“The great thing is to get your work done and see and hear and learn and understand. AND WRITE WHEN THERE IS SOMETHING THAT YOU KNOW And not too damned much after.” —Ernest Hemingway
“What was Churchill’s Philosophy of Life and Living?” was first published by the Hillsdale College Churchill Project. For the original article with endnotes, click here. To subscribe to free weekly articles from Hillsdale-Churchill, click here and scroll to bottom. Enter your email in the box “Stay in touch with us.” No advertising: Your identity remains a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma.
Q: On life and living
If I want to understand Sir Winston Churchill’s philosophy of life and living, what books would you recommend? —B.A., via email
A: Lengthy sources
At first your question reminded us of the old fraternity initiation technique: asking pledges an unanswerable question.…
In eary youth, Churchill found whisky repugnant. Then, in Sudan in 1899, “there was nothing to drink, apart from tea, except either tepid water or tepid water with lime juice or tepid water with whisky. Faced with these alternatives I ‘grasped the larger hope’.… Wishing to fit myself for active service conditions I overcame the ordinary weaknesses of the flesh. By the end of those five days I had completely overcome my repugnance to the taste of whisky.”
“Rab said he thought that the good clean tradition of English politics, that of Pitt as opposed to Fox, had been sold to the greatest adventurer of modern political history.... He believed this sudden coup of Winston and his rabble was a serious disaster and an unnecessary one: the “pass had been sold” by Mr. C[hamberlain], Lord Halifax and Oliver Stanley. They had weakly surrendered to a half-breed American whose main support was that of inefficient but talkative people of a similar type...” —Jock Colville, May 1940
In the world of automotive artists, Ken Eberts ranked with the best. His amazing eye for detail focused on artfully researched, nostalgic scenes, placing vintage motorcars in their original settings. William Jeanes wrote: “His work has a deja vu quality that may make you say to yourself, ‘I’ve been there before.’ The places are real, the cars are real, and the details of his settings are painstakingly accurate. Yet the moments never actually happened. Or did they?”
“The conversation turned to the French Fleet, and Clementine said she hoped that its ships and crews would carry on the fight with us. De Gaulle curtly replied that what would really give the French Fleet satisfaction would be to turn their guns ‘On you!’ (meaning the British). Winston tried to mediate but Clementine interrupted him, and said in French: ‘No, Winston, it is because there are certain things that a woman can say to a man which a man cannot say, and I am saying them to you—General de Gaulle!’”
After this verbal fracas, the General was much upset, and apologised profusely, and later presented her with the Lalique.
Setting: A grand hall in Westminster. Tapestries hang from the walls, and the faint clink of goblets echoes through the air. Enter: Sir Winstonus Churchillius, goblet in hand. Lady Bessica Braddockia approaches, fanning herself dramatically. Lady Bessica: “Hail, Sir Winstonus, thou art returned, From feasting, drinking, or some sport absurd? Thy face is flushed, and eyes like moons do glow; Dost thou drown England’s cares in wine's deep flow?”
They may have slipped on a banana, but ChatGPT has only been at this for a few years. "Give them another half decade and they'll probably have picked up every word Churchill wrote." So, before we lazily laugh at the tech boffins' failure accurately to pinpoint the Great Man's every word, we might stop to consider: They are just getting started. As Churchill was wont to say on occasion: "Let not the slothful chortle."
Honor(u)red to be invited to join Lord Roberts, at Secrets of Statecraft. It was fun to chat with the author of the foremost one-volume life of Churchill, about where Sir Winston stands on his 150th birthday. We mutually concluded that he stands as tall as ever. Beyond that, we need to remember him because he spoke everlasting truths about the relations between peoples, about governance, about the value of liberty. Those are as relevant as ever today.
There’s a way to derive a mostly correct picture of the man from this show: ignore Part 1. The other three parts also suffer from occasional forays into fiction. But they are more accurate, with honest dialogue, well-chosen quotations and spectacular footage, much of it freshly colorized. Kudos to Andrew Roberts, Jon Meacham, Allen Packwood and Catherine Katz for keeping it on track, and to Lord Roberts for his eloquent finale.
As the last minutes of 1941 ticked away, Churchill’s special train was steaming south on New York Central's broad tracks along the Hudson. Appropriately close to Roosevelt’s home at Hyde Park, the Prime Minister called staff and reporters to the dining car. He entered the carriage amid cheers and applause, raising his glass to the company. “It was with no illusions,” he wrote, “that I wished them all a glorious New Year.... 'Here’s to 1942, here’s to a year of toil—a year of struggle and peril, and a long step forward towards victory. May we all come through safe and with honour.'"
