1 - Winston Churchill

THE INTERNATIONAL CHURCHILL SOCIETIESUNITED STATES 'UNITED KINGDOM* CANADA • AUSTRAT T APATRON: THE LADY SOAMES, D. B. E.Founded 1968, the International Churchill Societies strive to preserve interest in and knowledge of the lifp w\heritage of the Rt. Hon. Sir Winston S. Churchill KG, OM, CH, MP (1874-1965), and the great themes to whkhhY 7 ?—the quest for liberty and fraternity among the Great Democracies. The Societies are independent non-profit orp-/ •*"*?• if uwith the Rt. Hon. Sir Winston S. Churchill Societies of Vancouver, Edmonton and Calgary, Canada, sponsor Fine^M lpublications, conferences, books, symposia, tours, youth educational programmes, and the Churchill Center in Washine'torTScHONORARY MEMBERSWinston S. Churchill, MPSir Martin Gilbert, CBEGrace Hamblin, OBERobert Hardy, CBEAmbassador Pamela C. Harrimanlames Calhoun HumesMary Coyne lackman, BA, D.Litt.S.Yousuf Karsh, OCWilliam ManchesterThe Duke of Marlborough, DL, JPAnthony Montague Browne, CBE, DFCColin L. Powell, KCBWendy Russell RevesAmbassador Paul H. Robinson, Jr.The Lady Soames, DBEThe Rt. Hon. The Baroness Thatcher, OM, FRSThe Hon. Caspar W. Weinberger, GBECOUNCIL OF CHURCHILL SOCIETIESlonathan Aitken, MP, Chairman45 Great Peter Street, London SW1P 3LT, EnglandTel. (071) 233-3103ICS AUSTRALIASubscription office: Robin Linke181 Jersey Street, Wembley, WA 6014ACT Representative: David Widdowson167 Chuculba Cres.Giralang, ACT 2617ICS CANADARevenue Canada No. 0732701-21-13Kenneth W. Taylor, Hon. Chairman146 W. 57th St, Apt 61T, New York NY 10019Garnet (Randy) Barber, President4 Snowshoe Cres., Thornhill, Ont. L3T 4M6Tel. (905) 881-8550John G. Plumpton, Secretary130 Collingsbrook Blvd, Agincourt ON M1W 1M7Tel. (416) 497-5349 Fax. (416) 395-4587Bill Milligan, Treasurer54 Sir Galahad Place, Markham ON L3P 3S5Tel. (905) 294-0952Committee MembersEdward Bredin, QC; Leonard Kitz, QCThe Other Club of TorontoBernard Webber, President3256 Rymal Road, Mississauga, Ont. L4Y 3C1Tel. (905) 279-5169Sir Winston Churchill Society of CalgaryElaine McCoy, President#830 407 2nd St SW, Calgary AB T2P 2Y3Sir Winston Churchill Society of VancouverIan Whitelaw, President1110 Palmerston Ave., W. Vancouver BC V7S 2J6ICS UNITED KINGDOMCharity Registered in England No. 800030David Boler, ChairmanJoan Harris, Membership SecretaryPO Box 244, Tunbridge Wells, Kent TN3 0YFTel. and Fax. (01892) 518171UK TRUSTEESThe Hon. Nicholas Soames MP (Chairman)The Duke of Marlborough, DL, JP; Richard G. G.Haslam-Hopwood; The Hon. Celia Sandys;David Porter; Geoffrey WheelerCOMMITTEEDavid Boler (Chairman); Wylma Wayne (Vice-Chairman); Tim Hicks (Treasurer);Dennis Jackson OBE, DL, RAF(ret); David Jones;Jill Kay; Mark WeberICS UNITED STATES, INC.A non-profit corporation, IRS No. 02-0365444Ambassador Paul H. Robinson, Jr., Chairman208 S. LaSalle St., Chicago IL 60604Tel. (800) 621-1917, Fax. (312) 726-9474Richard M. Langworth, President181 Burrage Road, Hopkinton NH 03229Tel. (603) 746-4433, Fax. (603) 746-4260Email: Malakand@aol.comWilliam C. Ives, Vice President77 W. Wacker Dr.,49th fir., Chicago IL 60601Tel. (312) 634-5034, Fax. (312) 634-5000Dr. Cyril Mazansky, Vice President50 Dolphin Road, Newton Centre MA 02159Tel. (617) 527-0522, Fax. (617) 296-2872Parker H. Lee III, Secretary117 Hance Road, Fair Haven NJ 07704Tel. (908) 758-1933, Fax. (908) 758-9350Email: PHLeeIIieaol.comGeorge A. Lewis, Treasurer268 Canterbury Road, Westfield NJ 07090Tel. (908) 233-8415, Fax. (908) 518-9439USA TRUSTEESAmbassador Paul H. Robinson, Jr., Chmn.Richard M. LangworthGeorge A. LewisWendy Russell RevesThe Hon. Celia SandysThe Lady Soames, DBEThe Hon. Caspar W. Weinberger, GBEUSA DIRECTORSR. Alan Fitch, William C. Ives,Richard M. Langworth, Parker H. Lee III,George A. Lewis, Dr. John Mather,Dr. Cyril Mazansky, James W. Muller,Douglas S. Russell, David L. Simpson, Jr.,Jonah Triebwasser, Jacqueline Dean WitterICS UNITED STATEScontinued...MEMBERSHIP SECRETARYDerek Brownleader, 1847 Stonewood DriveBaton Rouge LA 70816. Tel. (504) 752-3313ICS STORES (Back Issues and Sales Dept.)Gail GreenlyP.O. Box 96, Contoocook, NH 03229Tel. (603) 746-3452LOCAL ACTIVITIES COORDINATORDr. John H. Mather, 12144 Long Ridge Lane,Bowie MD 20715 Tel., days (410) 966-1983ACADEMIC ADVISORS (USA & CANADA)Professor James W. Muller (Chairman)University of Alaska Anchorage1518 Airport Heights Dr., Anchorage AK 99508Tel. (907) 786-4740 Fax. (907) 786-4647Email: AFJWM@acad2.alaska.eduProf. Keith Alldritt, University of British ColumbiaDr. Larry Arnn, President, Claremont InstituteProf. Raymond Callahan, University of DelawareProf. Eliot A. Cohen, Johns Hopkins UniversityProf. Kirk Emmert, Kenyon CollegeProf. Barry Gough. Wilfred Laurier UniversityProf. Warren F. Kimball, Rutgers UniversityProf. Patrick Powers, Assumption CollegeProf. Paul A. Rahe, University of TulsaProf. Maxwell Schoenfeld,Univ. of Wis. Eau ClaireDr. Jeffrey Wallin, President, National AcademyProf. Manfred Weidhorn, Yeshiva UniversityEXECUTIVE COMMI1TTEEWilliam C. Ives, Parker H. Lee III,George A. Lewis, Dr. Cyril Mazansky,Richard M. Langworth, Chmn.181 Burrage Road, Hopkinton NH 03229Tel. (603) 746-4433, Fax. (603) 746-4260DEVELOPMENT COMMITTEEParker H. Lee in, James C. Humes,Michael W. Michelson,David L. Simpson, Jr., Secretary:530 Rowland Rd., Fairfield CT 06430Tel. (203) 259-1939 Fax. (203) 371-5257ONLINE COMMITTEERaymond Lavine, David Eisenlohr,Jonah Triebwasser, Secretary:85 Manor Rd., Red Hook NY 12571Tel. (914) 256-3030Moderator: Jonah.Triebwasser@marist.eduWWW Homepage: http://www.onramp.net/icsHomepage Editor: DEisenlohr@aol.comOnline Bulletin Editor: Malakand@aol.comYOUTH COMMITTEEDorothy Hartland, Aida Schoenfeld,Jacqueline Dean Witter,Michael Altenburger, Secretary:9521 Liberty Tree La., Vienna VA 22181Tel. (703) 821-8770

CONTENTSWinter 1995-96FINEST HOURJournal of the International Churchill Societies Number 89"The Sinews of Peace" Fiftieth Anniversary 1946-199616 Action This Day"From Stettin in the Baltic, to Trieste in the Adriatic,an Iron Curtain has descended across the Continent"by John G. Plumpton28 The Ever-Relevant MessageThe most momentous speech of the early postwaryears was uttered fifty years ago at WestminsterCollege; Churchill's prescription is still appropriate.by Paul H. Liben29 The Iron Curtain Speech and Churchill'sPhilosophy of International PoliticsChurchill was basing his thoughts on the maturereflections of a lifetime's experience, derived from aconsidered political philosophy.by Spencer Warren52 Immortal Words"If we walk forward in sober strength, the highroadsof the future will be clear, not only for us but for all,not only for our time, but for a century to come."by Winston S. Churchill20 A Coming of Age12th International Churchill Conference, Boston, 1995by Richard M. Langworth25 Why Churchill Still Fascinates"Great Men are the Ambassadors of Providence"by Don Feder34 Butterflies to ChartwellChurchill learned species by name and liked to watchcolorful varieties emerge from their chrysalides...by Hugh Newman38 VE-Day: One More MemoryA meeting of Churchills and Churchilliansby Rafe MuirBook Reviews40 Anthony Montague Browne's Long Sunsetby H. Ashley Redburn41 Mieder & Bryan's Proverbial Winston S. Churchill43 Winston Churchill: Studies in Statesmanshipby Richard M. Langworth32 Video Reviews: From Passable to "Awesome"by Jonah Triebwasser45714161819464849505152Amid These StormsDespatch BoxInternational DatelinesRiddles, Mysteries, EnigmasAction This DayWit and WisdomChurchill CenterChurchill in StampsRecapsChurchill OnlineWoods CupboardChurchilltriviaImmortal WordsCover: This fine painting by CuthbertOrde, in the Founders' Gallery in CollegeHall at the Royal Air Force College,Cranwell, Lincolnshire, was presented tothe RAF College in 1952 by Rolls-RoyceLtd. WSC was an early advocate of airpower and Secretary of State for Air in1919-21. With Trenchard, he convincedLloyd George to give the fledgling RAF aseparate existence. The RAF continues tocount Churchill himself as very much oneof The Few. Reproduced by permission ofJarrolds Publishing. -Douglas HallFINEST HOUR 89/3

FINEST HOURISSN 0882-3715Richard M Langworth, EditorPost Office Box 385Hopkinton, New Hampshire03229 USA Tel. (603) 746-4433Email: Malakand@aol.comSenior EditorsJohn G. Plumpton130 Collingsbrook Blvd.Agincourt, OntarioM1W 1M7 CanadaH. Ashley Redburn, OBERosemere, Hollands MeadOvermoigne, Dorchester,Dorset DT2 8HX EnglandNews EditorJohn Frost8 Monks Ave, New Barnet,Herts. EN5 1D8 EnglandFeatures EditorDouglas J. Hall183A Somerby Hill, GranthamLines. NG31 7HA EnglandEditorial AssistantGail GreenlyContributorsSir Martin Gilbert, United KingdomGeorge Richard, AustraliaStanley E. Smith, United StatesRon Cynewulf Robbins, CanadaJames W. Muller, United StatesDavid Boler, United KingdomWm. John Shepherd, United States ii THOUR^b&hlT^r^r yfor Friends of the InternationalChurchill Societies, which offer severallevels of support in their respectivecurrencies. Membership applicationsMd changes of address should be sentW the appropriate national offices onPage 2. Permission to mail at non-profitrates in the USA granted by the USlostal Serv.ce, Concord, NH, Permitno. 1524. Copyright 1996. All rightsreserved. Designed and produced forlneChurchill Societies by DragonwyckPublishing Inc. Printed byReprographics Inc. Made in U.S.A.I wrtnessed another examnlp ugram, between Senator Daniel Patri^T , m ° re rece ntl y/ on the^ 1 ^FINEST HOUR 89/4RICHARD M. LANGWORTH

T\/Pay I take this opportunity to thank-LVXyou for the really splendid obituaryto Donald which you wrote in FinestHour 86. I had hoped I might be able tothank you personally but this was notpossible, so belatedly many thanks frommyself and my family.VALDA FORBESWOODFORD GREEN, ESSEX, UK1995 ConferenceAvery hasty note, which however youwon't get for a while since I'm at sea,but its purpose is merely to thank you foryour extraordinary courtesies. You couldnot have been more thoughtful, kinder,more generous, and if I performed anythingfor you or Mr. Churchill, that's onlya poor contribution in an attempt atrequital.W.M F. BUCKLEY, JR., NEW YORKAlexandra and I hasten to congratulateyou on building such a strongand lovely organization as ICS. I amdelighted that so many people admireWinston Churchill and continue to beinspired by him. It was an immense pleasureto see Mary Soames again and tomeet Celia Sandys. With our best wishesfor the continuing health of the ICS.ARTHUR SCHLESINGER, JR., N.Y.What a programme — what a Conference!You should be rightlyproud of this marvellous accomplishment:just the right balance of interestsfor everyone, including those romanticscaught in the rain in Harvard Yard.Solveig and I enjoyed ourselves immenselyand already look forward to the UKnext year. The great tradition continues.RANDY BARBER, PRESIDENT,ICS, CANADA, TORONTOJust wanted to add my name to the listof well-wishers. I thought it was terrificin every aspect, and especially strongin its academic focus, which is to say, inits focus on the most important featuresof WSC's remarkable life.JEFFREY WALLIN, PRESIDENTNATIONAL ACADEMY, WASHINGTONThe conference was outstanding. Thepresentations and events were interesting,thought-provoking, entertaining,and highly original. It was an honor anda pleasure to play a part in it.STEVE MITBY, CAMBRIDGE, MASS.1 W I 1 I III K \ \ I ! O \ \ I\l I Kl \(. IThe 1995 Conference Programmecontains articles and photos onChurchill's three visits to Boston(1901, 1943, 1949), and on speakersand sponsors: We ran out but printeda few more: US$5 postpaid. Cassettetapes of Mr. Buckley's and Mr.Schlesinger's speeches: US$10 each.A fine poster showing WSC, FDR andtheir famous exchange, "Sail On OShip of State...Give Us the Tools andWe Will Finish the Job" has also beenproduced and costs US $7 postpaid.Equivalent UK-Can-Aus currency iswelcome. Make all cheques payable toICS and send to the editor. (Seep. 27.)Congratulations on the Conference. Agreat feeling among Churchillians, Ithought. Thanks for the BlenheimAward. I will cherish it. I really look forwardto working with you in theChurchill Center.JOHN G. PLUMPTON,AGINCOURT, ON., CANADAongratulations on another outstandingConference! ICS did a superb jobof handling all of the many details and,having been involved in such endeavorsin the past, I have a special appreciationfor a well planned conference. We lookforward to next year's Conference in theUK and will be early subscribers whenthe details of the tour and conference areavailable.CHUCK & LINDA PLATT(DNHX7 lA@prodigy.com)artha and I thought the BostonM: .Conference was superb. It surelyDESPATCH BOXrequired a great effort by many people,but we didn't notice that. What we didsee was how smoothly it came together.The programs were both stimulating andenjoyable. And the fellowship with allthose Churchillophiles was again one ofthe best parts. We are now consideringEngland in October.FRED HARDMAN, SPENCER, WVEllen and I had a marvelous time atthe recent Boston ICS Conference.You are both to be congratulated on theunparalleled success of both the academicand the social programs. To paraphraseSir Winston: Never in the field ofICS Conferences was so much owed by somany to just two. We look forward to seeingyou again in Fulton.JONAH & ELLEN TRIEBWASSER,RED HOOK, N.Y. USAJust a quick note to congratulate Barbaraand all the others who workedso hard on the Boston Conference. I hada wonderful time despite the soaking atHarvard Yard. Everyone was very friendly,which was especially nice for me as itwas my first Conference. I'm looking forwardto attending other society events.I'll have no difficulty in keeping thememory of Boston green.LINDA J. WOODBURY DEAL, CALIF.Hearty congratulations for a wonderfuland successful Conference. Wereally enjoyed the events and the greatjob you did in organizing the meeting.Second, please add our names for the tripto Kent.CURT & GERT ZOLLER(curt@mail.calypso.com)It was a class act to present tape cassettesof Mr. Buckley's speech to conferenceattendees after the audio systemproved spotty. It improves with the listening.I thought at the time that hisremarks were unprofound, that they containedtoo many Churchill quotes for uswho are so familiar with them. But thesecond time round I found Buckley'sexposition precise and his phrasing elegant.He clearly contrived this speech forus, since it did not follow his conventionallecture circuit format ("Reflections onCurrent Contentions"). He usedChurchill's speeches in what WSC wouldcall "the scaffolding of rhetoric."JAMES MACK, FAIRFIELD, OH.FINEST HOUR 89/5

Despatch Box, continuedFinest Hour #87 discusses theChurchill study by Douglas Chandor,one-third of a triptych which was, unfortunately,never completed. When Iworked in Washington, DC, I visited theNational Portrait Gallery a number oftimes to view the painting, which hungseparately from its Roosevelt companion.In discussion with one of the curators, Iwas surprised (although I shouldn't havebeen) to discover that there were a numberof Churchill portraits in the Gallery,none of which was displayed. There'seven a bust, and I remember rummagingthrough a dusty attic of the Gallery, andthe curator's finding the bust on a shelf,behind other works. It seems a shamethat these items are not out for view bythe public, although I recognize that noteveryone searches for Churchilliana. Perhapsone day a reception/cocktail partycould be held in the magnificent GreatHall of the Gallery, and these items couldall be brought out for view?I'm enjoying the Internet ICS page,and have passed the address on toseveral friends. My congratulations;keep up the good work!Steve_Walker@mmacmail.jccbi.govEditor's Response: What a good ideafor a future meeting in Washington!Thanks for the tip.While many of us despair that WSCmay be neglected and forgotten,occasionally we come across little tidbitswhich give us hope. The December 12thnational edition of the New York Times,page A13, carried a story headlined "GingrichDraws Protestors to a Jewish SeminaryFund-Raiser." The Jewish TheologicalSeminary of America had invited theSpeaker of the House to be their keynotespeaker and were roundly criticized fordoing so. In response, the seminarychairman, Gershon Kekst, was quoted assaying: "He needs to be heard." Thepaper went on: "Besides," Kekst continued,"Winston Churchill once said thatyou should have your friends close butdraw your enemies even closer. To theextent that our friends in the liberal communityregard him as an enemy — and Idon't — I would think that they wouldwant to 'draw him close.'" All of whichgoes to show that Sir Winston's maximswill live for generations and have applicationto all times and in all circumstances.DAN MYERS(d-myers@genie.com)Editor's response: Can any readerprovide attribution for this quote?IE "Churchillians Cycle Latvia" (issue37, page 27), I see that a hot air ballooncontaining tourists was shot downby mistake over Belarus. So it's lucky theEditor & Co. were not ballooningthrough Latvia. I cannot believe the Sovietsbluffed us for so long.ALEX JUSTICE, REDLANDS CA.Editor's Response: A piercingthought... but Latvia is not Belarus!(To the Editor, The Spectator, replying toJohn Charmley's V-E Day article, "WhyAre We Celebrating?" Professor Charmleyis promoting Churchill's Grand Alliance1940-1957, reviewed last issue.)Sir: Professor Charmley says thatChurchill's victory was bought bySoviet domination of part of Europe, theloss of the Empire, his spending, UnitedStates power and a postwar Labour government.Both wars showed that Germanycould be defeated only by spendingmore than the whole gross nationalproduct of Britain on arms alone andwith at least ten million deaths.Churchill's greatness was indefeating Germany at, relatively, nocost to Britain: half a million dead,and debt which has long been paid off.He fought with Soviet manpower andAmerican money. Being British, thissounds a good deal to me.Mr. Attlee and Mr. Nehru mayhave been awful, but they were betterthan Adolf Hitler. Yes, the Polesended up communist for 48 years: terrible,but not the multi-million massacreof Nazism. And haven't theyjust voluntarily put the communistsback in power?Churchill defeated Germany andNazism far more comprehensivelythan the Allies did in 1918—yet over95 percent of those who marchedbehind him stayed alive. Could you dobetter, Professor Charmley?GEORGE STERN, LONDONFINEST HOUR 89/6Shortly before our Boston meetingPresident Clinton entertainedabout twenty decorated veterans ofthe Pacific War at a dinner party. Tomy surprise, I was seated at thePresident's right. There was an explanation:He had read my Churchillbooks and was just reading A WorldLit Only Before Fire. He expressedgreat interest in the ICS and added,"Of course, Winston Churchill willalways live in our hearts."WILLIAM MANCHESTER, FLA.GET WELL, BILL: Just after Boston,William Manchester successfully underwenta quadruple bypass operation. He isrecuperating and, though he may not beable to reply to all, readers might wish tosend him a get-well message: PO Box6117, Longboat Key FL 34228Atip of the hat to Professor Muller forproviding ICS members with a fineintellectual exercise. I, for one, aminclined to think crossword puzzlesshould be a permanent feature, especiallyif Prof. Muller can create them all.[More to come. Ed.]I noted that on page 9 of the sameissue something about an article onWSC's cigars in Cigar Aficionado magazine.I'm a Mormon and don't smoke, butas I read, the thought occurred to methat if I had met WSC in person and heoffered me a cigar, I probably would haveat least been tempted to indulge just thatonce and perhaps repent later. (I....fcigars were good enough for Churchill,perhaps I should at least try one).As I speculated about what I would doin such a situation, I turned the leaf —and lo, there was "Strong Drink Rageth"on page 11. And I loved it! I read it to mywife while she was cooking, and she got agood laugh out of it as well.GARRY WILMORE ^(Member7035@aol.com) ®

"THE CHURCHILLSBOSTON, FEB. 21ST—A 2 1/2-hourAmerican adaptation of the 1995British television documentary onthe Churchill family from LordRandolph to Winston was scheduledto air over PBS-TV at 8PMeastern time (check local listingsfor times and stations).By editing out thirty minutes ofthe worst original misrepresentations,WGBH has made a majorimprovement on the British version'sturgid parade of half-truths,leaving a film we don't have towatch in fear of some nasty slur onWSC's character or falsification ofthe record inserted by some extremistproducer or historian.Lord Randolph is still not allowedto die without mention ofsyphilis, but only a single mentionsurvives, and Prof. Foster qualifiesit, saying no one can be sure. PartII still asserts that in 1919 "whileLloyd George was at the Parispeace conference, Churchill senttroops to Russia." (14,000 Britishtroops and seven generals were inRussia when Churchill becameMinister of War in 1919; while hedid wish to oppose the Bolsheviks,he did not wish to do so withBritish troops. He stayed in touchwith Lloyd George on this issuewhenever they were separated andnever countermanded his chief. Sothis statement is entirely false.)On the whole, though, WGBH isto be congratulated. World War IIand the Roosevelt-Churchill-Stalinrelationship are described well andhonestly; family triumphs andtragedies are handled with sensitivity.The sad majesty of the funeralis conveyed memorably injust a few moments. The filmingand narration are marvelous, andRobert Hardy as Churchill's voiceis superb as usual. -RMLALEC DOUGLAS-HOMESCOTLAND, OCTOBER 9TH—Akind and gentle Scot, Sir Alec Douglas-Homedied today. He becamePrime Minister upon the resigna-tion of Harold Macmillan in 1963,but held the post a shorter timethan any other PM this centuryexcept Andrew Bonar Law, losingto Harold Wilson's Labour Partythe following year.Alas at least one obituary(American) stated that Alec Homeprotested, as a backbench MP,"Churchill's betrayal of the Polesat Yalta," a popular but inaccurateconception. We now know thatChurchill (and Roosevelt) leftYalta with Stalin's promise of freePolish elections. When thatpromise was broken, Churchillwas among the first to warn of theimminent loss of Polish freedom. IfAlec Home also did so, kudos forhim; but he was also a lifetimeChamberlain apologist who wroteregularly that Munich gave GreatBritain an extra year to arm.Hitler, of course, armed muchfaster, and used the year to digestCzechoslovakia, the last strongdemocracy in central Europe,which had, recent historians nowsuggest, a fighting chance of resistingthe Nazis. -RMLFRENCH EXHIBITVTLLEJEAN, BRITANNY, DEC. 2-17TH—A unique exhibition of Churchill'slife and works featured a massivecollection of photos and documents.Included were comic booksby Calvo, a 1940s French sketchartist,who used animals to portrayWSC (a bulldog) and Hitler (awolf). Propaganda leaflets andChurchill's paintings were shown;"Churchill on the Internet" showedthe ICS Homepage. A multimediacomputer housed events, soundsand images about WSC from a CDromdisk called "200 Personnalites,"made with the assistanceof the CCETT (Joint Centre for Researchin Telecommunications andBroadcasting).Finest Hour congratulates theorganizer, M. J. Foulon, for thisambitious exhibition. For informationcontact M. Foulon, telephone(033) 99.12.43.75 or by e-mail tofoulon@ccett.frFINEST HOUR 89/8The London back-up variant: only 40 exist.RARE ICS COVERSFor the first time in twenty-fiveyears, ICS cover #42 (WSC's visitto Normandy 12Jun44) was lost.Happily, forty back-up covers withthe London WSC one-day silhouettecancellation and D-Day stampwere issued on the right day,12Jun94. Point is, first come, firstserved. ICS Friends may order therare London cover with a copy ofthe replacement cover postmarkedaboard USS Normandy for $20/£13or the Can/Aus equivalent. Chequespayable to "ICS" should be sent toBox 385, Hopkinton NH 03229 USA.PROF. RAMSDENLECTURES ON WSCSAN FRANCISCO, FEBRUARY20TH—John Ramsden, FulbrightVisiting Professor of British Historyat Westminster College, Fulton,Mo., delivers a lecture entitled,"The Road from Fulton:Churchill as Icon 1946-1955" atStanford University here today at4:15PM. This issue will not be outby the time you read this, but localFriends were notified. ProfessorRamsden is also to speak at the50th Anniversary Sinews of PeaceChurchill Conference at JeffersonCity, Mo. on March 8th. For informationon the Stanford lecturecontact Prof. Peter Stansky at(415) 723-2663. For information onFulton contact Judith Pugh at(314) 642-6648.STIRRED, NOT SHAKENLONDON, JAN. 1st—Victor Gowercelebrated his MBE in usual style,serving drinks to everyone at thebar at Simpson's in the Stranduntil 4:30AM. Gower, 67, had receivedhis award for services to »

RECORD MEETING OF THE ICS LEADERSHIP: The Boston Conference (page 20) saw the largest-ever meeting ofSociety leaders worldwide, all but one ICS/USA director and all but two trustees. SEATED: USA Chairman Paul Robinson,USA Director John Mather, UK I USA I Canada Patron Lady Soames, ICS/Canada Secretary John Plumpton,ICS I Canada President Randy Barber, ICS I USA President Richard Langworth and USA Director Alan Fitch. STAND-ING: USA directors David Simpson, Douglas Russell, James Mutter and Parker Lee; UK I USA Trustee Celia Sandys;USA Directors Bill Ives, George Lewis & Cyril Mazansky; UK Chairman David Boler, USA Director Jonah Triebwasser.tourism, having worked with theSavoy Group for more than fiftyyears. He began aged 16 as awaiter in the Savoy Grill, where,one day, Churchill called him overto serve Turkish coffee and askedhim what he wanted to be in life.Gower answered, "A barman,Sir." WSC replied, "That's a fineprofession, my boy," and tippedhim a 10 shilling note. ThoughGower was earning only 3/6(17.5p) a week and 10/ was a magnificentgift, he kept the note andstill has it. He has served everyPrime Minister since Churchill exceptJohn Major, and offers tothank Mr. Major with one of hisseasonal creations, his hangovercure, "The Corpse Reviver."HERITAGE FUNDANOTHER SUCCESSICS United States is once againdeeply grateful to the hundreds ofFriends who responded to its annualend-of-year Heritage FundAppeal, which supports the basicoperations of the Society includingthis journal. The result is immediatelyevident, as this is the largestissue of Finest Hour ever published.ICS cannot do all it does onsubscriptions alone. If you havenot contributed to the HeritageFund, please consider doing so bysending a donation of any amountto ICS c/o George Lewis, Treasurer,268 Canterbury Road, WestfieldNJ 07090. Donations are taxdeductiblefor US citizens.To the many who have alreadydonated, you cannot be thankedenough, but we have acknowledgedyour kindness personallyand will also do so herein.FINEST HOUR 89/9HELP WANTED:CHURCHILLTRIVIABarbara Langworth has declaredher intent to retire from ourpopular Trivia department nolater than Question #800, so as topursue other Churchill interestsincluding cookery. (In October, sheand Lady Soames went overRecipes from Number Ten byChurchill cook Mrs. Landemare,with a view to "translating" themfor modern kitchens.)We need a person interested informulating Q&As to continue thiscolumn. Our original intent was toproduce at least 1,500 Q&As asthe minimum needed to create(with permission) a Churchill versionof "Trivial Pursuits." If youare interested, contact the editorat (603) 746-4433.ICS STORESAfter many years of service,Alan Fitch has stepped down fromICS Stores. Taking up this taskafter the 1990 San Francisco Conference,Alan built Stores from aback issue department to a broadmail order Churchilliana service.Proceeds contribute to the work ofICS, which is grateful to Alan andhis wife Pat for their efforts.Gail Greenly, a Friend of ICSand FH editorial assistant, is to bethe new ICS Stores manager, operatingfrom her home in Contoocook,New Hampshire. She willbe offering Visa/Mastercard andtelephone answering and fax service,which will make orderingmore convenient, especially fromoutside USA. Domestic shipmentsof perishables will be by UPS. Ms.Greenly's address is on page 2 andback issues and publications maybe ordered immediately, butplease allow until next issue forher to inventory and catalogue therest of the stock.continued overleaf»>

ICS DROPS AOLOnline folk will have noticedthat the ICS Bulletin Board in the"Communities" section of AmericaOnline (mentioned in "ChurchillOnline" last issue) has disappeared.It scrolled off the boardfrom lack of usage. We have notreestablished it, since all the actionis now on the Internet (whichis accessible by any online service).Don't miss our expanding homepageat http://www.onramp.net.icsAOL is still good value with decentInternet connections. ContactFinest Hour for more about AOL.ERRATA, FH #88Page 9: In the Cigar Aficionado story,for "sure" read "some."Page 12: In photographer's bylinefor "Rangnald" read "Ragnald."Page 21: The wall on which Celiaand family are sitting is not the wallshown with VVSC in adjacent photo.Page 43: Contrary to our reply loMr. Gillespie, Blenheim Palace is notopen year round but from mid-Marchto the end of October, 10:30-5:30.READER ADVERTS•MAINE HOLIDAY WATER-FRONT HOUSE. On Atlantic at picturesqueTenant's Harbor (Portland90 mins.). Heat, mod-cons, deck, dock,library stocked with Churchill. Sailing,biking, island hopping, fishing,walking distance to fine seafood. Nowbooking for 1996. Special low rates forFriends of ICS. Photos available. Contacteditor: (603) 746-4433.•ICS COVERS. Will trade FinestHour for ICS covers I need: #2, 3, 5,14, 17, 20a, 23, 24, 24a, 25b, 28, 33a,33b, 39b. Arthur Braver, 10837 W.Clairmont Circle, Tamarac FL 33321.• PORTRAITof WSC byArthur Pan, ina handsomeframe, $500 orbest offer. Cdr.Harold Feeney,USN(ret), 3442Aransas Street, Corpus Christi TX78411, telephone (512) 854-6115.• "THE WILDERNESS YEARS"Several readers need someone willingto copy VCR tapes of this TV series. Ifyou can help, contact the editor.1996 International Churchill ConferenceHosted hy ICS, UK: Octoher 2ni-6thAConference ap-.proaching I Boston'95 in size is setfor the South ofEngland on Friday-Saturday October4th/5th, with twoflanking events: agala dinner atBlenheim Palace onAshdown Park, East Grinstead, occupied by Sisters ofthe Order of Notre Dame 1920-70, was built in 1867. the 2nd and a walkingtour of "Churchill'sLondon" led by Sir Martin Gilbert on the 6th. TheChurchill Tour (see opposite) includes all the above.At Blenheim, ICS will present its Blenheim Award to TheDuke of Marlborough for his lifetime effort to preserveChurchill's birthplace for future generations. In addition to thetour party, ICS (UK) will offer tickets with the option of luxurycoach service to and from London on the evening of October 2nd.The Conference proper commences at Chartwell on Friday the4th where our hostesses (at the house) will be Lady Soames andCelia Sandys. Our luncheon speaker is John Sales, NationalTrust Head of Gardens, who will talk about, and then conduct uson a tour through, the Chartwell Gardens. The Conference thenadjourns to Headquarters, the magnificent Ashdown Park hotelin nearby East Grinstead, where a black tie dinner will welcomea prominent speaker.The usual round of panel discussions and scholarly papers willoccupy Saturday, including: remarks by a member of Sir Winston'spostwar government; Professor David Stafford on"Churchill and Intelligence;" Dr. John Mather on "Lord Randolph'sIllness" and Jonathan Aitken, MP on "Churchill andBeaverbrook." The book discussion this year, on the MalakandField Force, will include Dr. Piers Brendon, Keeper of theChurchill College Archives. At the black tie dinner-dance thisevening we honour special guest Mrs. Wendy Reves, who willpresent the Emery Reves Award to Mr. Aitken for his biography,Nixon; another distinguished speaker will reply to the Toast.A small registration fee will be charged to offset guest traveland expenses. The Blenheim dinner, Chartwell lunch, two Conferencedinners and Sunday walking tour may be booked separatelyaccording to your personal preference. Ashdown Park willoffer special discount room rates, and ICS(UK) will also provide alist of alternative B&B-style accommodations nearby. The idea isto offer maximum flexibility in costs to suit everyone's budget.Registration packets will be posted worldwide this Spring. (Donot call ICS.) It will be possible to remit funds in your local currency,free of conversion fees. Meanwhile, save those dates!FINEST HOUR 89/10

1996 CHURCHILL TOURFILLING UP FASTO nFebruary1st,•"?:*•V-/ai seatswere sixty bookedon "Churchill'sEngland" (announcedlastissue). Thetour begins inLondon September26thand ends followingthe ICSConference inLondon onOctober 6th.Moonfleet Manor (Book flightsto arrive 26September and depart 7 October.)We begin this year with the EnglishWest Country, new to ICStours: Churchill and Marlboroughancestral homesites, including avisit to Minterne by kind invitationof Lord Digby; this superbhouse and gardens include portionsbuilt by the first Sir WinstonChurchill (1620-88). Four nightswill be spent in the West Country,including spectacular MoonfleetManor, on the sea facing Dorset'sChesil Bank. Our guests here areauto writer Graham Robson("Churchill's motorcars") and thesenior editor of Finest Hour, AshleyRedburn.Returning east to Oxford (1-3Oct.), we lunch with Robert Hardyat the home of Celia (Sandys) andGen. Ken Perkins, visit Bletchley,Ditchley and Bladon, and attendthe Blenheim banquet October 2ndbefore moving on to Chartwell andAshdown Park for the ICS Conferenceending in London (opposite).The price covers all Conferenceand tour events. For a most memorablevisit to England with WSCand non-WSC events, the 1996ICS tour offers great value. Butwe must hear from you now!Please contact the editor at (603)746-4433 weekdays.BLENHEIM-CHARTWELLBICYCLE TOURA three-day, 100-mile bicycletour from Blenheim to Chartwellalong back country roads, skirtingLondon to the west, is planned forOctober 7th-9th following the ICSConference. Accommodation is atB&Bs with pub lunches and dinners.If you are interested, contactJoan Harris in UK, tel. (01892)518171; or Richard Langworth inUSA, tel. (603) 746-4433.NO. 10 ANNEX MUSEUM?LONDON, OCT 20TH— A plan existsto create a Churchill Museumin the ground floor offices abovethe War Rooms on King CharlesStreet, known as No. 10 Annex.As Sir Martin Gilbert haspointed out on ICS walking tours,it was here and not in the subterraneanWar Rooms (which he frequentedrelatively rarely) whereChurchill actually ran the war.The fixing points for the metalshutters, which were closed duringair raids, are still visible on thewindow casements.Historians wish to recreate thewartime atmosphere, down toreplicating the original bedcovers,soda siphons and ashtrays. Theyhave also suggested displayinghere some of the Churchill papers(FH 87 pl2). If the governmentsees fit, we like the idea, whichwould at last give No. 10 Annex itsproper place in history. -RMLL awrence W. Til" PiL i rim1921-1995Pil Pilgrim, who died September 26th after acourageous fight against cancer, devoted a considerableamount of his personal and professionaltime to ICS United Kingdom. As a chartered accountant,he enabled the Committee to present tothe members and Charity Commissioners meticulouslyprepared accounts, a role he fulfilled until his death.His leadership and courage became evident during the Second WorldWar. After qualifying as a pilot at RCAF Carberry in Manitoba, Canada,he returned to England in 1942 and gained experience in various aircraftincluding the challenging Avro Manchester. He was posted to BomberCommand, where he rose to the rank of Squadron Leader. As a Lancasterpilot, Pil flew more than thirty missions into Nazi Germany, bringingplane and crew back safely each time, despite substantial damage on anumber of trips. He fervently believed that Churchill's leadership wasthe reason he and his fellow aircrew were prepared to give and risk somuch to achieve victory.For his skill and tenacity he was awarded the Distinguished FlyingCross. He remained in the RAF until 1953, when he joined British EuropeanAirways; he later became an accountant. He eventually becamecompany secretary of the Grand Metropolitan Group Pic. The esteem ofhis RAF peers later saw him appointed chairman of the Bomber CommandAssociation, a position he held until his untimely death.Recently Pil helped produce a documentary film defining Bomber Command'svital role in attaining victory and reminding us of the 55,000 aircrewwho died to achieve peace and freedom. He is survived by his wifeAngie, who has agreed to continue as secretary to the Trustees of ICS(UK), for which my fellow trustees and I are indeed grateful.On 3 October I had the honour of reading the poem "High Flight" byJohn Gillespie Magee, Jr. (FH 68 cover) at a service of celebration for thelife of Pil Pilgrim, in St. Paul's Church, Camberley, attended by ICS (UK)Chairman David Boler and other Friends of the Society.Per Ardua Ad Astra.DAVID J. PORTERFINEST HOUR 89/11

ICS Local & NationalCANBERRAOCTOBER — Nearly 100% of ICSFriends in Australian Capital Territoryturned out for an inauguralmeeting at the Canberra HyattHotel, where they were able to sayhello and chat about our sharedinterest. A good time was had by alldespite a potential culinary faux pasby the organiser (me): we soon foundourselves sampling cuisine of thetraditional Oktoberfest celebrations— not the most appropriate settingfor our first ICS meeting. [Not toworry, WSC traveled to Germanyand enjoyed the local cuisine withgusto. -Ed] We all had an enjoyabletime and agreed we should keep theinitiative going, while boosting localmembership. -DAVID WIDDOWSONAustralian Friends of ICS contactMr. Widdowson at 167 ChuculbaCres. Giralang, ACT 2617.Seated: Charlotte Nicholson, PaulaRestropo, Ann Hazlett, Pat Marshall.Standing: Earl Nicholson, NathanHughes, guest Richard Byrd, DavidWillette and Richard Hazlett.DALLASDALLAS, SEPT. 30TH — "Churchill toFisher: *You have got to find the oil'"was the provocative title of the presentationmade by Richard Byrd tothe Emery Reves Chapter of the ICStoday. Thirty-five Friends enjoyed awine and cheese social before historianByrd, from the University ofNorth Texas, described Churchill'smomentous decision as First Lord ofthe Admiralty to convert the BritishNavy from coal to oil.The complex relationshipbetween young Churchill and theolder Fisher, dating to 1907, providedinteresting listening. After a livelyquestion/answer session (severalpresent were associated with theTexas oil industry and knowledgeableon the early history of oildrilling world wide) a year's ICSsubscription was presented to Mr.Byrd by director Nathan Hughes.DALLAS, NOV. 30TH — Sir Winston's121st birthday was celebratedwith a Champagne reception at thehome of Earl and Charlotte Nicholson.Thirty Friends raised theirglasses for the toast, proposed byDavid Willette. Paula Restropo, programcoordinator, introduced Dr.Gavin Hambly of the University ofTexas at Dallas, who spoke on "Gallipoli:The Shadow of the Past." Havingspent several years in Turkey,Hambly gave a succinct account ofthe Dardanelles/Gallipoli operations.In Hambly's opinion, Churchill'swide reading of history had focusedon the long skein of Royal Naval successes,and he could not envisage theopposite result in the Dardanellesoperation.ICS North Texas meets regularly.Please contact Nathan Hughes, 1117Shadyglen Circle, Richardson TX75081 tel. (214)235-3208.CAMBRIDGENOV. 30TH — The Alaska Chapterheld its Churchill birthday in theGreat Hall at Churchill College,attended by four Alaskans amonghordes of Cantabrigians. ChurchillCollege flew WSC's flag and thebirthday was announced at dinnerby the Master of Churchill College.»JAN. 20TH — Sixty Friends of ICS(UK) were hosted for a tour of theChurchill Archives by Keeper Dr.Piers Brendon and Chief ArchivistAllen Packwood. At luncheon underthe famous Orpen painting of WSC,Dr. Brendon discussed the ChurchillFINEST HOUR 89/12Papers, which take up 3,000 boxesand total some 1.5 million documentssent or received by WSC fromchildhood to his final years. Afterlunch the party enjoyed an exclusive-to-ICSexhibit of notable itemsin Jock Colville Hall. Allen Packwood,who had several offers to takeover his job (he cannot be more than30!), then patiently showed threeseparate groups of the party aroundthe Archives.Although the papers were movedto the purpose-built Archives Centrein 1974, their longterm future wasonly assured last April when NationalHeritage money was used to buyand preserve them. The Centrehouses other related collectionsincluding papers of prominentstatesmen from the Churchill era.Our very sincere thanks to Dr. Brendonand Mr. Packwood for this marvelousday amid Churchill treasures.UK Society event announcementsare sent automatically by post.DC & TORONTOJANUARY 18TH & 20TH — DouglasRussell presented his slide show,"Lt. Churchill, 4th Hussars" tolarge meetings in Washington andToronto, duplicating his performanceat the Boston Conference.Referring to the DC blizzard, Russelltold Canadians of a sign westof Washington: "Snow emergencynext 2,500 miles; to avoid delay,use Canada."Any ICS group interested ininviting Douglas may contact himat 221 112 E. Washington St., IowaCity IA 52240, tel. (319) 351-5610.ILLINOISOAK BROOK, NOV. 30TH — A 121stChurchill Birthday celebrationwas arranged by Mr. & Mrs. JoeJust at the Drake Oak BrookHotel, attended by thirty-three"Churchill support specialists."Music, 1985 Pol Roger Champagneand a fine dinner were topped offwith rare vintage port and a very

special Churchill birthday cake.The party was served by chief ofcatering Gino DiRanzo, who onceserved Sir Winston in Venice, inthe summer of 1954.Keynote speaker was TomRoeser, a columnist with theChicago Sun-Times, whose topicwas Churchill's "Stand Alone" duringWW2. David Druckman spokeon his recent trip to Gallipoli (toappear in our next issue) and PaulCarlson presented a slide show,"Churchill: Seizing the Moment."The evening ended with thisWSC quote: "We must beware ofneedless innovations, especiallywhen guided by logic." Followingthis success, further Chicago-areaevents were planned at a directorsmeeting on February 6th.For information on future activitiesplease contact Joe Just, 16 W.251 S. Frontage Rd. #25, BurrRidge IL 60521, tel. (708) 654-3500or fax 654-3520.HARROWOCT. 17TH — ICS (UK) sponsoreda "Young Orator of the Year Competition"which was well receivedby participants and audiencealike. Four schools took part: HarrowSchool, Haberdasher's AskesSchool for Boys, Haberdasher'sAskes School for Girls and theNorth London Collegiate School.Each school provided a chairmanand speaker; the latter were givena choice of "real life" scenarios todiscuss in five minutes.Speakers were required to displayleadership qualities, showhow a negative can be turned intoa positive, be unflappable and co-CELIA SANDYS TOUR D'HORIZONWASHINGTON, CHICAGO, SANFRANCISCO, OCT. 1995 — TheYoung Churchill author CeliaSandys spent three evenings onher recent book tour with ICS,organized in San Francisco byJacqueline Dean Witter, inChicago by Ambassador PaulRobinson, and in Washingtonby ICS/Washington and thelocal branch of the English-Speaking Union.The nation's capital affairAmbassador Sir John Kerr, ESUI WashingtonPresident C. Braxton Mocure and Celia Sandys.was the beginning of a two-week tour to promote the American editionof her book, which had just been released by Dutton. It attracted an impressive135 guests, including the new British Ambassador, Sir JohnKerr and Lady Kerr. It was the first joint ICS-ESU event in the area.Following dinner and toasts to The Queen and WSC, AmbassadorKerr introduced Ms. Sandys, who gave a delightful talk on researchingher book, explaining how she had turned up fascinating new sources.She gave everyone a special insight into her grandfather's life throughto his years at Sandhurst, and intimated that her next book will likelytrace his life from there through his first election to Parliament.All three evenings were great successes which bode well for futureevents. In Washington, we were particularly pleased to be cosponsorswith the English-Speaking Union. -JOHN H. MATHER, M.D.ICS I Washington hosts numerous events year round. For informationor to aid the effort, please contact the director, Ron Helgemo, 2037Wethersfield Ct., Reston VA 22901, tel. (703) 351-2967.FINEST HOUR 89/13gent in style and presentation. Thelatter requirement was a real necessitywhen the speaker was exposedto questions from the floor.The bipartisan nature of the audienceinevitably produced searching,and in some cases awkward,questions. Most speakers showedconsiderable skill in parryingthese and providing positivereplies. In such instances thechairman, although in essenceneutral, had to demonstrate anability to control what could havebecome a slanging match.The evening was a great success,and ably judged by a panelincluding ICS Chairman DavidBoler and Trustee Celia Sandys.First prize, which required deliberation,was award to JonathanRudoc of Haberdasher's AskesBoys School; the runner up prizewent to Emma Foldman of Haberdasher'sAskes Girls School.ICS is indebted to the sponsor,the Sun Life Assurance Society,which provided wherewithal forprizes and refreshments. The winnerreceived a £50 book token andthe runner up £25. Both winnersreceived an illuminated portrait ofWSC, suitably inscribed.ICS thanks the Headmaster ofHarrow for the use of its facilities;Harrow's Head of English, ChrisDeacon, for his hard work in coordinatingwith the other schoolsand so ably perfecting the conceptRichard Haslam-Hopwood hadbrought to him over a year ago; theteachers of the other schools forunstinting support, and the studentpresenters. Whilst there hadto be only one winner, it was feltthat each in his or her way hadbeen a winner in what, after all,was a pilot exercise. -RGGH-H $$)

f~\ , I've come across a booklet thatVv .I'm sure you're aware of, "MyVisit to Russia," by ClementineChurchill, a little blue paperback byHutchinson & Co, Ltd., Publishers. Itcame with a letter purportedly byLady Churchill, on Chartwell letterheadpaper. And here is the mystery,it's dated 9 May 1959 and isaddressed to a Mr. Mortimer. Doesanyone recognize the name? The letterrefers to a coming visit by Mr.Mortimer on May 23rd to Chartwelland mentions that Jock Colville andhis wife will be there. Also "myyoung cousins," Lord and LadyOgilvy. Jock loves croquet. I'm notsure about the others. We shall see!"LINDA WOODBUEY DEAL(SJPS09A@prodigy.com)A. We referred Ms. Deal to Miss, Grace Hamblin, an honorarymember and Lady Churchill's secretaryfor many years, who would bemost likely to know Mr Mortimer.The book (Hutchinson: 1945) wasCSC's only published work. It is notscarce but usually commands about$25 for status as author's only book.Q.I have a watercolour and• crayon painting of WSC andClementine (?) sitting on a verandah;WSC is in a brown suit andwith his cigar and the lady isdressed in red. It's signed in blackcrayon Sarah Churchill. DidSarah paint too? I know she wrotepoetry and have a book of hers. I'dlove to know more about the letteror the painting.A. Sarah did create some art-« work, including portfolios ofpen and ink or crayon sketches ofWSC and others which were soldin two formats, very large andabout 9x12, signed in pencil"Sarah Churchill." I have neverseen any of her watercolors, butshe did turn these out as well andthis sounds like one of them.On the question of whether WSCwore dentures (issue 88, page14)...Q. I am a practicing dentist of• almost 40 years, and unlessmy eyes and experience deceiveme, I would bet that he didn't.Also, I am sure that we all havechuckled over the incident whereW was not attended by "his Man"and was perplexed over his inabilityto make his toothbrush froth.Would someone help me on this?Unfortunately "toothbrush" didn'tappear in the index of any of mybooks. I was incredulous that agreat mind which could conceivethe idea of a machine to span thetrenches of the Western Frontcouldn't figure out from where thesuds on his toothbrush came! Thisshouldn't have been surprisingthough, since his mind was notpreoccupied with the insignificant.BOB MARTIN he did. In Assign-AtApparently,, ment Churchill, (my edition isthe Popular Library paperback,1961) his longtime bodyguard InspectorWalter H. Thompson says on page167, "And when he would suddenlyrealize he had forgotten his teeth andsend me running for them before hewould be seen without them, I wasglad for the exit." History is certainlya topic one can sink one's teeth into.Linda Woodbury DealQ. I am looking for a copy of a. speech, given by WSC on thecampus of a U.S. college, which isreputed to be exceedingly brief. Ihave not read the speech myself, butam looking for it for another personwho heard it read on television lastyear. I'm wondering if it could be the"Iron Curtain Speech." I'd appreciateany help you can give.-DR. RICHARD W. GILPINAmCan any reader help? Three, campus speeches come to mindbut all were lengthy and in fact quitefamous: Harvard 1943 ("Anglo-AmericanUnity"), Westminster College inFulton Missouri 1946 ("Sinews ofPeace"= "Iron Curtain") and MIT in1949 ("Empires of the Mind"). Nonefit your bill. Only way I can think ofto find it, if it exists, would be laboriouslyto go through Winston S.Churchill, The Complete Speeches1895-1963, Robert Rhodes James,editor, Chelsea House IBowker 1974,8 vols; major libraries have them.FINEST HOUR 89/14KIDDLES. MYSTERIES, EMGMAS1CSI USA's Derek Brownleader sends usthis latest appearance of the Churchillname on spirits. "For their ads they areusing a drawing of WSC which theyclaim was approved by the SpencerFamily," Derek writes. May we have ataster's review of this gin, please...Q.I saw a blurb in the Atlanta. [Ga., USA] paper yesterday, totoe effect that the Duke of Windsorplanned an overthrow of WSC's government,and his own reinstatement,with Queen Wallis, with the connivanceof the Nazis. Now I knowthat scurrilous rumors to this effecthave been around for years, but weregiven little credence. The newspaperarticle implied that recently releasedarchival data of the British Governmentsupported these allegations.Anything here?Bruce ThyerA,It was well known to• Churchill and his governmentthat the Duke of Windsor hadadmired Hitler's successes in resurrectingGerman national pride,if not Hitler himself, before thewar, and that WSC took an interestin extracting the Duke ofWindsor from the continent at anopportune time and, later, seeinghim installed far away asGovernor of the Bahamas. TheDuke's resentment over the way hewas treated following hisAbdication, and clandestine Naziovertures to him while in Europe,are also well known. The release of

Riddles, continuedhitherto secret documents may amplifythis but probably not alter much..1 enjoyed very much the• Spring "Wit and Wisdom,"buT noticed several "digs" atJohnny Walker Red Label scotch.What does the writer recommend?As to malts, my favorite is Oban.A. Personal opinions are only• that, but Teacher's is theblended scotch of choice here andin most households we know whereblends are consumed regularly.Your choice of single-malt showsdiscernment: Oban was one of tentop single malts named recently byWine and Spirits and is a lovely,soft, west-of-Scotland whiskey witha light touch of peat. Wine andSpirits also named many maltswhich we see regularly in thehomes of Churchillophiles includingour own: MacAllen (first place),Glenmorangie, Laphroig, Lagavullin,Bowmore and Glenfiddich.On the cover of that issue was aglass of Jura, one of our favoritesfrom a little-known island we havevisited. Several readers wrote us tosay that Johnny Walker Blackshould not be lumped with barroomscotches like Red Label; andthat there is now an ultra-premiumJohnny Walker Blue..1 recently purchased a novel>-r .by Winston Churchill from1901 called The Crisis. I rememberreading somewhere about anAmerican novelist named WinstonChurchill, who was active duringSir Winston's earlier literarycareer, and that they exchangedcorrespondence. It was probably inManchester, but it's not indexed.Can you help jiggle my memory?A.A likely reason why The• Crisis stayed in print for solong (it was available as late as1970) was that people (like me,once) were mistaking it for TheWorld Crisis and ordering copies.It was, of course, one of those ubiquitousnovels (like Richard Carvel,Mr. Crewe's Career, Coniston, TheCrossing and a dozen others, byWinston Churchill the Americannovelist, a distant relation. Thetwo Winstons engaged in an amusingcorrespondence in an attemptto prevent public confusion overtheir books (it can be found in MyEarly Life, in The Churchills:Pioneers and Politicians byElizabeth Snell and in FinestHour 83, which also provides illustrationsof the two Winstons). TheEnglish Winston agreed to use hismiddle name "Spencer." DuringWSC's American lecture tour in1901 the American Winston hosteda dinner for him in Boston, whereamidst joviality they agreed therewould be no more confusions...butWSC got the dinner bill. TheDartmouth College rare books collection(see InternationalDatelines) holds the papers of theAmerican Winston and a fine collectionof WSC as well; on a recentvisit we were able actually to seethe originals of the famousexchange between the twoWinstons./^V.The piece about JamesW.Muller (FH 88) says Churchillwrote over forty books andsixty-four volumes. My review listhas forty-nine in fifty-three volumes.What is the true count andis there a chronological bibliographyavailable which settles thisquestion? Would it be wiser to purchasethe 1974 "Collected Worksand Essays" or the volumes individuallyto obtain a complete collectionof Churchill?A.Churchill wrote forty-fourm hardbound titles if you countFrontiers and Wars, an abridgedcompilation from his first warbooks, and three posthumouslypublished works: Young Winston'sWars, the Collected Essays (published1975, never published involume form before) and TheDream (published for the first timein volume form by ICS in 1985;now available for $151 £10 softbound).This figure counts, as mostcollectors do, the first collected editiono/"War Speeches and the 1952definitive 3vol edition of The WarSpeeches as individual works,even though they are rearrangementsof the individual WW2speech volumes.FINEST HOUR 89/15The volume count is more problematic.Figuring two volumes forThe River War and Lord RandolphChurchill, four volumes (English edition)for Marlborough and A Historyof the English-Speaking Peoples, fivevolumes in six books for The WorldCrisis, three volumes for The WarSpeeches Definitive Edition and sixvolumes for The Second World Wargives us sixty-four actual volumes forthe forty-four titles. But if you includespin-offs like Blenheim, The IslandRace, The American Civil War, Joanof Arc, Heroes of History, and theone-volume abridgements of TheWorld Crisis, The River War andThe Second World War, you come upwith seventy-two individual volumes— or seventy-five if you include thefour-volume Collected Essays. So,while forty-four is the accepted figurefor book-length titles, your count ofthe actual volumes varies dependingon what you count.Whether it is preferable to buythe Collected Works (thirty-eightvolumes including the Essays) orthe individual titles depends onwhat you wish to achieve. For alltheir beauty and exclusiveness, theCollected Works are just magnificentreprints. (See "The SordidHistory of the Collected Works" inFinest Hour 57.) They will barelybe worth the price of just one classicfirst edition, the two-volumeRiver War (and by the way, thetext of that work in the CollectedWorks is only the one-volumeabridged version). Though buyingthe Collected Works and Essaysdoes secure (at a price) virtually95% of WSC's writings, there arecheaper ways to do this. You canput together a complete collectionof those writings for under $1500 ifyou settle for mundane and readingcopies and non-first editions.An ICS publication, ChurchillBibliographic Data, available fromICS Stores for $131£8 postpaid,does provide a good and mostlyaccurate list of works by and aboutWSC, pending the publication thisyear of more advanced works.Send your questions to the editor; ifwe can't find the answers we will askour erudite readership. Answers toqueries posted here are alsomost welcome. &5

Winter 1895-1896 • Age 21New York CelebrityNEW YORK newspapersannounced that Churchilland a brother officer fromthe 4th Hussars had set sail for Englandon the Cunard liner Etruria.The New York World reported thathe was returning "without a woundand with a conviction that there arefew occupations more salubriousthan that of a Cuban insurgent,"adding that, although Churchillreached the Cunard dock only fiveminutes before scheduled sailingtime, "the pleasant faced young officersubmitted as gracefully to therequests of the waiting group ofinterviewers as though there werehours of leisure on his hands."Churchill concluded that interviewby emphatically denying all reportsattributing a political significance tohis Cuban trip.Back in England, as he laterrecalled, he "passed a most agreeablesix months; in fact they formedalmost the only idle spell I have everspent." His definition of idle waspeculiar to him. He lobbied FleetStreet for a foreign assignment —Crete, Egypt, Rhodesia — anythingto avoid going back to India, an eventhe believed would delay his politicalcareer. He also assiduously developedsocial and political contacts.He continued to observe theCuban scene. Writing in the SaturdayReview he noted that the Cubanrebels "neither fight bravely nor dothey use their weapons effectively."Although he thought that the Spanishwere bad, "a Cuban governmentwould be worse, equally corrupt,more capricious and far less stable."He predicted that improvementswould come only with American controlof the island, but he worriedabout problems between Britain andAmerica over it. He wrote bis Americanfriend and mentor, CongressmanBourke Cockran, to "please bepacific and don't go dragging the 4thHussars over to Canada in aninsane and criminal struggle."ACTION THIS DAYThe Cairo Conference. Front row: Gen. Congreve (with cane), Sir Herbert Samuel, WSC, SirPercy Cox, Gens. Haldane, Ironside & Radcliffe. Second row left, Gertrude Bell; Lawrence ofArabia (above Cox), Gen. Salmond (above Haldane) and Hubert Young (between Ironside andRadcliffe). Extreme top centre: Sir Archibald Sinclair (bow tie), below him (also with bow tie)Joseph Crosland. Front left: one of two lion cubs bound from Somaliland to the London Zoo.Winter 1920-1921 • Age 46"England is out of the affair with clean hands..."CHURCHILL had reached theage at which his father haddied. This was a winter ofdiscontent for him but it ended witha major political and personalachievement. He had failed to stemthe Bolshevik tide in Russia andcould not even prevent his own governmentfrom negotiating with theBolsheviks. At home he was adespised enemy of Labour and distrustedby many in the ConservativeParty. He disagreed with his government'spolicy of reprisals in Ireland.He felt empty administering a WarOffice which had no war, when hewas expected to downsize and economize.He knew that his differenceswith his own Prime Minister madeit impossible for him to remain asWar Minister and he wanted tobecome Chancellor of the Exchequer,Foreign Secretary or Colonial Secretary,in that order.On New Year's Day Lloyd Georgeasked Churchill if he would acceptthe Colonial Office. Churchill acceptsed with several conditions, particularlyhaving to do with the MiddleEast. In February he assumed theposition with powers — so enhancedthat Lord Curzon charged that hewas becoming "a sort of Asiatic ForeignSecretary." In his new role hehad to deal with the remnants of theold Ottoman Empire, the division ofspoils among European powers, therise of Arab nationalism and theBalfour promise to establish a Zioniststate.In March Churchill set out for theMiddle East accompanied by T. E.Lawrence (of Arabia), Air MarshalTrenchard and Archibald Sinclair,his personal friend and private secretary.After picking up Clementinein France, he continued to Cairowhere he was met with protest andcries of "Down with Churchill" fromArab students. Important peoplefrom throughout the Middle Eastparticipated in Churchill's CairoConference, the major purpose ofwhich was to designate the rulers ofIraq and Transjordan. Most pleasedwith Churchill's statesmanship wasLawrence, who would later write: "Imust put on record my convictionthat England is out of the Arabaffair with clean hands." Zionist supportersalso appreciated Churchill'spromise to begin fostering a Jewishhomeland.Because of the hostile EgyptianFINEST HOUR 89/16

crowds, who objected to his declarationthat Egypt was part of theEmpire, WSC rode in an armouredcar when he wanted to paint thegreat scenes of Egypt, including theSphinx and the Pyramids. Duringhis journey home via Gaza,Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, he was surprisedto see anti-Zionist sentimentsamong the Palestinians. EvenLawrence had believed that Jewsand Arabs could live harmoniously.Left: Churchill at Fulton, 5 March 1946towards Russia is in prospect ... theevidence will soon be forthcoming. InMr. Truman's conversation withWinston Churchill here andChurchill's subsequent talks inFlorida with Secretary Byrnes andBernard Baruch the new programbegan to take shape."On March 4th and 5th Trumanand Churchill travelled by trainfrom Washington to JeffersonWinter 1945-46 • Age 71City, Missouri and then drove"An Iron Curtain has descended across the continent..." *° Fult ° n > twent y f iles fur ;ther. After lunch they joinedthe procession to the gymnasium ofAMERICAN politics was polar-Churchill went to Cuba for a few Westminster College, whereized between those who days before meeting the President. Churchill gave one of his most— —.thought Stalin was an impe-Truman later said that he told famous to as the orations, Iron Curtain commonly speech. referred Trumanhad predicted that the speechrialist bent on expansion by force Churchill, "It's your own speech, youand those who saw him as a protectorof Russian security. This division ed in his diary that the President would create quite a stir and it did,write it," but Admiral Leahy record-created uncertainty regarding the and Churchill spent many hours throughout the entire world.form American policy should take, talking about the speech.On March 8th, speaking in thebut there was an inexorable move Churchill also asked Prime MinisterMackenzie King of Canada to the General Assembly of Virginia inpresence of General Eisenhower tofrom accommodation to confrontationthat would culminate a year come to Washington because he Richmond, then to the most seniorlater with the proclamation of the appreciated King's knowledge of the officers of the American military,Truman Doctrine.Americans. King sent the Canadian and finally at a dinner in New YorkInto this vortex walked Winston Ambassador to the United States, City, Churchill repeated the themesChurchill to speak at Westminsterfuture Prime Minister Lester Pearson,to Churchill's assistance. Pearcalunderpinnings of those themesof his Fulton speech. The philosophi-College, Fulton, Missouri. He wouldson found a half-clad Churchill were expressed by Churchill in anprofoundly influence the outcome ofworking in bed with a breakfast tray impromptu speech to Canadian soldierswho were sailing home on thethe debate.beside him. Pearson read the speechChurchill had accepted Presidentand recommended that Churchill ship which brought him to NorthTruman's invitation to speak in thenot refer to the recent conflict as America, the Queen Elizabeth: "YesterdayI was on the bridge, watchingPresident's home state for two reasons:he wanted to campaign for a"The Unnecessary War" for fear ofproviding justification for American the mountainous waves, and thisloan for Britain and, more importantly,he wanted to forge an Anglo-isolationists to avoid foreign entanglements.Churchill agreed. through them and mocking theirship — which is no pup — cuttingAmerican alliance against the SovietWSC also spent time with British anger. I asked myself, why is it thatthreat which, he was convinced, theAmbassador Lord Halifax, who the ship beats the waves, when theyLabour Government was incapablenoted Churchill's intensity in are so many and the ship is one?or unwilling to confront. He toldpreparing his remarks but did not The reason is that the ship has aLord Moran: "I think I can be ofinform the government in London. It purpose, and the waves have none.some use over there: they will takewas evident that Churchill and Trumanwere about to pronounce a tireless, but ineffective. The shipThey just flop around, innumerable,things from me. It may be thatCongress will ask me to addresschange in direction from Roosevelt's with the purpose takes us where wethem." The only invitation extendedpolicy of good relations with the want to go. Let us therefore haveby Congress came from hostileSoviet Union while keeping a certain purpose, both in our national andRepublicans who wanted to crossexaminehim about Pearl Harbour.detachment from Britain.Imperial policy, and in our privateThere was increasing press lives. Thus the future will be fruitfulChurchill and Truman hadawareness that something was up. for each and for all, and the rewardplanned to meet in Florida but aThe New York Post reported that "a of the warriors will not be unworthyrash of strikes forced the Presidentstiffening American attitude of the deeds they have done." k>to remain in Washington, soFINEST HOUR 89/17

Glimpses or WSC rrom theBoston International Conference"County Durhamir!On the second day of the 1926General Strike the governmentordered me to London, along withseveral other young men, where wewere put up in army barracks.Around 3AM the next morning, weset off for the London docks, each ofus driving a huge army lorry accompaniedby a policeman and a soldier(with one bullet in his rifle). Ourassignment was to transport emergencyfoodstuffs into the city, andthe time was selected to avoid confrontationswith the pickets.A few days later we were orderedto the printing plant of the MorningPost, where the government wereproducing a daily newspaper editedby Winston Churchill known as TheBritish Gazette. It was designed tomaintain morale and provide upbeatnews about what Churchill and hiscolleagues hoped would be theprompt collapse of the GeneralStrike.One day while several of us wereloading bundles of newspapers intomy truck, a large car pulled up infront of the newspaper office, just afew yards from us down the street.Most of its occupants entered theoffices, but one man stopped on thepavement (sidewalk) and stood lookingat us young men tossing ourbundles of newspapers and chatteringtogether. He watched us for amoment and then started walkingtoward us, trailing his stick, whichdragged along the ground. As I keptloading newspapers, I looked at himand realized it was WinstonChurchill.He came within a few feet of meand stood watching us. Then with agrin he pointed and said, "You,young man — you don't sound like aLondoner. What part of the countrydo you come from?"Here I was, a young man of twenty,from a family which for the betterpart of two generations had admiredthis man, who had often been thesubject of lively discussions aroundthe dinner table: Churchill of the 4thHussars, Churchill of the MalakandField Force; Churchill of the RiverWar and Omdurman; Churchill ofthe Boer War, the Relief of Mafeking,the captured and escaped prisonerof war; Churchill, who hadmade the fleet ready in August 1914— and who, as Chancellor of theExchequer, had just presented hissecond budget to the House of Commonsa few weeks before.I pitched my bundle of newspapersinto the truck, stood up as tallas I could and said, "Sir, I am fromCounty Durham," wondering if Iought to salute.The grin on his face widened considerablyand he stepped closer, puthis hand on my shoulder and said,"Jolly good. Carry on. God bless youall." Then with a pat on my back heleft us.-FRED FARROW"Memories of the General Strike""I'm india-rubr) er!After the River War, Churchillreturned to India to participatein the all-India polo tournament,which the 4th Hussars won. RobertBaden-Powell, later founder of theBoy Scouts, remembered the granddinner in honor of that occasion:"Every team had its healthdrunk, and when all was over theresuddenly sprang to his feet one ofthe members of the 4th Hussarsteam, who said, 'Now, gentlemen,you would probably like to hear meaddress you on the subject of polo!' Itwas Mr. Winston Churchill.WIT AND WISDOM"Naturally there were cries of 'Nowe don't! ... Sit down!' and so on, butdisregarding all their objections,with a genial smile he proceeded todiscourse on the subject. ... He proceededto show how it was not merelythe finest game in the world butthe most noble and soul-inspiringcontest in the whole universe, andhaving made his point he wound upwith a peroration which brought usall cheering to our feet. [Then] one inauthority arose and gave voice to thefeelings of all when he said: Well,that is enough of Winston for thisevening,' and the orator was takenin hand by some lusty subalternsand placed underneath an overturnedsofa upon which two of theheaviest were then seated, withorders not to allow him out for therest of the evening."But very soon afterwards heappeared, emerging from beneaththe angle of the arm of the sofa,explaining, 'It is no use sitting uponme, for I'm india-rubber.'"This sounds rather characteristic,doesn't it?-DOUGLAS RUSSELL"Lt. Churchill, 4th Hussars"ThSyst em...Anent Churchill's remark that"Democracy is the worst systemof government, except for all theother systems" (this space lastissue), Professor Manfred Weidhornrefers us to his book, Churchill'sRhetoric and Political Discourse(Univ. Press of America: 1987) page126, which suggests: "This is anearthy, ironic version of JamesMadison's sober, syllogistic judgment:'No government can be perfect... That which is the least imperfectis therefore the best government ...Republican governments [are] thebest of all governments, because theleast imperfect.'" The quote is fromThe Federalists vs the JeffersonianRepublicans, ed. Paul Goodman(NY:1967),p73. «FINEST HOUR 89/18

THE CHURCHILL CENTERReport for trie Winter of 1995-1996The mission of the Churchill Center, in Washington, DC, is to encourage international study of the life and thought of SirWinston Churchill; to foster research about his speeches, writings ana deeds; to advance knowledge of his example as a statesman;anj, by programs of teaching ana publishing, to impart that learning to men ana women ana young people around theworld. Programs include course development, symposia, standard and electronic libraries, CD-rom research initiatives, anannual Churchill lecture, visiting professorships, publication subventions, fellowships, and a Journal of Churchill Studies.SUPPORT for tke Ckurckill Center kas keentremendous. We are very grateful to tke over 500people, corporations, foundations and educationalentities wkick responded to Lady Soames's Septemkerletter ky kecoming Founding Memkers, including onein five Friends of ICS, not only in America kut worldwide.In fact, ICS United Kingdom leads tke CkurckillSocieties witk over 20% participation (despite no taxCanadian and American Societies at around 19% each.advantages to Britisk citizens), followed closely ky tkeWe are indeed proud and gratified at tke distinguishedlist of Founding Memkers, including tke Dukeof Marlkorougk, Lady Soames, Lord Jellicoe and SirFitzroy Maclean; Ambassadors Pamela C. HarrimanJokn L. Loek, Jr. and Paul H. Robinson, ]r. GeneralColin L. Powell; Dr. Henry A. Kissinger and Caspar W.Weinkerger; Senators Tim Kelly and Harry Byrd Jr.;MPs Winston Ckurckill and Jonathan Aitken; Presidentof George WashingtonEden on WSC's war memoirs; Prof. Dan Makoney(Assumption College) on WSC and Europe; Dr. JoknMatker on Ckurckill's kealtk; and Prof. Jokn Ramsden(Westminster College) on WSC's postwar reputation,Tke Symposium is again cosponsored ky tke CkurckillCenter and tke Woodrow Wilson International Centerfor Sckolars on April 12tk. As kefore, it will ke possikleto outside attend tke tke presentations. area and wisk Invitations to attend, will ke mailed contact toWaskington-area ICS/Waskington, Friends Ron Helgemo, automatically; 2037 if you Wetkersfield are fromCourt, Reston VA 22091, tel. (703) 351-2967."CHURCHILL AS PEACEMAKER"THE FIRST Ckurckill Symposium, keld in Novemker1994, resulted in many fresk looks at Churchill's peacemakingefforts from tke Boer War to tke Cold War. Aswe go to press we kear tkat tke resulting papers kavekeenlicationaccepted,in a kook,sukjectakouttowkickcertainmorequalifications,anon,for pukqt^kenTTrackt^tTrVof George Waskington k p, j qUniversity; Celia Sandys, William Manckester, AlistairCooke and tke Pol-Roger l family; fil tke tk Aequus As Institute,Harrow School, Koklkerg Kravis Rokerts and theGIFTS OF SECURITIESAN EXTRAORDINARY stock market performance inEdelman n and Annenberg Foundations.foundations. ~- •• .In Boston last year, ky-laws were approved and tke past year kas resulted in outstanding capital gams, f f rnor8 elected A Board of Trustees, for many Friends of ICS. As a result of these gams,whose advice 2 wiH kTmstrumental t to tke k ongoing i work k gifts of f stock tck or securities can ke particularly appropri-of the C^ter, is being selected and operations com- ate, as well as beneficial, for people wko kave mkentedmencing. Finally, tke Development Committee is nowor purchased assets at a fractional cost of tkeir currentvalue. A gift of appreciated assets can avoid kigk capitalmoving to Phase 2 of its organization plan: preparingprinted and visual materials presentationp to poten-gains tax. Help tke Ckurckill Center to kuild a meaningfulendowment wkile receiving a full deduction on yourtial major supporters.itemized tax return.If you would like more information on girting"POSTWAR YEARS" SYMPOSIUMTTTF SFCOND Nation's Capital Ckurckill Sym-posium is devoted to studying Winston Ckurckill in tkeL is devoteu LU =1.u"^—t, 1 1 r> Iyears after World War II. Presenters include Pror.Elizaketk Spalding (George Mason Univ.) on containmentpolicy; Prof. Raymond Callakan Univ. otDelaware) on Empire; Max Sckoenfeld^(Univ_ofWisconsin Eau Claire) on tke Atomic Bomk; Dr. BokFINEST HOUR 89/19securities or on otker ways to kelp tke Ckurckill Center,please contact our office:Parker H. Lee, III, Secretary-Treasurer117 Hance RoadFair Haven, NJ 07704Tel. (908) 758-1933Fax (908) 758-9350

;ion

almost singlehandedly campaigned for Winston Saturday. The trolley tour explored Boston sites related toChurchill's — • •'" ' honorary American * :~- «: onri and clip the cruise rmicp Cl-mrrhill's Churchill's three visits (1901, 1943, 1949), nicely narratedby Mike Ryan, the Richard Batchelders Sr. &c Jr. andship "Spirit of Boston" gave us a fine opening night dinner-danceon Boston Harbor. It is superfluous to describe Cyril Mazansky. It ended at the Kennedy Library for thethe reaction of our delegates to all these exciting aspects, Honorary Citizenship exhibit, then returned to thebut a sampling of their thoughts will be found on page 5.Copley for the afternoon events. These comprised threeTo all who came we say: thanks for the memories. A specialthank-you goes to the individuals and corporations"Churchill Initiatives" presentations: by Coach JohnnyParker of the New England Patriots ("Churchill aswho contributed financially — without you, we couldInspiration" [in this case to football players]); DouglasRussell ("Lt. Churchill, 4th Hussars"); and Fred Farrownot have sponsored so many young people, nor provided("Personal Memories of the General Strike") — threeall that we did for everyone present.unique aspects of what Lady Soames calls "The Saga."IN THE glittering Venetian Room headquarters, visitorsfound a well-staffed registration desk peopled byvolunteers efficiently briefed and organized by chiefof staff Parker Lee; a selection of Churchilliana offered byAlan and Pat Fitch of ICS Stores and their helpers; andwhat must be the world's finest collection of World WarII memorabilia and autographia, displayed by KennethRendell. Next door in the Oval Room, Cynthia Newberryand Cyril Mazansky introduced our Thursday studentspeakers, led by Steven Mitby of Harvard, whose deliverywas as impressive as his paper. Mr. Buckley, who did notwitness Steve's speech but read his paper, repeatedlyreferred to it at dinner Friday night and got up to congratulateMitby after himself delivering the keynotespeech, "Let Us Now Praise Famous Men."Buckley's remarks capped a very full day onFriday the 27th, which had begun with the book discussionof Triumph and Tragedy by visiting professors organizedby academic chairman, Prof. Jim Muller. This wasfollowed by Celia Sandys, who related her experiences inwriting The Young Churchill (reviewed in issue 85), andher plans for the sequel, covering WSC's adventures fromSandhurst to the Boer War. The academics were backafter lunch with a spirited discussion of Churchill,Roosevelt and the End of World War II, described elsewherein these pages by Don Feder, and a seminar on"Teaching Churchill" for high school teachers and parents,arranged A long-Qistance Una distance uy bv iProfessor Patrick Powers,The crowning event was, of course, dinner, in theCopley Ballroom. After the national anthems, sung bySolveig Barber, came William Buckley's fine speech, and around of questions fired at him, National Press Clubstyle. ("What would have become of you had you beeneLed Mayor of New York in 1965? ... That wouldhave signified that the voters of New York had soreordered their thinking as to make my election redundant."The faint aroma of fine cigars permeated theCopley ground floor after dinner, for we had managedsomething that has eluded us for a few years: after-dinnergatherings for both smokers and non-smokers.We were clearly on a roll, which continuedINTRODUCING our Saturday speaker (above, onright), William Manchester was as fine as we expectedfrom the author of that literary masterpiece, The LastLion. Arthur Schlesinger's speech, on Churchill and therevisionist historians, was a humdinger that will beremembered a long time. Both spoke before dinner, sincethe Harvard Glee Club arrived afterward for an hour-longrendition of Churchill's favorite Harrow Songs, intowhich MC Jim Muller managed to insert "Fair Harvard"for a remarkable number of Harvard Alumni to join in.The Conference ended Sunday with a farewell breakfast,where Ambassador Paul Robinson expressed thanks to allon behalf of ICS/USA and David Boler and RandyBarber announced plans for the next two InternationalConferences (England in 1996; Toronto in 1997). It washard to believe the 12th ICS Conference was history.ICS set out to produce a zero-defects event, andby and large it succeeded. The nearest thing to a majorincident occurred Thursday night, when BarbaraLangworth received a communicator call from Parker Lee,down on the street (thank heaven for those communicators):"We ordered five trolleys to take us to the waterfrontand only three are here." The decision was instantaneous:fill the three and send them off, with instructionsto come right back for a second load. No sooner had theyleft than five more trolleys showed up — from a differentFINEST HOUR 89/21

LEFT: Amb. Paul Robinson with the ICS Stores crew: Alan Fitch, John Cox, Jack Nixon, Joanna Green, Bill Williams, Pat Fitch, Brock Comegys.CENTER: Don Feder of the Boston Herald is talked into a chance on a Holland-America Cruise by Parker Lee, who sold many a ticket.RIGHT: Ellen Triebwasser (New York) explains the contents of the registration packet to Peter Suzuki (Nebraska), Parker fields a call.company! We never heard another word from the firstthree, who had apparently mistaken our own team's radiomessages for theirs and sent three non-official conveyances.Whoever they were, they worked for freeThursday night!The other nits were incidental, but you shouldknow that we've made notes. The dinners as usual ran toolong. Larry Arnn says the way to fix this is to have bothsalad and the dessert on the table when we sit down —we'll try the salad but it would have been sacrilegious toadvance-plant the delectable hazelnut mousse in itschocolate tulip cups. (Hardly any were left untouched.)Mr. Buckley's speech was selectively inaudible becausetwo of seven speakers were accidentally mute; we compensatedby sending every attending party a tape. Thereception for Professor Schlesinger's speech was in thePlaza Bar, which was too crowded to stand and too darkto navigate. But skillful organization left very little else tocriticize. Among a broad array of speakers I was glad towitness the abundance of that Churchillian quality Iadmire most: humor and courtliness among people ofentirely opposite political persuasions. They proved, asChurchill did, that political discourse can and should becivilized and decorous.The Conference organizers cannot be thankedenough. Barbara Langworth conceived of most of theevents, while Parker Lee applied his years of corporateconference experience to achieve precision throughout.Our volunteers were superb. The result was the smoothestrun conference in history. As several said later, Bostonproved that this Society has come of age as a mature, settledorganization, confident in its values and goals, andsecure in the devotion of those who serve it so selflesslly.SUPPORTERS & SPONSORS• Corporate Support: Philip Morris Companies Inc., HollandAmerica Lines Inc., Books on Tape Inc., Pol Roger Champagne,Alfred Dunhill Ltd., Churchillbooks, Frederick Wildman & Sons.• President's Club: Mr. Fred Farrow, Mr. & Mrs. Gary J. Bonine,Mr. & Mrs. Richard H. Leahy, Mr. & Mrs. Parker H. Lee, III,Ethel M. Pont, Mr. & Mrs. James Snell, Reese Taylor, Mr. & Mrs.John Utz, Mr. Steven R. Wolf, Mr. & Mrs. Alex M. Worth• Patrons: Mr. & Mrs. Colin D. Clark, Mr. & Mrs. WilliamIves, Dr. & Mrs. Cyril Mazansky, Mr. & Mrs. Terrance W.McGarry, Mr. & Mrs. Charles D. Platt, Ambassador & Mrs. PaulRobinson, Jr.• Associates: Mr. & Mrs. Paul Alkon, Mr. & Mrs. David C.Boler, Mr. & Mrs. Walker B. Comegys, Mr. Orlin R. Corey, Mr.Raymond Lavine, Mrs. Ruth J. Lavine, Dr. & Mrs. Richard Streiff• Student Sponsors: Mr. Donald Best, Mr. Louis Burnett, Dr. &CMrs. Yong-Min Chi, The John T. & Mable Hay Fund, Mr. & Mrs.Mr. Nathan Hughes, Mr. Derek Lukin Johnston, Drs. Terrance andMary Leveck, Mr. Rich Lowry, Mr. & Mrs. Paul L. Meaders, Dr. &Mrs. John Michenfelder, Mr. & Mrs. Earl Nicholson, Mr. & Mrs.John G. Plumpton, Dr. & Mrs. Jack Proctor, Mr. & Mrs. SergeRoger, Dr. David J. Schreiber, Mr. Jens H. Schulthes, Mrs. HelenBecker Silverstein, Mr. & Mrs. Jonah I. Triebwasser, Dr. & Mrs.Allen P. Webb, Mr. & Mrs. Bill WilliamsLEFT: A long-overdue Blenheim Award went to Barbara Langworth (Ian, right) for fifteen years of service. CENTER: Another Blenheim, equallymuch delayed, to John Plumpton for his own thirteen years of dedication to ICS Canada and to Finest Hour. RIGHT: The Farrow Award, ICS'slatest, for notable achievement in Churchill Studies, was presented by Fred Farrow to Prof. James MuUer, University of Alaska Anchorage.FINEST HOUR 89/22

LEFT: "Randy, you're soaked through!" Celia pats down Randy Barber after the Harvard Yard downpour. Alex Worth remains dry and happy.CENTER: Conversation at the JFK Library: Doug Russell, Celia Sandys, Bill Manchester, Lady Soames, Alexandra Schlesinger, Amanda Smith.RIGHT: Lady Soames presents an ICS certificate of appreciation to Megan Desnoyers of the Kennedy Library for the Halle Papers exhibit.Richard Langworth: Although William F.Buckley Jr. always replied to previous ICS invitations byprotesting that he was unqualified, we finally wore himdown by suggesting there is nothing he is unable skillfullyto refract: from the Bach recitals of Rosalind Tureck, toevery political question under the sun, to the intricaciesof sextant work while sailing the Atlantic.Thanks to William Buckley, I know what CheGuevara was really like, because Blackford Oakes told us,and Blackford is never wrong. Thanks to WilliamBuckley, I have got into my bones the essential structureof a fund appeal letter, and I cannot count the times Ihave used his National Review subscription tally, sayingthat the combined circulation of Finest Hour and TheReaders Digest is 25 million copies. Thanks to WilliamBuckley, I ventured beyond lake sailing into the Atlantic;and through my son Ian — because Buckley has alsowritten a children's novel and Ian is a computer nut — Iknow who the "OmegaGod" is: a magical, dangerousbeing inside a computer. Thanks to William Buckley, in amore important sense, I know how to essay an obituary,for his touch on these is a model. Thanks to him also, Ihave an appreciation for Bach, and even at times he hasmade me hunger for a harpsichord. Thanks to him —and to Winston Churchill, and to William ManchesterI've viewed the heights to which the English languagecan rise. Thanks to him — and them — I have a grasp ofthe gratitude I owe my country.Wm. F. Buckley, Jr.: Five years after England'sand his finest hour began to tick (which was whenEngland denied to Herr Hitler the right to enslavePoland) Churchill prepared for the Yalta summit meetingin January of 1945. He confided to'his private secretary,Jock Colville: "All the Balkans except Greece are to beBolshevized, and there is nothing I can do to prevent it.There is nothing I can do for poor Poland, either." To hisCabinet he reported that he was certain he could trustStalin: the same man whose death he so eagerly anticipatedat M.I.T. five years later, in 1945 he spoke of as hopinghe would live forever...His concluding experience with Stalin came justsix months later at Potsdam, at which Winston Churchillhad come upon another historical force for which he wasthis time substantially unprepared. The first week of Junehe had gone on the BBC to alert the voters to a potentialdomestic catastrophe which he was quite certain wouldnever overpower even a country as exhausted by the exertionsof so fine an hour. "My friends," he spoke, "I musttell you that a socialist policy is abhorrent in the Britishideas of freedom...there can be no doubt that socialism isinseparably interwoven with totalitarianism, and theabject worship of the state. It is not alone that property inall its forms is struck at, but that liberty in all its forms ischallenged by the fundamental conception of socialism."But it was the fate of Winston Churchill toreturn to power in 1951 resolved not to fight the socialistLEFT- Steven Mitby of Harvard explains his techniques of Churchill Studies to an interested Yale graduate; our Patron at far right.CENTER- Ruth and (Master of Ceremonies) John Plumpton with Bill Buckley after having finally resolved the Quebec question. RIGHT: "Isaid 'hard-a-port' when I meant starboard and that's when we heard the breakers..." WFB to Colin Clark, with Linda Clark and Ethel Pont.FINEST HOUR 89/23

LEFT: Effervescent welcome: Richard Langworth pours Pol Roger for Lady Soames, Arthur Schlesinger and William Manchester, Saturday.CENTER: Caitlin Murphy, whose comprehension of WSC was demonstrated again at the "Teaching Churchill" panel, with Celia Sandys.RIGHT: A reunion among members of the 1994 Churchill Tour: Bill and Marjorie Williams, Norm West, Addie Comegys and Virginia West.encroachments of the postwar years. He and Englandwere too tired, and as with east Europe and Poland, therewas nothing to be done. There was no force in Europethat could move back the Soviet legions, no force in GreatBritain that would reignite, until the passage of timetwenty-five years later, the vision that Mr. Churchill displayedspeaking only to the BBC microphones that day inJune 1945, because nobody else was listening.Mr. Churchill had struggled to diminish totalitarianrule in Europe, which however increased. Hefought to save the Empire, which dissolved. He foughtsocialism, which prevailed. He struggled to defeat Hitler,and he won. It is not I think the significance of that victory,mighty and glorious though it was, that causes thename of Churchill to make the blood run a little faster.He subsequently spoke diffidently about his role in thewar, saying that the lion was the people of England, thathe had served mainly to provide the roar. But it is the roarthat we hear when we pronounce his name; it is simplymistaken that battles are necessarily more important thanthe words that summon men to arms or who rememberthe call to arms. The Battle of Agincourt was long forgottenas a geopolitical event, but the words of Henry V,with Shakespeare to recall them, are imperishable in themind, even as which side won the Battle of Gettysburgwill dim from the memory of men and women who willnever forget the words spoken about that battle byAbraham Lincoln.The genius of Churchill was his union of affinitiesof the heart and of the mind; the total fusion of animaland spiritual energy. "You ask what is our policy? Iwill say it is to wage war by sea, land and air, with all thestrength that God can give us..." In other days from othermouths we would mock the suggestion that extremism inthe defense of liberty is no vice. Churchill collapsed theequivocators by his total subscription to his cause. "Let'em have it," he shot back to a critic of aerial bombing;"remember this, never maltreat the enemy by halves."Looking back in his memoirs on the great Presidentialdecision of August 1945 he wrote, "There was never amoment's discussion as to whether the Atomic Bombshould be used or not." That is decisiveness we correctlydeplore when we have time to think about it, but he wastelling his countrymen, and indirectly Americans, thatany scruple at that time of peril to the nation itself was anindefensible and unbearable distraction.We are allowed by his many portraitists to seewarts, Cromwell insisted be preserved, which warts howeverdo not deface the memory of Churchill because ofthe nobility of his cause, and his high sense of the Britishmoment. It is my proposition that Churchill's words wereindispensible to the benediction of that hour, which wehail here tonight, as we hail the memory of the man whospoke them, as we come together, to praise a famous man.FINEST HOUR 89/24Larry Arnn: I have the formidable job ofresponding to Mr. Buckley, who has set an example forour people for a generation, of how to talk intelligently, infront of you who have made a vocation of listening to SirWinston. Bill Buckley has three things in common withWinston Churchill. Both are failed politicians...UnlikeBuckley, Churchill's story goes on to some political success,else Churchill would be remembered as Buckley willbe remembered, that is to say as a great man of letters.The second thing is that both men have progeny.In Britain Churchill changed Conservative politics, andso it was not Sir Samuel Hoare who became PrimeMinister but Anthony Eden, then Harold Macmillan,and some years later Margaret Thatcher. And these peoplehad something in common, and something different,than the strain of Conservatives who were in powerbefore Churchill. They were at once less anti-socialist,and more democratic. Now we know about Bill Buckleythat he gave rise to a movement here in America at a timewhen there was no hope that the movement could succeed,because every fashionable and authoritative opinionsaid no; and we count among his progeny Ronald Reaganand Newt Gingrich. It is the same kind of thing.The third thing is that both had or have certainaristocratic tendencies. Both are fine writers. Both wrotecertain things too complicated for us simple people fullyto understand. Both were given to drink, and to cigars, in

Why Churchill Still Fascinates, continuedagain afterwards, author and Nobel Prize-winning writer. And he stillfound time to paint and get off some classic one-liners.Above all, we are drawn to Churchill's indomitable spirit. Unlikethe current crop of politicians — who take the public pulse hourly andseem to be engaged in a nonstop popularity contest — he never hesitatedto tell people the one thing they did not want to hear at thatmoment in time.Throughout the 1930s, he warned of the growing menace ofNazi Germany. After losing 743,000 in the Great War, the Britishwanted only paeans to peace. He sacrificed office to candor. In 1945,when the democracies longed for a respite, he sounded the anti-Sovietalarm.But Churchill was more than a hero. He combined elan withwe owe to history is to rewrite it." But he had no hesitationin rewriting history himself.And now people are rewriting his history. No oneshould be shocked by this. Churchill would not havebeen. Sir William Deaken recalls that Churchill's attitudetoward his war memoirs was: "this is not history, this ismy case..." He has not been without critics before. Butthe present assault comes from historians who have dugdeep into the archives and whose arguments are not simplyrhetorical or polemical or political but are fortified bydocumentation.The latest of these is John Charmley's Churchill'sGrand Alliance: The Anglo-American Special Relationship1940-57 {see FH 88). The Special Relationship meant inpractice, the author observes, that "America would supportBritish interests where they coincided with her own,and only then, whilst expecting the British to tow [sic]the line whenever America wanted her to do so" (p252).It should be no great discovery, especially for anEnglish scholar, that nations tend to protect and pursuetheir own interests. In the new volume, FranklinRoosevelt emerges not so much as the villain but as theleader that Churchill failed to be: as the cool, crafty, calculating,accomplished champion of his own nation'sinterests...This is an interesting historiographical reversal:for years historians have been portraying Roosevelt as theinnocent and Churchill as the old master.Now it is true that Roosevelt and Churchill oftendisagreed both about the strategy of the war and the strategyof the peace. But just as it has been an error in thepast years to romanticize the harmonies of the relationship,so it is an error today to exaggerate the disharmonies.Both were large men. Both had a magnificentsense of history. Each rejoiced in what each saw as theincredible luck of occupying the stage of history with theother. Their disagreements were tactical disagreements, tobe understood within the embracing framework of grandpurposes, shared objectives and common ideals.John Charmley was born in 1955, and someattribute his critique to the fact that he wasn't around in1940. But there would be very little history written if historianswere debarred from writing about things they didnot personally witness. It is not Charmley's age that determineshis slant. It is his politics.He is unabashedly a right-wing Thatcherite. Inhis new book he occasionally interrupts his narrative togive vent to his prejudices. FDR's New Deal, he writes inlanguage that would please Newt Gingrich, was "littlemore than a veil for government interference in the livesof individuals on an unprecedented scale" (p52).Right-wing Tories never really trusted Churchill,nor does Charmley. And his obsession with Churchillleads him to neglect longer-range factors that shape history.Churchill was remarkable, but he was not the singlearchitect of the decline and fall of the British Empire.It is true enough that personalities do play a rolein history. In December 1931 Churchill, crossing FifthAvenue in New York City, looked in the wrong directionand was knocked down by an automobile—a moment, helater recalled, of a man aghast, a world aglare: "I do notunderstand why I was not broken like an eggshell orsquashed like a gooseberry." Fourteen months laterFranklin Roosevelt, sitting in an open car in Miami,Florida, was fired on by an assassin; the man beside him,the Mayor of Chicago, was killed.WOULD the next two decades have been thesame had the automobile killed WinstonChurchill in 1931 and the bullet killedFranklin Roosevelt in 1933? Would Neville Chamberlainor Lord Halifax have rallied Britain in 1940? Would JohnN. Garner have produced the New Deal and the FourFreedoms? Suppose in addition that Lenin had died oftyphus in Siberia in 1895 and Hitler had been killed onthe western front in 1916. What would the 20th centuryhave looked like now? Individuals do make a difference inhistory. But they don't make all the difference.In blaming so much on Churchill, this revisionistneglects the economic, social, cultural and demographicfactors that determined Britain's rise and decline in theworld. He fails to show that alternative policies, whetherChamberlain's or Eden's, could conceivably have main-eloquence, vision with humor and joie de vivre. If oratory survives foranother thousand years, his speeches still will be among the mostmemorable. Edward R. Murrow said Churchill "Mobilized theEnglish language and sent it into battle." He not only defied evil, buttold us why honor is essential to our survival. He was the lesson andthe teacher, the preacher and the sermon.Speaking of Lincoln, Calvin Coolidge observed, "Great men arethe ambassadors of Providence sent to reveal to us our unknownselves" — words equally applicable to a man born in the last century,who continues to fascinate idealists and romantics as this one draws toa close.Don Feder is a Friend oflCS and a member of the Boston Heraldstaff. His column appears Mondays and Wednesdays. Reprinted by permissionof the author and Creators Syndicate.FINEST HOUR 89/26

Arthur Schlesinger, concludedtained Britain as a great power, or could conceivably havepreserved the Empire in an age of worldwide revoltagainst colonialism. He fails to show how a Britain,divorced not only from the United States but fromEurope, could conceivably sustain an independent role inworld affairs. As for his anti-Churchill sniping along theway, I have no doubt that other historians will comealong, as Churchill did in his defense of Marlborough, todeal with the "host of sneers, calumnies and grave accusations."It is useful to remember that, on the whole, pastexercises in revisionism have failed to stick. Few historianstoday believe that the war hawks caused the War of 1812,or the slaveholders the Mexican War, or that the CivilWar was needless, or that the House of Morgan broughtAmerica into the First World War, or that FranklinRoosevelt schemed to produce the attack on Pearl Harbor.Still, revisionism is an essential part of the process bywhich history, through the posing of new problems, theemployment of new perspectives and the investigation ofnew possibilities, enlarges its reach and enriches itsinsights.History, as the great Dutch historian Pieter Geylsaid, is an argument without end. But if anyone is likelyto survive that argument and come out unscathed and ontop, it is that impetuous, imperious, fallible and gloriousman, history's impresario, Winston Churchill.Lady Soames: I think perhaps you may feel forme a little, in having to follow the voices and thoughts oftwo most eminent modern historians. I like to feel that Ihave inherited two characteristics from my father. One isthat I cry very easily. I also really do hate and loathe havingto make even the shortest speech without any notes.My father, I take comfort in recalling, although he was agreat orator, also hated not having his notes in his hands.On such occasions he would sometimes come home andsay: "I had to speak on the unpinioned wing." So pleaseforgive me, Professor Schlesinger, if I speak on the unpinionedwing, and do not express the deep gratitude andappreciation I am sure the present company are all feeling.But thank you for your wit and your magisterialexposition of history as it is being written today. I know ithas enlightened and comforted me, because sometimesone can't help feeling a bit dunched, when one sees historywhich is part of the world jigsaw puzzle in a minutecorner one has lived through, written in a form that canbe almost unrecognizable. But you have helped us seemore clearly, and accept that of course history is a perpetualargument, and must be so. Thank you very muchindeed. It has been a great privilege to hear you, and weshall for very long remember your thoughts and words.FINEST HOUR 89/27CONFERENCE TAPES & PUBLICATIONSPrices are postpaid. Make check payable to ICS and send toConference, PO Box 385, ContoocookNH 03229 USA.Cheques in equivalent UK/Can/Aus currency welcome.Churchill, Roosevelt and the End of World War II""Give Usthe Toolsand WeWill FinishtheJob""Sail On,Oh ShipofState"»w«»HH«»iniinmnMnmmfmM-»Hil»«».»Intamittwui Churehlll Socl*t]>, P.O. Sox llf, Hoj>k!nton,NH DJ1» USA • »01-T4M41]• Poster: Red, white and blue 18x24" printed on heavycoated stock suitable for framing: the immortal Roosevelt-Churchill 1940 exchange. Shipped in tubes $71£5• Programme: A 16-page documentary with articles onall speakers and Churchill's many visits to Boston, printedtwo-color with many illustrations. $5/£3• Buckley Cassette: "In Praise of Famous Men," withintro/response by Langworth/Arnn and Buckley's answersto a barrage of questions from the floor. $10/£6.• Schlesinger Cassette: "Churchill and the Historians,"with intro/response by Manchester/Soames + introductionsto the Harrow Songs (but not Songs themselves). $10/£6CONFERENCE STAFFChairwoman: Barbara LangworthVice-Chairmen: Cyril Mazansky, Richard LangworthChief of Staff: Parker H. Lee IIIAcademic Programs: James W. Muller, Patrick PowersPresenters: Larry Arnn, Kristen Binette,Neil Crawford, Megan Desnoyers, Kelly Domaingue,Kirk Emmert, Fred Farrow, Geoffrey Gelman, BarryGough, Warren Kimball, Cyril Mazansky, Steven Mitby,Caitlin Murphy, Johnny Parker, Kristey Pischetola, JohnPlumpton, Paul Rahe, Douglas Russell, Jeffrey Warren.Volunteers: Richard Batchelder, Sr., Richard Batchelder, Jr.,Charles & Sandy Cornelio, John & Margo Cox, JohnGrant, Dick & Posey Leahy, Barbara Lee, Pat Murphy,Cynthia Newberry, Jane Nixon, Jane Parker, Mike Ryan,Duane Sargisson, John Tucker/. C.S. Stores: Alan & Pat Fitch, Brock Comegys, JoannaGreen, Jack Nixon, Fred Sheehan, David SimpsonGuest Speakers & Programme Design: Richard LangworthPhotography: Jonah Triebwasser & Atlantic Photo $5

THESINEWSOF PEACE19461996ANNIVERSARYF U L T O N I S S O U R IFULTON +50The Ever-Relevant MessageThe most momentous speech of the early postwar yearswas uttered fifty years ago at Westminster College inFulton, Missouri. Churchill's prescription of peacethrough strength, despite massive changes in thegeopolitical equation, is still appropriate today.BY PAUL H. LIBENFor the past five years, we have witnessed thegreatest victory for the democratic West sincethat of the Allies in World War II. Once again,tyranny has suffered a crushing defeat. Once more ourdemocratic ideals and institutions have been vindicated.Once more are the foes of freedom at the mercy ofits friends.For one of the chief architects of the Allied defeat ofNazi Germany in 1945, it "was the signal for the greatestoutburst of joy in the history of mankind." But lessthan a year later, Winston Churchill was brooding overa new threat to freedom: Soviet communism.Concerning communism he had no illusions. Twentysixyears earlier, as Britain's war secretary, he hadsought in vain to "strangle [it] in its cradle" in Russia.As prime minister, he had reluctantly joined forces withit against a common Nazi foe. In May 1945, he hadwatched as American forces paused at Germany's ElbeRiver. How well he knew that Russia was now free tocrush liberty and democracy there.Worse still, in July 1945, British voters had thrownhis Conservatives out of power, so he could no longer influenceevents as before.Or so it was thought. On 5 March 1946, Churchill appearedas President Harry S. Truman's guest at WestminsterCollege in Fulton, Missouri. There he delivereda speech as momentous as any he had ever given asprime minister. With striking clarity, he defined theproblems and challenges of a new and potentially dangerousera and pointed the way to solutions that provedin time to be remarkably successful.The key problem he addressed was one of which noone on either side of the Atlantic had wished to speakpublicly — namely that the alliance with Russia wasdead and in its place was conflict between it and thefree world."From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic,an Iron Curtain has descended across the Continent.Behind that line lie all the capitals of the ancient statesof Central and Eastern Europe. Warsaw, Berlin,Paul H . Liben, Yonkers, N.Y., is a freelance writer.Prague, Vienna, Budapest, Belgrade, Bucharest andSofia, all these famous cities and the populationsaround them lie in what I must call the Soviet sphere."Tellingly, Churchill's speech was not entitled "TheIron Curtain" but "The Sinews of Peace." For peace washis aim. The question was how to achieve it withoutsacrificing freedom or capitulating to tyranny.Churchill replied that peace was to be achievedthrough strength: "I do not believe that ... Russia desireswar (but) the fruits of war and the indefinite expansionof their power and their doctrines. ... There isnothing they admire so much as strength and there isnothing for which they have less respect than for weakness,especially military weakness." He stressed that aFINEST HOUR 89/28

FULTON +50new world war was preventable if the West banded togetherto deter aggression.Perhaps most important, Churchill reminded his listenersthat "last time I saw [war] coming and criedaloud in the wilderness, but no one paid any attention."The meaning was unmistakable: Though he hadwarned the West about Hitler in the 1930s, the Westhad ignored him. The tragic result was World War II.Now, in 1946, he was warning us again. If we wished toavoid another cataclysm, we would do well to pay heedthis time.Fortunately, the West did heed what was said thatday in Fulton. Through the Marshall Plan and NATO,America as leaders of the free world halted communism'swestward spread from Eastern Europe and vigorouslyopposed it elsewhere. During President Reagan'ssecond term, Soviet communism began to falterand during President Bush's tenure it seemingly collapsedpermanently. Thus was Churchill vindicated.Churchill died well before the Soviet downfall he hadso ardently desired. Throughout his adult life, he contestednot only Soviet tyranny, but tyranny everywhere.Were he alive today, and concluding that the world's remainingdespotisms are at our mercy, would he beshocked to discover that we are coddling them? Wouldhe be astonished by our failure since the TiananmenSquare massacre to censure China or to press it to institutegenuine democratic reforms?The placating of despotism shows how we have forgottenthe heart and meaning of Churchill's utteranceson 5 March 1946. During this, an election year, weshould remember them. $3The Iron Curtain Speech and Churchill'sPhilosophy of International PoliticsWhat seems like a simple interpretation of the obvioustoday was viewed as anything but that in 1946 — by bothsides of the political spectrum. But Churchill was basinghis thoughts on the mature reflections of a lifetime'sexperience, derived from a considered political philosophyBY SPENCER WARRENCHURCHILL'S "Sinews of Peace" speech, deliveredin the gymnasium of Westminster College,Fulton, Missouri, on 5 March 1946, is renownedas one of the greatest and most significant speeches ofthe twentieth century. It was made at a pregnant momentin history, as America's wartime alliance withStalin's Soviet Russia was beginning to turn in the directionof Cold War. Behind its carefully wrought wordslay a half century of Churchill's study and observationof international politics, and a philosophy whose rootscan be traced to some of the great thinkers of the seventeenthand eighteenth centuries.Churchill journeyed to Missouri to instruct the newMr Warr^islr^nTof The Insider's Washington Experiencea public policy seminar program^ This article is excerptedfrom a pa'per delivered to the 50th Anmversary of theSinews of Peace Churchill Conference, cosponsored by ICS«nHThP Churchill Memorial, at Jefferson City, Missouri onMarcl!?£ hU M r Sof this article was published as "ChurchillsReaHsm: Reflections on the Fulton Speech," m the Winter1995/96 issue of The National Interest.American colossus — still learning its novel role in theworld — in some of the brutal realities of power: theneed for an Anglo-American alliance to maintain thebalance of power against the increasingly evident Sovietthreat, and, toward that end, the importance ofcontinued Western monopoly of the atomic bomb.(Many, including the former Secretary of War, HenryStimson, and Under Secretary of State Dean Acheson,were at the time so awed by the destructive power ofthe new weapon that they were sympathetic to sharingthe nuclear secret with Russia as part of a system of internationalcontrol.)Knowing well his American audience and its morallegalistic— and decidedly un-British — tradition in foreignaffairs, Churchill elaborately dressed up his messagein the promising new garb of the United Nations(in which he personally placed little faith) and in theconcept of the "special relationship" (in which he believeddevoutly). Nevertheless, his message camethrough loud and clear, and set off a storm of controversy.Churchill's speech came as a shock to manyFINEST HOUR 89/29

Americans, who believed the Second World War hadbeen fought to change the international system forever,to transcend the past and abolish the bad old world of"power politics." In the shadow of the frightful newpower of the atomic bomb, creating this new age wasseen as vital to survival. Churchill's now famous addressthus was greeted with far more criticism thanpraise.FULTON +50Background and Response to the Fulton AddressChurchill spoke in a climate of increasingly anxiousUS-Soviet relations, as the US was taking early stepsaway from the late President Roosevelt's accommodationistpolicy toward Soviet Russia, which his successorhad generally continued, in the direction of a more confrontationalpolicy. Stalin's "Election" speech of 9 February1946 had created concern in Washington and Above: Churchill delivers his speech, 5 March 1946.London with its emphasis on the opposition between socialismand capitalism, whose internal contradictions,Below: The Daily Worker reacts, 6 March 1946.he said, had precipitated the war and threatened to setoff another. On 15 February, news of a Russian atomicspy ring in Canada became public with the detention of* Have a cigar while I tell yoou>bat a Power for Peace ourtwenty-two persons suspected of espionage. (It had beenUnion would be..."known to the government since September.) Though itwas not public, George Kennan's now famous LongTelegram had been sent to the State Department on 22February and was receiving wide circulation in the government,especially at the behest of Navy SecretaryForrestal. President Truman was among its readers.(Kennan later described the reaction as "nothing lessthan sensational.") 1The first meeting of the UN General Assembly hadrecently ended in London. Secretary of State Byrnes,who had headed the US delegation and was under pressurefor being too soft on the Russians, gave a speech on28 February to the Overseas Press Club at the WaldorfAstoria which signaled a more robust US attitude. In The day before Byrnes spoke, Senator Vandenberg, aan obvious allusion to Russia's refusal to withdraw its Byrnes critic, asked in a Senate speech, "What is Russiatroops from Iran in violation of a wartime agreement up to now?" He, too, urged a stronger US stand but, likeand its role in setting up an autonomous regime in Byrnes, stressed working for peace through the UnitedAzerbaijan, he warned, '". . . we cannot overlook a unilateralgnawing away at the status quo [nor] allow ag-New York Times of 3 March, 1946 headlined its analy-Nations. 3 "The Week in Review" section of the Sundaygression to be accomplished by coercion or pressure or sis, "Is Our Policy Changing?" and James B. Reston'sby subterfuge such as political infiltration." Without article was titled, "Have We a New Foreign Policy? Capitalasks."naming names, he bluntly criticized the occupation ofIran and confiscation of industrial equipment in EasternEurope and Manchuria. A week later, on the day ofChurchill's speech, the State Department made public I n retrospect, it appears Truman was allowingits dispatch of two notes to Moscow protesting Russian Churchill to encapsulate events and crystallize opinionactions in Iran and Manchuria.on behalf of a new policy that was already taking effect.4 Churchill had discussed his speech with TrumanBut Byrnes did not wish to sound too tough. He reassertedRoosevelt's policy, emphasizing the importance at a White House meeting the evening of 10 Februaryof maintaining the "unity of all great powers" and preventing"exclusive blocs or spheres of influence." "We vana, who forwarded his account directly to Truman),(and earlier on 7 February with the US minister in Ha-must live by the Charter," he insisted. "That is the only and also with Byrnes and Bernard Baruch in Floridaroad to peace." 2 on 17 February. (Truman also saw the speech on theFINEST HOUR 89/30

FULTON +50train journey to Missouri, and Byrnes read it in full beforetheir departure.) 5But Churchill's harsh and somber tone, and thebreadth and detail with which he made his case — thefirst strong criticisms of Russia by a Western leadersince the Nazi invasion of Russia in June 1941 —brought down on him a torrent of controversy. (Actually,it brought him back to the stage he had known allof his career except for the war years.) Senators Pepper(D-FL), Kilgore (D-W.V.) and Taylor (D-Id.), issued ajoint statement: "Mr. Churchill's proposal would cut thethroat of the United Nations Organization." They describedit as "shocking." 6 Representative Savage (D-Wa.)declared that "this is an entirely different world than itwas before the war" and complained that Churchill was"asking for power politics to start lining up again." Russia'sactions were only guarding her security, he argued.7 Representative Patterson (D-Ca.) said Churchillwas asking "that we should revert to the reactionaryand self-destructive ... old idea of balancing of onepower or one group of powers against another group. . .Blocs of powers against powers in this atomic age canonly bring world war and total destruction to thehuman race." 8_»_ earl Buck, a Nobel Laureate, called Churchill's visita "catastrophe." George Bernard Shaw told a Reuterscorrespondent that Churchill's speech was "nothingshort of a declaration of war on Russia" and thatChurchill was proposing a "recrudescence of the old balanceof power policy . . . with a view to a future war." 9Marquis Childs wrote in the Washington Post that thespeech "overlooks a vital truth, [t]hat ... you cannotfight the 'Communist menace' by armed alliances."Rather the world needed to address the root economicand social causes of popular discontent. 10 In the Houseof Commons, 105 Labour MPs introduced a motion condemningthe speech and affirming the view "that worldpeace and security can be maintained, not by sectionalalliances, but by progressively strengthening the powerand authority of U.N.O. to the point where it becomescapable of exercising ... the functions of a world government."11„ _Time reported that a majority of Congress was"cold" and that US newspapers "generally viewed withdistaste and alarm the kind of military marriage proposedby Churchill." 12 Newsweek reported that Britishnewspapers "generally took the line that Churchill hadgone too far both in criticism of Russia and in proposinga virtual British-American alliance." 13Leading liberal newspapers and magazines attackedChurchill for relying on the old power politics, endangeringthe UN and wrongly placing the blame on Russia.The Chicago Sun denounced Churchill s poisonousdoctrines "" Norman Cousins wrote in the Saturday Reviewthat "Russian unilateralism today is not the disease;it is a product of the disease." The danger "is thecenturies-old problem of competitive national sovereignties. . . , the race for security, each nation decidingfor itself what is necessary for its own security . . . ."This leads to military bases, spheres of influence, alliancesand the arms race, all of which in the past hadled to war. The only hope, he concluded, mindful of theatomic bomb, "is real world organization, meaningworld law. . . ," 15 The New Republic proclaimed, "Securityis found in the hatred of all peoples for war, and thedemand of all peoples that all issues between nations beresolved through the U.N.O. . . . One standard must beraised now ... — 'Stand by the Charter.'" 16These words, although hyperbolic, were not entirelydissimilar to wartime statements by President Rooseveltand others, who offered the promise that victorywould usher in an era in which cooperation replaced thedemands of power. Wilsonian rhetoric was still the rulein their public pronouncements; it was, Roosevelt believed,the best way to keep the country united againstthe Axis enemy.T,hus, in an address to a joint session of Congress followingthe Moscow Foreign Ministers' Conference inNovember 1943, Secretary of State Hull (still a trueblue Wilsonian), said that once the new internationalorganization began, "there will no longer be need forspheres of influence, for alliances, for balance of power,or any other of the special arrangements throughwhich, in the unhappy past, the nations strove to safeguardtheir security or to promote their interest." TheCongressmen applauded wildly. 17 Roosevelt was certainlymore mindful of power considerations than Hulland very concerned to avoid the errors of President Wilson— the Security Council was based on his view thatthe Great Powers had to secure the peace; nevertheless,near the end of his Congressional address on the Yaltaagreement he felt compelled to say:"[Yalta] ought to spell the end of the system of unilateralaction, the exclusive alliances, the spheres of influence, thebalances of power, and all the other expedients that have beentried for centuries — and have always failed." 18For Americans reared in an idealistic tradition, theUN had all the answers: for Eastern Europe, Iran,Turkey and control of the atomic bomb. Churchill's liberalcritics now saw the Roosevelt policy of one worldembodied in the UN breaking up into a confrontation oftwo blocs.For their part, conservative critics were more concernedwith Churchill's proposal of a peacetime Anglo-American alliance than with his attacks on Russian policy.Senator Taft (R-Ohio) agreed with much ofChurchill's criticism of Russia, but stated, "it would beFINEST HOUR 89/31

FULTON +50very unfortunate for the US to enter into any militaryalliance with England, Russia, or any other country intime of peace." 19 Senator Aiken (R-Vt.) commented: "I'mnot ready to enter a military alliance with anyone.Britain, the United States and Russia should pull togetherto make the United Nations work." 20Others were concerned about placing the UnitedStates in the position of backing British imperialism.The New York Herald Tribune felt the speech had "miscarried"and noted that "American comment suggests areluctance to assume responsibility for all British imperialinterests." 21 The country's most prestigious columnist,Walter Lippmann, wrote: "The line of the Britishimperial interest and the line of American vital interestare not to be regarded as identical." He also criticizedwhat he saw as Churchill's call for an anti-Soviet alliance.(In private, he deplored the speech as "a directincitement to a preventive war" and an "almost catastrophicblunder.") 22 The British Embassy in Washingtonfound in its mail that the main criticism was notChurchill's warning against Soviet Russia but whatwas seen as his call for an anti-Soviet alliance in supportof British imperialism. 23While support came from The New York Times, TheChristian Science Monitor, Time and the PhiladelphiaInquirer (but not many beyond the East Coast), andfrom columnists like Ernest K. Lindley of Newsweekand George Fielding Eliot of the Herald Tribune, thespeech had ignited so much controversy that Newsweekdescribed it as the "worst diplomatic storm of the postwarperiod." 24 The Washington Post found it merely "audacious."25 At a press conference three days after thespeech, President Truman refused to endorse it andwrongly denied that he knew its contents in advance. 26Prime Minister Attlee refused to comment on thespeech in response to a question in the House of Commons.27 When Churchill visited New York for ChurchillDay on 15 March for a Broadway ticker tape parade, hewas greeted by hundreds of protestors and Under Secretaryof State Dean Acheson abruptly bowed out of hisplace as the US representative at Churchill's addressat the Waldorf Astoria, which, in the event, was unrepentant.Churchill's Philosophyof International PoliticsThe clash between Churchill and his critics, especiallythose on the left, was inevitable, for they werebearers of conflicting philosophic assumptions and traditions:indeed, it is not too much to say they representedthe gulf between the Old World and the New.Where many of the critics took inspiration from whatthey saw as the limitless potential of the future,Churchill was tempered by his knowledge of the past.Churchill's speech at Fulton was not somethingpulled together from headlines and opinion pages, butthe product of mature reflection and an impressive consistencyof outlook dating back to his youth. In 1897,aged 22, in a letter to his mother written while servingwith the Army in India, he explained his efforts to"build up a scaffolding of logical and consistent views,"which was to be constructed of facts and "muscles," orprinciples. 28 In 1936 he stated:"Those who are possessed of a definite body of doctrine andof deeply rooted convictions . . . will be in a much better positionto deal with the shifts and surprises of daily affairs thanthose who are merely taking short views, and indulging theirnatural impulses as they are evoked by what they read fromday to day." 29He commented in 1953:"True wisdom is to cultivate a sense of proportion whichmay help one to pick out the three or four things that governall the rest and as it were write one's own headlines and notchange them very often." 30Among the three or four things that governedChurchill's outlook were his view of history as the greatteacher and guide; his view of unchanging human nature,with both its lust for power and impulse for liberty;power and strength as the guarantors of peace andfreedom; and the evolutionary, natural process of politics.Churchill was keenly aware of man's limitationsand skeptical of Utopian, rationalistic solutions to ageoldproblems. Like Edmund Burke and others in theempirical, conservative tradition, he saw politics as anorganic process in which concrete facts and human nature— as embodied in custom, tradition and experience— counted for far more than man-made theories, ideologicalconstructions and legalistic formulas.Churchill's philosophy is illustrated by his predictionsof the collapse of Communism. In January 1920,he predicted it would fail in Russia because it was "fundamentallyopposed to the needs and dictates of thehuman heart, and of human nature itself." He denouncedBolshevism as a". . . rule of men who in their insane vanity and conceit believethey are entitled to give a government to a people whichthe people loathe and detest .... The attempt to carry intopractice those wild theories can only be attended with universalconfusion, corruption, disorder, and civil war." 31o,ut of the "bloodshed and foment" of the civil warthen raging, Churchill continued, would emerge not thevisionary Communist republic, "but something quite different.""The ferocious military leaders and artful politicalwirepullers are the people who emerge in their owninterest and the interest of their belongings." In 1931FINEST HOUR 89/32

FULTON +50he wrote that Bolshevism would never work because itwas at war with "intractable" human nature and wouldbe unable to control "the explosive variations of its phenomena."In the midst of the Depression, when many inthe West looked longingly at the promise of rationalistcentral planning, Churchill wrote that not only hadCommunism "lost the distinction of individuals," it had"not even made the nationalisation of life and industrypay. We have not much to learn from them, except whatto avoid." 32Later, in January 1952, at the height of the ColdWar, he told a joint session of Congress:"I am by no means sure that China will remain for generationsin the Communist grip. The Chinese said of themselvesseveral thousand years ago: 'China is a sea that salts all thewaters that flow into it.'" 33Of the subjugated states of Eastern Europe, Churchillpredicted in February 1954:"Time may find remedies that this generation cannot command.The forces of the human spirit and of national characteralive in those countries cannot be speedily extinguished,even by large-scale movements of populations and mass educationof children."He then contrasted the temporary nature of Stalin'sconquests with other results of his aggression "whichwill live and last":"Nothing but the dread of Stalinized Russia could havebrought the conception of united Europe from dreamland intothe forefront of modern thought."Nothing but the policy of the Soviets . . . could have laidthe foundations of that deep and lasting association whichnow exists between Germany and the Western world, betweenGermany and Britain and, I trust, between Germany andFrance."These are events which will live and . . . grow while theconquests and expansion achieved by military force and politicalmachinery will surely dissolve or take new and otherforms." 34Finally, in his 1957 epilogue to the one-volume editionof his World War II memoirs, Churchill wrote that Russia'speople experience every day ... those complications andpalliatives of human life that will render the schemes of KarlMarx more out of date and smaller in relation to world problemsthan they have ever been before. The natural forces areworking with greater freedom and greater opportunity to fertiliseand vary the thoughts and the power of individual menand women. They are far bigger and more pliant in the vaststructure of a mighty empire than could ever have been conceivedby Marx in his hovel. . . . [h]uman society will grow inmany forms not comprehended by a party machine." 35How interesting that Churchill foresaw the collapseof Communism even at the height of its powers — aswell as at its inception — when most scholars, with alltheir detailed study, were unable to see this as late asthe mid-1980s. Churchill's philosophy of hopes and limitsalso taught him the inescapable demands of power,which, used wisely, is the indispensable tool of progress.What Churchill called "the combined strength of theEnglish-Speaking Peoples" and their allies, not theutopian dreams of his critics, brought victory in the coldwar.FOOTNOTES1. George F. Kennan, Memoirs, 1925-1950 (Boston: Little Brown& Co., 1967), p. 294.2. New York Times, 1 March, 1946, p. 10.3. Congressional Record, 27 February, 1946, pp. 1692-95.4. Beginning in mid-February, the State Department took a numberof steps to stiffen US policy in Eastern Europe, Iran and Turkey.See Fraser J. Harbutt, The Iron Curtain: Churchill, America, and theOrigins of the Cold War (New York: Oxford U. Press, 1986), pp. 165-170.5. See Henry B. Ryan, "Churchill's 'Iron Curtain' Speech," The HistoricalJournal, 22:4 (1979) and Martin Gilbert, Winston S. Churchill,Vol. VIII, Never Despair, 1945-1965 (Boston, Houghton Mifflin, 1988),pp. 192, 197.6. New York Times, 7 March, 1946, p. 1.7. Congressional Record, 6 March 1946, p. 1974.8. Ibid., p. 1970.9. New York Times, 7 March, 1946, p. 5.10. Washington Post, 6 March, 1946, p. 10.11. Parliamentary Debates, House of Commons, Hansard vol. 420,14 March 1946, col. 1293.Vl.Time, 18 March, 1946, p. 19.13. Newsweek, 18 March, 1946, p. 49.14. Quoted in U.S. News, 15 March 1946, p. 39 (nb: it was notWorld Report in those days).15. Saturday Review, 30 March 1946, p. 28.16. The New Republic, 25 March 1946, p. 396.17. Congressional Record, 18 November 1943, pp. 9678-79, quotedin John Lewis Gaddis, The United States and the Origins of the ColdWar, 1941-1947 (New York: Columbia U. Press, 1972), pp. 30-31.18. Samuel Rosenman, ed., Public Papers and Addresses ofFranklin Delano Roosevelt (New York: Harper & Bros., 1950), p. 586(1 March, 1945).19. Los Angeles Times, 6 March 1946, p. 9.20. Ibid.2l.New York Herald Tribune, 7 March, 1946, p. 26.22. Ibid., p. 25 and Ronald Steel, Walter Lippmann and the AmericanCentury (Boston: Little Brown & Co., 1980), p. 429.23. Ryan, op. cit., p. 915.24. Newsweek, 25 March, 1946, p. 27.25. Washington Post, 6 March, 1946, p. 1.26. Public papers and Addresses of Harry S. Truman, 8 March,1946, p. 145. And see n. 5 above.27. Parliamentary Debates, House of Commons, Hansard vol. 420,11 March 1946, col. 760-61.28. Randolph S. Churchill, Winston S. Churchill, Vol I, Youth1874-1900 (London: Heinemann, 1966), p. 334.29. Winston S. Churchill, The Gathering Storm (Boston: HoughtonMifflin, 1948), p. 210.30. Address of 9 November 1953, in Robert Rhodes James, ed.,Winston S. Churchill: His Complete Speeches, 1897-1963 (New York:Chelsea House, 1974), Vol. VIII, p. 8507 (Cited hereafter as Speeches).31. Address of 3 January 1920, in Speeches, Vol. II, pp. 2920-21.32. "Mass Effects in Modern Life," in Winston S. Churchill,Thoughts and Adventures (New York: W.W. Norton, 1990), pp. 185-86.33. Address of 17 January 1952, in Speeches, Vol. VIII, pp. 8326.34. Address of 25 February 1954, in Speeches, Vol. VIII, pp. 8532.35. Winston S. Churchill, The Second World War (one volumeabridgement) (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1959), pp. 1015-16. $5FINEST HOUR 89 / 33

THIS is Winston Churchill speaking," the voiceon the telephone said. "I have just read an articlein the magazine Good Gardening entitled'Stock Your Garden with Butterflies.' I found it most interesting."The voice that all the world was soon to know continued— deep, cultured and polite in a decisive sort ofway. It was the spring of 1939, a busy season at my father'sbutterfly farm at Bexley, Kent, and Mr. Churchillwanted to know more about our butterflies and ourbusiness."I should like some butterflies to liberate in my gardenat Chartwell," he continued. "May I come and seeyour butterfly farm and discuss a plan?"Hugh Newman operated a British butterfly farm founded byhis father, L.W. Newman, author of The Text Book of BritishLepidoptera. He also devised the BBC radio programme "NatureParliament." Reprinted by permission of the Audubon Magazine,1965. Thanks to Tom Fusto for bringing it to our attention.I turned to my father, L.W. Newman, who was sittingat his desk nearby. Placing my hand over themouthpiece of the phone, I whispered, "It's WinstonChurchill on the line. Do you want to show him aroundthe farm?""Of course I do," my father replied, "if he's really interested.Here, pass me the phone."Immediately Mr. Churchill recognized the voice ofauthority on butterflies, and for quite a long time theytalked — Mr. Churchill listening while my father toldhim something of the aims and objects of our uniqueprofession. Before Mr. Churchill rang off, a date hadbeen arranged for his visit to our establishment.I often think of that conversation in 1939, when wediscussed butterflies with Winston Churchill as the warclouds were gathering. Our talk marked the start of anintriguing association with the future prime minister,whose interest in nature, we soon discovered, was intenseand unlimited.FINEST HOUR 89/34

On the day set for Mr. Churchill's visit my father andI waited in our office. Time passed, and when the greatman failed to appear at and after the scheduled hour,we tried to hide our disappointment. Then, suddenly,the phone rang, and I practically leaped to answer it.In measured Churchillian tones our prospectiveguest expressed his regrets at the delay in his arrivaland explained in some detail that his chauffeur had lostthe way. He had not given up hope, he assured me, ofbeing with us soon.When his chauffeur finally found us, it was evidentthat Mr. Churchill had planned an outing for his wifeand friends. He was accompanied by quite a party. Myfather was delighted, for he was always at his happiestwhen he had an audience. He immediately took everyonefor a grand tour of the breeding grounds. My fatherhad a wonderful gift of transforming the most insignificantinsect into an object of intense interest, because hehad never lost his wonder and admiration for the simplethings in nature.Mr. Churchill's visit coincided with the height of theseason when butterflies emerge, and in one of oursmaller greenhouses we were able to show him Britishswallowtails emerging from their chrysalides. He askedif he could handle one of the butterflies.My father opened the door of a cage, and when Mr.Churchill put his head, shoulders and outstretchedhand through the aperture, a butterfly obligingly settledon his hand. Mr. Churchill looked at the colorfulyellow-and-black insect with a smile of satisfaction, obviouslyas pleased as if he were still a boy.Outside in the grounds once more I opened a"sleeve," or cloth covering, on a limb of a wild plum tree.On the limb were a number of lappet moth larvae. Witha remarkable form of camouflage, these caterpillarsmake themselves virtually invisible by blending m withtheir surroundings. My father never failed to get a certainamount of amusement from exhibiting this speciesto people who were not prepared for such a convincingdisguise on the part of insects.Even our distinguished guest was not spared. Mr.Churchill peered vainly into the muslin sleeve and aftera while came to the somewhat natural conclusion thatthere was nothing there to see. Then I ro led back thesleeve a little farther, touching a caterpillar so that itmoved and revealed the disguise.Mr Churchill was naturally amazed, and I think itwas at this moment that his early interest in entomologywas rekindled. Instead of being only an interestedvisitor he became, if not a full-fledged lepidoptenst, atleast a disciple in the field.He told me that his interest in butterflies had begunwhen he was a prisoner of war in South Africa duringthe Boer War. He used to while away the time watchingbutterflies when he was exercising in the compoundwhere he was confined. He had never attempted tocatch butterflies or to make a collection he said.During the ensuing years in which I helped Mr.Churchill stock the grounds at his country home,Chartwell, near Westerham in Kent, he carefullyavoided killing a single insect. It was live butterflies hewanted to see flying in his garden and in the park, andit was for this purpose that I was engaged, over a periodof years, to advise him and to supply him with specimensfrom our butterfly farm.On that first visit of 1939 we finally adjourned to theoffice, where my father showed Mr. Churchill the paintingsof entomologically historic insects which he hadbred or captured. He showed interest, but this wasstressing the past whereas he was thinking of the future.He made it clear that he wanted to increase thebutterfly population in his immediate neighbourhoodand would like to have my father help him do so. Hepromised to invite us both to lunch the following week,when the whole matter could be discussed thoroughlyafter he had shown us around his estate.The invitation never arrived. Leon Blum, leader ofthe Socialist Party of France, came to England thatweekend especially to confer with Mr. Churchill. Whenwe read of this conference we understood why it had becomeimpracticable for Mr. Churchill to follow throughwith his invitation. Europe was in turmoil. A great dealof diplomatic activity was going on in high places.Within a few months World War II broke out, andMr. Churchill was named First Lord of the Admiralty.After the war I wondered whether this man who hadborne such mountainous responsibilities in rallying thenation and the Free World would still be interested inbutterflies. How wrong I was even to hazard a doubt.That far-ranging mind of his had never lost interest inthe idea, as I discovered when I wrote to Mr. Churchillin 1946 reminding him of his visit to the butterfly farmin 1939. His secretary responded with a telephone calland arranged to send a car from Chartwell to pick us upon the following day.Winston Churchill ponders the marvel of a lappet mothlarva's camouflage. Author Hugh Newman believes this momentrekindled Churchill's interest in entomology.FINEST HOUR 89 / 35

My father, however, could not make the trip. A Germanrocket had fallen near his home in the spring of1944, demolishing it and partly burying him in theruins. He had suffered a mild stroke and was still unableto walk. That he could not go to Chartwell was abitter disappointment to him.Thus it fell to me to take my father's place. I had notthen attained his ease and confidence in the presence ofthe great, and it did not make things easier for me,after I had arrived at Chartwell, when Mr. Churchillcame into the reception room where I was waiting,looked me up and down, and remarked sharply, "Deputizingfor your father, are you?"When I told him of the misfortune which had befallenmy father, he changed his tone completely andsent the most sympathetic message to my father, acceptingme as the new head of the farm.Then he suggested a walk around the grounds sothat I could assess the possibilities of stocking his gardenwith butterflies. It was more of a whirlwind tourthan a quiet stroll, and I found it was almost as difficultto keep up with Winston Churchill physically as mentally.It was quite obvious that he had read a lot aboutbutterflies before my visit. He knew, for example, thefood plants of many of the butterflies and which specieswould be most likely to breed successfully on theChartwell terrain.When we reached the walled rose garden, Mr.Churchill stopped and pondered for a moment. "Butterfliesfeed on nectar from flowers, don't they?" he said,turning to me for confirmation.I agreed."Um-m, but roses don't provide nectar, do they?""No," I replied, "although artists are very fond of depictinga butterfly settled on a rose, as you've probablynoticed!"Mr. Churchill nodded. "Artists sometimes depict verycurious things," he said. Then, changing his tone ofvoice, he continued, "We will make a fountain here inthe center of the rose garden, and it will flow withhoney and water.""A good idea," I commented — but the scheme wasnever put into practice.With his remarkably inventive mind, Mr. Churchillmay well have thought it a good idea at the time andabandoned it later for practical reasons. However, asthe world knows, Mr. Churchill seldom spoke for longwithout a shaft of humor illuminating his conversation.I shall never know if he was serious when he suggestedinstalling a fountain of honey and water.On our way back to the house we passed a smallsummerhouse. Mr. Churchill stopped outside andthought a moment or two. Then, turning to me, he said,"Take the roof off it if you like, and put a glass one in itsplace. I can get it done for you, but make use of it."With that he took me to the waiting car, opened thedoor, gave me his hand, smiled and, with a keen glance,said, "Let me have your plan soon." Then, command-Clementine and Winston Churchill in rapt attention as entomologistL. W. Newman explains his Butterfly Farm, 1939.ingly: "And let it be a plan of action."That night I composed a list of the species which Ithought would be most likely to naturalize successfullyat Chartwell. They were quite common butterflies andprobably occurred there already — peacocks, small tortoiseshells, and the rarer larger tortoise shells (if Icould collect any of this species from the rather limitedlocalities where it was then still known to be breeding),brimstones, commas and, to be added later in the summer,the migrant red admirals, painted ladies and, perhaps,some clouded yellows.Before going to bed I drafted a sketch adapting thesummerhouse as a place of emergence for thechrysalides which I hoped to supply. I realized thatthere would be no need to "take the roof off," as pupaeare always best kept cool and in the shade; otherwisethey will dry up and seldom emerge successfully. I com-The future Prime Minister inspects a display of butterfliesand chrysalides shown him by the author in April 1939.FINEST HOUR 89/36

pleted the plans in the morning, and within twenty-fourhours they were on Mr. Churchill's desk.He wasted no time, and within a day or two I receivedanother telephone call asking me to go toChartwell to inspect the new Butterfly House, whichhad been constructed according to my plan. I had designedit so that anyone could walk upright when inside.The seating had been left in place to act as a stagefor the emerging cages. In the front, as I had suggested,there was a wooden framework with a small door in thecenter. The whole structure was to be covered withblack mosquito netting so that one could see clearly thebutterflies inside the house.On this visit I was shown into a private sitting room,and I was admiring some of Mr. Churchill's paintingswhen he came in. We set off at once to inspect the erstwhilesummerhouse. He liked the idea of being able tosit inside the Butterfly House, and I heard later that hespent a lot of time waiting for the various species tocome out of their chrysalides. After the butterflies tookto the wing, however, he quickly opened the door andgave them their liberty.It was while we were sitting together one day in theButterfly House that I put forward a proposal to Mr.Churchill that had been on my mind for many years.There is an attractive butterfly, known as the blackveinedwhite, which used to occur locally in variousparts of England until 1912. My father saw it flyingwild then, for the last time in any numbers, in an orchardat the back of the old Portobello Inn within sightof Canterbury Cathedral. Soon after this the butterflydisappeared completely from the countryside, its exterminationcoinciding with the start of the use of poisonsprays in orchards to control insect pests.I had conceived the idea that it might be possible toreintroduce this species from the Continent, where itstill occurs commonly in the mountain valleys ofFrance, Germany and Switzerland. The attempt, however,would have to be on private land where the ownerhad consideration for wildlife.At the time of our talk in the Butterfly House, I hada few "nests" of the young caterpillars of this butterflywhich a colleague had sent me from central France, so Isuggested to Mr. Churchill that we "plant" them out inthe grounds and try to establish this once-British butterflyagain at Chartwell. It might breed successfullythere, I said, and spread into the surrounding countryside.I asked Mr. Churchill if the idea appealed to him.After asking me a few more questions he suddenly said,"But what about my fruit trees. Won't they be damagedby the caterpillars?"I reassured him on this point by explaining thathawthorn was their natural food plant in the mountainsthat they only spread into orchards occasionallyto feed on plum and apple trees, and that, in any case,routine spraying would quickly check larvae which..•«""*" "i.«..*-—z — :; — - *EMmightstray over the garden wall into the orchard.Mr. Churchill pondered a moment or two and thenasked whether he would be able to see the butterfliesflying in the garden that same year. When I told himthey hibernated as small caterpillars in "nests" fromlate summer until the following spring, and admittedregretfully that it was too late in the season for a broodto emerge as butterflies, he pondered again. Then hesaid slowly with deep feeling:"A pity, for goodness knows where we shall all be thistime next year."I did not understand the true significance of that remarkand said so."The Russians, you know," he explained. "They arebeing very troublesome."He probably was referring to the tensions developingover West Berlin and Iron Curtain tactics. An inspirationcame to me, and I replied, "But nature goes on, sir."He nodded and remarked, "True, very true." Comingquickly to a decision, he looked me in the eye and said,"Very well, then, carry on with your plans."So that autumn I placed several "nests" of larvae onthe hawthorn bushes near the lake where Mr. Churchillkept his black Australian swans. I covered the larvaecolonies with small, muslin bags to keep away any birdsthat might be tempted to tear open the silken webs anddevour the small caterpillars.The following spring, when my own black-veinedwhite caterpillars at the butterfly farm were beginningto stir, I wrote to the head gardener at Chartwell, askingthat somebody be instructed to remove the muslinbags from the hawthorn bushes. When I went down tocontinued on page 39.FINEST HOUR 89/37

VE-Day: One More MemoryA meeting of Churchills and ChurchilliansBY RAFE MUIRRafe Muir with Stanley Winfield, VE Day 1995. Stan's flag isthe same one he waved on the great day fifty years ago.There was no other place I wanted to be. There wasno other place in the world to be. May 8th, 1995—VE-Day plus fifty years—and with my wifeWendy and my old pal Stan Winfield, I stood for twohours across from Buckingham Palace waiting for thecelebration to begin.We were not disappointed—nor were the tens ofthousands of others doing the same thing.One highlight came early, as the Canadian Scottishcame around the corner from Birdcage Walk, playing"Scotland the Brave," a piece of music guaranteed to getScottish blood coursing through the veins. There wasmore band music and then came the introduction ofsingers—Harry Seccombe, Cliff Richard (I still haven'tfigured out how he got into the all VE-Day action, buthe was everywhere) and the person who, except for oneother, we had gathered to see, Vera Lynn. Dame VeraLynn that is. They sang. We sang. And we all cried,even the young people.Then onto the balcony where she and her husband,King George VI, along with Prime Minister WinstonChurchill, had greeted the huge VE-Day throng fiftyyears before, came the Queen Mum. The roar for thismost beloved of people was deafening.The Queen and her sister, Princess Margaret, wereon the balcony, too, but it was the Queen Mum we hadall come to see—and honour.She, of course, refused to leave London during theBlitz. When asked if she'd at least take the children,Mr. Muir is a Canadian broadcaster and journalist withseveral regular columns, who is heard Monday to Friday from8:30 to 11:00 a.m., on CKNW Radio, Vancouver. His friendStan Winfield secured permission to reprint his article, whichfirst appeared in the Vancouver Courier.Elizabeth, now our Queen, and Margaret Rose, as shewas then called, into the country and safety, shereplied, "The children will not leave unless I leave. Iwill not leave unless the King leaves. And I cannotimagine the circumstances under which the King wouldleave."She is not forgotten for this—especially in the EastEnd which was hit so hard.Later on in Hyde Park, Wendy and I, along with100,000-plus others, watched the Queen light the firstof a series of torches to ring the island, watched the fireworksand once more heard Vera Lynn sing to her boysand girls of the armed forces, their children, grandchildrenand indeed, great-grandchildren.London, May 8th 1945, was the one place in theworld to be that day. So it was on May 8th 1995. Myfriend Stan Winfield was at both celebrations.I don't know how many believe in a "hidden hand," asort of magical parallel universe which intervenes fromtime to time, but I do. So does Wendy. And even if hedidn't before, so now does Stan. Let me explain.I am a devout Winston Churchill fan. I have read virtuallyeverything he wrote and which has been writtenabout him. I devoured Randolph Churchill's and MartinGilbert's eight-volume biography. Imagine—eight volumesaveraging more than 1,000 pages a volume to tellthe story of one man.Churchill was not perfect—far from it. He was, however,a colossus who strode the world stage for fiftyyears or more. He was the heart and soul of Britainwhen, between the fall of France in June 1940 andHitler's attack on Russia a year later, the country stoodutterly alone. He was unquestionably the greatestBriton of his time and many, I included, would call himthe greatest human being of his time.In the run-up to the VE-Day celebration, over a pintor two the evening before, Stan and I talked a lot aboutChurchill—he from his perspective as a young airmanduring the war, I from the perspective of a precociousteenager who followed the entire war with a world mapand pins showing which army was where.Stanley, an active member of the InternationalChurchill Society, spoke of the many Churchillians hehad been privileged to meet through the Society. Wespoke of the speech I gave to the annual meeting of theVancouver Society one year. We chatted about theChurchill papers which had been so much in the news.(For those who may not have followed the story,Churchill's private papers, in the hands of the family,were sold to the government for £12.5 million and one ofFINEST HOUR 89/38

the principal beneficiaries was likely to be the greatman's grandson and namesake, Winston Churchill, MP.We both rather thought that while it would have beennice if "young" Winston [he's 54!] had given the papersto the government, he was under no obligation, andsince the old man had collected his papers as a "patrimony"to be handed on, well, so be it.)I tell you this for two reasons.First, to give you the strong impression that WinstonChurchill formed a very great part of our thoughts asStan, Wendy and I stood outside Buckingham Palace acouple of weeks ago.Secondly, to set the stage for what happened rightafter the ceremony at the Palace.As we walked down the side of the palace alongBuckingham Palace Road, we sat down on some steps togive some relief to my badly banged-up knee (no, not awar wound —just from squash). The idea was to let thecrowds thin out, then try to find a taxi.As we sat there, a man, obviously noting Stan'smedals and small Canadian flag lapel pin, walked overand shook our hands. His face looked very familiar. Heintroduced himself.vvwvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv^^tOcontinued from page 37Chartwell a little later, however, to see how the caterpillarswere faring, it was obvious that my instructionshad been misunderstood.The bags had simply been snipped off with secateurs,and apparently the larvae inside had been removed aswell, for I could see no sign of them anywhere. I did nottell Mr. Churchill of this minor tragedy, but hastenedhome to prepare my own stocks of black-veined whitesfor release at Chartwell.Gathering them as quickly as I could, I rushed backto Chartwell and liberated them on the hawthorns bythe lake. I do not know what happened to them. For allI know, there still may be a nucleus colony of blackveinedwhites in the district. I certainly hope so.Another experiment I conducted at Chartwell wasdoomed to failure, but through no fault of my own. Mr.Churchill and I had agreed that it would be interestingFINEST HOUR 89/39"I'm Winston Churchill, MP," he said, "and this is myson Randolph and this is my son Jack."But for me, that wasn't the end of the matter. A coupleof weeks later, after a wonderful visit to Wales,Wendy and I decided to spend our last night in Stratfordand see "Romeo and Juliet." "Why don't we visitBlenheim Palace, where Churchill was born, and thelittle churchyard in nearby Bladon where he is buried?"Good idea, so we did. We went to Blenheim and saw theroom where Winston first saw the light of day; we wentinto the garden to the Temple of Diana, whereChurchill proposed to Clementine. Then we went toBladon and the churchyard, to the gravesite which, incidentally,had fresh flowers from some Dutch visitorswhich simply said, "Thank you for liberating us." It wasa sentimental day to say the least.As we walked out of the churchyard we met an elderlylady and a small boy, perhaps two, her grandsonas it turned out. I stopped to pat his head saying "It'sobviously true ... all babies look like WinstonChurchill." "He ought to," said the lady . . . "my daughtermarried a man named Churchill (no relation) andthis is their first son. They called him Winston. . ." $5to try to localize some British swallowtails beside thelake. These large, handsome butterflies are now confmedto the Narj*^ Broads in England In the 19th cen.tury, however, they had been quite widespread onmarshy land.I planted a bed of fennel all around the edge of thelake in the autumn, and by the next spring it hadgrown up sufficiently to support a small colony of thesebutterflies. I liberated a score of almost fully fed caterpillarsas a preliminary test. They appeared to thrive intheir new surroundings. Possibly because they have"warning colors," no bird will touch them for food.Before the caterpillars had time to pupate, however,the men who cut the hay in the meadows also razed thefennel. After this disappointment we made no attemptto carry the scheme any further.There was a time when I was constantly at war withthe head gardener at Chartwell. For the Vanessa butterfliesto breed successfully there must be a plentifulsupply of stinging nettles, as the larvae of small tortoiseshells, peacocks and red admirals feed only on theleaves of these weeds. I wanted as many nettle clumpsleft in the grounds as possible; the gardener wanted tocut and clear them away to keep the place tidy.Eventually, we came to an amicable agreement. Certainnettle beds became sacrosanct to the butterflies,and the rest were kept within bounds.I am certain that during the years when I was regularlyturning out specially bred or surplus stock forChartwell there was a great resurgence of the butterflypopulation in that part of Kent — thanks to Mr.Churchill. $

BOOK REVIEWS"Glory that ShinesUpon our Tears"H. ASHLEY REDBURNU)N(iSINSELong Sunset: Memoirs of Winston Churchill's Last PrivateSecretary, by Anthony Montague Browne. London,Cassell Publishers Ltd., 1995, illustrated, 376pp, £20.Available in North America for $29 + $4 shipping fromICS New Book Service c/o the editorWHEN the reader opens this book he should dispensewith a bookmarker and start reading inthe early morning, for he will surely not put itdown before reading the last page. Lady Soames's fineintroduction gives a flavour of the feast to come and is adeserved tribute to an outstanding man. These memoirs,which are important as history, too, cover a life ofthree absorbing public careers which give a splendid insightinto one man's experience in the wartime RAF; asa postwar civil servant in the Foreign Office, includingspells in the British Embassy in Paris, and as one ofthe private secretaries at Number Ten for the greaterpart of Churchill's last premiership; and as courtier tothe Queen. His third career and possibly the most importantfor posterity was as Esquire and Ganymede toSir Winston for the last decade of that great knight's illustriouslife.I call AMB, as he refers to himself, an Esquire becausehe qualifies by his prowess in battle and devotedservice to his chivalrous knight. Like Sir Winston, hewas proud to serve his country in war and peace, and toact staunchly in her defense against fainthearts and detractors.In short, he is a true Englishman (of Ulsterblood) and a patriot. Despite the jibe that "patriotism isthe last refuge of a scoundrel," there is nothing wrongin being a patriot, whatever your country.Anthony Montague Browne reveals himself as a manof independent mind (from boyhood), forthright and uncompromisingin his views, a bon viveur and a bonraconteur, a good companion and friend — it must havebeen fun to live with him in the RAF, at University andin the Diplomatic Service. Despite the disparity in agesand in experience, he turned out to be the happiestchoice as companion and amenueusis to WSC in the lastdecade of his life, and fortunately for us, his chroniclerand Boswell. A man of wit and humour, he writes ashehas lived. "Le style est l'homme meme!"Mr. Redburn is a Finest Hour senior editor living in Dorset,England.In these pages we encounter many of the great figures,foreign as well as British, the statesmen, thepoliticians, public servants, diplomats, military menand others, including charlatans and careerists, whohave graced or disgraced this country since 1940. Hepresents in telling phrases the foibles of eccentrics, thepomposities of not a few, the hilarity of things goingwrong in high places, including his own mistakes, andthe serious errors of people and policies — some of theselatter by his own colleagues. As Vansittart saidscathingly, "The soul of our [Civil] Service is the loyaltywith which we execute ordained error." Not all the errorswere — or are — committed by the political masters.Macmillan's unfortunate "Winds of Change"speech was written by David Hunt, one of AMB's colleaguesand a friend, characterised memorably by LordLamston: "for the sake of a phrase he has cofounded aContinent" (p. 307). [Incidentally, AMB, who is notalone in considering the demise of the British Empireas not altogether a blessing, elsewhere quotes Isaiah insupport: "Thou hast multiplied the nations and not increasedthe joy."]AMB is a shrewd and discerning observer, a goodjudge of character. He writes affectionately of those whoserved him and those whom he served; without maliceof the people he disliked, except of men like Burgess thetraitor and Lord George Brown, and has the pungentphrase for the pretentious. He is not afraid to be vitriolicabout some of his own countrymen who failed intheir attitudes and some foreigners who would doBritain harm. He is a man of strong principles and expressesviews which, he admits, would have been inappropriatein the post of Private Secretary to the Queenwhich he wisely declined. He abhors socialism, the destructionof national identity, the shenanigans of politicallife today, the decline of British power and influencethrough the ineptitude of politicians and public servants,and lack of will of people in general. These stricturesmay appeal more to his and my generation andare derived from a heritage no longer regarded as offirst importance — service to the State, which once hadprimacy over self-service.Like so many truly brave men AMB is modest. Heleft University, determined to join the RAF. He drawsattention obliquely yet vividly to the perils and terrorsof pilot training during the war — before the advent ofsimulated cockpits, and pays deserved tribute to theskill and valour of the instructors, particularly theAmerican. Not all pilots and crews were killed in combat.Man is not equipped biologically to fly, and men inflying machines would consider apposite the words writtenby an Elizabethan sailor to his Queen: "The wingsof man's life are pinioned with the feathers of death."FINEST HOUR 89/40

The horrors of fighting in the jungle in Burma arewell known to the veterans of Slim's Fourteenth Army,but they were equally awesome for the RAF, especiallyin monsoon conditions. AMB served there and survived:he proved his courage and was decorated, but sounds notrumpet. On a personal note, I cavil at his strictures regardingthe slowness of the army in pursuit of theJapanese towards the end of 1945. The Battles of Kohimaand Imphal had smashed the invaders, but Slimand his commanders knew how vicious in both advanceand retreat their opponents could be. There was morejustification for caution than Montgomery showed afterAlamein.AMB served in the Foreign Office under both Labourand Conservative administrations and his comments onthe conduct of government, the service, and on the personalitiesinvolved are illuminating. He singles outErnest Bevin for special praise and his generous assessmentof him is totally deserved, for he was one of ourgreatest Foreign Secretaries.There is, of necessity, a very long list of dramatis personaein the chapters on Foreign Affairs, Number Ten,and those concerned with Churchill in retirement at LaPausa, home of Emery and Wendy Reves, on cruiseswith Onassis, at Chartwell or Hyde Park Gate. But oneis never jaded with the experience. They are essential tothe history of Churchill as peacetime Premier and outof office, and the sketches are invariably well done. Thechapters in Book Four skillfully cover some of the greatthemes of Churchill's life, particularly in the SecondWorld War and the postwar era.The author tries to elicit Churchill's views, not alwayssuccessfully, but we do learn much that is new orcorrective. Chapter 27, for example, on Churchill andthe European Union, is very valuable, and AMB acts onthis and other matters not as a diarist but as a historian.He is often critical of Churchill's actions on affairspast and current, and shows that he tried to elicit fromhim his reasons for acting as he did, occasionally with asatisfactory result. Why did Churchill show such blindtrust in Stalin and Roosevelt? What was the reason forhis emphasis on and belief in the "special relationship,"and why was he reluctant to hand over to Eden? As towhat Churchill really knew about the Katyn massacre,we are now aware that there was a real fear of anotherNazi-Soviet pact to stop the German assault on Russiain 1942. And, we know that Churchill excised parts ofthe draft of the last volume of his memoirs criticisingRoosevelt and Eisenhower in the interests of Anglo-American relations. Did Churchill realise he was dupedmaliciously by Stalin and cynically by Roosevelt? AMBprobes these and other matters in conversations withChurchill, but Churchill took most of his secrets to thenot the struggle naught availeth." He said more thanonce that he had accomplished so much to achieve nothingin the end, and in the sadness and loneliness of oldage he knew "the labour and the wounds [were] vain."Patriot that he was, he could not but mourn the demiseof Britain's empire and power, and the spirit of theBritish people. At the last Mankind will always defeat aman however powerful, and as Aeschylus writes:"So in the Libyan fable it is toldThat once an eagle, stricken with a dart,Said when he saw the fashion of the shaft,With our own feathers, not by others' handsAre we now smitten."Winston Churchill's slow decline owed more to physicalfrailty, accentuated by his fall in Monte Carlo in1957, than to mental deterioration, and the authorgives many examples, almost to the end of his life, whenChurchill's memory and wit shone forth, giving the lieto the cruel tale that he was "ga-ga," when in fact his increasingdeafness caused him to look uncomprehending.AMB relates briefly the events of the final days, probablybecause he still feels the deep emotions of sadnesshe experienced at the time. Death was kept at bay bythe indomitable spirit for fourteen days, yet the shockwas still unbearable when the BBC made the announcementon 24th January 1965. To my mind cameonly the words:"Know ye not that there is this day fallen a Prince inIsrael?"And as we watched and listened to the Funeral ServiceI read Laurence Binyon's "For The Fallen.""Solemn the drums thrill: Death august and royalSings sorrow up into immortal spheres.There is music in the midst of desolationAnd a glory that shines upon our tears."These memoirs recreate faithfully and vividly the sightsand emotions of those days.Key Reference toChurchill's ProverbsRICHARD M. LANGWORTHThe Proverbial Winston S. Churchill: An Index toProverbs in the Works of Sir Winston Churchill, compiledby Wolfgang Mieder and George B. Bryan. Westport,Conn.: The Greenwood Press, 436pp, $79.50.Available from ICS New Book Service, c/o the editor, at$65 + shipping.ST3.VGHe also comments on Churchill's "Black Dog," ofwhich he saw no evidence; rather he noted a melancholyspirit, a man in his eighties brooding over thepast. Perhaps, after all, he came to deny Clough's "SayFINESTHOUR89/41Areference work following the path staked out byDarrel Honey's Churchill's Literary Illusions(1987, Redburn 408), this extensively researchedbook traces Churchill's use of proverbs, folklore and fa-

mous expressions throughout his written works andspeeches. The authors claim to have read 40,000 pagesin its compilation, and I don't doubt them. For instance,if you want to trace the development of "blood, toil,tears and sweat," you will find that WSC joined "bloodand tears" as early as 1900 and added "sweat" in 1931.Indeed the authors have gone overboard: it was Rooseveltwho told Churchill, "we are all in the same boatnow," but the expression makes the book because, inproposing that they meet following Pearl Harbor, WSCquoted the phrase back to FDR.You search the book using "key-words," which arearranged alphabetically over 300 pages. For example,under "curtain" (not "iron" — one must take care to tryall possible key-words) you find Churchill's evolution ofthe term "iron curtain": he first referred to a figurativecurtain falling in 1906, and wrote that a "curtain fellbetween Britannia and the Continent" while writing hisHistory of the English-Speaking Peoples in 1939.When Churchill himself puts quotemarks around aphrase, the authors track it. For example, "Africa forthe Africans" (WSC 1906), is said to appear in Urdang'sSlogans, page 273, Urdang being one of several "quotationdictionaries" consulted. Unfortunately the list ofthese is obscure. (It starts on page 127; be sure to flagit. For ease, it should be printed on the endpapers.)There are several thin appendices listing the numberof proverbial references in Churchill's works,speeches, letters and the Official Biography; a list offrequency for his favorite phrases ("to play a part" isthe leader with forty-three appearances; "John Bull,""no-man's land" and "in cold blood" rate high). More interesting— indeed the best part of the book — is a 100-page essay about how Churchill acquired and exploitedhis expansive repertoire of proverbs, editing them whenit suited him, not always to his advantage. His comment,"Consistency is the last resort of feeble and narrowminds" (1947 speech) "seems pale and wan," commentthe authors, when compared with the original(from Emerson): "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblinof little minds."Churchill's ability to "bend" proverbs to suit his purposes— "Beg while the iron is hot" . . . "make hell whilethe sun shines" . . . "physician, comb thyself ... "I donot wish to cast my pearls before . . . those who do notwant them" (88-91) is rightly emphasized by the authors,who amusingly designate them "anti-proverbs."Too many examples are noted to recount here, but oneshrewd piece of insight involves Churchill's attitude towardclassical quotes, most of which he often altered tosuit himself:... for the proponents of the "new" Latin pronunciation, hehad nothing but opprobium. He complained, "They have distortedone of my most serviceable and impressive quotationsinto the ridiculous booby Wainy, Weedy, Weeky'" (My EarlyLife, page 23). Although Julius Caesar's remark may havebeen "serviceable," Churchill seems never to have used it inits pristine form, save for the modern English variant "Theycame, they saw, they ran away" (The River War, 1933 edn.,page 16). That and numerous other classical references reinforcedhis stylistic arsenal, but at times the muse was fugitive.At a critical juncture he once said, "There ought to be agood Latin quotation which would come in here, but I cannotfind one in my repertoire." (Official Biography, CompanionVolume I, US edn., Part 3, page 1634.)They then list a small number of "pristine" Latin expressionswhich Churchill used without alteration: theytake up little more than a page!Winston Churchill clearly had a photographic memory,as the authors point out, listing his numerous referencesto the Bible (King James version, of course);French history, poetry and literature (despite his abominablepronunciation he freely read French); and suchstandard works as Bartlett's Quotations, which he committedto memory in India in 1896. This rich assortmentis the joy of the book, serving to remind and astonishus with the depth of Churchill's largely self-imposededucation.There are a few faults which perhaps should not bemade much of, since the book is a major contribution toour knowledge of Churchill's works. Despite their40,000 pages of reading, the authors display no deepknowledge of the canon. Publication dates are sometimeswrong. They make the same mistake as the publishersof the "Collected Works" in consulting only theabridged edition of The River War; excerpts from theoriginal which were culled from that volume, publishedin Finest Hour 86, display what they missed. Mr. Brodrick'sArmy is represented as Mr. Broderick's [sic]War; the American edition of Into Battle is renderedBlood, Sweat, Toil and Tears; the Companions to VolumeI of the Official Biography are said to numberthree; the huge Companion Volume Part 3 to Volume Vis left out entirely; and the authors fail to consult therecent Companions to Volume VI (The Churchill WarPapers) because the series "still appears incomplete."(Indeed, and let us hope that appearance is correct!)Churchill's works are clumsily referenced by numbers(001-965), which are listed obscurely on pages 96-126. The list itself has no logical order. "001" is Londonto Ladysmith, "003" is Volume I of Kimball's Churchill-Roosevelt Correspondence; next come a hodgepodge ofessays not published in book form, followed by books inno apparenjt order, orations from the Rhodes JamesComplete Speeches, with The World Crisis bringing upthe rear. This gets especially confusing when the referencenumber is strung together with volume, part andpage references, such as "272, IV, 3, p.1988, 1922" (84).Surely in the case of Churchill's books and speeches,and the Official Biography, a brief reference (e.g. CV4pt3 pp 1988/1922) would take up hardly more spacethan these mysterious codes, especially if a slightlysmaller size type were used (it looks like 13 point, couldFINEST HOUR 89 / 42

easily be 11 or 12). I realize this cannot be done with allthe articles, but most of those are grouped in the CollectedEssays (CE1 to CE4 would work for them), so fewcitations require code numbers and the endpapers couldhouse a more compact list for reference ease. Nor doesthe number system always work: Churchill's revisedEmerson quote mentioned above is dated 1947, fromVolume VII of the Complete Speeches, but is referenced"874," which cites a speech in 1950 from Volume VIII.The system isn't foolproof, nor complete. (I searchedin vain for the Shakespeare reference, "I feel like one /who walks alone / the banquet hall deserted..." fromChurchill's musings after reviewing the fleet as FirstLord in 1939, but maybe such quotes are literature, referencedin Holley's book.) Though expensive, TheProverbial Winston S. Churchill is the best referencebook in its field, and is recommended to anyone interestedin learning how Churchill went about what hecalled "the Scaffolding of Rhetoric." Now if it can onlybe bunged onto a CD-Rom disk...A Fine Set of Gems,Plus One ClangerRICHARD M. LANGWORTHWinston Churchill: Studies in Statesmanship, edited byRAC Parker, London: Brassey's Ltd., 260pp., £30.Available from ICS New Book Service c/o the editor at$20 + shipping. US edition awaited at this writing.THIS collection of papers on Churchill was presentedat a 1994 colloquium at Churchill CollegeCambridge, and has all the pros and cons of similarworks, such as the Blake-Louis Major New Assessment(Finest Hour 80 p.35). It is by its nature disjointedThe fifteen papers range from the daughterlyobservations of Lady Soames to Churchill's relationswith Adenauer (Hans-Peter Schwarz) and his approachto such abstracts as "the European Idea" (Sir MartinGilbert) It does, however, boast certain consistencies: itattempts neither to rewrite or "demythologize"Churchill, as did Blake-Louis, nor to idolize him; it isthe most "international" book of Churchill studies yetpublished, with contributors from Poland DenmarkGermany and Italy as well as the USA UK andCanada- it reaches no conclusions about Churchill scharacter that have not been reached by others, criticsand supporters alike. Its contributors seem to concludethat "in the great drama," as Charles de Gaulle said,"he was the greatest."There are many unique contributions. TageKaarsted's study of Churchill and the smaller Europeanstates (specifically Denmark) explains why though hedidn't do much for them overtly, they nevertheless consideredhim their hero and savior. Paolo Pombeni's"Churchill and Italy" destroys the late-blooming myththat Churchill supported the Fascist dictatorship: whilehe admired Mussolini as a man, and his benign accomplishments,he was never blind to whom he was dealingwith: "Mussolini and Churchill spoke different languages.Mutual understanding was complete," Pombeniconcludes — although "mutual understanding" did notextend to II Duce's belief that the anti-communistChurchill would never accept a Soviet alliance.This book is particularly valuable in analyzingChurchill's relations with the Navy — the American(Phillips O'Brien) as well as the British (Jon Sumida);and his attitude toward Europe, from balance of powerpolitics (Brian McKercher) to the postwar situation(Warren Kimball) to the European Community (Gilbert)and specifically toward France (Maurice Vaisse andFrancois Kersaudy), Germany (Schwarz) and Poland(Anita Prazmowska).One supposes every book like this contains at leastone turnip, and in this case the prize goes to BerndMartin, a German history professor who takes up theCharmley topic: peace or war with Hitler in 1940? UnfortunatelyMartin is less well prepared to deliver hisrevisionist line, which does not prevent him from tryingout some new twists. Roosevelt's offer to mediate peacetalks in early 1939, Martin says, was "deliberately reserved"because the crafty Roosevelt wanted it to fail.The intent of American policy was to nullify the risingtide of German-Japanese industrial achievement, whichthreatened to surpass that of the USA; Roosevelt eggedon Churchill to stand fast against Hitler, though he"provided no real help" to Britain. When he became convincedthat war with Germany was essential he goadedthe Japanese into attacking Pearl Harbor. I presumethat FDR was also a mind-reader who knew that Hitlerwould declare war on him. Clearly Professor Martin hasno clear concept of the nature of the American people,and fancies 1930s US foreign policy as a well-organizedand singleminded pursuit of trade dominance. (The impulseof the American people is isolationist, except inextreme circumstances, witness the delay and doubtover sending troops to Bosnia; and there wasn't any USforeign policy to speak of in the 1930s.)Martin's account of Churchill's alleged considerationof peace with Hitler takes a familiar revisionist tack,based on the war cabinet of 26 May 1940, when Halifaxsupported a peace overture. That excerpt from its minutes,where Churchill said he might consider peace ifHitler would base it on "restoration of German coloniesand the overlordship of Central Europe" has beenflogged so often that I've almost memorized it. The reasonthey use it repeatedly is that there's nothing else touse: no other evidence that Churchill ever consideredpeace with Hitler. As for Halifax, Martin ignores thework of new researchers like Sheila Lawlor (Churchilland the Politics of War, FH #84), who proved there wasno space between Churchill's position and that of Hali-FINESTHOUR89/43

fax or Chamberlain once France fell in mid-June 1940.Martin later admits that no British peace overturesfollowed France's fall, and wonders if "Halifax or LloydGeorge would really have concluded a peace agreementwith a vainglorious dictator like Hitler" — but not beforehe fills us with a lot of superfluous speculation tothe contrary. Yet he cannot resist stating that "WinstonChurchill did not understand Germany and Germanculture in general, let alone National Socialism in particular."Churchill defined National Socialism as "thatpower which spurns Christian ethics, which cheers itsonward course by barbarous paganism, which vauntsthe spirit of aggression and conquest, which derivesstrength and perverted pleasure from persecution, anduses with pitiless brutality the threat of murderousforce." (Commons, 5 October 1938.) Evidently WSC understoodGermany better than Martin understands theUSA.Video Reviews:From Passable to " Awesome"JONAH TRIEBWASSER"Churchill: The Private War," narrated by Hal Holbrook(HBO Video, 1301 Avenue of the Americas, New York,New York 10019), 30 mins.THIS film's unique and highly debatable theory isthat Winston Churchill achieved greatness becauseof his episodes of depression, whatChurchill called his "black dog." Having beaten theenemy within, goes the theory, Churchill was ready atage sixty-five to conquer the enemy without: AdolfHitler's Third Reich.In the film, Churchill's coping with "black dog" beginswith his childhood. British psychiatrist AnthonyStorr, leading proponent of the "black dog" argument, isseen analyzing Churchill through the written record ofthe great man's school days. Storr attributes his depressionto the treatment young Winston received at thehands of his parents, which, Storr says, ranged from the"cool indifference" of his mother to the outright hostilityof his father. The stinging comments of a disappointedfather (whose thinking and actions may have been influencedby illness) stayed with Winston until his closingdays. As his daughter, Lady Soames, recalls, Winstonhad one great unsatisfied yearning at the end ofhis life: "I wish my father had lived long enough to seethat I was going to be some good."The facts are not always presented. Had Dr. Storr examinedLady Randolph's letters to Winston he wouldhave found much more affection than "cool indiffer-Mr. Triebwasser is adjunct professor at Marist College inPoughkeepsie, New York, a director oflCS/USA and moderatorof "Churchill Online."ence," and her personal diary is filled, as a youngmother, with her daily activities with Winston and hisbrother Jack. Judging by the testimony of WSC's lastprivate secretary, Anthony Montague Browne (his book,Long Sunset, is reviewed herein) the "black dog" anglehas been disproportionately emphasized by writers wholack sufficient grounding in the primary sources.Happily the video shows that Churchill began toenjoy respites from depression as he achieved success inhis military and journalistic careers. As Lady Soamesnotes: "Danger had a fascination for him . . . proving tohimself his own courage, his own capacity to be steadyunder fire." As long as he was in the thick of military orpolitical action, the film suggests, Churchill was toobusy to harbor dark thoughts. His fall from power afterthe Dardanelles fiasco again brought deep depression.Here the film shows his embracing of the "muse ofpainting," while curiously ignoring his invigorating experiencesin the trenches of Flanders.Actor Holbrook's restrained narration deftly takes usthrough the "wilderness years," when Churchill's writingkept his family fed and bricklaying was therapeutic.The film uses archival footage to great effect in portrayingWorld War II, and credits Churchill's early depressionswith his success in the Second War: "Only a manwho had known despair could convey to his people hisown confidence that hopelessness can be overcome."The World War II section has one glaring error: Whilethe narration describes how Churchill is loved by theBritish people, we see only Lord Beaverbrook (dressedin a three-piece suit and bow tie a la Churchill) shakinghands with children. Churchill: The Private War is afast-paced half hour which presents a theory ofChurchill's greatness with which serious students maynot agree, and some unique footage."The Finest Hours," The Electronic Publishing Company,Ltd., 68-70 Wardour Street, London W1V 3HP;111 minutes; color and black & white. Priced under £20and available in both UK (PAL) and USA/Canada(NTSC) television formats.WHEN you pick up the case for this video andlook into Churchill's eyes glowering out at youfrom the Karsh "bulldog" portrait, you mightassume that this film only covers WSC's reign as PrimeMinister of Great Britain during England's finesthours. In fact, this excellent biography, nearly twohours in length, covers Churchill's many finest hoursfrom boyhood to old age. Narrated by Orson Welles andproduced by Jack LeVien (an early keeper of theChurchill flame), "Finest Hours" begins with a briefoverview of the war exploits of the early Churchills, includingthe first Sir Winston and the Duke of Marlborough.The story then moves to the whirlwind courtshipof Churchill's parents, Lord Randolph and Brooklyn'sJennie Jerome, which serves as historical backgroundfor a beautiful and extensive cinematic tour ofFINEST HOUR 89/44

Blenheim Palace; this alone is worth the price of thevideo. The review of Churchill's boyhood and schooldays is intercut with film clips of WSC commenting onhis early life. As the story of Churchill's life progressesin time, LeVien sprinkles into the film a vast treasuretrove of still and motion pictures of Churchill.The World War I section explores Churchill's earlysupport of air power, his nurturing of the developmentof the tank and the armored car and his assurance thatthe fleet would be ready. Perhaps no scene in any film Ihave watched so vividly supports Churchill's view ofwar ("what vile and wicked folly and barbarism it allis") than the armistice parade of hundreds of Britishwar veterans, all of them leg amputees, all on crutches.The end of the Great War finds Churchill (and theviewer) at Chartwell during the Wilderness Years.Churchill warns an unheeding nation about the dangersof a rearmed fascist Germany, but becomes distractedby the abdication of King Edward (to marryMrs. Simpson), an event covered through the extensiveuse of contemporary newsreels.All this leads up to what is truly Churchill's finesthour, his giving the roar to the British lion during WorldWar II. The progress of the war is tracked by film clipsof Churchill giving some of his most famous speeches, orby archival battle footage, accompanied by actor PatrickWymark reading from WSC's six volume The SecondWorld War There is extensive footage of Churchill vigorouslyon the move by rail, sea and air. Churchill's executivestyle of "leadership by memoranda" is well illustratedby Wymark reading just a small selection of theflood of correspondence WSC dictated to his generals,his cabinet and to President Roosevelt.With victory came Churchill's exit from office. Thefilm follows him through his painting, writing and "IronCurtain" speech. His knighthood, his second premiershiphis Nobel Prize and honorary United States citizenshipare covered in less detail than his wartime exploitsbut are not shortchanged.This is a marvelous film which does true justice toChurchill's life in a limited amount of time. OrsonWelles's robust narration is matched by Ron Grainer'sstirring musical score which offers just the right touchof military pomp. Until LeVien's seminal Churchill series"The Valiant Years" is available on video, FinestHours" will amply satisfy."Young Winston^llCA/Columbia Pictures HomeVideo, 2901 West Alameda Avenue, Burbank California91505; 124 minutes; color. Priced under $20.00 inthe United States.THOSE who have taken to heart the ICS goal of"Teaching the Next Generation" could ask for nobetter way to introduce pre-teens and teenagedchildren to the adventure and excitement of WinstonChurchill's early life than by showing them the videoversion of the 1974 film "Young Winston." Based uponChurchill's My Early Life: A Roving Commission, anddirected in grand and epic style by Sir Richard Attenborough,"Young Winston" explores WSC's story frombirth to his early political career. Simon Ward, lookingas if he just stepped out of the pages of Vanity Fair, isremarkable both as Young Winston on screen, and asthe off-screen narrating voice of the mature Churchillreading passages from My Early Life. Ward gives a restrainedperformance that strikes just the right balancebetween the young Churchill's political ambition andhis courage under fire, without lapsing into a lip-juttingcaricature. The distinguished supporting cast (eachgiven his or her own star turn in crucial roles) includesICS Honorary Member Robert Hardy (who is chilling asChurchill's sadistic headmaster), Jane Seymour asPamela Plowden, Sir Anthony Hopkins as LloydGeorge, Sir John Mills as General Kitchener, and EdwardWoodward (who later played Sir Samuel Hoare toRobert Hardy's Churchill in "The Wilderness Years") asa fellow South African prisoner of war. Churchill'smother, the great American beauty Jennie Jerome, isplayed to perfection by another American beauty, AnneBancroft.The film is stolen, however, right from under thesetop actors, by the towering presence of the late RobertShaw as Lord Randolph Churchill. Shaw starts out as ayoung, handsome, virile, impish, powerful and immenselylikable Lord Randolph and slowly, almost imperceptibly,degenerates into the prematurely aged andderanged shadow of his former self.Colorfully costumed and sumptuously photographedon location at Blenheim, Sandhurst and in Morocco,with a stirring soundtrack featuring the works of SirEdward Elgar, "Young Winston" has battle scenesaplenty, and more action in the South African trainwreck and escape scenes than one can find in an IndianaJones film, with the added advantage that the storyis all true (or at least true as the author rememberedit). "Young Winston" will grab the attention of theyounger members of your household and give them abetter understanding of the man you admire. If youdon't believe me, just ask Tom Triebwasser, age 12, orAlison Triebwasser, age 9, who gave the film the ultimatepre-teen accolade . . . "awesome."REVIEWS COMING UP• Great Battles and Leaders of World War II, by WSC. An outstandingtext and photos, marred by sloppy editing.• Churchill and Lloyd George, by Marvin Rintala: How friendshipchanged politics: an important book.• Churchill and the Prof, by Thomas Wilson. Finally, a newbook on the WSC-Lindemann relationship.• Resolution, Defiance, Magnanimity, Goodwill: a neededcompilation of Westminster College's Kemper Lectures• The Greatest of Friends: Roosevelt and Churchill, by KeithAlldritt. A new look at the duo by a Friend of ICSNEW BOOK SERVICE: All of the above will be available at20-25% discounts by the time you read this. Contact the editorfor exact prices or refer to NBS listings in USA. $FINEST HOUR 89/45

Jl-The Great Invasion:Churchill in StampsHY MPages 211-216: OPERATION O\ EKLOR1)CatJa^ue nitmhtrr tire SnJit \*t t and \hinlt• (i-I'J\ anoi\eisiir}' stamps and th? l i ws \u:tiirj in hnropr tiittiiiiL-iiKiraTtvcs »erc on the siciii; Ihnse recent itsiu 1 * nfu-r cnuniioiiN \cisatilrty un the 0 Da\portrd> the drama and Jancor ot that linn: \\\wn the tatc oi 1 uropehung tn the balance21].211. When prcpantit; this sectinn 1 rcali/nl 1 itaitn i irc.iUd I'-Da\ AL all. so this ha-uK asscinblcii pji:f mil ha\e to do until Icaiibettei assa\ llm subicci with rciem 5'Hh anm\t.i£ai\ ^tanlpsThe text it., of Loursc Chuii-hill s lioin iliainatK lonurk, to tlioHouse un 0 June, and his tek-gt.nn 10 Stalin oi ihe same d.ue TheIOUVcmr sheet isl'pper\olla^^| iimpcil MIMOIO212. ChurchiJI-rdalcd \JCR1 C(imnifinor.iu\c Mliisirat. 1 the liberationof Pans Ihf block at bottom show*- Xinetuan mlJicr^ on pjraitein Pans T'b \ **°'1 isg«J^l> and Lionel al I i^\ev^ whu ledthe Prench atriucs mlo Pans France »H412 3 ISJ: I* 1 "-* 1 ' -40iC\K calchmi.' ua\ to ilispla\ a stamp basi d on a photo istu superimpose it on the on^inal. as »\nh St \nu.(.nt4(14) 1558'62> :ind a 1074 Nicaragua »."* *5'J (sc l'JIH214. George i> Patton tontnueisial Lommanderot the I S ThudArm\. was ponrdjed h> I iuemhoui}> i> \M.H .IS hi- ov n counu\USA #1026 i"*g I02^i His tanks smashed the Cn-iman i ounlciattaLk in the \.idennes and ate s\mboli/cd tn ( inadt #2^ l' >SLion so the ones chosen wae ^iiiciiL ( hiii^lnll issues ('.sj? SdSi oh*inusl\ .md logo n*^ ^l ( 1" .» 4^ 4J^127) les>-»L'b^ iuusl\ \ hcinJ-ome i aii.idian T^VMI djlner\ st.ini] 1the Hat' ot the (\inailiau armed s k *i%ii.e> t\m.ida ffH()216. C'hurLhill's jnd de daulk's tnutnph.int \isit lo Pans onAinustiic I\«» I«->45 is illuitiared H> (liLnada *'"ri (s^ -401»which is pait ol a l l )~0 \ I -ft.iv issue mflud.ne ,i ( huuh II valuoAjman #566 "M >*£ o9" (>!. tvo nl uhu.h shi?v C lnirLhill mdFranee #503 (sg Q0I i. which was l^ued in 1 inuaiv 1°4^ tn . ommemorate the liberation212.-•'* • •' '• •. •**1; In hi 1 LiM'tnun 1 !FiNESTTiObR 89 46

DE GAULLE IN COMMAND"...The present French Government, under General de Gaulle,commands the full assent of the vast majority of the Frenchpeople...it is the only Government which can possibly dischargethe very heavy burdens which are being cast upon it (to enabledevelopment of) the constitutional and Parliamentary processes,which it has declared its purpose to reinstate. 1 '—House of Commons, 27 October 1944"Thus we completedthe process begunin the dark andfar-off days of1940."—"Triumphand Tragedy"213. 215.WSC made his firstvisit to Parisafter liberationon Armistice Day1944, On 12November, he andGeneral de GaulleaccompaniedGeneral de Lattrede Tassigny on aninspection of therevitalized FrenchArmy, holding theline at Besancon."The Frenchsoldiers seemedto be in thehighest spirits."CREDIT WHERE DUESECOND CtUEBhC CONFERENCEI14.After-Normandy, General Pattern and the U.S. Third Army clearedBrittany and surged toward Rouen and the Loire. When the furiousArdennes counter-attack ( Battle of the Bulge ) occurred, thePrime Minister emphasized who was standing up to it—the Yanks:"I never hesitate...to stand up for our own soldiers when theirachievements have been cold-shouldered or neglected...But wemust not forget that it is to American homes that the telegramsof personal losses and anxiety have been going...GeneralGeorge S.Patton, Jr.".. -A gap wastorn open as agap can alwaysbe in a linehundreds of mileslong. GeneralEisenhower atonce gave thecommand to thenorth of the gapto Field-MarshallMontgomery, andto the south ofit to GeneralOmar Bradley...these highlyskilled commanders(acted inwhat may) becomea model formilitary studentsin the future.215.During 11 to .1.6 September 1944, Canada once again hosted theBritish Prime Minister and American President at Quebec. Kr.Churchill offered units of the Royal Navy for the final driveagainst Japan, and the President accepted. Churchill was indoubt that Germany would surrender in 1944.Here too, PDii'aTreasury SecretaryHenry Morgenthauproposed theMorgenthau Plan,"to render Germanya mainly agrariancountry after thewar. Churchill wasopposed. The ideadid not survive.Had WSC supportedit, Britain wouldhave benefitted.But Churchill feltpostwar Germanywould need to beplaced on equalfooting.,«»•••••: • • $•1KJiL;

RECAPSSalisbury Hall, the Pike and MosquitoA recap based on recent informationBY HARRY E. CROOKSSince the "Fact or Fish" articleappeared, (FH#79), several relateditems have emerged. Firstly, someevidence of how Winston Churchillmight have caught the pike at SalisburyHall is given in AnthonyMontague Browne's fascinating,frank and revealing Sunset (reviewedthis issue). During conversation,Sir Winston mentioned, "Ionce caught a big pike. Someonesaid I had shot it basking on thesurface and that this was unsporting."I later gathered from Mr.Montague Browne that the fish inquestion was caught at SalisburyHall; it was surely the pike, a centrepieceof the FH article.We must assume therefore thatSir Winston used a conventionalangling method to capture themonster rather than the pest controlmeasure of shooting, and wastherefore fully entitled to engagethe services of the taxidermist, althoughit is possible that hisbrother Jack (who in 1904 advisedhis mother on the decor of her newhome) had something to do withthis. As mentioned in FH#79 theChurchill pike is thought to havegiven inspiration to the designer ofthe Mosquito aircraft at the secretlocation (Salisbury Hall) of the designand construction team. It isperhaps unique that during hisRAF WWII service the author ofLong Sunset was a Mosquito pilot.Mosquito Flights to MoscowMention in FH#79 was madeof the non-stop RAF Mosquitocourier flights to Moscow andreaders may be interested to knowthat the friend on the general staffat Moscow (p20) was Joan BrightAstley whose WWII books, TheMr. Crooks, of Oxfordshire, England,has written of the wartime deHavilland Mosquito aircraft, and itsrelation to Lady Randolph's SalisburyHall, in issues #69 and #79.Inner Circle and Gubbins andS.O.E. (jointly with Peter Wilkinson)contain much original informationconcerning the WWIIprime minister.Sarah Churchill &Operation TorchDuring her photographic interpretationat RAF Medmenhamduring World War II, SarahChurchill would have studied aerialphotographs taken by Mosquitoreconnaissance aircraft. ConstanceBabington-Smith in 'Evidence inCamera' 1 writes: "Sarah, who hadbrightened the scene with herglamour and elegance and wit,was a quick and versatile interpreter,and adept at relating airphotographs to maps; before shebecame an officer she had been aMedmenham plotter. During thehectic week that Kendall's teamlaboured on the reports that contributedso much to the success ofOperation Torch (Eisenhower'sNorth Africa landing in 1943) shepulled her weight with enthusiasm,like all the others.On November 7th, after theMedmenham rush was all over,Sarah went off to Chequers on 48hours leave, and late that eveningshe and her father were alone together.It was nearly 1:00am;Sarah was curled up in a big chairby the fire, and Churchill was pacingup and down. Then the clockstruck. "At this very minute," announcedChurchill with measuredgravity, "under cover of darkness,six hundred and forty-three shipsthat are carrying our troops ontheir great enterprise are approachingthe shores of Africa.""Six hundred and forty-four,"said a voice from the armchair."What's that?""I've been working on Torch formonths.""Why didn't you tell me?""I was told not to mention it toFINEST HOUR 89/48anyone.Her father smiled. "S'ppose youthought I didn't know" was his lastword.The Mosquito, Neils Bohr andSir John CockcroftMargaret Gowing (an acquaintanceat AERE Harwell near Oxfordwhere she was archivist andhistorian) describes Neils Bohr'sjourney in her Britain and AtomicEnergy 1939-45: 2 "On October 5th1943, a Mosquito bomber tookNeils Bohr to England. The planecould only land in neutral Swedenif it was completely unarmed.Bohr was placed in the emptybomb rack, equipped with flaresand parachute, and told that if theplane was attacked, the bomb rackwould be opened and he would beemptied into the sea. The professorwould have been quite unableto cope with this unpleasant situationif it had occurred, for he spentthe journey unconscious. Theplane had to fly very high andBohr had been given oxygen equipmentwhich he was to use as soonas the instructions came throughon his headphones. Bohr's domedhead was so high that the earphonesdid not reach his ears andhe heard no instructions at all.The pilots, when they received noresponse, thought with alarm thattheir precious cargo, filched fromthe Nazis with such relief, wasdead. They managed to reduceheight and by the time the planereached Scotland, Bohr had recoveredconsciousness. He was flownto London and Aage (his son) followedlater."Bohr then went to America butreturned to England after seeingPresident Roosevelt, to meet thePrime Minister. This interviewwas mentioned in "Birth of theBomb," a review of Margaret Gowing'sbook by Sir John Cockcroft: 3"Neils Bohr [tried] to persuade thePrime Minister to prepare for thepost-war International control ofatomic energy by informing the

Russians in general terms about[the atom bomb]. Bohr had astormy interview with the PrimeMinister — and the result was entirelynegative."Sir John Cockcroft, in 1933, wasa member of Rutherford's teamwhen atom fission was firstachieved. He was credited, withE.T.S. Walton, for being first to"split the atom," which earnedthem the Nobel Prize for Physicsin 1951. He performed importantscientific work in WWII and becamethe first director of theAtomic Energy Research Establishment,Harwell near Oxford,and later, in 1951, the first Masterof Churchill College, Cambridge.While at Harwell he accompaniedmany important visitors includingQueen Elizabeth and onone celebrated occasion in 1955,Sir Winston Churchill. The staffweekly, AERE News, featured thevisit on the cover. Sir Winston isseen with Sir John Cockcroft (centre)and the then director Sir BasilSchonland. The writer, a memberof the medical staff (Radiographer)only had a distant glimpse of theheavily overcoated Sir Winstonduring the visit.Shortly after Sir John had returnedto Harwell from the treeplanting ceremony at ChurchillCollege, Cambridge on October17th 1959, he attended the medicaldepartment for a routine testwhich involved radiography. Thewriter naturally asked him aboutSir Winston and the tree planting,the somewhat taciturn Sir Johnreplied, "He was in very goodform."^Evidence in Camera,' ConstanceBabington-Smith, Chatto and Windus1958."'Britain and Atomic Energy 1939-45, Margaret Gowing, Macmillan1964."Spectator September 25th 1964.CHURCHILL ONLINEICS on the Internet and America Online- USC in CyberspaceListserv "Winston":Communicate Automaticallywith the ChurchillOnline Community.The indefatigable Jonah Triebwasserat Marist College has establisheda new ICS Listserv,which in real English means anautomatic carbon copy service:now you can communicate withand hear from the Churchill Onlinecommunity without emailingeveryone individually or sendingmessages to Jonah to forward (increasinglycumbersome since ouronline community is over 300!).Here's how to go about it. (1)Send an email message to: (2) Inyour message area, type: SUB-SCRIBE WINSTON followed byyour name. (AOL and other servicesmay require a "subject" boxto be filled in — enter "subscribe.")You will receive confirmation byemail. Thereafter, you will receiveall blanket communications fromChurchill online, and may in turnsend blanket messages back usingthe email address Online Exchanges:Churchill and FisherIn the opening months of WorldWar I, First Sea Lord AdmiralFisher sent Churchill what modernemailers call "flames" (angrymemos, often in all-caps). Here'sthe beginning of a non-flame exchangeof rapidfire opinion onChurchill and Fisher between twostudents of WWI naval historyChris Bell in Calgary and JeffWallin in Washington, author ofBy Ships Alone (1981).20 July 1995Fm: 72124.3656@compuserv.com(Dr. Jeffrey Wallin)That Fisher had a big effect onWSC was, at least initially, a greatboon for the Navy, witness the decisionsto power the fleet with oiland to deploy 15-inch guns. (Imaginewhat the Queen Elizabethmust have sounded like giving afull broadside). But what a shamethat Fisher was at the helm in1915 when a real blue water admiralwas needed. For this WSCmust bear some responsibility, althoughit is hard to fault someonefor not anticipating that the hithertoaggressive Fisher would getcold fear when real fightingagainst serious odds began.21 July 1995Fm: cambell@acs.ucalgary.ca(Chris Bell)I think you're being a little toohard on Fisher. He deserves creditfor the prompt (and entirely aggressive)measures he took thatmade possible the Battle of theFalkland Islands. And his basicstrategy in 1915 was entirely correct.A strategically defensive posturewas the best that the RoyalNavy could have adopted in thecircumstances. They already had,after all, general command of thesea, and there was little to begained, and much to be lost, bytaking too many risks with theNavy. But you are entirely rightthat Fisher was not up to the jobin 1915. He was clearly too old,tired and more than a little unbalanced.This was the beginning of alengthy Fisher-Churchill exchangewhich continues next issue.FINEST HOUR 89/49

Woods Cupboard:Churchill CookeryR. ALAN FITCHFORMER CHEF DE GARDE MANGERIfirst met Fred Woods, the famousChurchill bibliographer,at the 1992 ISC 25th anniversaryconference in Washington.During the pre-dinner cocktailhour on Saturday evening, my wifePat and I had the opportunity tospend some time with him. I wasnot surprised to find that he didnot wish to talk about Sir Winston,as he had given a lengthy speechjust a few hours prior. What didsurprise was that he wished totalk about food, and proceeded todo so.I said very little, only encouragingand probing the conversation,for I, in fact, did not wish to talkabout food. I had just finished adifficult week of exams and wishedto forget (more difficult for the studentsthan for me). Moreover, I recalledsome wag had once said orwritten that the tongue is the onlyorgan that, when engaged, prohibitslearning.Dr. Woods had more than apassing interest in food, andseemed to know a great deal aboutit. There was a point where hebegan a discourse on some casseroleor such with a rich creamsauce and that much malignedvegetable, broccoli. As he describedhis method of preparationand cooking, I interjected at onepoint, "If you do that, you willovercook and ruin the broccoli."Fred paused, got a somewhat hostileglint in his eye and asked, "Isthat a professional opinion orsheer arrogance?" I smiled andMr. Fitch spent the better part of thelast decade as Chef de Cuisine in finerestaurants in Baltimore and New Orleans,and on the faculty of a prominentculinary college. In 1992 he metPat Peschko on the Sixth ChurchillTour, and they are just celebratingtheir first wedding anniversary, thesecond (that we know of) couplebrought together by ICS.The author and Pat Fitch withFred Woods at the 1993 Conference."Fred's knowledge was staggering;he often described elaboratedining scenes, and thoughtWSC ripe for a culinary book,given his refined tastes."said, "as a matter of fact, it is professional;I am a chef." It was apriceless moment for he had beengoing "quite on" about food withoutrealizing. He actually doubledover with laughter. It was apoignant beginning to a friendshipwhich lasted until illness robbedhim of his strength and powers.It is this memory of Woods theconnoisseur of food, not the bibliographer,that causes me to proposea series of articles onChurchill-related cuisine. WereFred still with us, he would wishto establish a few ground rules,the foremost being: it must be fun.I do not recall meeting anyone inrecent years who so genuinely enjoyedworking with, eating or talkingabout food. It was not uncommonfor me to get a call at somebizarre hour from Fred with an energeticinquiry about some methodor recipe, or just seeking newideas. His enthusiasm was contagious.Many approaches and topicsmight serve. We could adopt a systematicapproach regarding cookingmethods, equipment, recipes,menus, what works, what doesnot, and most importantly, why itdoes or does not. The possibilitiesare endless. One could take theArthur Haley approach to restaurants(as he did for Wheels), oreven food critics, which would beunpleasant and violate rule #1. Itmight be enjoyable to do some culinarytrivia. Who cooked the onlyhot meal prior to the only Frenchvictory during the Franco-Prussianwar? Who created Melba toast?Who cooked Churchill's and LloydGeorge's vegetables when theydined at Carlton House on 3 August1914, the night war was declared?(The answer, Sir MartinGilbert revealed, was Ho Chiminh,we kid you not, and a plaqueattesting to the revolutionary'stime in London is affixed to NewZealand House, which stands onthe old Carlton site).It will not be difficult to achievea Churchillian air to these proceedings,given WSC's love andpassion for food and dining. Onemight even consider decipheringMrs. Landemare's cook book,Recipes from Number Ten, forthose "lacking a classic Sorbonnianeducation." I do believe it is stillpossible to enjoy food without becominga slave in the kitchen, evenin this cybernetic, interlocked, microwave,off-line world we live in.In fact I know it, cooking as I doonce or twice a week, and diningdaily apolaustically when themood serves.Editor's note: Recipes from NumberTen, the book of Churchill favoritesproduced by his longstandingcook Mrs. Landemare, has recentlybeen examined jointly byLady Soames and Barbara Langworth,with a view to interpretingsome of its recipes in modern context,using contemporary ingredients,measures and cooking methods.What this will lead to we're notsure, but you will be the first toknow. In the meantime, commentaryon Churchill cuisine is welcomefrom all comers. $?FINEST HOUR 89/50

EDITED BY BARBARA LANGWORTHTEST your skill and knowledge. Virtuallyall questions can be answered in back issuesof FINEST HOUR or other ICS publications(but it's not really cricket to check).Twenty-four questions appear in each issue,the answers in the following issue. Questionsfall into six categories: Contemporaries688. How did Churchill get his first racehorse?(P)(C), Literary (L), Miscellaneous (M), Personal(P), Statesmanship (S), and War (W).673. "He was a man without a countryyet he acted as if he was head of state"was said by WSC about whom in 1943?(C)674. What was the subject of Churchill'sfirst commercially published writings?(L)675. What famous landscape architectwas responsible for the gardens atBlenheim Palace? (M)676. Where and when did Churchill firstuse paper money (and disliked it)? (P)677 WSC was twice Prime Minister ofBritain. What other cabinet positions didhe hold? (S)678. Churchill blamed "chemists in spectaclesand chauffeurs pulling the leversof aeroplanes or machine guns" for thedemise of what traditional military maneuver?(W)679. "All my thoughts are with you onthis day which is so essentially yourday. It is you who have led, uplifted andinspired us throughout the worst days"was written to WSC by whom and onwhat day? (C)680. How much did WSC earn with hisfirst attempt as an author? (L)681. What institution awarded Churchillhis first honorary degree? (M)682. What were Churchill's "belly-bandos"?(P)683. What was the "Stalingrad Sword"? (S)684. What is the Churchill connection withthe Staats Model School in Pretoria? (W)685. Who owned the villa La Capponcinawhere Churchill often visited? (C)686. WSC's The World Crisis consists offive volumes published over a period ofeight years. Name each volume title. (L)687. Why did the First Duke of Marlboroughname his palace "Blenheim"? (M)689. What was the KGB's codename forChurchill? (S)690. What was the "Morgenthau Plan"that Churchill rejected at the secondQuebec conference? (W)691. What position did Churchill's goodfriend and counsel Jan Smuts hold duringWWII? (C)692. How many copies of the original, twovolume,River War were published? (L)693. What was special about the swimmingpool WSC designed and built atChartwell? (M)694. What was Winston's favorite brandof Cognac? (P)695. "It may well be a blessing in disguise,"said Mrs. Churchill, to whichWSC replied, "At the moment, it seemsquite effectively disguised." What was"it"? (S)696. After what incident did FDR say toWSC, "We are all in the same boatnow."? (W)ANSWERS TO LAST TRIVIA649. "[The West Point Cadets] are not allowedto smoke or have any money . . .nor are they given any leave except twomonths. [I think those] who would resigntheir personal liberty to such an extentcan never make good citizens orfine soldiers." 650. The "Official Biography"of Churchill by Randolph Churchill/MartinGilbert is the longest biographywritten at over 20,000 pages. 651.A time capsule, to be opened by thePresident of the US in 2063 on the 100thAnniv. of WSC's honorary citizenship, isburied under his statue in Washington.652. To Clementine's annoyance andCHURCH1LLTR1VIAWinston's amusement, Brendan Brackenliked to hint that he was Churchill's illegitimateson. 653. Churchill made hisfirst public speech at the Empire Theatre(now Equinox) in Leicester Square, defendingthe pleasures of the music hall.654. WSC said, (1945) ". . . to fight thisgreat war at the other end of the world[the Pacific] at their [United States] side."655. King Leopold, Belgium; Queen Wilhelmina,Holland; and Grand DuchessCharlotte, Luxembourg were heads ofstate of the "low countries" when invadedby Hitler. 656. Churchill waswriting The Gathering Storm when hegave his speech at Fulton. 657. Macaulay'scollection of poems in balladform (retelling legends of the beginningof the Roman republic) were the Lays ofancient Rome. 658. Winston Churchill isburied in St. Martin's ChurchyardBlandon, Oxfordshire. 659. Churchill feltthat ... all my past life had been but apreparation for [Prime Minister]. 660."Churchill's sharpshooters" were theMaritime Royal Artillery founded byWSC in 1940. 661. Kay Halle, an Americanjournalist who met Churchill whenshe was based in London, was chieflyresponsible for his honorary Americancitizenship. 662. Step by Step is a collectionof artilces (most from the EveningStandard from 1936 to 1939). 663. In 1965the United States issued a 5

IMMORTAL WORDSIf the Western Democracies stand together in strict adherence to theprinciples of the United Nations Charter, their influence for furtheringthose principles will be immense and no one is likely to molest them.If however they become divided or falter in their duty, and if all theseimportant years are allowed to slip away, then indeed catastrophe mayoverwhelm us all."Last time I saw it all coming, andcried aloud to my own fellow countrymenand to the world, but no one paid any attention...Nowsurely, ladies and gentlemen,surely, I put it to you: we must not letthat happen again...."If we walk forward in sedateand sober strength, seeking noone's land or treasure, seekingto lay no arbitrary controlupon the thoughts ofmen; if all British moraland material forces andconvictions are joinedwith your own in fraternalassociation, thehighroads of the futurewill be clear, not onlyfor us but for all, notonly for our time, butfor a century tocome."WSC, FULTON, MO. 5 MARCH 1946