions of gallons
of Californian wines are stored in the mighty vats
of its warehouses.
Fermented! Certainly! Do not be alarmed, dear Miss
Anna, it is “for sacramental purposes only.” The
Constitution of the United States, the God of Israel, and the
Pope—an august combination—protect, with the triple
*J.H. Thomas (1874-1949), Labour MP (1910-36), Minister of
Employment and Lord Privy Seal at the time of Churchill’s article.
He was elected to the Other Club in 1925, but resigned in 1930. His
last office was Secretary of State for the Colonies, 1935-36.
**Philip Snowden, later Viscount Snowden (1864-1937), Labour
MP (1906-18, 1922-31), Chancellor of the Exchequer at the time of
Churchill’s article. His last office was Lord Privy Seal, 1931-32.
sanctions of Washington, Jerusalem and Rome, this inspiring
scene. Nevertheless, there is a fragrance in the air which even
the Eighteenth Amendment cannot deprive us.
Not to be tantalized, we hasten on, and fifty miles to
the southward alight for refreshment before the verandahs
and porticos of a pretty inn, whose advertisement proclaims,
“Good Eats and Soft Drinks.” Yielding to these allurements,
I am supplied with a glass of “near beer.” This excellent and
innocent beverage is prepared in the following way:
Old-world beer is brewed, and thereafter all the
alcohol in excess of one-half of one percent is eliminated,
and cast to the dogs. The residue, when iced, affords a
pleasant drink indistinguishable in appearance from the
naughty article, and very similar in flavour. But, as the less
regenerate inform us, “it lacks Authority.” I was told that
sometimes distressing accidents occur in the manufacture.
Sometimes mistakes are made about the exact percentage,
and on one melancholy occasion an entire brew was inadvertently released at the penultimate stage of manufacture, to
spread its maddening poison through countless happy
homes. But, needless to say, every precaution is taken.
I have not concealed my own views upon Prohibition,
but candour compels me to say that, having been for two
months for the first time in my life exposed to its full rigours,
I have found the effects upon my constitution very much less
disturbing than I had expected.
The shades of evening were already falling as we
approached San Francisco. I had been dozing and awoke
with a start to find myself in the midst of the ocean. As far
as the eye could reach on all sides in the gathering dark
nothing but water could be seen. The marvellous road
was traversing an inlet of the sea, or perhaps an estuary, by a
newly constructed bridge seven miles long, and only a few
feet above the waves.
On either side the water reaches depths of eighty feet,
and in the centre we climbed by easy gradients to a sort of
Tower Bridge with bascules to allow the passage of shipping.
This remarkable piece of engineering, brilliantly illuminated
throughout its entire length, has been constructed to avoid
the delays or inconvenience of detour or ferry. That the
motor traffic—mainly pleasure traffic—should warrant the
formidable outlay involved is a fair measure of the wealth
and enterprise of California.
The City of San Francisco was, as everyone knows,
destroyed by fire, not earthquake (this is important), at the
beginning of the century. It has risen again from its ashes (not
ruins) in quadrupled magnificence. Its forty-storey buildings
tower above the lofty hog-backed promontory on which it is
built. The sea mists which roll in and shroud it at frequent
intervals rob it of sunshine, but ensure a cool temperate
climate at most seasons of the year. I was eager to see the sea
lions for which the bay is renowned, and made a special
journey to view the rocks on which they are accustomed to
bask. In this I was disappointed. The rocks were occupied
only by large and dreary birds; and when I asked a bystander
when the sea lions would appear, he replied gaily in Italian,
“Damfino,” meaning no doubt “in due course.”
>>
FINEST HoUR 142 / 31
FROM THE CANON II
HOLLYWOOD: At a lunchon hosted by Louis
B. Mayer of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios.
From left, Randolph S. Churchill, William
Randolph Hearst, Winston Churchill, Louis B.
Mayer, unknown (Spencer Tracy? He signed
with MGM in 1935), Jack S. Churchill, unknown, and Jack’s son Johnny Churchill.
NATURE’S PANORAMA...
Peter Pan Township
South of San Francisco we entered the latitude and vegetation of North Africa. The houses became increasingly
Mauresque, the soil more sandy, and water—except, of course,
for drinking purposes—scarce. Resting for a while at the
seaside resorts of Pebble Beach and Santa Barbara, we draw by
easy stages nearer to the latest city of the Pacific Coast, Los
Angeles. Ignoring St. Augustine’s famous pun, the inhabitants
pronounce the “g” hard, as in “angle.” A keen rivalry exists
between Los Angeles and San Francisco. Each population
exceeds a million, but by how much depends on which
suburbs are included; and on this point there are disputes.
No two cities could present a greater contrast. San
Francisco stretches up to the heavens; Los Angeles spreads
more widely over the level shores than any city of equal
numbers in the world. It is a gay and happy city, where
everyone has room to live, where no one lacks a small, but
sufficient dwelling, and every house stands separate in its
garden. Poverty and squalor have never entered its broad
avenues of palms. The distances are enormous. You motor ten
miles to luncheon in one direction and ten miles to dinner in
another. The streets by night are ablaze with electric lights
and moving signs of every colour. A carnival in fairyland!
All this opulence and well-being is prominently supported by two 20th-century industries. The first is oil.
Everywhere scattered about in the city, all around it, on the
beach, even in the sea itself, stand the pylon structures or
derricks used for the finding and extraction of oil. At Calgary
in Canada, where the oil lies a mile below the surface, these
derricks are very tall; but in California they seem to average
fifty or sixty feet. The hills to the south of the city are covered
with them. They are packed so densely together as to look at
a few miles’ distance exactly like forests of fir-trees.
Democratic principles have shaped the laws governing
this newcomer industry. Oilfields, like goldfields, are parcelled out in small holdings, almost in allotments. A
multitude of small proprietors are pumping away in mad
haste, lest their neighbours a few yards off should forestall
them. There is an immense production of oil at cheap prices.
For the present everyone is content, especially the consumers. Whether this system is the last word in the scientific
utilization of oil resources is doubtful; that it will not last for
ever is certain. It may well be that the natural oil age will synchronize with the twentieth century.
The second staple industry is found in the films associated with Hollywood. Here we enter a strange and an
amusing world, the like of which has certainly never been
seen before. Dozens of studios, covering together thousands
of acres, and employing scores of thousands of very highly
paid performers and technicians, minister to the gaiety of the
world. It is like going behind the scenes of a theatre magnified a thousand-fold. Battalions of skilled workmen
construct with magical quickness streets of London, of
China, of India, jungles, mountains, and every conceivable
form of scenery in solid and comparatively durable style. In
a neighbouring creek pirate ships, Spanish galleons and
Roman galleys ride at anchor.
This Peter Pan township is thronged with the most
odd and varied of crowds that can be imagined. Here is a
stream of South Sea Islanders, with sweet little nut-brown
children, hurrying to keep their studio appointments. There
is a corps-de-ballet which would rival the Moulin Rouge.
Ferocious brigands, bristling with property pistols, cowboys,
train robbers, heroines in distress of all descriptions, aged
cronies stalk or stroll or totter to and fro. Twenty films are in
the making at once. A gang of wild Circassian horsemen
filters past a long string of camels from a desert caravan.
Keen young men regulate the most elaborate processes of
photography, and the most perfect installations for bridling
light and sound. Competition is intense; the hours of toil are
hard, and so are the hours of waiting. Youthful beauty claims
her indisputable rights; but the aristocracy of the filmland
found themselves on personality. It is a factory in appearance
the queerest in the world, whose principal characteristics are
hard work, frugality and discipline.
The apparition of the “talkies” created a revolution
among the “movies.” Hollywood was shaken to its foundations. No one could challenge the popularity of these
upstarts. Their technique might be defective; their voices in
reproduction rough and unmusical; their dialect weak; but
talking films were what the public wanted; and what the
public wants it has to get. So all is turned upside down, and
new experts arrive with more delicate apparatus, and a far
more complicated organization must be set up. Everywhere
throughout filmland the characters must be made to talk as
well as act. New values are established, and old favourites
have to look to their laurels. Now that everyone is making
talking pictures, not only darkness but perfect silence must be
procurable whenever required, and balloons float above the
studios to scare away the buzzings of wandering aeroplanes.
Alone among producers Charlie Chaplin remains
unconverted, claiming that pantomime is the genius of drama,
and that the imagination of the audience supplies better words
than machinery can render, and prepared to vindicate the
silent film by the glittering weapons of wit and pathos.
,
On the whole, I share his opinion.
FINEST HoUR 142 / 32
GREAT CONTEMPORARIES II
Churchill
and Orwell
A GENTLE ACCOLADE, FROM ONE GIANT
OF OUR HERITAGE TO ANOTHER ON THE
OPPOSITE END OF THE POLITICAL SPECTRUM, MAKES MY EYES MIST OVER.
ROBERT PILPEL
L
et us now praise an unreconstructed
Tory and a self-proclaimed Man of
the Left. The former was a
Harrovian, the latter an Etonian.
No great difference there. The
former was of noble lineage, the
latter lower middle class.
The former thought he
had lived too long for
his own good, the latter
died far too soon. The
former was a
statesman/politician, the
latter a philosopher. The
former was father to five children, the latter adopted one.
The former was a Nobel
Laureate in literature, the latter
had trouble getting published.
Oddly enough, that almost
covers their differences. Consider
now their similarities.
Both were truth-tellers—
veracity’s fools. Both had the ability, in
Orwell’s words, to face unpleasant facts.
Both were deemed traitors to their class.
Both were exiled from their political circles.
Both had been fugitives. Both saw action in
combat—Churchill in India and Africa, Orwell in Spain.
Both were partial to tobacco, if you can call Orwell’s lungscorching Woodbines tobacco. Both were chronically short
of money, though on slightly different scales. Both had
Mr. Pilpel is the author of Churchill in America (1976). His “What
Churchill Owed the Great Republic” (FH 125) won the FH Journal
Award for the best article of 2005. In this piece he has “refrained
from dilations on the many arresting similarities between Orwell and
Churchill, not to mention their diametrical differences.”
awe-inspiring physical and moral courage. Both felt that
their fathers regarded them as disappointments. Both had
only one son. Both flirted with suicidal thoughts. And
both, above all, were children of the Enlightenment.
We know little about Churchill’s opinion of Orwell,
although late in life he told his physician that
he’d read 1984 and found it so remarkable
that he planned to read it again. But,
Nobel Prize notwithstanding,
Churchill was hardly a litterateur, and in the
years before
Orwell’s
death
in
1950 his
focus was
on a return
to power. He
was also a
luminary of
monumental proportions by then, an
icon of western civilization, while Orwell’s
contributions to human
progress have become
pillars of our intellectual
heritage only in the decades
since his death. It’s not strange,
accordingly, that Orwell had far
more to say about Churchill than
Churchill did about him. So in order
to gauge the symmetry between their
basic values it is to Orwell’s works we
must turn—hardly an onerous task.
The “hero” of 1984,
George Orwell’s chilling prediction of a totalitarian future, is
Winston Smith. Mere coincidence? No. The names of
fictional characters are never
chosen haphazardly, especially when the
characters in question are prime protagonists, and
most especially when the author and the characters’
eponyms are contemporaries.
But the question for us Churchillians is not Orwell’s
literary motivations. There has been endless speculation
about this subject, most of it endlessly gaseous. Suffice it to
say that Orwell had many layers of irony in mind when he
dubbed his hero “Winston.” But far more interesting is his
view of Churchill: the person, persona and personality.
As a political analyst Orwell often had occasion to
express himself on the subject of our paragon. By contrast,
Churchill’s only known reference to Orwell comes from
Lord Moran’s “diaries,” wherein WSC, on the eve of his >>
FINEST HoUR 142 / 33
GREAT CONTEMPORARIES II
CHURCHILL AND ORWELL...
second premiership, age 76—and
of Orwell’s
untimely death,
age 46—told his
physician that
he’d just read a
“remarkable”
novel that he was
planning to reread.
It will come as
no surprise that
Orwell’s feelings
about Churchill
were decidedly
ambivalent.
Although he was
a self-described
man of the Left,
he was also far
GEORGE ORWELL
too clear-sighted
(ERIC ARTHUR BLAIR) 1903-1950
and intellectually
Wikipedia Commons photo
honest to accept
the standard left-wing view that Churchill was a right-wing
grotesque. But in common with many of his countrymen
he’d had just about enough of Churchill by the summer of
1942. In the wake of the shocking losses at Namsos,
Norway, followed quickly by France, Crete, Dieppe,
Singapore, the Prince of Wales, the Repulse and Tobruk,
and numerous other Britannic disasters, he noted in his war
diaries that his friends were delighted with his quip that it
might be best for England if WSC, en route back from
Russia, were torpedoed and sunk, like Kitchener in 1915.
But in most respects this comment was uncharacteristic. It reflected the widespread sense of disaffection that
pervaded public life in Britain when the auspicious formation of the Grand Alliance in 1941 led only to a
continuation of the calamity-of-the-month scenario in
1942. The stunning U.S. naval victory at Midway had
received only the sketchiest press coverage, lest America’s
achievement in deciphering Japanese radio codes be inadvertently divulged. And the momentous turning points of
Stalingrad and Alamein were still months away. From the
average Briton’s viewpoint, therefore, 1942 hadn’t heralded
a new dawn but only a dreary continuation of British
incompetence, of which Churchill was presumably the
impresario.
But if we review Orwell’s comments about WSC
during and after the war the clear impression we get is one
of grudging admiration and even reluctant affection.
(Granted, Orwell’s self-awareness was so acute that he was
capable of writing that he’d never managed to feel much
animosity toward Hitler personally, although “I would certainly kill him if the opportunity arose.” His affection for
Churchill involved no such homicidal undertones.)
Because of Churchill’s prominence—nay, preeminence—Orwell was often stimulated to refer to him in the
context of both praise and blame. But perhaps the embodiment of his commentaries came near the end of his
far-too-brief life, when he reviewed Churchill’s account of
his own and Britain’s epitome in the second of his World
War II volumes, Their Finest Hour. In this short essay
Orwell demonstrated the broad expanse of perspective
characteristic of WSC himself. Rising far above ideological
issues and taking an almost Olympian stance, Orwell
reached across the vast political chasm separating him from
his subject and saluted a fellow child, and evangel, of the
Enlightenment:
The political reminiscences [Churchill] has
published...have always been a great deal
above the average, in frankness as well as literary quality....His writings are more like
those of a human being than of a public
figure....and whether or not 1940 was anyone
else’s finest hour, it was certainly
Churchill’s....One has to admire in him not
only his courage but also a certain largeness
and geniality which comes out even in formal
memoirs of this type....The British people
have generally rejected his policies, but they
have always had a liking for him, as one can
see from the tone of the stories told about
him....At the time of the Dunkirk evacuation,
for instance, it was rumoured that what he
actually said, when recording his [House of
Commons] speech for broadcast, was: “We
will fight on the beaches, we will fight in the
streets...we’ll throw bottles at the bastards;
it’s about all we’ve got left!” One may assume
that this story is untrue, but at the time it
was felt that it ought to be true. It was a
fitting tribute from ordinary people to the
tough and humorous old man whom they
would not accept as a peacetime leader [in
1945] but whom in the moment of disaster
they felt to be representative of themselves.
Speaking as a considerably less tough and more sentimental old man, I confess that this gentle accolade from
one giant guardian of our heritage to another on the opposite end of the political spectrum always makes my eyes
mist over. I offer this confession willingly, even cheerfully,
happy in the knowledge that many readers of this splendid
journal—no matter what their age—may actually go me
,
one better and shed a tear.
FINEST HoUR 142 / 34
LEADING CHURCHILL MYTHS (16)
Myth: “Churchill Caused the
1943-45 Bengal Famine”
Fact: The Blame Rests with the Japanese
F
inest Hour bestows our 2008
Utter Excess Award on MWC
(“Media With Consceience”) in
Vancouver for Gideon Polya’s
charming editorial, “Media Lying Over
Churchill’s Crimes” (http://xrl.us/bem6de):
“Churchill is our hero because of his
leadership in World War II,” but his
immense crimes, notably the WW2
Bengali Holocaust, the 1943-45 Bengal
Famine in which Churchill murdered 6-7
million Indians, have been deleted from
history by extraordinary Anglo-American
and Zionist Holocaust Denial.”
Polya cites a long list of Churchill
“crimes,” including all the old chestnuts
(poison-gassing the Iraqis, warmongering
before WW1, Gallipoli, bombing
German cities, etc.); and some new ones:
“Churchill actively sought the entry of
Japan into World War II.” That one
reminds us of Churchill’s observation
that he had never heard the opposite of
the truth stated with greater precision.
We have dealt with most of these
before (over and over)—so let’s consider
the new flagship accusation.
G
ideon Polya dismisses all who disagree with him, including Sir Martin
Gilbert, as Zionist propagandists. Since
it’s always a good idea to question the
accused, we asked Sir Martin. “Churchill
was not responsible for the Bengal
Famine,” he replied. “I have been
searching for evidence for years: none has
turned up. The 1944 Document volume
of the official biography [Hillsdale College
Press] will resolve this issue finally.”
We next turned to Arthur Herman’s
Gandhi & Churchill, (FH 138: 51-52).
There is much on the Bengal Famine
(512 et. seq.). Secretary of State for India
Leo Amery, Herman writes,
at first took a lofty Malthusian view of
the crisis, arguing that India was “overpopulated” and that the best strategy
was to do nothing. But by early
summer even Amery was concerned
and urged the War Cabinet to take
drastic action....For his part, Churchill
proved callously indifferent. Since
Gandhi’s fast his mood about India
had progressively darkened. [He was]
resolutely opposed to any food shipments. Ships were desperately needed
for the landings in Italy....Besides,
Churchill felt it would do no good.
Famine or no famine, Indians will
“breed like rabbits.” Amery prevailed
on him to send some relief, albeit only
a quarter what was needed. A quarter
of what was needed may also have
been all that was possible by ship; but
Churchill was also hoping for more aid
from India itself.
Mr. Herman elaborated in a note to FH:
The idea that Churchill was in any
way “responsible” or “caused” the
Bengal famine is of course absurd. The
real cause was the fall of Burma to the
Japanese, which cut off India’s main
supply of rice imports when domestic
sources fell short. It is true that
Churchill opposed diverting food supplies and transports from other theaters
to India to cover the shortfall: this was
wartime. Some of his angry remarks to
Amery don’t read very nicely in retrospect. However, anyone who has been
through the relevant documents
reprinted in The [India] Transfer of
Power volumes knows the facts:
Churchill was concerned about the
humanitarian catastrophe taking place
there, and he pushed for whatever
famine relief efforts India itself could
provide; they simply weren’t adequate.
Something like three million people
died in Bengal and other parts of
southern India as a result. We might
even say that Churchill indirectly
broke the Bengal famine by appointing
as Viceroy Field Marshal Wavell, who
mobilized the military to transport
food and aid to the stricken regions
(something that hadn’t occurred to
anyone, apparently).
If the famine had occurred in peacetime, Herman added “it would have been
dealt with effectively and quickly by the
Raj, as so often in the past. At worst,
Churchill’s failure was not sending more
aid—in the midst of fighting a war for
survival. World War II, of course, is what
Churchill’s slanderers avoid considering.”
FINEST HoUR 142 / 35
Martin Gilbert added:
The Japanese were already inside India
at Kohima and Imphal. Gandhi’s Quit
India movement, and Subhas Chandra
Bose’s Indian National Army then
fighting alongside the Japanese, provided the incentive for a full-scale
Japanese invasion. The RAF and the
Army were fully stretched. We know
what terrors the Japanese wreaked n
non-Japanese natives in Korea, the
Phillipines, and Malaya. If the RAF
planes supporting India’s defence were
pulled off for a famine airlift, far more
than three million would have died.
The blame for insufficient famine relief
lies with those who prevented those
planes from being used: the Japanese.
Despite Churchill’s expressions about
Gandhi, clearly he did attempt to alleviate the famine. As William Manchester
wrote, Churchill “always had second and
third thoughts, and they usually
improved as he went along.”
So what have we left besides the lie
about “deliberate, sustained, remorseless
starving to death of 6-7 million Indians”?
As a wrap, “Media With Conscience”
offers every critical quote it can find by
Churchill on Indians. Thirteen years ago
at our 1995 conference, one of these was
recited by William F. Buckley, Jr.:
Working his way through disputatious
bureaucracy from separatists in New
Delhi he exclaimed, to his secretary, “I
hate Indians.” I don’t doubt that the
famous gleam came to his eyes when
he said this, with mischievous glee—an
offense, in modern convention, of
genocidal magnitude.
And sure enough, here is that remark,
represented just as Buckley described it.
Polya’s piece is a prize-winning
example of the myopic determination to
find guilt where there is none. Yes, WSC
had a blind spot about Gandhi—despite
his positive initiatives to Gandhi in 1935,
Nehru in 1953. Churchill was human
and made mistakes; He remains
admirable, in part because he gave all his
papers to an archive where carpers can
pore over them. And fifty years of poring
has not significantly changed the verdict
of history about him.
The best summation of this nonarticle is the line by Jack Nicholson in
the charming film As Good as it Gets:
“Sell crazy someplace else. We’re all
stocked up here.” RML
,
CHURCHILL PROCEEDINGS
The Irish Experience: Insight for
Today’s World
ROBERT L. PFALTZGRAFF, JR.
________________________________________________
Dr. Pfaltzgraff, our leading moderator at Boston, is President
of the Institute for Foreign Policy Analysis, and Shelby
Cullom Davis Professor of International Security Studies, at
the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, Tufts University.
He has advised key U.S. officials on military strategy, defense
modernization, the future of alliances, proliferation and
counter-proliferation issues, and arms control policy.
A
lthough we often think of him as the great World War II leader, what fascinates so
many about Churchill is his connection, a very direct connection, with the great
events in the history of the early to mid-20th Century. He was an influential and
often decisive player in so many of these events. In fact, to study that history through the
Churchill lens is a good place to begin—in fact, difficult to avoid.
So it is with Churchill and Ireland. The Boston Churchill Conference of 2008 examined in detail the central role Churchill played in the Irish question—and the central role
which the Irish question played in pre-World War I politics. It is little wonder that
Churchill, always where the action was, intensely involved himself in the effort to reconcile
Home Rule in the south of Ireland with the Unionist demands of the north.
World War I delayed and postponed but did not stop efforts to resolve the Irish question. The setting that faced Churchill, as well as Ireland and Britain, after the Great War, as
it was then called, led to the outbreak of armed conflict, civil war, the 1920 Government of
Ireland and the Irish Treaty of 1921: key events for Ireland and Great Britain which would
shape their relations from World War II to the present time.
“Churchill and Ireland” addressed issues that have 21st Century counterparts. In these
papers, eminent scholars talk about and study Irish partition as a less-than-perfect solution,
though sometimes the only solution, to ethno-nationalist religious conflicts. They consider
strategies of “non-state armed groups,” one of the great buzz-phrases of today’s international security studies field. And they ponder the irregular issues which Churchill, British
and Irish politicians faced in the years after the First World War.
Many lessons and insights may be derived for today’s world from what the British and
the Irish faced and fought, in what became known as the Interwar Years.
,
FINEST HoUR 142 / 36
The Churchills in
Ireland, 1877-1914
THE RECENT CONFLICTS IN NORTHERN IRELAND, WHICH TOOK CLOSE TO 4000
LIVES, WERE THE PRODUCT OF POLITICAL STRATEGIES AND PATTERNS ESTABLISHED in 1912 TO 1914: NOT AN ESPECIALLY POSITIVE LEGACY FOR THOSE WHO
FAILED TO FOLLOW WINSTON CHURCHILL’S LEAD IN TRYING TO WORK OUT A
FAIR AND REASONABLE RESOLUTION OF THE ULSTER/HOME RULE IMBROGLIO.
CATHERINE B. SHANNON
L-R: John Spencer-Churchill, 7th Duke of Marlborough; Lord Randolph Churchill; WSC.
C
hurchillian involvement with Ireland, beginning
with the appointment of the Seventh Duke of
Marlborough as Irish Viceroy in 1877 and continuing on with his son Randolph and his famous
grandson Winston, coincided with the high water
mark of Irish political nationalism between the 1870s and
the mid-20th century.
Inspired by the rationalist and democratic ideals of the
Enlightenment and the French Revolution, 19th century
Irish nationalism had as its primary goal the repeal of the Act
of Union of 1800, which had abolished the Irish Parliament
and established the Parliament at Westminster as legislative
authority for Ireland. The national movement developed in
both constitutional and revolutionary forms, illustrated by
the tactics employed by the Irish Home Rule leader, Charles
Parnell, in his links with former Fenians and his support for
the Irish Land War of 1879-81. Yet the pre-1900 Home Rule
movement was essentially constitutional, and had as its
primary goal the establishment of an Irish legislature responsible for domestic affairs.
________________________________________________
Dr. Shannon is Professor Emerita of History, Westfield State College,
Massachusetts, where she was Director of Irish Studies; she also taught
Irish history at the University of Massachusetts Amherst.
By the middle of the 1870s, falling agricultural prices
had resulted in widespread rent defaults by Irish tenant
farmers, but the early Home Rule movement’s deferential
posture in the House of Commons, and the vagueness of its
federalist proposals, held little attraction for the former
Fenians and tenant farmers, who joined an association called
the Home Rule League. Then in 1874 a young Protestant
MP named Charles Stewart Parnell and others launched a
campaign of parliamentary obstruction, or filibustering. This
reached its zenith in May 1877, when they kept the House
of Commons in session for seventy-two consecutive hours.
Marlborough and His Son
The challenges were formidable when the Duke of
Marlborough arrived in Dublin as Viceroy in January 1877,
accompanied by the Duchess, their son Randolph (an
unpaid private secretary), their daughter-in-law Jennie and
their two-year old grandson Winston. The Viceroy and Lord
Randolph traveled widely through Ireland, observing the
deterioration of economic and social conditions. Randolph
established firm and lasting friendships with Protestant
urban professionals, like Gerald FitzGibbon, later SolicitorGeneral of Ireland, and John Gibbons, the future Lord
Ashbourne, as well as with academics like J.P. Mahaffy of >>
FINEST HoUR 142 / 37
CHURCHILL PROCEEDINGS
DRAMATIS PERSONAE: Charles Stewart Parnell (left) led the early Home Rule movement in Parliament. The great Liberal Prime
Minister Willam Gladstone (center) twice tried to pass it. Arthur Balfour, Lord Randolph’s friend, tried to kill it with kindness.
CHURCHILLS IN IRELAND...
Trinity College. These men, while committed to the preservation of the Union, wanted London to pursue more
progressive policies. Indeed, the Viceregal family did not hesitate to socialize with various Catholic clergy and members
of the Catholic hierarchy.
In a February 1877 Belfast speech, the Viceroy
deplored the sectarian attitudes and rioting that had come to
characterize that city in the previous two decades.
Marlborough and his son held that progressive policies were
the most effective means to combat Fenianism, to preserve
the Union and to undercut the obstructionist campaign
Parnell and his party were waging at Westminster. Randolph
expounded on this approach, perhaps a little too forcefully
for the comfort of his father and Prime Minister Disraeli, in
an autumn 1877 speech in his Woodstock constituency:
…it was inattention to Irish legislation that had produced the obstruction to English legislation [in the
Commons]. There were great and crying questions
which the government had not attended to, did not
seem inclined to attend to and perhaps did not intend
to attend to. These were questions of intermediate and
higher education, the assimilation of municipal and
parliamentary electoral privileges to English privileges,
and other matters that he would not go into. They
must remember that England had years of wrong,
years of crime, years of tyranny, years of oppression,
years of general misgovernment to make amends for in
Ireland.1
Although his father attributed these embarrassing
comments to an excess of champagne, Randolph could have
been trying to steal thunder from Herbert Gladstone, the
Liberal leader, who was due soon in Ireland. But over the
next three years Marlborough and his son consistently promoted government assistance to enable small tenants to
purchase their holdings and opposed landlords’ demands for
coercion or summary justice to quell rural unrest. Both supported the Intermediate Education Act of 1878 that
widened hitherto limited post-primary education opportunities for the Catholic majority, and, a year later, unsuccessfully
lobbied to establish a Catholic university.
As a Cabinet minister in the mid-1880s, Lord
Randolph Churchill put a high priority on solving the
Catholic higher educational grievance as the best tactic to
attract the Catholic hierarchy and middle classes to the Tory
party and the Unionist cause. Although Arthur Balfour,
Randolph’s Tory contemporary and friend, made two unsuccessful attempts to address this issue, it was not resolved until
a Liberal government, including Randolph’s son Winston,
passed the National University of Ireland Act in 1908.
When western Ireland faced the looming threat of
another potato famine in 1879, the Duchess of
Marlborough, aided by Randolph and Jennie, organized a
relief effort that eventually raised over £135,000, mostly
from English sources, providing assistance for food, fuel,
clothing and seed potatoes. Randolph warned his mother to
be careful not to legitimize by her efforts the widespread agitation for rent reductions and the boycotting of landlords
urged by Michael Davitt’s new Land League. At
Westminster, Parnell quipped that the government was
fighting the famine, or perhaps the Land League “from
behind the Duchess’s petticoats.”2
The Viceregal efforts failed to alleviate the agrarian
crisis or to check the growing political popularity of Parnell’s
Home Rule movement. Realizing that the land question was
the steam that drove the Home Rule engine, Parnell allied
himself and his party with the Land League’s campaign of
rural agitation and intimidation of landlords to secure rent
reductions and prevent evictions. Former Fenians in America
helped fund nationalist politics. A sign of the increasing Irish
hostility to the British government was when the
Marlboroughs were pelted with eggs by Dubliners upon
their final departure from Ireland in April 1880.3
FINEST HoUR 142 / 38
Randolph Plays the Orange Card
Randolph Churchill’s experience in Ireland influenced
his belief that progressive policies on land, local government,
economic development, and higher education, would
benefit both the Conservative Party and Irish society.
Although in opposition for the next five years, Randolph
kept au courant with Irish friends and Dublin Unionists;
Irish Nationalist MPs like Tim Healy, Joseph Biggar, and
Timothy Sexton; and even reform-minded Liberals like
Joseph Chamberlain, Charles Dilke and Henry Labouchere.
His opposition to Gladstone’s reintroduction of coercion in
1881 led many to believe that Randolph had become a
Home Ruler, and even that he wished to form a new
fusionist party with Liberal friends and fellow “Tory
Democrats.”
These suspicions were acute after Gladstone’s 1885
resignation and in the Conservative caretaker government of
Lord Salisbury. Hoping to secure Irish votes for the Tories in
the approaching general election, Randolph unofficially
assured Parnell that the Tories would not renew coercion. By
then, Parnell had a network of 1200 National League
branches in the south and west of Ireland and a well financed
and highly disciplined Irish party of eighty-three MPs, whose
support could determine whether Tories or Liberals formed
a government. The new Tory Viceroy, Lord Carnarvon,
joined with Churchill, even urging a devolved Irish assembly.
Salisbury and most of his Cabinet opposed these moves and
rejected a confidential offer from Gladstone to cooperate on
a bipartisan solution to the Irish question.
The canny Salisbury believed that Gladstone’s commitment to the Irish cause would split the Liberal Party.
When the Irish Nationalists won eighty-six seats in the
December 1885 election, giving them the balance of power,
Salisbury resigned in January, allowing Gladstone to return
to office pledged to Home Rule.
The political battle waged over Gladstone’s 1886
Home Rule Bill was one of the most bitter in modern British
history. It catapulted Lord Randolph Churchill into the
political spotlight when, in a dramatic appearance at Belfast’s
Ulster Hall, he invoked threats to loyal and industrious
Ulster Protestants as the principal objection to a Home Rule
legislature. Repeatedly using “Protestant” instead of
“Loyalist” or “Unionist,” he proclaimed that England would
not leave the Protestants of Ireland in the lurch….It
was only Mr. Gladstone who could for a moment
imagine the Protestants of Ulster would yield obedience to the law, would recognize the power or would
satisfy the demands of a Parliament in Dublin—a
Parliament of which Mr. Parnell would be the chief
speaker and Archbishop Walsh the chief priest.”4
In a May 8th letter to The Times, Randolph more or less
justified armed resistance to Home Rule when he said “Ulster
will fight and Ulster will be right”—a slogan that energized
Ulster Protestants against Home Rule for decades to come. A
more sectarian slogan was “Home Rule is Rome Rule.”
Was Lord Randolph acting more out of opportunism
than conviction? Historians A.B. Cooke and John Vincent
argue that he was secretly a Home Ruler but cynically
“played the Orange card” knowing it would split the
Liberals, paving the way for a Tory government. This ignores
the consistency with which Lord Randolph denounced
Home Rule before 1886 and even more forcefully in his
public speeches against Gladstone’s Second Home Rule Bill
in 1893, a time when it held no political gain and when his
health was failing badly. Cooke and Vincent confuse Lord
Randolph’s advocacy of land reform, equality of franchise
and local government with support for Parnell’s goal of abolishing the Act of Union.
What then accounts for Randolph’s passionate and
provocative language in 1886? Although political considerations cannot be entirely discounted, his opposition to Home
Rule was influenced by several factors.
First, his mother was a Londonderry: a family with
extensive Ulster holdings and a distinguished history of
service to the Crown. Randolph respected his mother’s political views and was concerned for the property of his relatives
and other landlords under a Home Rule administration that
would be dominated by politicians who had openly supported the land war.
Second, Randolph’s sister-in-law Leonie had married
into the County Monaghan Leslie family, which had Orange
connections and held some 50,000 acres in Ulster. Although
the Leslies had good relations with their tenants, they were
forced to sell 6000 acres between 1878 and 1883, owing to
the agricultural crisis and a steep decline in rental income
following the land war and Gladstone’s 1881 Land Act.
Another sister-in-law was married to Moreton Frewen,
whose family also held Irish lands.
Third, in autumn 1883 Churchill came to the defense
of Lord Rossmore, a County Tyrone magistrate dismissed by
Gladstone because of his participation in an Orange protest
against Nationalist campaigns for Home Rule among Ulster
Catholic voters, which decimated the vote of Protestants
who had heretofore voted Liberal. In the 1883 Monaghan
by-election the Liberal candidate secured only 247 votes
compared to the 4247 Liberal votes in the 1880 general election. From then on, mid-Ulster Protestant Liberals voted for
Tory or Liberal Unionist candidates. The significance of this
in Churchill’s 1886 Orange posture, and in laying the
groundwork for seventeen Unionist victories in the l886
Home Rule election, is considerable.5
Fourth, Lord Randolph had long relied for Irish advice
on Gerald FitzGibbon. In December 1885, FitzGibbon had
urged him to do something for Irish education, but as
regards “the National Question—For heaven’s sake don’t
touch it! It is red hot.”6 It was at FitzGibbon’s 27 December
salon that Randolph first proposed using Ulster as the main
weapon to defeat Home Rule. A few weeks later he wrote to
FitzGibbon, “…the Orange card is the card to play, Pray
God it may turn out the ace of trumps.”7
Churchill’s focus on Ulster underlined the reality that
by the 1880s, most Ulster Protestants considered themselves
a people apart from the rest of Ireland. Led by Belfast, the >>
FINEST HoUR 142 / 39
CHURCHILL PROCEEDINGS
CHURCHILLS IN IRELAND...
economy of the northeast was a stark contrast to the economically devastated south and west, and there was a strong
sense of Ulster pride and identity. Protestant-Catholic relations in Belfast had been good in the early 19th century, but
religious tension grew as rural Catholics flocked to Belfast
after 1850, competing with working class Protestants, and
sectarian rioting increased after 1856. By 1880 Catholics
were a third of the city’s population, nurturing Protestant
fears of Catholic engulfment.
Home Rule Fails, 1886
The phenomenal success of Parnell’s Irish Nationalists,
especially in Ulster, effectively destroyed the last vestiges of
liberalism and led to a common Protestant alliance against
Home Rule. The prospect of a Home Rule Parliament
passing protectionist legislation was anathema, especially to
businessmen. These factors continued to reverberate through
to the era of the Third Home Rule Bill on the eve of World
War I—as Randolph’s son Winston would soon learn.
Ulster Protestants’ loyalty to the Union ignored the
fact that Catholics were the majority or close to it in many
parts of the province, as the map on page 49 illustrates. The
implications of this religious demographic would haunt
Ulster politics through recent times.
But Ulster did not have to fight. Gladstone’s bill was
defeated on 8 June 1886, when ninety-three Liberals voted
with the Conservatives against it. Gladstone resigned went to
the country. In the June election, the Tories and their Liberal
Unionist allies won 317 seats, a majority of 141 over
Gladstone and the Irish Nationalists. In Belfast, inflammatory rhetoric by politicians of both sides produced the worst
sectarian rioting and intimidation in history. Between June
and late August 1886, fifty people were killed, 371
policemen injured, property was looted and burned.
Except for a brief 1892-95 Liberal rule, when the
second Home Rule Bill again failed, Tory/Unionists would
govern Ireland until 1906. Salisbury had called for “twenty
years of resolute government,” so effectively implemented by
his nephew and Irfish Chief-Secretary Arthur Balfour that
his sobriquet “Bloody Balfour” is familiar in Ireland today.
But the Tories knew that they could not govern Ireland with
coercion alone, and eventually the kind of progressive policies Lord Randolph advocated were introduced. Randolph
and his Liberal Unionist friend Joseph Chamberlain were
now spokesmen for Ulster Unionists who, while opposed to
Home Rule, lobbied for additional land purchase legislation
and a system of democratically elected local government.
Arthur Balfour, his brother Gerald, and George
Wyndham, the Irish Chief-Secretaries from 1887 to 1905,
hoping to “kill Home Rule with kindness,” initiated measures that transformed the Irish countryside. Government
financing through five Tory and one Liberal land bills
through 1909 provided £157 million, enabling over 200,000
tenants to purchase over nine million acres of Irish land.
Only three percent of the population owned land in 1870;
by 1916 it was 64 percent. This represented the virtual
undoing of the 17th century land confiscations and initiated
the most profound, if quietest, economic and social revolution in modern Irish history.
When local government began in 1898, county and
urban councils demonstrated that the Irish were capable of
efficient, honest administration, but council elections provided an opportunity for Nationalists to demonstrate that
Home Rule could not be killed by kindness. Nationalists
won 218 council seats to only twenty-eight Unionists in
Leinster, 145 to fourteen in Munster, ninety-three to five in
Connaught. In Ulster Nationalists won ninety-five seats
while Unionists won eighty-six, over half of the latter concentrated in Counties Antrim, Armagh and Down.8
Another Conservative legislative measure was the
Congested Districts Board in l891, which used state funds to
purchase large tracts of land in the west and convert it into
viable small farms for the impoverished people of
Connaught and other areas. This measure enabled my
mother’s family to come down from their desolate and rocky
mountain rental in County Mayo to take up a small farm at
Turlough near Castlebar. My relatives are still on that property over a century later.
Other measures were introduced to provide badly
needed agricultural training and craft instruction as well as
to improve transport facilities with light railways during this
period of Tory/Unionist government. New cultural and
social movements that emphasized Irish national identity
proved that conditions were now improving. Irish emigration slackened.
But to Conservative disappointment, their conciliatory
policies did more to promote Home Rule than to erode it.
As Winston Churchill observed to Bourke Cockran in April
1896: “Home Rule may not be dead but only sleeping—but
it will awake like Rip Van Winkle to a world of new ideas.”9
Winston Churchill as Home Ruler
Home Rule did awaken, when the Liberals returned to
power in 1906, but instead of new ideas, it ultimately was
wrecked by the old ideas and habits of English politicians:
indecisiveness and ambivalence about Ireland, cynical political intrigue, Orange bigotry, the stubbornness and the
conditional nature of Ulster Protestant loyalty.
The 1906 Liberal government, with its vast majority,
felt little pressure to commit to Home Rule. An attempt was
made to fob off the Irish with the very limited Irish Council
Bill in 1907, but this was rejected outright by the Irish. Even
though Winston Churchill had abandoned the
Conservatives and joined the Liberals in May 1904, and had
acknowledged that Ireland was more stable and law-abiding
than in his father’s day, he publicly remained opposed to
Home Rule until 1908. But, as Michael McMenamin will
demonstrate, there is evidence to suggest that his opposition
was gradually diminishing because of the positive changes in
Irish economic, political and social conditions.
Liberal opposition to Irish Home Rule evaporated in
1908 when by-election losses and the challenge of passing
Lloyd George’s controversial budget gave the party leaders a
FINEST HoUR 142 / 40
new appreciation for the eighty-three Irish MPs. Thus, when
Irish leader John Redmond tabled a Home Rule resolution
on 30 March 1908, Winston Churchill endorsed an Irish
Parliament for domestic affairs with the proviso that it would
be subject to the supremacy of Westminster. Speaking at
Dundee on 20 April he explained:
I have become convinced that a national settlement of
the Irish difficulty on broad and generous lines is
indispensable to any harmonious conception of
Liberalism—the object lesson is South Africa…At the
next election I am strongly of the opinion that the
Liberal Party should claim full authority and a free
hand to deal with the problem of Irish self-government without being restricted to the measures of
administrative devolution of the character of the Irish
Council bill.10
Home Rule Reawakens...
Within a year Home Rule was at the center of the political stage. The veto of Lloyd George’s budget by the
Tory-dominated House of Lords—the first such veto in 250
years—effectively paralyzed the government. The Liberals
resigned and appealed to the country, their leader H.H.
Asquith announcing that if returned to government, they
would introduce legislation to curb the Lord’s veto and create
Irish self-government compatible with imperial integrity.
Liberals campaigned on “Peers vs. the People,” while
Tory/Unionists campaigned on the triple threat of Home
Rule, Welsh Disestablishment and socialistic revolution. In
the January 1910 election the Liberals secured only two
more seats than the Tory/Unionists, giving the balance of
power to eighty-two Irish and forty Labour members.
The Irish MPs supported the resubmitted budget and
gladly anticipated quick action in the Lords. John Redmond
said: “With us this question of the veto is the supreme issue.
With us it means Home Rule for Ireland.”11
The Lords finally approved the budget in April, but
the issues of the Lords’ veto and Home Rule were linked in
bitter political discourse for the rest of the year. The
Tory/Unionists attacked the Liberals for entering into to a
“corrupt bargain” with the Irish, whose support for the
budget they alleged had been contingent on an explicit
Liberal promise to destroy the Lords and introduce Home
Rule. Redmond was attacked as the “dollar dictator” after his
party’s successful fundraising in America. In fact, the budget
was carried by thirty-four votes independent of the Irish and
Asquith had given no specific promises to Redmond.
The Tories continued to perpetuate the “corrupt
bargain” because they had nothing else to offer. Their party
was divided over Free Trade. Voters, they perceived, equated
tariff reform with “stomach taxes” and were angry that the
Lords had tried to smash Lloyd George’s budget, which
funded old age pensions and health insurance.12
The death of King Edward VII in May 1910 brought
a temporary pause in this bitter debate and occasioned a constitutional conference to seek compromise over the powers of
the House of Lords. Home Rule was the proverbial elephant
in the room at conference sessions, but Unionist leader
Arthur Balfour refused to compromise, even over a proposal
for federal devolution instead of Home Rule. Although
Balfour knew the federal idea commanded some sympathy
with Churchill and Lloyd George, he refused to budge,
hoping to drive the Liberals out of office over the Lords issue
in the next election.
Dining with Balfour that summer, Winston’s uncle
Moreton Frewen and Bourke Cockran urged him to consider
a federal solution for Ireland. The failure of the conference
on 18 November brought the dissolution of Parliament and
another election in December. Meanwhile, Asquith had
secured a secret promise from the new King, George V, to
create sufficient new Liberal peers to vote for Lords reform if
his party won.
The election was another tie: 272 seats each to the
Liberals and Tory/Unionists, with the Irish and Labour again
holding the balance of power. On 10 August 1911, after
months of bitter debate, a Parliament Bill limiting the Lord’s
power to delay organic legislation to three years received the
royal assent. The path was now open for Asquith to table the
third Home Rule Bill, which he did on 11 April 1912.
Ulster Unionists watched these events with horror and
anxiety, knowing that Parliament Act had removed the last
obstacle to Home Rule. Over the next three years they
engaged in an escalating propaganda campaign, drilling,
marching and arming, making “Ulster will Fight” more than
a rhetorical threat, and bringing the region to the brink of
civil war by 1914.
...and Fails Again
Within six weeks of the passage of the Parliament Act,
Edward Carson, the leader of the Irish Unionist Alliance,
declared that Home Rule was “the most nefarious conspiracy
that had ever been hatched against a free people,” and urged
the creation of a “Protestant Province of Ulster.” In October
Winston Churchill, who had become the government’s
point man on Ireland, announced that a Home Rule bill
would be introduced in the next Parliamentary session. It is
significant that he admitted the government’s duty to
address Ulster anxieties by providing “secure and effective
safeguards for civil and religious equality and freedom.”13
Churchill and his wife made a well-publicized trip to
Belfast on 8 February 1912, where he was prevented from
speaking at the Ulster Hall, the very site where his father had
condemned Home Rule and urged Ulster to resist a quarter
century earlier. Arriving at their hotel, the Churchills were
jeered by a crowd of about 10,000, and his car was nearly
overturned by protesters as he made his way to the alternative venue of Celtic Park in Catholic West Belfast.
Churchill tried to assure all that religious discrimination would not happen under Home Rule. He urged Ulster
Protestants to unite as Irishmen and to fight, not against
Home Rule, but to ensure it would be a success for all.
His message fell on deaf ears. Orange lodges escalated
their drilling, marching and training; rifle clubs proliferated >>
FINEST HoUR 142 / 41
CHURCHILL PROCEEDINGS
CHURCHILLS IN IRELAND...
and provided legal cover for arms acquisition. By January 1913
an Ulster Volunteer Force was constituted from local groups
and English Tories actually cooperated in the search to secure a
professional soldier to command it.
Having written a biography of his father a few years
earlier, Winston Churchill knew about Lord Randolph’s rallying of Ulster Protestants in 1886. His Belfast trip
undoubtedly convinced him that despite the positive
changes in Ireland since, the Protestant opposition to Home
Rule had not abated and must be taken into account.
Over the next few weeks, he and Lloyd George tried
diligently but unsuccessfully to convince the Cabinet that
some provision to satisfy Ulster Protestants be included in
the initial Home Rule Bill. Asquith feared this would
alienate Redmond and the Nationalists so he choose his
usual tactics of “wait and see,” and had introduced the third
Home Rule Bill without any provision that addressed the
Ulster problem.
This was a fatal mistake. It gave Edward Carson, James
Craig and the other Ulster leaders ample opportunity over
the next two years to agitate further and organize and expand
the Ulster Volunteer Force. Equally as serious was the fact
that by not including Ulster in the initial draft, any subsequent proposal would have to be brought in as separate
legislation, and subject to a three-year delay if the Lords
vetoed it. As time would tell, trying to figure out which areas
of Ulster could legitimately be excluded from Home Rule
was an almost impossible task.
On 9 April 1912, two days before Asquith introduced
his bill, Andrew Bonar Law, Balfour’s successor as
Tory/Unionist leader, proclaimed to 100,000 people at
Belfast’s Balmoral Showgrounds that Ulster was holding the
pass not only for itself but for all people of the British
Empire. Carson added: “Even if both parties in Great Britain
were committed to Home Rule, Ulster would still resist.”14
“THEIR IRISH MASTER”: Irish Nationalist Party leader John
Redmond leads Asquith, Lloyd George and Churchill by the nose
in this contemporary cartoon published in the Unionist press.
The above cartoon conveys the dangerous waters
Churchill and his colleagues were entering. Despite WSC’s
eloquence, passion and convincing speech during the bill’s
second reading, Carson’s followers and the English Unionists
were not charmed into abandoning their resistance.
On July 29th, in a speech in the shadows of
Churchill’s ancestral home at Blenheim, Andrew Bonar Law
declared: “I can imagine no length of resistance to which
Ulster can go in which I should not be prepared to support
them, and in which, in my belief, they would be supported
by the overwhelming majority of British people.” Behind the
scenes on at least two occasions, Law tried to pressure the
King to dismiss the government, despite its majority.
Ulster Will Fight
In late September 1912, the Ulster Unionist Council
organized the elaborate and religiously resonant Ulster
Covenant: nearly half a million Ulster citizens sign a pledge
to use “all means necessary” to resist Home Rule and to
refuse to recognize the authority of any Dublin Parliament.
Prominent English Unionists participated, giving their
stamp of approval to threats of revolution.
In September 1913 a thoroughly alarmed George V
invited Bonar Law, Balfour and Churchill to Balmoral to see
if some deal could be worked out. Again Churchill tried and
failed to broker a compromise which would confer Home
Rule on Ireland but keep the Protestant parts of Ulster separate. He even suggested that Redmond make an “exclusion
offer” to Carson, but the furthest Redmond could go politically was to suggest regional autonomy under a Dublin
Parliament—and that of course was a non-starter.
Equally alarmed, Prime Minister Asquith began a
series of secret talks with Bonar Law in October, to see if the
length and area of an Ulster exclusion could be negotiated.
Initially Bonar Law and Balfour were conciliatory, but following Tory victories in two by-elections in mid-November,
they rejected any compromise. In Dublin on 28 November,
Bonar Law taunted Asquith: either crush the Ulster
Volunteers and face an army rebellion or concede a general
election. He even contemplated crippling the army by suspending the Army Annual Act when it came up for renewal,
an idea he eventually dropped as dangerous and unprecedented.
In February 1913 Balfour called for the permanent
exclusion of all of Ulster as the only way to avoid civil war,
even though he knew this was not justified demographically
or economically.15 In March, Carson rejected Asquith’s
belated offer of a six -year exclusion for those Ulster counties
which opted out. Within days the government received intelligence of potential Ulster Volunteer Force raids on army
ammunition depots in four Ulster towns. Plans were made
to send troops to secure these supplies and Churchill, with
the approval of Cabinet, ordered naval ships to the area to
provide possible assistance in the movement of troops.
Bonar Law’s previous references to army disobedience,
and the ham-fisted conveying of orders to the army unit at
the Curragh, provoked the so-called Curragh Mutiny, when
fifty-seven army officers resigned their commissions in the
mistaken impression that they were going to be ordered to
disarm the Ulster Protestants and enforce Home Rule. The
affair was patched up, but did not prevent the army from
FINEST HoUR 142 / 42
intervening when a few weeks later the Ulster Volunteers illegally landed 35,000 guns and large quantities of
ammunition at Larne. Over 10,000 Ulster citizens were
involved in this clearly treasonable act, but no one was ever
arrested or prosecuted. Churchill was quick to emphasize in
Parliament the hypocrisy of so-called law-abiding Ulster loyalists openly defying the law.
The Curragh affair provoked a Parliamentary furor,
Balfour calling Churchill an “agent provocateur” who, “in
one of his Napoleonic moods [would encircle] Ulster with a
military and naval force that it could be…strangled into submission.” Balfour believed that the government was in such
a pickle over the amending bill that nothing should be done
to help them unless they agreed to a general election. He
rejected efforts of Austen Chamberlain to revive the federal
idea as a way around the difficulty. Even at the subsequent
Buckingham Palace Conference in late July, which was called
by the King to try to hammer out an exclusion agreement
between Redmond and Carson, Balfour was uncooperative.
Dublin Nationalists tore a page from Ulster’s book in
January 1913 by forming the Irish Volunteers, 75,000 strong
by 1914. On 26 July the Irish Volunteers landed a large
quantity of German arms in open daylight at Howth—not
to attack the Ulster Volunteer Force but to uphold Home
Rule if it took effect. In contrast to Larne, police and troops
now intervened and seized some of the arms, with three
people killed and thirty-eight wounded. Passions in Ireland
were inflamed by the difference in treatment.
World War I Intervenes
But for the outbreak of World War I, Ireland may have
been plunged into civil war in 1914. Home Rule was put on
the statute book on September 15th, but was suspended for
the duration of the war. There was no amending bill for
Ulster. John Redmond’s subsequent call for the Irish
Volunteers to join the war effort effectively destroyed the
Irish Nationalist Party in Parliament, opening the door for
more militant Irish Republicans like Padraig Pearse and Tom
Clarke to seek Irish opportunities in England’s wartime difficulties. The result, of course, was the Easter Rising in 1916,
which put the final nail in the Home Rule coffin. After the
war Winston Churchill would again face the difficulties
posed by the “muddy byways and dreary steeples of
Fermanagh and Tyrone.”
Walter Hines Page, American Ambassador to the
Court of St. James’s, summed up the tragedy of these years
when he observed:
The Conservatives have used Ulster and its army as a
club to drive the Liberals out of power, and they have
gone to the very brink of civil war. They don’t really
care about Ulster. I doubt if they care much about
Home Rule. They’d slip Ireland out to sea without
much worry—except their own financial loss. It’s the
Lloyd George programme that infuriates them, and
Ulster and Home Rule are all mere weapons to stop
the general Liberal Revolution.16
At this stage of his involvement in Ireland, Winston
Churchill made a sincere effort to reconcile the claims of the
Irish majority to self-government, and at the same time to
insure that the Protestants of Ulster would be secure. The
challenge of achieving such a settlement was to remain for
the remainder of the century.
The challenge of reconciling opposing religious and
ethno-political groups is not unique to Ireland, as conflicts
in our contemporary world illustrate. I’ll leave it to subsequent speakers to evaluate the nature of Churchill’s
involvement and legacy after World War I, when he was
drawn into controversies over the Anglo-Irish Treaty and the
control of the Irish naval ports.
Endnotes
1. Roy F. Foster, Lord Randolph Churchill; A Political
Life (Oxford University Press, 1981), 43.
2. Ibid., 51.
3. Ibid., 55.
4. Roy F. Foster, “To the Northern Counties Station:
Lord Randolph Churchill and the Prelude to the Orange
Card,” in F.S.L. Lyons and R.A.J. Hawkins, eds., Ireland
under the Union: Varieties of Tension; Essays in Honour of T.
W. Moody (Oxford University Press, 1980), 254.
5. Catherine B. Shannon, “The Roots and Symptoms of
Separatism in Nineteenth Century Ulster, 1840-1886,” a
paper delivered to the American Historical Association, 1977.
6. Foster, “Northern Counties,” 242.
7. Randolph S. Churchill, Winston S. Churchill, vol. 2,
Young Statesman 1901-1914 (Boston: Houghton Mifflin,
1967), 435.
8. Catherine B. Shannon, Arthur J. Balfour and Ireland,
1984-1922 (Washington: Catholic Univesity of Amrica Press,
1987), 104.
9. Randolph S. Churchill, ed., Winston S. Churchill,
Companion Volume I, Part 1 (Boston: Houghton Mifflin,
1966), 669.
10. Churchill, Young Statesman, 434-35.
11. Ibid., 438.
12. See St. Loe Strachey to Balfour and G.A. Arbuthnott
to Sandars in Shannon, Arthur J. Balfour, 144, 159.
13. Churchill, Young Statesman, 444-45.
14. Ibid., 452.
15. Shannon, Arthur J. Balfour, 186.
16. Ibid., 206.
Other works consulted:
A.B. and John Vincent Cooke, The Governing Passion:
Cabinet Government and Party Politics in Britain, 1885-86
(New York: Barnes & Noble, 1974).
R.W. Kirkpatrick, “Origins and Development of the
Land War in Mid-Ulster, 1879-85” in Ireland Under the
Union, cited above.
Martin Gilbert, ed., Winston S. Churchill, Companion
Volume III, Part 1 (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1973).
Ronald E. Quinault, “Lord Randolph Churchill and
Home Rule” in Reactions to Irish Nationalism, Alan O’Day,
ed. (London: Hambledon Continuum, 1987).
,
FINEST HoUR 142 / 43
CHURCHILL PROCEEDINGS
Churchill and Home Rule
OFTEN CRITICIZED AS A MAN WHO LOVED WAR, CHURCHILL DID HIS BEST BEFORE
WORLD WAR I TO BRING ABOUT A PEACEFUL RESOLUTION IN IREALND, IN THE
FACE OF OPPONENTS WHO WERE SPOILING FOR A FIGHT. HE PLAYED THE GAME IN
A WAY COMPATIBLE WITH LIBERAL DEMOCRACY. HIS OPPONENTS DID NOT.
MICHAEL McMENAMIN
“THE HARP THAT ONCE AGAIN”: F. Carruthers Gould in the Westminster Gazette, 1 May 1912. (An allusion to St. Brendan, charming
the fishes.) Gould’s title was from the Irish poet Thomas Moore (1779-1852, author of “Oft in the Stilly Night”): “The harp that once through
Tara’s halls / The soul of music shed / Now hangs as mute on Tara’s walls / As if that soul were fled.” The fish in the water is Sir Edward
Carson, leader of the Ulster Unionists, who adamantly opposed the Home Rule Bill Churchill and the Liberals had just introduced.
W
inston Churchill throughout his long parliamentary career was frequently accused of
political inconsistency, a charge seemingly
made plausible by the fact that he twice
changed parties. Churchill himself considered
the charge false. He thought it more important to adhere to
principle rather than to party, and believed he had done so.
But Irish Home Rule seems to offer, upon first impression,
an example where Churchill in just eight years did a 180degree turn, from opposing Home Rule as a Conservative
upon his election to Parliament in 1900, to supporting it as
a Liberal in 1908.
Churchill was never as conservative as his opponents
on the left liked to claim. In 1897, well before entering
______________________________________________________
Mr. McMenamin, a regular contributor to Finest Hour, is a first
amendment and media defense lawyer in Cleveland and co-author of
the critically acclaimed Becoming Winston Churchill: The Untold
Story of the Young Churchill and His American Mentor.
public life, he wrote to his mother explaining that he was a
Liberal and that, but for Home Rule, he would stand for
Parliament as a Liberal:
There are no lengths to which I would not go in opposing
[the Conservatives] were I in the House of Commons. I
am a Liberal in all but name. My views excite the pious
horror of the Mess. Were it not for Home Rule—to
which I will never consent—I would enter Parliament as
a Liberal.1
Seemingly he maintained this position until 1908
when he first voted in principle to grant Home Rule to
Ireland. Two years later as Home Secretary, Churchill
became the government’s leading spokesmen on Irish Home
Rule, thereby earning him the undying enmity of the
Conservative Party. Conservatives disliked and distrusted
Churchill before then; but Home Rule took their hostility to
a new level.
FINEST HoUR 142 / 44
Did Churchill really do a complete turnaround on
Home Rule? A detailed examination of his correspondence
and speeches suggests that he did not. From a young age,
Churchill supported self-government for Ireland in a way
Unionists and their Conservative allies never did. That position never changed, but his views on how practically to
implement some form of Irish self-government evolved in
response to changed circumstances.
A remarkable letter from a twenty-one-year-old
Churchill in April 1896 to his American mentor and oratorical role model Bourke Cockran, sets out his views on Irish
self-government: a benchmark from which to analyze the
evolution of his views through 1908. He freely admits the
historical wrongs Ireland suffered at English hands, but suggests that is all in the past and that, in twenty years, “the
necessity” for Home Rule “will have passed away.”
Cockran, a passionate Home Ruler, quickly recognized
that the two men were not really that far apart in their opinions and principles and, as he would often do in his unique
formative relationship with the budding young statesman,
went out of his way to coinvince Churchill that they shared
the basic assumptions of a liberal democracy.
An analysis of Churchill’s views on Home Rule falls
into four phases:
First are the years 1896 to 1900, before Churchill was
elected to Parliament.
Second are his years as a young Conservative MP, from
1900 to 1904, when he left the Conservative Party to join
the Liberal Party over the issue of Free Trade.
Third is the 1904-08 period where, after the overwhelming Liberal victory in 1905, Liberals ruled the
Commons without depending upon the Irish Nationalists to
stay in power. Now Churchill began to see the successful selfgovernment negotiated in South Africa in the wake of the
Boer War as a template for Irish self-rule.
Fourth are the years from 1910 to the outbreak of
World War I in 1914, when the Liberal majority in the
Commons was so reduced that the Irish Nationalist Party
held the balance of power. But perhaps we should let
Churchill speak for himself (with a few observations).
His Father’s Son: 1896-1900
Despite his youth, Churchill at twenty-one was well
informed on Ireland. In his 1896 letter to Cockran he comments on a speech Cockran had sent him strongly
supporting Irish Home Rule:
Of course—my dear Cockran—you will understand that
we approach the subject from different points of view and
that your views on Ireland could never coincide with
mine....Six years of firm, generous, government in Ireland
will create a material prosperity which will counteract the
efforts which able and brilliant men—like yourself—
make to keep the county up to the proper standard of
indignation. Not for twenty years could a Home Rule bill
pass the English people—so sick and tired are they of the
subject.... The problems & the burning questions of
today will be solved and Home Rule for Ireland as likely
as not will be merged in a wider measure of Imperial
Federation.”2
Cockran promptly replied, attempting to minimize
the differences between their views:
I do not think you and I are very far apart in our convictions. We differ more in phrases than in principle. If your
idea of Imperial Federation be the solution of the Irish
question nobody will rejoice at it more than the men who
have struggled for the same result under the name of
Home Rule.”3
We are fortunate that young Winston expressed his
views in such detail at an early time: a baseline with which to
evaluate the evolution of his position on Home Rule over the
years. Cockran promised that he would go into the subject
of Irish Home Rule “more freely” once he and Churchill met
again. Presumably they did but, if so, Churchill was not yet
persuaded. In the aforementioned 1897 letter to his mother
he declared his Liberal principles, but added: “As it is—Tory
democracy will have to be the standard under which I shall
range myself.”4
Opening His Mind: 1900-1904
Irish policy did not much concern Churchill in 190004, but he was especially well informed on it: at this time he
was writing a biography of his father, Lord Randolph, who
had been one of the leading Conservative spokesmen on
Ireland, having spent five years there as secretary to his
father, the Duke of Marlborough, who had served as the
Irish Viceroy (see previous article).
Conservatives in the early 1900s believed that land
ownership was more important to the Irish than Home Rule.
So they used government subsidies to allow Irish tenant
farmers to purchase the land on which they worked.
Churchill supported this policy. A letter on 28 December
1903 from Churchill to an unknown addressee (probably a
Free-Trade Conservative hesitant to support the Liberals
because of their support for Home Rule) suggests his familiarity with the issues, although his position on Irish
self-government was ambiguous.
I do not believe that the Liberal Party have any intention of introducing a Home Rule Bill for Ireland in the
immediate future; nor do I think that the question of
Home Rule can be in any degree at stake at the next
general election. No doubt there is an immense
number of people of both political parties who adhere
to the general principle that countries should be governed by their own consent from within & not by
other authority from without. But the objections to
the Home Rule Bills of 1886 & 1893 were more effective against the details of that legislation than against
the principles & aspirations by which it was sup>>
ported.5
FINEST HoUR 142 / 45
CHURCHILL PROCEEDINGS
CHURCHILL AND HOME RULE...
Churchill was correct that the Liberal Party had no
intention of introducing a Home Rule Bill in the immediate
future. But after he left the Conservatives for the Liberals in
May 1904, his views on Ireland continued to evolve as he
began to see “practical solutions” to the problems posed by
Irish self government.
His Opinions Ripen: 1904-1910
As a newly minted Liberal, Churchill continued his
public stance against Home Rule, but a speech in
Manchester on 30 September 1904 foreshadowed his eventual shift. Typically, he presented two extreme points of
view—Ireland as a colony, Ireland as an independent
republic—leaving the reasonable middle for himself
You have doubtless read the account of the plan for
securing to the Irish people a more effective and intimate
control of their own purely local and domestic concerns,
of their private bill legislation, for certain portions of
their local legislation, and for the spending and auditing
of their own money—a plan which has been brought
forward by Lord Dunraven and other prominent Irish
Unionists and landowners. These proposals have of
course been attacked, and from two extreme points of
view. They have been attacked by those who wish to see
Ireland a foreign country and even a hostile country, and
they are attacked by those whose plan is to hold it as a
conquered and subjugated country. This is just the reason
why they seem to me so very interesting—that they
should be attacked from both these points of view.
I implore you not to let this new Irish hope die. Let us
take it for what it is worth. Do not let us allow ourselves,
on the one hand, to be frightened by extravagant
demands not now before us, or on the other to be bullied
out of what is right and reasonable and what is practical
and prudent.6
On 20 February, 1905, Churchill addressed the House
of Commons and openly moved closer to the Liberal
Party’s’s position on Home Rule:
The most obvious objection to the present Irish system
was that the people had no sense of ownership in government similar to that existing in this country. We might
have a poor thing of a Government, but at least it was our
own, and slowly the electoral machinery could change it;
but in Ireland there was no change possible, it was an
arbitrary authority under the specious guise of representation.”7
Churchill’s moderate tones, and his 1906 biography of
his father, were drawing notice. Lord Randolph’s friend Wilfrid
Scawen Blunt wrote that WSC’s father “was far more of a
Home Ruler than you seem to know, and I have always
thought that, if the Election of 1885 had gone rather more
favourably and Gladstone had not taken up the Irish cause
when he did, your father would have persevered with it.”8
During the 1906 general election campaign, Churchill
continued to support reform in Irish government but not
Home Rule: “I am persuaded that considerable administrative reforms are required in the government of Ireland, and I
would gladly see the Irish people accorded the power to
manage their own expenditure, their own education and
their own pubic works according to Irish ideas.9 In another
speech Churchill said: “I do not think we should be frightened from dealing with the question [of Irish reform]
because we have the harsh and senseless reiteration of the cry
of Home Rule.”10
Churchill’s position on Home Rule began to change
openly in 1908, after he had been appointed to his first
cabinet position at the Board of Trade. In March 1908, John
Redmond, the head of the Irish Nationalist Party, introduced
a Home Rule resolution in the House of Commons.
Churchill proposed to vote for it, and wrote Redmond: “My
vote for your resolution will undoubtedly expose me to considerable attack, as it will rightly be interpreted as being
another step forward on my part towards a full recognition
of Irish claims to self-Government.”11
Ten days later, Churchill wrote to Prime Minister
Asquith seeking his approval of the answers he proposed to
go all-out for Home Rule in the next Parliament:
At the last election I precluded myself as did others of my
colleagues from attempting what is called the “larger
policy” [Home Rule] in respect of Ireland during the represent Parliament. By that I am bound so far as this
Parliament is concerned. I have for some time resolved
not to be fettered in that way in any subsequent
Parliament. I am encouraged by the striking success of a
bold and generous policy in South Africa to approach
Irish difficulties in a similar spirit—and when this
Parliament has reached its close, I am strongly of opinion
that the Liberal Party should claim authority to deal with
the problem of Irish self government as indicated in Mr.
Redmond’s resolve.12
During the 1908 by-election, which Churchill had to
contest after being appointed to the Board of Trade, he
explained how his position on Home Rule had changed:
My opinion on the Irish question has ripened during the
last 2 years when I have lived in the inner or nearly in the
inner councils of Liberalism. I have become convinced
that a national settlement of the Irish difficulty on broad
and generous lines is indispensable to any harmonious
conception of Liberalism—the object lesson is South
Africa….At the next election I am strongly of the opinion
that the Liberal Party should claim full authority and a
free hand to deal with the problem of Irish self-government without being restricted to measures of
administrative devolution of the character of the Irish
Councils Bill.13
FINEST HoUR 142 / 46
Churchill continued to support Home Rule during the
election campaign which began in December 1909. In doing
so, he persuaded the Irish of his sincerity in a way Asquith
did not. On 10 February 1910, Wilfrid Blunt wrote in his
diary about a conversation with Churchill:
He would like the Home Office. He would not take
Ireland, unless it were to grant Home Rule. I questioned
him as to his understanding of the Home Rule to be
given, and he said it would be complete Parliamentary
Government for all Irish affairs in Dublin, including
finance, police, and everything, but not the power of
levying Custom duties against England, or altering the
land settlement and, of course, none of levying troops or
of treating foreign Powers. He would have the Irish
members still sit at Westminster, but in diminished
numbers.14
Taking the Lead: 1910-1912
Churchill became Home Secretary in 1910 but not
before turning down the Irish Office. As Churchill wrote to
Asquith in early February, 1910:
I am sensible of the compliment you pay to my personal
qualities in suggesting that I should go to Ireland at this
juncture, & I realize the peculiar importance to the
Government of successful conduct of that post. I am the
more grateful to you for not pressing me to undertake it.
The office does not attract me now. There are many circumstances connected with it which repel me. Except for
the express purpose of preparing & passing a Home Rule
Bill I do not wish to become responsible for Irish administration. And before that situation can be reached, we
must—it seems to me—fight another victorious battle in
the constituencies.15
were steamships, railways, telegraphs, and telegraphy: “we
have been absolutely relieved from all apprehensions of a
descent upon Ireland.”
On population, Churchill noted that Ireland’s had
fallen to 4.3 million while Great Britain’s had rise to 41
million. Ireland was now so dependent that “the fortunes of
the two islands are so profoundly interwoven that I submit
to the party opposite that any disagreement upon primary
matters has become morally and physically impossible.”
Churchill conceded that Irish representation at
Westminster must fall, but pointed out that this would “be an
advantage and not a disadvantage to the Conservative Party.”
He brushed aside religious fears, saying Irish Protestants
would be “shielded and guarded by the Imperial Parliament.”
And he held out the promise of broad, sunlit uplands: “If we
could reconcile the English and the Irish peoples and rally the
Irish nation around the Monarchy...then we should have
gained an addition for the British Empire equal to many divisions of the Fleet and the Army.”
Churchill concluded his speech with an appeal to the
Conservative Party to correct its mistake when it had rejected
self-governance for the Transvaal colony in South Africa.
When he had moved approval of the Transvaal Constitution
five years earlier, he recalled, “I said that, with our great
majority, we could only make the Transvaal Constitution a
gift of party, but that they could make it the gift of the
nation as a whole.” Now the Conservatives faced the same
question: “Do not choose wrongly again!”
But not only did the Conservative Party choose
wrongly again; it brought the country to the brink of civil
war by opposing Home Rule over the next four years. A few
months later, Churchill was appointed First Lord of the
Admiralty, a position from where he continued to be the
government’s chief spokesman on Home Rule for Ireland.
Opposing Treason: 1912
But the Liberals did poorly in the first 1910 election,
holding a two-vote lead over the Tories, which dropped to
one after another election in December. Now the Liberals
had to seek support of the eighty-two Irish Nationalist MPs,
which gave leverage to Home Rule proponents.
Addressing Parliament on 15 February 1911,
Churchill spoke of all that had changed since 1886 when
Lord Randolph had opposed Home Rule: “better houses,
better clothes, more food, more money, more education,
expanding prosperity, an astonishing absence of crime, a new
activity of enterprise, a new culture. But the biggest change,
he asserted, was “events in South Africa which had followed
upon the grant of self-government to the Transvaal and
Orange River colonies....” The speech also demonstrated
Churchill’s perception of Irish history and its impact on
current British politics.16
Churchill first addressed the question of military risk
attendant with Home Rule. Alluding to the Spanish Armada
and the abortive French involvement in Irish “troubles” in
the 1790s, Churchill pointed out that in those days, weather
was crucial and communications were poor. But now there
Catharine Shannon has already described the violent
opposition that greeted Churchill in Belfast in February
1912, where he characteristically went to parlay with the
Ulster voters. “It seemed to me,” wrote The Times reporter,
“that Mr. Churchill was taking a greater risk than ever he
expected….Yet he never flinched and took hostility visualised as well as vocalised calmly and no harm fell him.”17
Trying to assure the Protestants, Churchill listed six specific
safeguards designed to protect their interests, including the
right of the Crown, the Imperial Parliament and Privy
Council to invalidate legislation deemed unjust to
Protestants. Realizing that his father’s famous “Ulser will
fight” declaration would be thrown in his face, Churchill
turned it to his advantage:
...it is in a different sense that I accept and repeat Lord
Randolph Churchill’s words, “Ulster will fight and Ulster
will be right.” Let Ulster fight for the dignity and honour
of Ireland. Let her fight for the reconciliation of races and
for the forgiveness of ancient wrongs. Let her fight for the
unity and consolidation of the British Empire. Let her >>
FINEST HoUR 142 / 47
CHURCHILL PROCEEDINGS
CHURCHILL AND HOME RULE...
fight for the spread of charity, tolerance, and enlightenment among men. Then, indeed, “Ulster will fight and
Ulster will be right.” [loud cheers].18
In a letter written on 14 September 1912, Churchill
scorned the possibility of the persecution of Protestants by
Catholics in Ulster:
There is not the slightest danger in my opinion of
Throughout 1912, Sir
Protestants in Ulster being
Edward Carson, leader of the
persecuted for their religion
Ulster Unionists, and Tory
under a system of Home
leader Andrew Bonar Law,
Rule. The danger is entirely
frequently urged Ulster viothe other way, viz—that the
lently to resist Home Rule.
very strong and aggressive
Referring to their speeches as
Protestant majority in parts
“almost
treasonable,”
of North East Ulster will
Churchill declared on 30
maltreat and bully the
April they were inciting open
Catholics in their midst.
rebellion: “As the detestable
This has recently occurred
incidents which have lately
on several occasions, and is
taken place in Belfast prove
in my opinion the direct
they have been only too well
result of the encouragement
interpreted by those to whom
given to bigotry and lawlessthey were addressed.”19
ness by the Leaders of the
Bonar Law kept piling
Conservative Party.23
on. Lamenting “a revolutionary committee which has
Lords Again: 1913
seized upon despotic power
By August 1913 Home
by fraud,” he could imagine
Rule had twice been passed by
no Ulster act of resistance he
the House of Commons and
“should not be prepared to
twice rejected by the House of
support.”20
Lords. Since the Lords could
Churchill, deeply disno longer effectively veto a bill
turbed, wrote to J.L. Garvin,
after this happened, Home
editor of The Observer: “Do
Rule was scheduled to become
they [the Tories] think they
effective by the middle of
will never come back to
1914. Regardless of the compower? Have they no policy
promises eventually put forth
for Ireland except to make it
to appease Ulster, it must be
UNIONIST POSTCARD lauding Carson and other leaders.
ungovernable?...no one that I
remembered that the Ulster
know of has ever contemUnionists and their conservaplated the application of force to Ulster. The principle and
tive allies were opposed to any Home Rule for Ireland even
doctrine lately enunciated would dissolve the framework not
if Ulster were excluded.
only of the British Empire, but of civil society.”21
Churchill and the Liberals were looking for a way to
Churchill took the initiative in appeasing the
appease Ulster, but not at the expense of denying self-govUnionists by suggesting, in a 31 August, 1912 letter to John
ernment to the rest of Ireland. What Churchill and the
Redmond, that a proposal to allow counties to opt out of
Liberals resented were the threats of violence and civil war
Home Rule for a limited period would best be made by the
from the Ulster Unionists. One diarist wrote that Churchill
Irish nationalists and not the government:
indicated that Liberals were not opposed per se to some sort
of exemption for Ulster from an Irish government but:
My general view is just what I told you earlier this year—
“he strongly resents that Ulster should talk of ‘Civil War’ &
namely that something should be done to afford the
do everything in her power to stir up rebellion before even
characteristically Protestant and Orange counties the
the H.R. bill [is debated]....Naturally the Opposition wish to
option of a moratorium of several years before acceding
turn out the Government. But it is not ‘playing the game’ to
to an Irish Parliament. I think the time approaches when
try & do this by trying to raise a threat of civil war.”24
such an offer should be made—and it would come much
At the same time, however, the Irish Nationalists
better from the Irish leaders than from the
remained opposed to a divided Ireland. T.P. O’Connor, an
Government....These opinions are personal so far as I am
Irish Nationalist MP from Liverpool, wrote Churchill on 7
concerned—they have not been arrived at from consultaOctober 1913, telling him that his party was “irreconcilably
tion, they are for your private eye alone.”22
hostile” to any break up of Ireland, and would prefer postFINEST HoUR 142 / 48
them agitate for a majority when an election comes, and
ponement of Home Rule “for some years” rather than to “a
then, if they choose, they can amend or at the very worst
mutilation of the country.”25
repeal a law against which the country would then have
Since the Liberals needed the Irish Nationalists to stay
pronounced. That is a full remedy. It is the only remedy
in power, they could not agree permanently to exclude Ulster
which is open to Liberals when we are in a minority. But
from Ireland. But the most the Irish Nationalists were
I repeat what I said in Dundee that the most extreme
willing to do, as Redmond told Asquith in November, 1913,
course in which the Opposition would be justified would
was to provide for autonomy of Ulster under an Irish
be to obtain a majority, and then to amend or repeal the
Parliament, much Quebec’s autonomy in Canada.
Home Rule Bill. That is their right. It is their extreme
Churchill made repeated attempts to reach an accomright. And it is their only right.26
modation with the Conservatives, to no avail. Sir Edward
Carson’s threat to declare in essence unilateral independence
Churchill enjoyed public speaking and, while he freely
for Ulster in the event of Home Rule was anathema to
used self-deprecating humor, he just as frequently used
Churchill, who believed that violence or even its threat had
humor, if not ridicule, against his opponents—which he did
no place in a democratic society governed by the rule of law.
now, in commenting upon the Conservative rejection of
Ireland and Ulster were to pay a heavy price in blood
Asquith’s compromise. The bracketed audience reactions are
at various times during the 20th Century, and Bonar Law
from the verbatim transcript in Hansard:
and Carson were more responsible for it than their counterparts in the Irish
But are they satisNationalist Party.
fied, are they
While
the
pleased, are they
Nationalists were in
gratified? Oh, dear,
Churchill’s words
no. Within a few
“playing the game,”
hours of the Prime
Bonar Law and
Minister’s stateCarson
courted
ment Lord Robert
treason with Great
Cecil was writing to
Britain’s
mortal
the Times newsenemy, Imperial
paper pointing out
Germany.
More
that two general
importantly, they
elections would be
did
so
with
no protection to
impunity. There are
Ulster, because the
many aspects to all
ULSTER PARLIAMENTARY DIVISIONS: The shaded areas are majority Catholic,
country might vote
this remindful of
showing that Ulster itself was by no means overwhelmingly Protestant.
Liberal on other
more recent times
matters [laughter].
and issues in other
What! Two general elections are no protection for Ulster!
lands.
Where, then, are the Tory hopes of victory? [laughter and
cheers]. Don’t they think they can even win one out of these
Passage and War: 1914
two elections—not even the second one, six years hence?
In March 1914, Asquith produced his final compromise, without the support of Conservatives but with the
Why, gentlemen, to satisfy these gentry [laughter] you
Irish Nationalists. It provided that each of the Ulster counwould have not only to promise them an election, but
ties could decide in an election to exclude itself for six years
you would have to guarantee that it will go the way they
from the provisions of Home Rule—giving the
want [laughter]. You will have to promise that they are to
Conservatives in effect two elections in which to overturn it.
have a majority at the election, or else, of course, there
Within a week of the compromise being introduced
will be civil war [laughter]. To satisfy their friends in
Churchill gave a speech, approved in advance by Asquith,
Ulster you must not only arrange that the counties where
which goes a long way toward explaining the sheer hatred
there is an Orange majority should be excluded, but those
and vitriol in which the Unionists held Churchill. After
counties where they are in a minority must be excluded
explaining the nature of the compromise the Liberals had
too. Of course—what did you expect? [laughter].
proposed, Churchill examined the options open to Ulster
Majority or minority, they must have their own way—or
Protestants and their Conservative allies:
else it will be civil war [laughter].27
Strictly speaking, no doubt, the Constitutional remedy of
A later passage in this speech perfectly illustrates the conthe Ulster Protestants and the Unionist Party is clear and
tempt Churchill held for the Ulster Protestants whose
plain. They should obey the law [loud cheers]. If they
legitimate concerns he had tried to so hard to appease: >>
dislike the law—it is a free country—[hear, hear]—let
FINEST HoUR 142 / 49
CHURCHILL PROCEEDINGS
CHURCHILL AND HOME RULE...
The Prime Minister asked in one of his great speeches—
”If Home Rule were to fail now, how could you govern
the West of Ireland?” Captain Craig, an Ulster Member,
a man quite representative of those for whom he speaks,
interjected blithely, “We have done it before.” Ah! now,
observe that here is a man claiming to rebel himself, and
asking for special consideration, asking that he shall not
be ridden rough-shod over, and in the very midst of this
agitation, of this act of his, he shows the kind of measure
he would mete out to others.
There you get the true insight into the Tory mind.
Coercion for four-fifths of Ireland is a healthful, exhilarating, salutary exercise, but lay a finger upon the
Tory fifth—sacrilege, tyranny, murder [laughter]. “We
have done it before, and we will do it again.” There is
the ascendancy spirit. There is the spirit with which we
are confronted. There is the obstacle to the peace and
unity of Ireland. There stands the barrier which, when
all just claims have been met and all the fears, reasonable and unreasonable, have been prevented, still
blocks the path of Irish freedom and British progress....
If Ulstermen extend the hand of friendship it will be
clasped by Liberals and by their Nationalist countrymen in all good faith and in all goodwill. But if
there is no wish for peace, if every concession that is
made is spurned and exploited, if every effort to meet
their views is only to be used as a means of breaking
down Home Rule and of barring the way to the rest of
Ireland, if Ulster is to become a tool in party calculations, if the civil and Parliamentary systems under
which we have dwelt and our fathers before us for so
many years are to be brought to the crude challenge of
force, if the Government and the Parliament of this
great country and greater Empire is to be exposed to
menace and brutality, if all the loose, wanton and reckless chatter we have been forced to listen to all these
many months is in the end to disclose a sinister and
revolutionary purpose—then, gentlemen, I can only
say to you let us go forward together and put these
grave matters to the proof.28
A little over a month later Edward Carson and the
Ulster Volunteers, conspiring with Imperial Germany
against the Crown, illegally landed 35,000 rifles and
3,000,000 rounds of ammunition in Ulster. While this hardened British public opinion against the Ulster Protestants,
not a single person was ever charged let alone convicted of
this open act of treason.
Churchill had taken the lead in persuading the Irish
Nationalists to allow any Ulster county temporarily to opt
out of Home Rule, while at the same time being the most
outspoken opponent of what he labeled the “almost treasonable actions” of Carson and the Unionists in opposing
it—actions encouraged and facilitated by Andrew Bonar
Law and the Conservative Party, who supported the die-hard
opposition to any self-government anywhere in Ireland. It
was a view Winston Churchill never shared.
In August 1914, Irish Nationalist Party leader John
Redmond agreed that, while the Home Rule Bill was to be
put in the statute book, its actuation would be suspended for
the duration of the war that had just broken out in Europe.
His agreement was his political death warrant at the hands of
Naionalist extremists. The last chance for a peaceful resolution of Irish self-government was forever lost.
While he is criticized even today as a man who loved
war, Winston Churchill did his best in those days before the
coming of the Great War to bring about a peaceful resolution
in Ireland, in the face of opponents who were spoiling for a
fight. Carson and his followers, by openly arming themselves, and by conspiring with Britain’s adversary, set an
example for the “physical force” Nationalists who wanted
Ireland to be an independent republic, not the self-governing
Dominion promised by Home Rule. Decades of bloodshed
would follow in Ireland.
Churchill played the game in the only way compatible
with liberal democracy. His opponents did not.
,
Endnotes
BV and CV refer to Biographic and Companion volumes of
the official biography: Randolph S. Churchill, Winston S.
Churchill (London: Heinemann, 1966-67).
1. CV I, Part 2, 751.
2. Michael McMenamin and Curt Zoller, Becoming
Winston Churchill (Westport, Conn., Greenwood Press, 2007), 86.
3. Ibid., 88.
4. CV I, Part 2, 751.
5. CV II, Part 1, 273.
6. Robert Rhodes James, ed., Winston S. Churchill: His Complete
Speeches 1897-1963 (New York: Bowker, 1974) 8 vols., I: 360.
7. Ibid, 421.
8. CV II, Part 1, 491.
9. Complete Speeches, I: 531.
10. Ibid.
11. CV II, Part 2, page 764.
12. OB II, 431.
13. OB II, 434.
14. OB II, 437.
15. CV, II, Part 2, 1133.
16. Complete Speeches, II: 1678.
17. OB II, 450.
18. Complete Speeches, II: 1899.
19. Complete Speeches, II: 1947.
20. OB, II, 453.
21. CV II, Part 3, 1393.
22. OB II, 454.
23. CV, II, Part 3, 1397.
24. CV, II, Patt 3, 1399.
25.CV, II, Part ?, 1401.
26.Complete Speeches, II: 2224-2233.
27. Ibid.
28. Ibid.
FINEST HoUR 142 / 50
BOOK REVIEWS
Books, Arts
& C uriosities
Old Story, Different Approach
TED HUTCHINSON
Warlord: A Life
of Winston
Churchill at War
1874-1945, by
Carlo D’Este.
Harpers, 2008,
846 pp., illus.,
hardbound,
$39.95, member
price $31.95.
C
arlo D’Este’s agreeable new book is
neither a cradle-to-grave biography
or the specialized study seemingly promised by the title. It is instead a curious
overview of Churchill’s nearly lifelong
involvement in the British armed forces,
a study which focuses tightly on some
aspects of his subject’s relationship with
the military while, frustratingly, gives
others only the most fleeting of glances.
D’Este himself calls his book “the
story of the military life of Winston
Churchill,” and asserts that “very little
has been written about the military
Churchill” (xvi)—which is not categorically true.
Virtually every book ever written
about Churchill (excepting, perhaps, books
on his paintings) contains at least some
element of his varied relationship with the
military and war, and specialized studies
have been penned by Ronald Lewin
(Churchill as Warlord ), Max Schoenfeld
(The War Ministry of Winston Churchill),
R.W. Thomson (Generalissimo Churchill),
David Jablonsky (Churchill, The Great
Game and Total War), and Douglas
Russell (Winston Churchill: Soldier)
among others.
Still, D’Este seems to be doing
something a little different. He focuses
on Churchill’s role as “warlord” during
World War II (the book contains some
interesting passages about how Churchill
combined the roles of Prime Minister
and Minister of Defense in May 1940,
essentially making himself the undisputed head of military affairs) and how
this role was informed by Churchill’s
long career both in serving and leading
military departments.
D’Este begins by tracing young
Winston’s boyhood fascination with
things military, following the young man
to Sandhurst and to military posts
abroad. He dogs Churchill’s path, like
countless other biographers, from India
to the Nile to South Africa before finally
assuming his first parliamentary seat after
the turn of the 20th Century. There is
little new here, but D’Este writes well
and seems commendably up-to-date on
the latest in the voluminous Churchill
literature. I found his writing on actual
military engagements (such as the battle
of Omdurman) to be particularly strong,
as befits a renowned military historian.
After an interlude the author takes
us through the First World War, from the
Admiralty to the trenches. He spends the
requisite pages on the Dardanelles and
concludes that Churchill must shoulder
much of the blame for the operation,
even if there was still much to go around:
tough but fair. It is to D’Este’s credit that
I never felt he had an axe to grind; I do
not necessarily agree with all of his
methods or conclusions, but he
approached the topic, in my mind, with
fairness and even-handedness.
This is not to say that D’Este isn’t
seriously critical of Churchill and his
behavior. At the Admiralty in 1914-15,
he writes that Churchill “lost sight of the
enormousness of his responsibility as
First Lord” as he got caught up in the
FINEST HoUR 142 / 51
Churchill Centre Book Club
Managed for the Centre by Chartwell
Booksellers (www.churchillbooks.com),
which offers member discounts up to
25%. To order please contact
Chartwell Booksellers, 55 East 52nd
Street, New York, NY 10055.
Email [email protected]
Telephone (212) 308-0643
Facsimile (212) 838-7423
excitement of the war. (226) This theme
recurs again and again, contradicting the
belief held by many.
Virtually everyone who has studied
Churchill acknowledges that, in his
youth, WSC was fascinated by war; but
in World War I, exposed to the slaughter
in the trenches, many scholars argue that
he was a changed man who approached
war in a more mature and cautious way.
D’Este does not dispute that
Churchill hated war’s mindless destruction or regretted its immense human
costs. By he also writes with some conviction and much evidence that WSC
never really lost his fascination for battle,
which was both a strength and weakness
in World War II.
The inter-war years are traversed in
a handful of pages, which may seem reasonable in a book already overlong at 846
pages. But in retrospect, I think greater
coverage of the late 1920s (when
Churchill served as Chancellor of the
Exchequer and fought for reduced military spending), and the 1930s (when he
famously advocated rearmament), would
have been more illuminating. D’Este
might have examined these periods rather
than focus so much energy on the early
years, where he offers little new or even
relevant material.
There are moments in the book
where it almost seems that D’Este was
undecided about whether to write a book
about Churchill as a warlord or as a
soldier. In some ways he tried to do both,
and thus succeeded in doing neither as
well as the reader would hope.
Regardless, the bulk of this study
covers World War II, which is appropriate considering its focus, and here the
author is on firm and familiar ground.
(D’Este’s biography of General George
Patton is one of his outstanding >>
BOOK REVIEWS
CHURCHILL AS WARLORD...
works.) As expected, his analysis and
descriptions of the ground battles of the
war are extremely lucid; his words on
North Africa, Italy and Northern Europe,
are helpful for both the expert and the
novice; I understood the events leading
to Alamein much better after reading his
account.
The main thrust of the book is
that Churchill was in many ways a poor
warlord, one who frequently misunderstood strategy and tactics, had little
conception of the difficulty in supplying
armies, and pushed for action even when
prudence was a better course. All of this
was driven, argues D’Este, by Churchill’s
underlying weakness: a fascination for
war driven more by romance than reality.
D’Este readily concedes, however, that
this glaring weakness was ironically also
Churchill’s greatest strength as a war
leader. Churchill’s lack of pragmatism,
his disgust with surrender, his love of
action, his belief in daring offensives and
his innate belief in the will of the British
people were not just hindrances to the
British war effort but the very thing that
made him such an acclaimed war leader
in 1940. For at that moment, during his
country’s finest hour, Britain did not
need a pragmatist; they needed a
romantic dreamer.
It is to D’Este’s credit that he recognizes this truth, and thus leaves us
with a deeply ambiguous portrait: one
that is greatly critical of Churchill the
strategist while deeply appreciative of his
qualities as a national leader in a crisis. It
is this ambiguity that is truly reflective of
Churchill himself, and makes the book
worth reading. ,
WSC as Prop for a Larger Story
ALFRED JAMES
Churchill and
Australia, by
Graham
Freudenberg,
Macmillan, 614
pp., illus., hardbound A$59.99,
available from
chaos.com at
$51.98.
“I
ncomparably, Winston Churchill
thought more about Australia and
more about what Australia thought of
him than any world leader before or
since, or ever will again.…the best lesson
to be drawn from the long story of
Churchill and Australia is how much, in
the final analysis, we must rely upon ourselves. And, of course, the lesson of his
whole life: ‘Never Despair.’”
So says Graham Freudenberg at the
end of his incisive and lengthy account of
Churchill’s interaction with Australia. He
is not a “rusted-on” conservative but a
key figure in the Australian Labour Party
who was principal speechwriter to two
prime ministers and three premiers of
____________________________________
Mr. James ([email protected]) represents
The Churchill Centre in Australia.
New South Wales, our largest state.
Churchill supposedly has or had a
bad press in Australia over Gallipoli in
1915 and Singapore in 1942. Graham
Freudenberg says the first problem began
with a statement in the 1921 Official
History of Australia in the War of 19141918 by C.E.W. Bean: “So, through
Churchill’s excess of imagination, a
layman’s ignorance of artillery and the
fatal power of a young enthusiasm to
overwhelm older and slower brains, the
tragedy of Gallipoli was born”—a remark
coloured by Bean’s emotional attachment
to the Australian soldier, whom he
regarded as heroic and above fault.
In The World Crisis (vol. 2, 1923)
Churchill responded: “It is my hope that
the Australian people, towards whom I
have always felt a solemn responsibility,
will not rest content with so crude, so
inaccurate, so incomplete and so prejudiced a judgement but will study the
facts themselves.” It is doubtful that “the
Australian people” had ready access to
the information that the Dardanelles/
Galllipoli campaign was designed to
break the deadlock in the mud of
northern France by diverting the Turks
from their alliance with Germany and to
control the Black Sea, allowing supplies
to reach Russia. Nor would they have
known of the prevarication and bloodyFINEST HoUR 142 / 52
minded obstinacy of leaders like
Kitchener and Fisher, which ensured that
the element of surprise was lost to the
ANZAC attacking forces.
The Singapore complaint involves
the degree of help by Britain to Australia
in World War II. Early on, Churchill told
Australians that Japan was not a threat
and that Singapore would always be
unassailable, and they did not much
object when Churchill himself moved
Australian troops and personnel around.
He ordered the 7th Division of the 2nd
Australian Imperial Force (AIF) to join
two other divisions in the Middle East
and not go, as Australia expected, to
Malaya; he even sent one brigade to assist
in the forlorn invasion of Greece, where
3000 Australians were captured.
Everything changed with the attack
on Pearl Harbour on 7 December 1941.
Australian Prime Minister Curtin at once
announced that Australia was at war with
Japan “because of unprovoked attacks on
British and U.S. territories,” hoping that
Australia would become the base from
which Australia, Britain and the U.S.A.
would repel and then attack Japan. He
soon realized that he was more likely to
get help from the U.S., declaring on 27
December that “Australia looks to
America, free of any pangs as to our traditional links or kinship with the United
Kingdom.”
This did not go down well with
Churchill who, inter alia, saw it as a
propaganda gift to the enemy. Even
Roosevelt allegedly thought it bespoke
“panic and disloyalty.” Freudenberg
claims that “Churchill’s overheated reaction to Curtin’s message to the Australian
people distorted his relations with
Australia for the rest of the war and
beyond.”
Churchill, of course, wanted
nothing to interfere with his carefullywrought case for the policy of “Hitler
First.” Australia, he wrote later, had a
duty to “study their own position with
concentrated attention....we had to try to
think for all.” Freudenberg in his prologue puts it differently: “Churchill’s
priority was not saving the British Empire
but using the Empire to save Britain.”
But Paul Keating, a Labour Prime
Minister in the 1990s, wrote recently:
“Churchill could be truculent or even
petty but never mean....His fight with
Curtin was about the management of the
war and his priorities; it was in no way
about punishing or ostracising Australia.”
The prologue also makes a lot of
Lord Moran’s claim that Churchill,
annoyed by Curtin’s independence, said
Australians came from “bad stock.” The
representations of Churchill’s doctor are
not always reliable, but regardless, about
half of the 300,000 Australians who
fought in the Great War were born in
Britain or were children of Britons. Many
others were descendants of free immigrants, including gold-seekers, who
flooded the country from 1840 and,
perhaps, no more than ten percent were
distant descendants of the 160,000 convicts sent to Australia, mostly in the
half-century after 1788.
After Singapore fell, Australia
became much more self-interested and
assertive and properly requested that the
7th Division return from the Middle East
to fight in New Guinea, while Churchill
wanted them to assist in the defence of
Burma. Fortunately, the Japanese threat
to the Australian mainland did not
amount to much, and paradoxically, the
AIF was left with little to do in the later
stages of the War, tending to blame
Douglas MacArthur for ignoring them.
As one who has lived in Australia
for sixty years, I’ve never found an
underlying current of dislike for
Churchill. Ex-servicemen in particular
have great respect for him. When the
Winston Churchill Memorial Trust was
launched in February 1965, Australians
donated over £2 million, more than was
raised in Britain.
In his Man of the Century, John
Ramsden notes that the appeal coincided
with Britain’s closer identification with
Europe and with Australia’s imminent
involvement with the Vietnam War, and
wondered whether the appeal was “one
last rally” for all that Churchill had stood
for in the Anglo-Australian identity.”
Maybe so, but there was a further “rally”
in 1999 when 55 percent of Australians
voted against a republic and to retain
Elizabeth II as Queen of Australia.
Freudenberg’s work must be
regarded as fair analysis. Its generosity
towards Churchill and his vagaries
reminds me of that of Roy Jenkins (FH
114, http://xrl.us/bejq78)—also no political soul-mate. Freudenberg relies
strongly on the series Documents in
Australian Foreign Policy and Sir Martin
Gilbert’s official biography. Oddly, he
does not mention the Companion
Volumes or the Churchill Papers at
Churchill College (whose index produces
1080 hits for the keyword “Australia”).
Why was this book written when
most of the facts are well known? It
seems that Freudenberg has employed
Churchill as a prop to tell the broader
story of Britain and Australia.
He states, for example, that
“Churchill’s ambivalence about Australia
was a mirror image of Australia’s ambivalence about itself.” For a century, leading
Australian politicians made three-month
round trips by sea to London to assert
their Britishness and to allow themselves
to be “duchessed” by their hosts. In the
Great War, Australians were keen to
demonstrate that “the British race in the
Antipodes had not degenerated” and, in
World War II, “in an almost theological
sense Australian Britons had been reborn
into the baptism of fire at Anzac Cove.”
Was this a lack of confidence and selfdetermination arrested only when
dragged too far into someone else’s war?
If so, not much has changed under the
new protection of the U.S.A. in the past
half-century. ,
The Wine of Life was in His Veins
DAVID DILKS
Churchill by
Himself: The
Life, Times and
Opinions of
Winston
Churchill in His
Own Words,
Richard M.
Langworth,
editor. Public
Affairs, 620 pp.,
illus., hardbound, $29.95, member price $24.
L
et it be said at once: this is far and
away the most comprehensive and
illuminating book of its kind yet published. For half a century and more, we
have not lacked compendia which offer
extracts from Churchill’s speeches, writings and talk (indeed rather more than
that; for many a quote has been wrongly
attributed to him over the years). Now
we have something of a different order.
Churchill by Himself is a massive
____________________________________
Professor Dilks is former Vice Chancellor of
the University of Hull and author of The
Great Dominion: Winston Churchill in
Canada 1900-1954. As stated last issue, this
review was mistakenly assigned twice; this
report is therefore the British version.
FINEST HoUR 142 / 53
affair, made possible by a confluence of
talent and circumstance which would
have pleased WSC himself. Applied
science, which always fascinated
Churchill and in which he had a serious
interest, has enabled computers to store
and cross-reference, in a way hitherto
unimaginable, huge tracts of knowledge
and fact. The editor thus created a mechanism which overcomes the frailties of
human memory and omission.
Since Churchill published some 15
million words, however, no merely
mechanical process will suffice. Even a
volume of this size, at more than 600
pages, can accommodate but a tiny fraction. To the testing task of selection the
editor has brought his long experience
with Finest Hour. He knows which subjects are most interesting to readers, and
which misapprehensions are the most
common. Indeed, this bible has its own
Apocrypha in the shape of an amusing
appendix entitled “Red Herrings.”
That Churchill had an elephantine
memory is well known; let us call it a
Napoleonic memory on account of his
profound admiration for the Emperor.
Even in old age, he could recall with ease
verses not read for thirty or fifty years.
Those who possess so extraordinary a
faculty are often themselves lacking in
originality and become mere sponges, a
suitable pressure upon which causes >>
BOOK REVIEWS
CHURCHILL BY HIMSELF...
the words of others to spill out. With
Churchill, the process was quite other.
To an astonishing power of recall
was allied an irrepressible physical and
mental vitality. To adapt a phrase which
he used of own mother, the wine of life
was in his veins. He received his real education, after the formalities of Harrow
and Sandhurst, devouring as a young
officer in India great works of literature.
Suddenly he envied those fortunate
young cubs at universities before whom
the treasures of the ages in history and
philosophy were laid. As he later taught
himself to paint, so Churchill taught
himself to write, speak and think. Bill
Deakin, his literary assistant and close
friend of latter days, once said “Alone he
had created his own school and graduated from it; this was the essential role of
his own writings in the formation of his
personality and career.”*
To the end of days, Churchill
acknowledged his gratitude to the master
at Harrow who had taught him English,
Mr. Somervell (whose son served
throughout the war as Attorney-General
in Churchill’s government, and then
became Home Secretary in the caretaker
Cabinet of May 1945). Perhaps our
Centre should institute a Somervell Prize,
for we all have ample cause to bless this
splendid teacher.
To young Churchill’s prodigious
memory was married an instinctive
rather than tutored taste for language, a
capacity to surprise and amuse, a remarkable flair for the ambush of the
unexpected word or phrase. Small
wonder that he was soon earning a handsome living as a journalist. Never did a
statesman owe so much for so long to
mastery of words. This very facility
carried its own dangers. When he was
exhausted or unduly pressed, as in the
later stages of the war, his English sometimes became florid.
From an early stage he dictated his
books, and the more sonorous passages
sound better if read aloud than they look
on the page. That master of a more
austere style, Evelyn Waugh, characterised Churchill’s as “sham Augustan.”
At any rate, this book provides its
____________________________________
* “Churchill the Historian”: The Third
Winston Churchill Memorial Lecture, Swiss
Churchill Society, University of Basle,
Switzerland, 10 January 1969.
reader with material upon which to form
a judgement. Here is a man of powerful
intellect with a taste for reflection, not
invariably consistent and quite willing to
admit the fact. As he used to remark, he
had often had to eat his own words, and
found them on the whole a very nourishing diet. The variety of subjects
covered testifies to the range of
Churchill’s thought. The material is classified partly by subject (each of the
Armed Services, the Second World War,
Germany, Empire) and partly in general
ways (maxims, foresight, ripostes).
The editor concedes (xi) that he
has put “the best possible spin” on
Churchill’s words through the explanatory notes. That is often so. An unwary
reader may well not realise, for example,
that remarks made by Baldwin in
November 1936, and twice cited in this
book, refer not to the General Election
which took place in the previous
autumn, but to an election which might
have been held at the end of 1933 or
early 1934. Some of the footnotes and
references are being corrected in the next
edition and are already posted on the
internet (http://xrl.us/j2uc8).
Even this massive volume does not
exhaust the possibilities. We learn that on
the digital database underlying the book
are 35 million words written about
Churchill, and there are millions beyond
that. A selection from them, discarding
the gushing or the venomous, would
contribute much to our understanding. It
might begin with a dictum of Baldwin:
“The furnace of war has smelted out all
the base metal that was in him.”
Meanwhile, perhaps the editor may
compile a new collection of Churchill’s
words, a literary equivalent of the salon
des refusés; or, if that will not do,
perhaps a page now and again in Finest
Hour for such gems as these:
“My dear young man, thought is
the most dangerous process known to
man” (said to the future Prime Minister
Lord Home, who had asked for a little
time to brood over a complicated issue of
policy); or, to the same interlocutor, and
in respect of Stalin’s appetite for expansion, “A bear in the forest is a proper
matter for speculation; a bear in the zoo
is a proper matter for public curiosity; a
bear in your wife’s bed is a matter of the
gravest concern”; or, in reaction to the
Minister of Transport’s proposal that in
order to demonstrate confidence in the
redesigned Comet aircraft, a large
number of Conservative MPs should be
flown in it to Italy, “I absolutely decline
to place all my baskets in one egg.”
That is for the future, however.
Here is a volume which enables us to
make acquaintance in many contexts
with a man of genius. It should be in the
library of everybody who reveres his
memory and admires his example. ,
Empire’s End: The American Role
CHRISTOPHER H. STERLING
The Last
Thousand
Days of the
British Empire:
Churchill,
Roosevelt, and
the Birth of
the Pax
Americana, by
Peter Clarke.
Bloomsbury
Press, 560 pp., illus., paperback, $25,
$13.60 from Amazon.com.
C
larke argues cogently that decisions
made in the last year of World War
II, leading to the end of Empire, were
increasingly made by the Americans,
FINEST HoUR 142 / 54
reflecting their growing portion of the
fighting forces. The decisions ranged
from military strategy to political
necessity to (and this was central)
Britain’s ongoing financial exigency.
Wrapping up his argument with
the British pull-out from India and
Palestine in 1947, Clarke makes clear
that the writing was on the wall for the
British Empire years earlier. Yet many
in Britain (Churchill sometimes among
them) didn’t see or refused to see the
signs, until the termination of
American Lend-Lease in August 1945
helped to precipitate Britain’s postwar
financial crisis.
____________________________________
As stated last issue, this review was mistakenly
assigned twice, and this is the second review.
A new paperback edition is now available.
LAST THOUSAND DAYS...
A masterful meld of personalities
and policy, Clarke’s review of September
1944 to August 1947—the “thousand
days” of the title—provides insight on
the fast-changing relationship between
Britain and the U.S. Much is alread
known, but this is one of the better versions of this sad tale of Britain’s
transition in the postwar years.
For all his doubts about Empire,
FDR knew and supported the British
view on some issues (such as sharing
atomic secrets). But Truman’s team
began to forge different pathways which
hastened the end of the Empire.
The first part of the book, “Broad,
Sunlit Uplands” (Churchill’s hoped-for
postwar world) brings the story to
autumn 1944. “False Summits” covers
the six months from the 1944 Quebec
conference to the Yalta summit of
February 1945, including the tension
between Eisenhower and Montgomery
over strategy in the war’s endgame.
“Hollow Victories” centers on the first six
months of 1945, through to Potsdam
and the British election. Part four, somewhat overtitled “the liquidation of the
British Empire,” covers the time from VJ
Day in August 1945 through the departure from India and Palestine in 1947.
Ongoing power plays in this period
increasingly came down to money:
Britain’s insufficient wherewithal to run
her Empire. Lend-Lease negotiations
figure large, especially the difficult 1945
deliberations between Britain (led by
economist John Maynard Keynes) and
the U.S. (lesser players, but in control of
the outcome). So do the political realities
of the postwar American and Canadian
loans to Britain as the latter faced what
some termed an economic Dunkirk.
Britain’s departures from India and
Palestine were driven as much by the
need to slash military expense as by the
political deadlocks that hindered quick
resolution of either case. They would lead
to a wider unraveling in the years to
come—the beginning of the end of the
Empire, as Churchill foretold and feared.
Written for a general audience by
an accomplished historian, and based in
considerable part on his close reading of
the published and private diaries of many
of the participants, this book combines
the important role of historical assessment with a vivid sense of what people
actually thought at the time. The two are
usually quite different things.
We know how these events turned
out, but the key players at the time did
not. American military power, vital to
win the war, spelled the end of Britain’s
long hegemony. The fighting was over,
and hard decisions followed. Those decisions fell eventually to Labour, which
ruled the austere postwar world of
rationing, shortages, and often difficult
change; yet American policy and circumstance made many decisions inevitable.
This book makes it abundantly
clear that Clementine Churchill had it
exactly right when she said that the 1945
election loss was, for her husband, a
“blessing in disguise.” ,
Churchill for the Young: Two
Hits, One Miss, and an Artifact
DAVID FREEMAN
Winston Churchill: British Soldier,
Writer, Statesman, by Brenda Haugen.
Compass Point, 112 pp., illus., paperback, Amazon.com, $9.95.
Did Fleming Rescue Churchill?, by
James Giblin, illustrated by Erik
Brooks. Henry Holt, 64 pp., hardbound, $16.95, Amazon.com $13.22.
Winston of Churchill: One Bear’s
Battle Against Global Warming, by Jean
Davies Okimoto, illustrated by Jeremiah
Trammell. Sasquatch, 32 pp., hardbound, $16.95, Amazon.com $11.53.
The Happy Warrior: The Life Story
of Sir Winston Churchill, by Clifford
Makins, illustrated by Frank Bellamy,
commentary by Richard M.
Langworth. Levenger Press, 96 pages,
hardbound, $38, available only from
the publisher, www.levenger.com.
T
he fecund field of Churchill literature extends to books for young
readers nearly as broadly as it does to
adults—and with equally mixed results.
Winston Churchill
by Brenda Haugen
is a straightforward biography
for children published as part of a
series known as
Signature Lives.
Haugen lives in
North Dakota,
and this book is clearly written for
Americans. The text consists of about
ninety pages of narrative illustrated with
many good photos in color and black
and white. A time line sets Churchill’s
life in a global context, and a glossary
FINEST HoUR 142 / 55
explains unfamiliar terms. Altogether,
this is a good introductory account for
children aged 10-13.
Haugen does make a few errors:
Blenheim was Churchill’s birthplace but
not his boyhood home; Winston and
Clementine were married not in
Westminster Abbey but in the neighboring Church of St. Margaret’s.
I
nterestingly,
Haugen includes
the apocryphal
story about
Churchill being
captured by Louis
Botha during the
Boer War. She
might have
avoided such an error if she had read Did
Fleming Rescue Churchill? by James
Cross Giblin. This excellent little book
tells the story of a fifth grade student
who is assigned to write a biographical
essay about Sir Alexander Fleming. In the
process it teaches students the importance of critical thinking and modern
research practices.
“Jason,” our hero, plans to begin
his Fleming research on the Internet, but
his wise teacher warns him that much of
the material found there is inaccurate. So
Jason begins his work by looking through
traditional biographies and encyclopedias. Finding this disappointingly dull, he
turns again to the web, where he quickly
encounters an urban myth: that young
Winston had once been rescued from
drowning in a bog by Fleming’s father.
In gratitude, Winston’s father, Lord
Randolph, agrees to pay young
Alexander’s school fees, including the
costs of medical school. >>
BOOK REVIEWS
CHURCHILL FOR CHILDREN...
The rest is history: as an adult, Dr.
Fleming discovers penicillin, and the
adult Winston’s life is saved by the
antibiotic when he contracts pneumonia
during the Second World War. But Jason
finds variant accounts of this story on the
Internet, carrying the suggestion that the
tale may not be true at all. What to do?
Resourcefully, Jason turns to the
one website that provides the most
authoritative information about
Churchill: our very own Churchill
Centre, www.winstonchurchill.org. “It
must be an English site since they didn’t
spell center the way we do,” Jason concludes, not realizing that we spell “centre”
the way most of the world spells it.
Visiting the Churchill Centre’s
home page, he sees a tab marked
“Churchill Facts.” He clicks on it: “Up
came a list of frequently asked questions,
and would you believe it? The very first
one was ‘Did Sir Alexander Fleming save
Winston Churchill’s life?’”
Having gone to the source, Jason
learns that: “Charming as the story is, it
is certainly fiction. It apparently originated in Worship Programs for Juniors,
by Alice B. Bays and Elizabeth Jones
Oakberry, published around 1950 by an
American religious publisher. The story
appeared in a chapter entitled ‘The
Power of Kindness.’”
Jason reports his findings along
with a factual account of Fleming’s life in
a paper so impressive that his teacher
reads it to the entire class. A scholar is
born—and readers learn the lesson of
checking their facts before publishing.
F
act checking is
precisely what
did not happen in
the case of
Winston of
Churchill: One
Bear’s Battle
Against Global Warming, by Jean Davies
Okimoto. “Winston” is a cigarchomping, Churchill-quoting polar bear
who sets out to warn his fellow ursids
about the sources of greenhouse gas emissions contributing to the deterioration of
their habitat. The bears of Manitoba, in
turn, stage a successful demonstration for
tourists who have come to view the
inhabitants of the “polar bear capital of
the world.”
Unfortunately Winston’s research
(and that of Okimoto) has failed to
uncover that the primary sources of
atmosphere-threatening change are fellow
members of his animal kingdom: cattle,
sheep, goats, deer, giraffes and camels.
The gaseous emissions of these ruminants
(animals with multi-chambered stomachs) account for more greenhouse gas
emissions than all carbon-burning
sources combined—by a wide margin.
We do not learn how Winston of
Churchill proposes to solve global
warming by abolishing the beef, dairy
and woolen industries. Perhaps
Okimoto’s sequel will be an allegorical
tale about a Fascist Nazi grizzly bear who
organizes the deportation of offending
animals to death camps in an effort to
establish an ruminantfrei environment.
B
ut cheer
yourself up
with this:
Levenger Press
has brought
out another
handsome
volume in its
small but
impressive list
of Churchill
titles. The
Happy Warrior, by Clifford Makins with
cartoons by veteran illustrator Frank
Bellamy, and a commentary by Finest
Hour editor Richard Langworth, tells the
life of Winston Churchill in comic-book
format. The series, which took its title
from Wordsworth, appeared in England’s
Eagle comic in 1957-58.
The Eagle, as some Finest Hour
readers will remember, was very much a
“boy’s own” publication, intended by its
creator, the Rev. Marcus Morris, to inculcate “standards and morals as it
entertained with action and adventure.”
The Happy Warrior appeared in weekly,
full-colored installments on the Eagle’s
back cover. Likely it did not disappoint
its readers. By the second week, young
Winston was being shot at without result
in Cuba; the following week had him
reporting for duty on India’s northwest
frontier. Action follows action from that
point on, the cartoonist and narrator
deftly skipping the duller periods like the
great Liberal government of 1906-10, the
General Strike and Depression.
FINEST HoUR 142 / 56
The publisher may have been a
vicar, but he knew what boys wanted to
read. This “biography” is long on
Churchill’s military adventures and the
Second World War accounts for half the
book, while the postwar years are on the
bottom of the penultimate page.
Langworth’s commentary is frank:
“The only hints of criticism in The
Happy Warrior are the suggestion that
Winston traded his English for another
boy’s Latin at school, and that it was
foolhardy—which it probably was—to
defend Crete in World War II. The
shoals on which Churchill briefly went
aground—the gold standard and General
Strike in the 1920s, die-hard opposition
to the India Bill and Gandhi in the early
1930s, over-zealous support of Edward
VIII in the 1936 Abdication crisis—are
all untouched by this account. Of course,
it is a war book, not a biography, so successes like settling the Middle East in
1921 or helping write the Irish Treaty in
1922 are similarly omitted. But even militarily, The Happy Warrior is almost
universally positive.”
Yet Langworth argues that this was
the right approach for the time: “Few
ever argued that there was anyone else to
lead the country in May 1940. Absent
Churchill, who? This comic was produced, of course, in glorious hindsight,
but the reader may consider what
Churchill’s daughter Mary often says:
‘Remember—nobody knew in those days
whether we were going to win.’”
The commentator quotes the late
William Buckley’s remarks to The
Churchill Centre in 1995, that
Churchill’s words were “indispensable to
the benediction of that hour,” Britain’s
finest, Langworth says, “whatever the
glories that came before or the disappointments that came after. It is no
coincidence that our view of Churchill is
still more or less that of Makins and
Bellamy fifty years ago. For those who
remember, or are willing to learn,
Churchill is still the Happy Warrior.”
Offered more as an artifact of a
bygone era when history was presented
quite differently to children—and far
more handsomely bound than it was fifty
years ago—The Happy Warrior makes an
attractive addition to any Churchill
library. For both Churchillians and adolescents, it is a unique and captivating
introduction to the Great Man’s life. ,
BIBLIOGRAPHY
About Winston S. Churchill:
Books Published in 2003-09
ADDENDUM TO THE BIBLIOGRAPHY OF WORKS ABOUT SIR WINSTON CHURCHILL
CURT J. ZOLLER
W
hen the editor asked me
recently to update my
Annotated Bibliography of
Books About Sir Winston Churchill
(2004), it was a difficult decision. It had
taken me ten years to generate the original. Finally we decided to limit the
revision and establishing some ground
rules which will provide maximum information, within my own limitations and
in a reasonably short time frame.
We determined to upgrade only
Section A—books with Winston
Churchill as the main subject—with the
following extensions:
I also added books which include
Churchill, and up to three other individuals, or Churchill and a key subject, such
as Andrew Roberts’ Masters and
Commanders and Raymond Callahan’s
Churchill and His Generals. In my original text, these fell into Section B.
Since I was not in a condition to
travel and personally to review each
book, I relied on a program listing any
book with an ISBN number, which provided information such as author, title,
place of publication, publisher, year of
publication or revision, page count.
Although this program lists every
book published in every language, I
decided, with few exceptions, to include
only European languages and ignore
books in Asian languages (Russian,
Hebrew, etc.), because I had no way to
verify English transliterations.
This abridged Addendum of books
about Churchill since 2003 is offered for
the enlightenment of Finest Hour
readers, and refers to first publication
titles only, not later editions.
Far more extensive is my
unabridged Addenum, which goes to
buyers of copies of my Bibliography sold
by the Churchill Centre (right). This
includes reprints and new entries for
books as early as 1940, along with
reprint information for works published
in 2003-08. If you alreaady own a copy
of my Bibliography, the unabridged
Addendum is available by email from the
editor.
Several people helped me create
this revision. I am indebted to three fine
helpers at the Mission Viejo, Callifornia
Library: Thea Blair for identifying the
digital application that made this project
possible; Kathy Walker for locating
certain scarce titles through inter-library
loan; and Dianne Nixon who was able to
identify index information about books
of which I could locate only a single
copy. I also owe gratitude to my friend
and our editor, Richard Langworth, who
convinced me to tackle the project and
provided repeated advice and suggestions;
and to Dave Turrell who edited this list
for publication.
2003
A684. Adams, Simon. Winston
Churchill. Twentieth Century History
Makers Series.London: Franklin Watts;
Austin, Texas: Raintree Steck-Vaughn,
112 pp. (juvenile).
A685. Arthur, Max. Churchill at
War. London: Carlton, 160 pp.
A686. Ball, Stuart. Winston
Churchill. New York: NYU Press;
London: British Library, 144 pp.
A688. Delpla, François. La face
chachée de 1940: comment Churchill
réussit à prolonger la partie. Paris:
Guibert, 192 pp. (French text.)
A689. Dover, Katherine. Winston
Spencer Churchill, 1874-1965: The
Health of a World Leader. London: privately published, 58 pp.
A690. Enright, Dominique.
Winston Churchill: The Greatest Briton.
London: Michael O’Mara, 256 pp. >>
Curt Zoller’s Annotated Bibliography
of Works About Sir Winston S.
Churchill, at 410 pages, is the most
comprehensive bibliography of works
about Churchill. It includes frank,
forthright reviews on 700 books
specifically about WSC. Also listed are
works substantially about Churchill,
articles, lectures, reviews, dissertations
and theses. The book was a Farrow
Award winner in 2004. Selling for up
to $189 on the web, it’s indispensable
for the serious Churchill library.
SPECIAL! We will include Curt’s
unabridged Addendum (specify
whether you want this by email or
hard copy): $65 postpaid in USA.
TO ORDER: Send check payable to The Churchill Centre, 200 West Madison
Street, Suite 1700, Chicago IL 60606 USA. Or phone toll-free (888) WSC-1874
using Visa, Mastercard, Amex. (Alas postage costs extra outside USA.)
FINEST HoUR 142 / 57
BIBLIOGRAPHY
BOOKS SINCE 2003...
A691. Fowells, Gavin. An
Alternate View of Churchill. London:
Gavin Fowells, 68 pp. (paperback).
A692. Gilbert, Martin. Churchill
at War: His “Finest Hour” in Photographs, 1940-1945. London: Carlton;
New York: W.W. Norton, 160 pp.
A693. Gilbert, Martin. Churchill
and the Middle East. Toronto: Churchill
Society for Advancement of Parliamentary
Democracy, 48 pp. (softbound).
A694. Gilbert, Martin. Winston
Churchill’s War Leadership. New York:
Vintage Books; Continue to Pester,
Nag and Bite: Churchill’s War
Leadership. Toronto: Vintage Canada;
London: Pimlico, 104 pp. Churchillovo
vále ne v dcovstvi: neustále dotírejte,
sekýrujte a kousejte [Continue to Pester,
Nag and Bite]. Prague: BB Art, 2004,
116 pp. (Czech text).
A695. Hack, Karl and Blackburn,
Kevin. Did Singapore Have to Fall?:
Churchill and the Impregnable Fortress.
London and New York: Routledge
Curzon, 300 pp.
A696. Humes, James C. Winston
Churchill. New York: DK Pub. and
A&E, 160 pp.
A697. Macdonald, Fiona.
Winston Churchill. Milwaukeee: World
Almanac Library, 48 pp. (juvenile).
A698. Maurer, John H. Churchill
and Strategic Dilemmas Before the
World Wars: Essays in Honor of Michael
I. Handel. London and Portland,
Oregon: Frank Cass, 164 pp.
A699. Neillands, Robin H.
Winston Churchill: Statesman of the
Century. Cold Spring Harbor, New York:
Cold Spring Press, 2003, 216 pp.
A700. Roberts, Andrew. Hitler and
Churchill: Secrets of Leadership. London:
Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 202 pp.; Hitler
y Churchill; los secretos del liderazgo.
Madrid: Taurus, 310 pp. (Spanish text);
Hitler i Churchill: sekrety przywództwa.
Warsaw: Wydawnictwo Dolnoslaskie,
236 pp. (Polish text); other foreign editions post 2003.
A701. Rogers, Anthony.
Churchill’s Folly: Leros and the Aegean:
The Last Great British Defeat of the
Second World War. London: Cassell,
2003, 288 pp.
A702. Rubin, Gretchen. Forty
Ways to Look at Winston Churchill: A
Brief Account of a Long Life. New York:
Ballantine, 2003, 308 pp.
A703 Sandys, Celia. Churchill.
London: Contender, 2003, 160 pp.
A704. Sandys, Celia. Chasing
Churchill: The Travels of Winston
Churchill. London: HarperCollins; New
York: Carroll & Graf, 294 pp.
A705. Sandys, Celia and Littman,
Jonathan. We Shall Not Fail: The
Inspiring Leadership of Winston
Churchill. New York: Portfolio, 284 pp.
A706. Thompson, W.H. Beside the
Bulldog: The Intimate Memoirs of Churchill’s
Bodyguard. London: Apollo, 144 pp.
2004
A707. Binns, Tristan. Winston
Churchill: Soldier and Politician. New
York: Franklin Watts, 128 pp.
A708. Cannadine, David and
Roland Quinault. Winston Churchill in
the Twenty-First Century. Cambridge
and New York: Cambridge University
Press for the Royal Historical Society,
2004, 250 pp. (paperback).
A709. Cantalapiedra Cesteros,
Luis. Winston Churchill: el rugido del
léon. Madrid: Dastin Export, 268 pp.
(Spanish text)
A710. Catherwood, Christopher.
Churchill’s Folly: How Winston
Churchill Created Modern Iraq. New
York: Carroll & Graf, 268 pp.
A711. Gilbert, Martin. Churchill
and the Great Republic. Washington:
Library of Congress with D. Giles Ltd.,
94 pp. (softbound).
A712. Giminez, Manuel. Churchill.
London: Edimat Books, 190 pp.
A713. Hatter, David. Winston
Churchill: His Politics and Writing.
Privately published, 30 pp. (softbound).
A714. Kastory, Andrzej. Winston
Spencer Churchill. Warsaw: Zaklad
Narodowy imienia Ossolínskich
Wydawn, 488 pp. (Polish text).
A715. Kimball, Warren; O’Brian,
Robert; Tisch, Daniel. The Place in
History of Churchill, Roosevelt and the
Second World War. Toronto: Churchill
Society for Advancement of Parliamentary
Democracy, 38 pp. (softbound).
A716. MacDonald, Alan. Winston
Churchill and His Great Wars. London:
Hippo, 2004, 192 pp. (paperback).
A717, Mann, Heinrich. Zur Zeit
von Winston Churchill. Frankfurt:
FINEST HoUR 142 / 58
Fischer, 544 pp. (German text).
A718. Packwood, Allen. Churchill:
Forging an Alliance for Freedom.
Washington: Heritage Foundation, 12
pp. (softbound).
A719. Reynolds, David. In
Command of History: Churchill
Fighting and Writing the Second World
War. London: Allen Lane, 600 pp.
A720. Ruotsila, Markku. Churchill
and Finland: A Study in Anticommunism
and Geopolitics. London: Routledge, 256
pp.; English edition of Churchill ja
Suomi (2002).
A721. Ržesevskij, Oleg
Aleksandrovich. Stalin i Cherchill’:
vstrechi, besedy, diskussii: dokumenty,
kommentarii: 1941-1945. Moscow:
Nauka, 562 pp. (Russian text). Stalin and
Churchill. London : Constable &
Robinson, 2007.
A722. Theakston, Kevin. Winston
Churchill and the British Constitution.
London: Politico’s, 264 pp.
A723 Zoller, Curt J. Annotated
Bibliography of Works About Sir
Winston S.Churchill. Armonk, New
York: M.E. Sharpe, 2004, 412 pp.
2005
A724. Addison, Paul. Churchill:
The Unexpected Hero. Oxford and New
York: Oxford University Press, 308 pp.
A725. Bercuson, David Jay and
Holger, J. Herwig. One Christmas in
Washington: The Secret Meeting between
Roosevelt and Churchill that Changed the
World. Woodstock, New York: Overlook
Press; Toronto: McArthur & Co.;
London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 320 pp.
A726. Best, Geoffrey. Churchill
and War. London and New York:
Hambledon and London, 354 pp.
A727. Cannadine, David. Winston
Churchill: Abenteurer, Monarchist,
Staatsman. Berlin: Berenberg, 188 pp.
(German text).
A728. Charmley, John. Der
Untergang des Britischen Empires:
Roosevelt: Churchill und Amerikas Weg
zur Weltmacht. Graz: ARES Verlag, 472
pp. (German text).
A729. Dilks, David. The Great
Dominion: Winston Churchill in
Canada 1900-1954. Toronto: Thomas
Allen Publishers, 472 pp.
A730. Fenby, Jonathan. The
Sinking of the Lancastria: Britain’s
Greatest Maritime Disaster and
Churchill’s Cover-Up. London and New
York: Simon and Schuster, 2005, 270 pp.
A731. Fisher, David E. A Summer
Bright and Terrible: Winston Churchill,
Lord Dowding, Radar and the
Impossible Triumph of the Battle of
Britain. Washington: Shoemaker &
Hoard, 288 pp.,
A732. Forster, John and Bapasola,
Jeri. Winston and Blenheim. Woodstock:
Blenheim Palace, 20 pp. (softbound).
A733. Gilbert, Martin. Churchill
and America. New York: Free Press;
London: Pocket Books; Toronto:
Mcclelland & Stewart, 504 pp.
A734. Hayward, Steven.
Greatness: Reagan, Churchill and the
Making of Extraordinary Leaders. New
York: Crown Forum, 204 pp.
A735. Hickman, Tom. Churchill’s
Bodyguard. London: Headline, 312 pp.
A736. Holmes, Richard. In the
Footsteps of Churchill. London: BBC
Books, 352 pp.
A737. Hunter, Ian, ed. Winston
and Archie: The Letters of Sir Archibald
Sinclair and Winston S. Churchill, 19151960. London: Politico’s, 530 pp.
A738. Jong, Oebele de. Churchill
en de Nederlanders. Zutphen: Walburg,
238 pp. (Dutch text).
A739. Kenny, Mary. Allegiance:
Michael Collins and Winston Churchill
1921-22: A Dramatised Account.
Dublin: Kildare Street Books, 96 pp.
A740. Legrand, Jacques and Nida,
François. Churchill. Trélissac: Éditions
Chronique, 128 pp. (French text).
A741. Lénárt, Levente. Churchill
és az európai gondolat. Pomáz: Marconi
Kft. 160 pp. (Hungarian text).
A742. Lewis, Brenda Ralph.
Churchill: An Illustrated History.
London: Reader’s Digest, 2005, 256 pp.
A743. Lloyd George, Robert.
David and Winston: How the Friendship
Between Churchill and Lloyd George
Changed the Course of History; How a
Friendship Changes History. London:
John Murray, 304 pp.
A744. Mahoney, Richard J. and
Dalin, Shera. The Quotable Winston
Churchill. Fulton, Missouri: Winston
Churchill Memorial Library, 160 pp.
A745. Moradiellos, Enrique.
Franco frente a Churchill: España y Gran
Britaña en la Segunda Guerra Mundial
(1939-1945). Barcelona: Ediciones
Peninsula, 2005, 480 pp.
A746. Nicholson, Arthur Pole.
Hostages to Fortune: Winston Churchill
and the Loss of the Prince of Wales and
Repulse. Stroud, Glos.: Sutton, 234 pp.
A747. Paterson, Michael.
Winston Churchill: Personal Accounts of
the Great War Leader. Newton Abbot
and Cincinnati, Ohio: David & Charles;
320 pp.
A748. Paterson, Mike. Winston
Churchill: His Military Life 1895-1945.
Newton Abbot: David & Charles, 320 pp.
A749. Rompuy, Hubert van.
Winston Churchill: kampioen van de vrijheid. Antwerpen; Apeldoorn: Garant,
2005, 146 pp. (Dutch text).
A750. Russell, Douglas S.
Winston Churchill, Soldier: The Military
Life of a Gentleman at War. London:
Brassey’s, 2005, 280 pp.
A751. Sandys, Celia. Churchill:
The Book of the Museum. London:
Imperial War Museum, 160 pp. New
appearance of A703.
A752. Walters, Neil and Ramsden,
John. Churchill, Gifts to a Hero.
Westerham, Kent: National Trust
Chartwell, 2005, 40 pp. (softbound).
A753. Wigg, Richard. Churchill
and Spain: The Survival of the Franco
Regime, 1940-1945. London and New
York: Routledge, 2005, 212 pp.
Churchill y Franco: la politica británica
de apaciguamiento y la supervivencia de
régimen, 1940-1945. Madrid: Debate,
368 pp. (Spanish text.)
A754. Williamson, Daniel Charles.
Separate Agendas: Churchill, Eisenhower
and Anglo-American Relations, 19531955, Lanham, Maryland: Lexington
Books; Oxford: Oxford University Press,
146 pp.
A755. Winckelmann, Thomas.
Winston Churchill, England’s Lion.
Glenview, Illinois: Pearson/Scott
Foresman, 16 pp. (softbound).
2006
A756. Alkon, Paul. Winston
Churchill’s Imagination. Lewisburg,
Pennsylvania: Bucknell Press, 268 pp.
A757. Allende, Juan Martin.
Winston Churchill: visto por un
sudamericano. Buenos Aires: Editorial
Dunken, 2006, 550 pp. (Spanish text).
A758. Alter, Peter. Winston
Churchill (1874-1965): Leben und
FINEST HoUR 142 / 59
Überleben. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 326
pp. (German text).
A759. Berthon, Simon and Potts,
Joanna. Warlords: An Extraordinary ReCreation of World War II through the
Eyes and Minds of Hitler, Churchill,
Roosevelt and Stalin. Cambridge,
Massachusetts: Da Capo Press, 358 pp.
A760. Cohen, Ronald I..
Bibliography of the Writings of Sir
Winston Churchill. London and New
York: Continuum, (3 vols.), 2184 pp.
A761. Daynes, Katie. Winston
Churchill. Tulsa, Oklahoma: EDC;
London: Usborne, 64 pp. (juvenile).
A762. Delaforce, Patrick. 274
Things You Should Know About
Churchill. London: O’Mara, 192 pp.
A763. Gilbert, Martin. The Will
of the People: Winston Churchill and
Parliamentary Democracy. [Toronto]:
Vintage Canada, 152 pp. (paperback).
A764. Hamilton, Janice. Winston
Churchill. Minneapolis, Minn.: TwentyFirst Century Books, 112 pp. (juvenile).
A765. Haugen, Brenda. Winston
Churchill: British Soldier, Writer,
Statesman. Minneapolis: Compass Point
Books, 112 pp. (juvenile).
A766. Kersaudy, François.
Winston Churchill. Buenos Aires:
Ateneo, 562 pp. (Spanish text).
A767. Kinvig, Clifford.
Churchill’s Crusade: The British Invasion
of Russia, 1918-1920. London:
Hambledon Continuum, 2006, 374 pp.
Krucjata Churchilla: brytyjska inwazja na
Rosje 1918-1920. Warsaw: Bellona, 430
pp. (Polish text).
A768. Paterson, Mike. Winston
Churchill: Photobiography. Newton
Abbot and Cincinnati, Ohio: David &
Charles, 208 pp. Winston Churchill:
fotobiografie. Prague: Metafora, 204 pp.
(Czech text).
A769. Read, Craig. Winston S.
Churchill: Last of the Conservatives: An
Analysis of Churchill, Recent History,
and His Conservative Ideals.
Philadelphia: Xlibris, 138 pp.
A770. Thomson, Malcolm.
Fenomén Winston Churchill. Prague:
Vladimir Korinek, 394 pp. (Czech text).
2007
A771. Addison, Paul. Winston
Churchill. Oxford and New York:
Oxford University Press, 138 pp. >>
BIBLIOGRAPHY
BOOKS SINCE 2003...
A772. Andriola, Fabio. Carteggio
segreto Churchill - Mussolini. Milano:
Sugarco, 406 pp.
A773. Bar-Noi, Uri. Anglo-Soviet
Relations During Churchill’s Peacetime
Administration. Brighton: Academic.
A774. Bennett, Gil. Churchill’s
Man of Mystery: Desmond Morton and
the World of Intelligence. London: and
New York: Routledge, 404 pp.
A775. Buczacki, Stefan. Churchill
& Chartwell: The Untold Story of
Churchill’s Houses and Gardens.
London: Frances Lincoln, 324 pp.
A776. Callahan, Raymond,
Churchill & His Generals. Lawrence,
Kansas: University Press of Kansas, 310 pp.
A777. Churchill, Winston and
Kupfermann, Thomas. Zum Teufel alle >>
miteinander!: Anekdoten über Churchill.
Berlin: Eulenspiegel Verlag, 126 pp.
A778. Fenby, Jonathan. Alliance:
The Inside Story of How Roosevelt,
Stalin and Churchill Won One War and
Began Another. San Francisco:
MacAdam/Cage; London: Simon &
Schuster, 464 pp. Alianci:: Stalin,
Roosevelt, Churchill: tajne rozgrywki
zwyciezców II wojny swiatowej. Krakow:
Znak, 642 pp. (Polish text).
A779. Gilbert, Martin. Churchill
and the Jews. London: Simon &
Schuster; New York: Holt; Toronto:
McClelland & Stewart, 360 pp.
A780. Hesse, Helge. Das Churchill Prinzip: mit Persönlichkeit zum Erfolg.
Frankfurt: Eichborn, 236 pp. (German text).
A781. Hunter, Ian. Collected
Correspondence of David Lloyd George
and Winston S. Churchill 1904-1945.
London: PalgraveMacmillan.
A782. Kersaudy, François. Le
monde selon Churchill: sentences, confidences, propriéties et reparties. Paris:
Alvik, 282 pp. (French text).
A783. Lavery, Brian. Churchill Goes
to War: Winston’s Wartime Journeys.
Annapolis: Naval Institute Press; London:
Conway, 392 pp. (paperback)
A784. Lee, Celia and John.
Winston & Jack: The Churchill Brothers.
London: privately published, 408 pp.
A785. Lukacs, John. Blood, Toil,
Tears and Sweat: Winston Churchill and
the Speech That Saved Civilization. New
York: Basic Books, 148 pp.
A767. Makovsky, Michael.
Churchill’s Promised Land: Zionism and
Statecraft. New Haven: Yale University
Press, 342 pp.
A787. McGinty, Stephen.
Churchill’s Cigar. London: privately published, then by Pan Books, 214 pp.
A788. McMenamin, Michael and
Zoller, Curt. Becoming Winston
Churchill: The Untold Story of Young
Winston and his American Mentor.
Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood
Press, 276 pp.
A789. Moody, Joanna and
Margerison, Olive. From Churchill’s War
Rooms: Letters of a Secretary, 1943-45,
Stroud, Glos.: Tempus, 256 pp.
A790. Olson, Lynne. Troublesome
Young Men: The Rebels Who Brought
Churchill to Power and Helped Save
England. New York: Farrar, Straus and
Giroux; London: Bloomsbury; Toronto:
Bond Street Books, 436 pp.
A791. Serra, Enrico. Winston
Churchill: luci e hombre. Firence: Le
lettere, 90 pp. (Italian text).
A792. Smith, Berthon and Potts,
Joanna. Warlords: An Extraordinary ReCreation of World War II Through the
Eyes and Minds of Hitler, Churchill,
Roosevelt, and Stalin. New York: Da
Capo, 358 pp.
A793. Toye, Richard. Lloyd
George & Churchill: Rivals for
Greatness. London: Macmillan, 2007,
504 pp.
2008
A794. Bar-Noi, Uri. The Cold
War and Soviet Mistrust of Churchill’s
Pursuit of Detent 1955. Brighton:
Academic Press; Portland, Oregon: Susses
Academic Press, 238 pp.
A795. Buchanan, Patrick, J.
Churchill, Hitler, and the Unnecessary
War: How Britain Lost Its Empire and
the West Lost the World. New York:
Crown Publishers, 518 pp.
A796. Clarke, Peter. The Last
Thousand Days of the British Empire:
Churchill, Roosevelt, and the Birth of
the Pax Americana. New York:
Bloomsbury Press, 560 pp.
A797. Courtinat, Roland. Les
accords secrets Pétain-Churchill (octobrenovembre 1940). Coulommiers:
Dualpha, 100 pp. (French text).
A798. D’Este, Carlo. Warlord:
Churchill at War, 1874-1945. London:
Allan Lane. Warlord: A Life of Winston
FINEST HoUR 142 / 60
Churchill at War, 1874-1945. New York:
Harper, 846pp.
A799. Duchesne, Jacques [SaintDenis, Michel]. Deux jours avec Churchill,
Londres, 21 octobre 1940, Paris, 11
novembre 1944. LaTour d’Aigues: Éd. de
Aube, 78 pp. (French text).
A800. Herman, Arthur. Gandhi &
Churchill: The Epic Rivalry That
Destroyed an Empire and Forged Our
Age. New York: Bantam; London:
Hutchinson, 722 pp.
A801. Knight, Nigel. Churchill:
The Greatest Briton Unmasked. Newton
Abbot: David & Charles, 400 pp.
A802. Langworth, Richard, M.
(editor). Churchill by Himself: The Life,
Times and Opinions of Winston Churchill
in His Own Words. London: Ebury Press;
New York: Public Affairs, 646 pp.
A803. Reid, Walter. Churchill
1940-1945: Under Friendly Fire.
Edinburgh: Birlinn Ltd., 320 pp.
A804. Rhys-Jones, Graham.
Churchill and the Norway Campaign 1940.
Barnsley, Pen & Sword, 240 pp.
A805. Roberts, Andrew. Masters
and Commanders: How Churchill,
Roosevelt, Alanbrooke and Marshall Won
the War in the West, 1941-45. London:
Allen Lane. Massters and Commanders:
The Military Geniuses Who Led the
West to Victory in World War II. New
York: HarperCollins, 674 pp.
A806. Weigold, Auriol. Churchill,
Roosevelt and India. New York:
Routledge, 210 pp.
FORTHCOMING IN 2009
Catherwood, Christopher.
Winston Churchill: The Flawed Genius
of World War II.
Dixon, Jack. Dowding &
Churchill: The Dark Side of the Battle of
Britain. Barnsley: Pen & Sword, 320 pp.
Ive, Ruth. The Woman Who
Censored Churchill. Stroud, Glos.:
History, 160 pp.
Langworth, Richard M. The
Definitive Wit of Winston Churchill.
London: Ebury Press; New York: Public
Affairs. ,
THE CHURCHILL QUIZ
Level 3:
7. Whom did Churchill refer to as
l’homme du destin [man of destiny]? (C)
8. Who told her listeners, in
Manchester in 1905: “The Conservatives
give you dear coal, I give you dear
Winston.” (S)
9. When playing Hamlet in the
Old Vic Theatre in London, whom did
Richard Burton hear uttering his lines
word by word in the front row? (M)
10. In January 1942, Newsweek
wrote that Churchill received “the
greatest ovation which has been accorded
to any person in that chamber in living
memory.” What was the occasion? (S)
11. About which event did WSC
say on 18 June 1940: “…our terrible foe
collapsed before us, and we were so
glutted with victory that in our folly we
threw it away”? (W)
12. Which U.S. President said,
“When there was darkness in the world,
and hope was low in the hearts of men, a
generous Providence gave us Winston
Churchill”? (S)
Level 1:
19. In which of Churchill’s books
was the Iron Curtain speech first published? (L)
20. When did WSC tell his companions “Keep cool, men. This will
make good copy for my paper”? (W)
21. How many races did
Colonist II, Sir Winston’s most famous
thoroughbred, win? (M)
22. Which three hymns, all
chosen by Churchill, were sung on
board HMS Prince of Wales in
Placentia Bay on Sunday 10 August
1941? (M)
23. “Vials of Wrath” is the title
of the first chapter of which of
Churchill’s books? (L)
24. To whom did WSC write in
1895: “Many congratulations on
becoming an officer and a gentleman.
Don’t let the double promotion go to
your head”? (C) ,
FINEST HoUR 142 / 61
Answers
(1) Churchill’s. (2) America. (3)
Churchill. (4) Mary Churchill (Lady
Soames) in a letter to her father in
1960. (5) “Painting as a Pastime.” In
1929 the Earl of Birkenhead included
this essay in his anthology The
Hundred Best English Essays. (6)
Germany, where he visited the new
Labour Exchanges in Frankfurt.
Level 4:
1. Whose bridge game did Lord
Beaverbrook describe as “exceedingly
careless, and his card sense almost nonexistent”? (M)
2. In which country was
Churchill’s mother born? (P)
3. What was the monogram on
Churchill’s slippers? (P)
4. Who wrote to Churchill: “I owe
you what every Englishman, woman and
child does—Liberty itself”? (P)
5. In which essay did Churchill
write: “Happy are the painters, for they
shall not be lonely. Light and colour,
peace and hope, will keep them
company to the end, or almost to the
end, of the day”? (L)
6. Which country influenced
Churchill’s ideas on social reform in
1909? (S)
Level 2:
13. WSC in a world broadcast 10
May 1942: “There is a winter, you
know, in Russia…. —— forgot about
this Russian winter. He must have been
very loosely educated.” Who forgot? (C)
14. To whom did WSC write in
September 1898: “…I speculated about
the shoddiness of war. You cannot gild
it. The raw comes through”? (W)
15. In a letter to The Times published on 30 January 1964, WSC wrote
to support a fund “to preserve
Doornkloof in memory of this man
who shone among his contemporaries.”
Who was the man? (C)
16. Where was Churchill when
he wrote to his wife in February 1918:
“Nearly 800,000 of our British men
have shed their blood or lost their lives
here during 3½ years of unceasing conflict”? (W)
17. What did their children give
Winston and Clementine for their
golden wedding anniversary? (P)
18. Which Churchill book was
his first best-seller in America? (L)
(7) Charles de Gaulle. (8) Winston’s
mother, Lady Randolph Churchill. (9)
Winston Churchill. During the intermission, the actor’s dressing-room door
opened. A familiar face appeared and
its owner said, “Beg pardon, my Lord
Hamlet, may I use your loo?” (10) His
speech to a joint session of Congress on
26 December 1941. It was also broadcast to the world. (11) The end of the
Great War. (12) Lyndon Johnson, 24
January 1965.
ach quiz includes four questions in
six categories: contemporaries (C), literary matters (L), miscellaneous (M),
personal (P), statesmanship (S) and war
(W), with the easier questions first. Can
you reach Level 1?
(13) Adolf Hitler. (14) His mother.
(15) Field Marshal Smuts. (16) The
Ypres Salient in Flanders “…this vast
cemetery, ennobled & rendered forever
glorious by their brave memory.” (17)
An avenue of golden roses in the
garden at Chartwell. (18) Blood Sweat
and Tears (speeches, 5 May 1938 to 9
November 1940), compiled by his son
Randolph, was published in April 1941
by G.P. Putnam’s Sons; it sold nearly
60,000 copies.
E
“Congratulations on becoming an officer and a gentleman.
Don’t let the double promotion go to your head.”
—WSC, 1895
(19) The Sinews of Peace, first published 1948. (20) 15 November 1899,
after the armoured train was ambushed
in South Africa. (21) Thirteen, earning
his owner £12,000 in prize money.
(22) “For Those in Peril on the Sea,”
“Onward Christian Soldiers” and “O
God our Help in Ages Past.” (23) The
World Crisis, from Revelations XVI:1,
“Go your ways, and pour out the vials
of the wrath of God upon the earth.”
(24) His fellow Sandhurst cadet
Charles Maclean, father of Fitzroy
Maclean.
JAMES R. LANCASTER
AMPERSAND
&
A pot-pourri
of grist that
didn’t fit elsewhere.
take our
readers only a
few microseconds to
decode.
Who will be
the first to
provide the
solution?
PAUL H. COURTENAY
The Debate We’ve Been Waiting For
At 7pm on Thursday 3 September—the 70th anniversary of the outbreak of World War II—Intelligence
Squared will be hosting a debate at the Royal Geographical Society in Exhibition Road, London, on the motion:
“This House believes Winston Churchill was more of a liability than an asset in the Second World War.” Professor
Norman Stone and Pat Buchanan will be proposing the
motion and Sir Martin Gilbert, Professor Anthony
Beevor and Andrew Roberts will be opposing it.
We look forward to this as much as Churchill and
Lloyd George (above right) confronting Tories in the
1905 election. Lloyd George: “I say, Winston, what are
we going to do to those poor old Duffers?” WSC: “We’ve
made them take a back seat already, they’ll have to learn
to like it.” (Pall Mall, 1905, John Frost Collection.)
Tickets to this blessed event are available from
www.intelligencesquared.com.
Note: For
those who
lack a
Winchester
education (to
borrow a jibe by WSC), a rebus is a puzzle in which
words are represented b pictures or individual letters; for
instance, apex might be represented by a picture of an
ape followed by the letter “x." —Ed.
California Dreamin’: 28 September 1929
During Winston
Churchill’s visit to California (page 28) he went
fishing for marlin off
Catalina Island. With
the usual Winstonian
luck he hooked a 180pounder in next to no
time. It was, of course,
the catch of the day, and
everyone was amazed.
There was no room in
Churchill’s article herein
for the photo, but it’s
too good to miss.
Nun So Fine (Or: Uncle Rebus)
When my wife Sara was at school in the 1940s and
early 1950s, her geography teacher was a nun, Sister
Mary Barbara (Verren), who was also a well-known artist.
Sara recently found this rebus which her teacher had
drawn as part of a lesson on Canada. I am sure it will
FINEST HoUR 142 / 62
14 August 1971
Out of a dusty file
drops a brochure marking
the 25th anniversary of
Churchill’s investiture as
Lord Warden of the
Cinque Ports—the first
membership flyer we ever
produced, We had 300
members and offices in
Australia, Britain and the
United States. ,
Churchill Centre Regional and Local Organizations
Chapters: Please send all news reports to the Chartwell Bulletin: [email protected]
LOCAL COORDINATORS
Marcus Frost, Chairman
([email protected])
PO Box 272, Mexia TX 76667
tel. (254) 587-2000
Judy Kambestad ([email protected])
1172 Cambera Lane, Santa Ana CA 92705-2345
tel. (714) 838-4741 (West)
Sue & Phil Larson ([email protected])
22 Scotdale Road, LaGrange Park IL 60526
tel. (708) 352-6825 (Midwest)
D. Craig Horn ([email protected])
5909 Bluebird Hill Lane, Weddington NC
28104; tel. (704) 844-9960 (East)
®
LOCAL ORGANIZATIONS
(AFFILIATES ARE IN BOLD FACE)
For formal affiliation with the Churchill Centre,
contact any local coordinator above.
Rt. Hon. Sir Winston Spencer Churchill
Society of Calgary, Alberta
Mr. Justice J.D. Bruce McDonald, Pres.
([email protected])
2401 N - 601 - 5th Street, S.W.,
Calgary AB T2P 5P7
tel. (403) 297-3164
Rt. Hon. Sir Winston Spencer Churchill
Society of Edmonton, Alberta
Dr. Edward Hutson, Pres. ([email protected])
98 Rehwinkel Rd., Edmonton AB T6R 1Z8
tel. (780) 430-7178
Rt. Hon. Sir Winston Spencer Churchill
Society of Alaska
Judith & Jim Muller ([email protected])
2410 Galewood St., Anchorage AK 99508
tel. (907) 786-4740; fax (907) 786-4647
Churchill Centre Arizona
Larry Pike ([email protected])
4927 E. Crestview Dr., Paradise Valley AZ 85253
bus. tel. (602) 445-7719; cell (602) 622-0566
Rt. Hon. Sir Winton Spencer Churchill
Society of British Columbia
Christopher Hebb, Pres.
([email protected])
30-2231 Folkestone Way, W. Vancouver, BC
V6S 2Y6; tel. (604) 209-6400
California: Churchillians-by-the-Bay
Richard Mastio ([email protected])
2996 Franciscan Way, Carmel CA 93923
tel. (831) 625-6164
California: Churchillians of the Desert
David Ramsay ([email protected])
74857 S. Cove Drive, Indian Wells CA 92210
tel. (760) 837-1095
Churchillians of Southern California
Leon J. Waszak ([email protected])
235 South Ave. #66, Los Angeles CA 90042
tel. (818) 240-1000 x5844
Churchill Friends of Greater Chicago
Phil & Susan Larson ([email protected])
22 Scottdale Road, LaGrange IL 60526
tel. (708) 352-6825
Colorado: Rocky Mountain Churchillians
Lew House, President
([email protected])
2034 Eisenhower Dr., Louisville CO 80027
tel. (303) 661-9856; fax (303) 661-0589
England: CC-UK Woodford/Epping Branch.
Tony Woodhead, Old Orchard,
32 Albion Hill, Loughton,
Essex 1G10 4RD; tel. (0208) 508-4562
England: CC-UK Northern Branch
Derek Greenwell, Farriers Cottage,
Station Road, Goldsborough
Knaresborough, North Yorks. HG5 8NT
tel. (01432) 863225
Churchill Centre North Florida
Richard Streiff ([email protected])
81 N.W. 44th Street, Gainesville FL 32607
tel. (352) 378-8985
Winston Churchill Society of Georgia
www.georgiachurchill.org
William L. Fisher ([email protected])
5299 Brooke Farm Rd., Dunwoody GA 30338
tel. (770) 399-9774
Winston Churchill Society of Michigan
Richard Marsh ([email protected])
4085 Littledown, Ann Arbor, MI 48103
Tel. (734) 913-0848
Churchill Round Table of Nebraska
John Meeks ([email protected])
7720 Howard Street #3, Omaha NE 68114
tel. (402) 968-2773
New England Churchillians
Joseph L. Hern ([email protected])
340 Beale Street, Quincy MA 02170
tel. (617) 773-1907; bus. tel. (617) 248-1919
Churchill Society of New Orleans
J. Gregg Collins ([email protected])
2880 Lakeway Three
3838 N. Causeway Blvd., Metairie LA 70002
Churchill Society of Greater New York
Gregg Berman ([email protected])
c/o Fulbright & Jaworski
666 Fifth Ave.
New York NY 10103 • tel. (212) 318-3388
North Carolina Churchillians
www.churchillsocietyofnorthcarolina.org
Craig Horn ([email protected])
5909 Bluebird Hill Lane
Weddington NC 28104; tel. (704) 844-9960
Churchill Centre Northern Ohio
Michael McMenamin ([email protected])
1301 E. 9th St. #3500, Cleveland OH 44114
tel. (216) 781-1212
Churchill Society of Philadelphia
Bernard Wojciechowski
([email protected])
1966 Lafayette Rd., Lansdale PA 19446
tel. 610-584-6657
South Carolina: Bernard Baruch Chapter
Kenneth Childs ([email protected])
P.O. Box 11367, Columbia SC 29111-1367
tel. (803) 254-4035
Tennessee: Vanderbilt University
Young Churchill Club; Prof. John English
([email protected])
Box 1616, Station B, Vanderbilt University,
Nashville TN 37235
Texas: Emery Reves Churchillians
Jeff Weesner ([email protected])
2101 Knoll Ridge Court, Corinth TX 76210
tel. (940) 321-0757; cell (940) 300-6237
Churchill Centre South Texas
Don Jakeway ([email protected])
170 Grassmarket, San Antonio, TX 78259
Tel. (210) 333-2085
Sir Winston Churchill Society of
Vancouver Island
Sidney Allinson, Pres. ([email protected])
3370 Passage Way, Victoria BC V9C 4J6
tel. (250) 478-0457
Washington (DC) Society for Churchill
Dr. John H. Mather, Pres.
([email protected])
PO Box 73, Vienna VA 22182-0073
tel. (240) 353-6782
Churchill Centre Seattle
www.churchillseattle.blogspot.com
Simon Mould ([email protected])
1920 243rd Pl ., SW, Bothell, WA 98021
tel. (425) 286-7364
Moments in Time:
Columbia University, New York City, 18 March 1946
BY STEPHEN JOEL TRACHTENBERG • PHOTOGRAPH BY MANNY WARMAN
T
PROFESSOR TRACHTENBERG WAS PRESIDENT OF THE GEORGE WASHINGTON
UNIVERISTY FOR NINETEEN YEARS BEFORE RETIRING TO RESUME TEACHING.
his photograph portrays Churchill’s visit
to Columbia thirteen
days after his “Iron Curtain”
speech at Fulton, Missouri.
We see him passing before the
famous statue of Columbia’s
“Alma Mater” by Daniel
Chester French. It is characteristic Churchill, cigar and
all. I like him, but I particularly enjoy the collection of
Secret Service men and police
surrounding him. And isn’t
the face on that big police
officer to his right a classic?
Manny Warman was for
many years Columbia’s official photographer. When I
was still President of the
University of Hartford in
Connecticut, I saw this in a
Columbia alumni magazine
and wrote to Manny, who
sent me this print.
Editor’s note: Churchill
was being criticised in the
days after Fulton by those
who saw what he said there as
a call to arms. At Columbia
he was at pains to point out
his actual goal: “In my heart
there is no abiding hatred for
any great race on the surface
ol the globe. I earnestly hope
that there will be no pariah
nations after the guilty are
fully punished. We have to
look forward to a broader,
fairer world, richer and fuller
in every way under the aegis
and authority of the world
organization, to guard the
humble toiler, the small
homes of all nations, from
renewed horrors and
tyranny.” ,