Month: August 2017

Civil
Robert E. Lee on Traveller, by Frederick William Sievers, Gettysburg National Battlefield.
Civil War Memorials: What We Need to Remember

Civil War Memorials: What We Need to Remember

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Of Civil War…

“We think we are whol­ly supe­ri­or peo­ple,” said the Civ­il War his­to­ri­an Shel­by Foote. The 50th and 75th Anniver­saries of the Civ­il War Bat­tle of Get­tys­burg were poignant, inspir­ing moments. The words spo­ken of those occa­sions give cause to won­der. In the wel­ter of emo­tions, have we for­got­ten what we need to remember?

 

Footage of Civ­il War Vet­er­ans at 50yr Anniver­sary in 1913 & 75yr Anniver­sary in 1938
Watch this video on YouTube “We may be given to meet again…”

Shel­by Foote:

We think we are whol­ly supe­ri­or peo­ple. If we’d been any­thing like as supe­ri­or as we think we are, we’d nev­er have fought that Civ­il War.…

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Lindemann
Frederick Lindemann Viscount Cherwell (1886-1957), arriving for a Cabinet meeting, 1951. (Fred Ramage, history.net)
Frederick Lindemann: Churchill’s Eminence Grise?

Frederick Lindemann: Churchill’s Eminence Grise?

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Revi­sion­ist His­to­ry, Sea­son 2, Episode 5, “The Prime Min­is­ter and the Prof [ Fred­er­ick Lin­de­mann ],” pod­cast by Mal­colm Gladwell.

A pop­u­lar week­ly half hour pod­cast, Revi­sion­ist His­to­ry takes aim at shib­bo­leths, real and imag­ined. This episode is Churchill’s turn in the barrel.

Scientific Nemesis

The vil­lain, aside from Sir Win­ston, is his sci­en­tif­ic advis­er, Fred­er­ick Lin­de­mann,  lat­er Lord Cher­well, aka “The Prof.” You’ve prob­a­bly nev­er heard of him, says nar­ra­tor Mal­colm Glad­well. You should have. It was Lin­de­mann who made Churchill bomb inno­cent Ger­man civil­ians and starve the Bengalis.

Iron­i­cal­ly, the pro­gram begins with an ad for its spon­sor, Chanel Per­fume.…

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rhinoceros
Cover of the first edition MAJ, 1908.
Rhinoceros Table, Mr. Churchill? Thanks but No.

Rhinoceros Table, Mr. Churchill? Thanks but No.

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The Hills­dale Col­lege Churchill Project received a nov­el ques­tion: “After his 1908 African safari, Churchill’s  taxi­der­mists ask if he wants a ‘Rhi­noc­er­os Table.’ What in the world is a Rhi­noc­er­os Table?”

Rhinoceros Table, anyone? The ref­er­ence is in The Churchill Doc­u­ments, vol. 4, Min­is­ter of the Crown, 1907-1911 (2007), page 753:

Row­land Ward Ltd., 167 Pic­cadil­ly, to WSC, 4 March 1908

Sir, In accor­dance with instruc­tions giv­en on your behalf by Lieu­tenant Colonel Gor­don Wil­son, we have in hand the fol­low­ing: MODELLED HEADS 1 Rhi­noc­er­os, 1 Zebra, 1 Warthog, 1 Wilde­beest, 1 Coke’s Har­te­beest, 1 Grant’s Gazelle, 1 Thomson’s Gazelle and the dress­ing of three Zebra skins, at a total cost of £​32.…

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quotations
Holding forth in Parliament, 1912. (Illustrated London News)
How Would Churchill Tweet? -National Review

How Would Churchill Tweet? -National Review

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“How Would Churchill Tweet?” appeared in Nation­al Review, 12 August 2017.

Since Pres­i­dent Trump has tak­en office, the pub­lic has quick­ly learned to get its polit­i­cal news from a nov­el source—namely, the President’s Twit­ter account.

The move to this plat­form rep­re­sents a shift in the nature of pol­i­tics, both for good and for ill. Trump might be among the first polit­i­cal lead­ers to use this medi­um to attack oppo­nents or make major announce­ments. He is cer­tain­ly not the first to uti­lize the kind of brevi­ty the plat­form requires to make his points.

Such brevi­ty also char­ac­ter­ized the rhetor­i­cal style of Win­ston Churchill, whose wit, humor and insight com­ple­ment­ed his deci­sive and effec­tive polit­i­cal lead­er­ship.…

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movies
Well-cast leads in “Churchill: The Wilderness Years” (1981). L-R: Edward Woodward (Sir Samuel Hoare), Peter Vaughan (Sir Thomas Inskip), Robert Hardy (Winston Churchill), Eric Porter (Neville Chamberlain), Peter Barkworth (Stanley Baldwin).
Churchill Bio-Pics: The Trouble with the Movies

Churchill Bio-Pics: The Trouble with the Movies

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“The Trou­ble with the Movies” was pub­lished in the Amer­i­can Thinker, 5 August 2017.

David Fran­co, review­ing the film Churchill, star­ring Bri­an Cox, rais­es ques­tions he says every­one should be ask­ing. “Isn’t the abil­i­ty to accept one’s mis­takes part of what makes a man a good leader? …. To what extent should we rely [on] past expe­ri­ences in order to min­i­mize mis­takes in the future? These are the ques­tions that make a bad movie like Churchill worth seeing.”

Well, I won’t be see­ing this bad movie. Described as “per­verse fan­ta­sy” by his­to­ri­an Andrew Roberts, it joins a recent spate of slop­py Churchill bio-pics that favor skewed car­i­ca­tures over his­tor­i­cal fact.…

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Hudson
Could this have been the revolutionary 1948 Hudson? Yes and no.
Should this have been the “Step-down” Hudson?

Should this have been the “Step-down” Hudson?

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Read­er Brent Hinde writes about my Hud­son book, The Clas­sic Post­war Years (1977, reprint­ed 1993). Very kind of him, since it’s the first men­tion of that book in decades.

Recent­ly at an estate sale I picked up the book and found it an excel­lent read. On page 38 is a ter­rif­ic sketch of a car that should have been built, rather than the design man­age­ment chose. My ques­tion is: Who drew that sketch? Are there more draw­ings like that in exis­tence? It would make a great guide for a project car.

Hudson’s styling team

The draw­ing (top) shows a crisper shape than the pro­duc­tion 1948 Hud­son.…

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Nolan
Dunkirk 2017: avoiding computer imaging made it hard to convey the real dimensions of the operation (see photo below).
Nolan’s Dunkirk: “Don’t Let’s Be Beastly to the Germans”

Nolan’s Dunkirk: “Don’t Let’s Be Beastly to the Germans”

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(Reviewed for the Hills­dale Col­lege Churchill Project.) Dunkirk, pro­duced by Christo­pher Nolan, sets out to por­tray the 1940 res­cue of the Allied armies from the clutch­es of Hitler’s Wehrma­cht in terms of courage, hero­ism, sur­vival, and a few exam­ples of cow­ardice. In that he suc­ceeds admirably. In terms of context—in con­vey­ing an under­stand­ing of what Dunkirk was about—he fails utterly.

Drama Sans Meaning

Mr. Nolan says con­text wasn’t the aim. Dunkirk is about com­mu­nal togeth­er­ness and uni­ver­sal good­ness. But that could be shown on any beach in any war in the last hun­dred years from Gal­lipoli to Nor­mandy to Inchon.…

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Tim
Moment of Triumph: Robert Hardy / Winston Churchill returns to the Admiralty, 1939.
“Tim”: In Memory of Timothy Robert Hardy, 1925-2017

“Tim”: In Memory of Timothy Robert Hardy, 1925-2017

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 “What Price Churchill?” Click here for the final moments of a momen­tous tele­vi­sion epic. “Churchill: The Wilder­ness Years” (1981) enshrined him for­ev­er as the great­est of “Churchills” in a sea of pale imi­ta­tions. Mar­tin Gilbert‘s close involve­ment with the scriptwrit­ers gave him truth and sub­stance. In a world of revi­sion­ist his­to­ry, flawed por­traits and over­played roles, it was accu­rate to a fault. Tim­o­thy Robert Hardy was the only actor to play her father for whom Lady Soames would brook no word of crit­i­cism. I’ll always remem­ber her greet­ing Tim with out­stretched arms: “Papa!”

Hardy at Hillsdale

I’m glad we were in time.…

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Indian
Indian infantrymen of the 7th Rajput Regiment on the Arakan front in Burma, 1944. (Wikimedia Commons)
Amnesia or Fantasy? The Indian Contribution in the Second World War

Amnesia or Fantasy? The Indian Contribution in the Second World War

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"The glorious heroism and martial qualities of the Indian troops...shine for ever in the annals of war…. Nearly three million Indians volunteered to serve, and by 1942 an Indian Army of one million was in being, and volunteers were coming in at the monthly rate of fifty thousand…. The response of the Indian peoples, no less than the conduct of their soldiers, makes a glorious final page in the story of our Indian Empire." Churchill

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RML Books

Richard Langworth’s Most Popular Books & eBooks


Winston Churchill, Myth and Reality

Churchill by Himself

Churchill in His Own Words

Churchill and the Avoidable War

The Definitive Wit of Winston Churchill

The Patriot’s Churchill

Triumph Cars - The Complete Story
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