Category: Quotations

future
Artwork from the cover of “Reflexions et Aventures,” the 1939 first French edition of “Thoughts and Adventures.” (Composite by Barbara Langworth)
How Churchill Saw the Future: Prescient Essays, 1924-1931

How Churchill Saw the Future: Prescient Essays, 1924-1931

"While men are gathering knowledge and power with ever-increasing and measureless speed, their virtues and their wisdom have not shown any notable improvement as the centuries have rolled. The brain of modern man does not differ in essentials from that of the human beings who fought and loved here millions of years ago. The nature of man has remained hitherto practically unchanged. Under sufficient stress—starvation, terror, warlike passion, or even cold intellectual frenzy—the modern man we know so well will do the most terrible deeds...." —WSC

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Dream
“The Dream,” 1947. Painting by Sal Asaro (www.salasaro.com)
Introduction to “The Dream”: Churchill’s Haunting Short Story

Introduction to “The Dream”: Churchill’s Haunting Short Story

The Dream is repub­lished (from Nev­er Despair 1945-1965, Vol­ume 8 of the offi­cial biog­ra­phy) by the Hills­dale Col­lege Churchill Project. To read it in its entire­ty, click here.

The Dream…

… is the most mys­te­ri­ous and ethe­re­al sto­ry Win­ston Churchill ever wrote. Yet the more we know about him, the bet­ter we may under­stand how he came to write it.

Replete with broad-sweep Churchillian nar­ra­tive, The Dream con­tains many ref­er­ences to now-obscure peo­ple, places and things. The new online ver­sion pub­lished by Hills­dale pro­vides links to all of them. You need only click on any unfa­mil­iar name or term for links to online ref­er­ences.…

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tributes
The Lying-in-State, Westminster Hall, January 1965. (ITV)
Tributes to Churchill: What They Said Back Then

Tributes to Churchill: What They Said Back Then

A col­league asks if there were any offi­cial trib­utes by the gov­ern­ment of India fol­low­ing Churchill’s death in Jan­u­ary 1965. He was curi­ous to know if Indi­an atti­tudes half a cen­tu­ry ago were as vir­u­lent as they are in some quar­ters today.

There were indeed trib­utes from India. Hei­di Egger­ton of the Churchill Archives Cen­tre pro­vid­ed this cov­er­age in The Times of 25 Jan­u­ary 1965, page 8, under the heading:

“Leader with Magic Personality”

DELHI, 24 JANUARY 1965— The Indi­an tri­colour fly­ing on all pub­lic build­ings in prepa­ra­tion for Repub­lic Day on Tues­day, was low­ered to half-mast today….…

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Schama
Photograph by Walter Stoneman, 1940.
“Unswerving Moral Decency”: Churchill Remembered by Simon Schama

“Unswerving Moral Decency”: Churchill Remembered by Simon Schama

At a time when Churchill is under vio­lent and irra­tional attack, it is time for a ton­ic. One good anti­dote to it all  is an elo­quent essay by Simon Schama.

Years ago the Colum­bia his­to­ri­an reviewed, for The New Repub­lic, Mar­tin Gilbert‘s offi­cial biog­ra­phy Vol­ume VI, Finest Hour 1939-1941. It was, inci­den­tal­ly a fine trib­ute to Sir Mar­tin, whose epic biog­ra­phy Pro­fes­sor Schama chris­tened “The Churchilliad.”

What we should con­sid­er right now, though, are Schama’s ever­green words about Churchill. Mar­tin Gilbert’s vol­ume VI reach­es its apogee in May 1940—the very time com­mem­o­rat­ed by the movie Dark­est Hour.…

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Indians
Women queuing for rice during the Bengal Famine, Lake Market, Calcutta, 1943 (South Magazine).
Indians Again: No Oscars for Movies about War Criminals

Indians Again: No Oscars for Movies about War Criminals

"But all this is only the background upon which the glorious heroism and martial qualities of the Indian troops who fought in the Middle East, who defended Egypt, who liberated Abyssinia, who played a grand part in Italy, and who, side by side with their British comrades, expelled the Japanese from Burma…. The loyalty of the Indian Army to the King-Emperor, the proud fidelity to their treaties of the Indian Princes, the unsurpassed bravery of Indian soldiers and officers, both Moslem and Hindu, shine for ever in the annals of war…." -Churchill

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Baltic
“Here we stir the embers of the past and light the beacons of the future. Old flags are raised anew; the passions of vanished generations awake.” —Churchill, 1929. Riga Castle (1330), today home to the President of Latvia. (Foto.sanne.lv)
Churchill and the Baltic States: From WW2 to Liberation

Churchill and the Baltic States: From WW2 to Liberation

EXCERPT ONLY: For the com­plete text of “Churchill and the Baltic” with end­notes, please go to this page on the Hills­dale Col­lege Churchill Project.

“No doubt where the right lay”: 1940-95

Sovi­et Ambas­sador Ivan Maisky was a “Bollinger Bol­she­vik” who mixed sup­port for Com­mu­nism with a love of West­ern lux­u­ry. Friend­ly to Churchill, he knew the Eng­lish­man hoped to sep­a­rate Hitler and Stal­in, even after World War II had started.

But Maisky tend­ed to see what he wished to see. In Decem­ber he record­ed: “The British Gov­ern­ment announces its readi­ness to rec­og­nize ‘de fac­to’ the changes in the Baltics so as to set­tle ‘de jure’ the whole issue lat­er, prob­a­bly after the war.” There…

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Darkest
With the dockworkers, 1 August 1940. “I never gave them courage. I was able to focus theirs.”
Darkest Hour: Queries and Comments with “Total Film” Magazine

Darkest Hour: Queries and Comments with “Total Film” Magazine

Jane Crowther, edi­tor-in-chief of Britain’s Total Film mag­a­zine, had per­ti­nent ques­tions about the new film Dark­est Hour. They were for­ward­ed by Lady Gilbert from the web­site of offi­cial biog­ra­ph­er Sir Mar­tin Gilbert. Alas he is gone, but Sir Martin’s inspi­ra­tion con­tin­ues to guide every­one, as he said, “who labours in the Churchill vineyard.”

Q: Did Win­ston Churchill ever use pub­lic trans­port while PM, par­tic­u­lar­ly the tube?

​Not to my knowl­edge. His daugh­ter Lady Soames told me he only used the Under­ground once, and became so lost that he had to be res­cued.…

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Indian
Churchill harangues Halifax, London, 1938.
“I don’t want [my views] disturbed by any bloody Indian”: Was it Churchill?

“I don’t want [my views] disturbed by any bloody Indian”: Was it Churchill?

“I am quite sat­is­fied with my views of India. I don’t want them dis­turbed by any bloody Indi­an.” Thus Win­ston Churchill said (or is alleged to have said) to Lord Hal­i­fax née Lord Irwin née Edward Wood, in 1929.

“Bludgeon of choice”

A his­to­ri­an friend says the Indi­an Ben­gal Famine (1943) “is on its way to sur­pass­ing the Dar­d­anelles (1915) as the blud­geon of choice for Churchill’s detrac­tors.” He was com­ment­ing on the lat­est out­burst of Ben­gal Famine nonsense—contested by a thought­ful Indi­an, as well as myself: scroll to comments.

“Bloody Indi­an” tracks to Ben Pim­lott, edi­tor, The Sec­ond World War Diary of Hugh Dal­ton 1940-45 (Jonathan Cape 1986), 126.…

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Bracken
Holding forth, London, 1941: Bracken lectures Dutch diplomat Eelco van Kleffens. Charles de Gaulle, seemingly oblivious, chats with U.S. Ambassador to Holland Tony Biddle. (Wikimedia Commons)
Brendan Bracken: “Winston’s Faithful Chela”

Brendan Bracken: “Winston’s Faithful Chela”

“Stan­ley Bald­win, show­ing an unex­pect­ed famil­iar­i­ty with Indi­an phras­es, described Bren­dan Brack­en as ‘Winston’s faith­ful chela,‘ wrote the biog­ra­ph­er Charles Lysaght. “This is what gave Brack­en his place in his­to­ry, a minor but still an impor­tant one.”

The Hills­dale Col­lege Churchill Project has pub­lished two arti­cles on Bren­dan Brack­en, Churchill’s loy­al ally and friend for four decades. The first begins with a mem­oir by the late Ron Rob­bins, a Cana­di­an jour­nal­ist who ear­ly on cov­ered the House of Com­mons, where he met Brack­en. The post­script is by me, fol­lowed by reviews of the two Brack­en books by George Gale and A.J.P.…

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Trump
Kristin Scott Thomas and Gary Oldman in the film “Darkest Hour.” (Focus Features)
Mr. Stern, Mr. Trump, Churchill Quotes and Misquotes

Mr. Stern, Mr. Trump, Churchill Quotes and Misquotes

Novem­ber 27th— Writ­ing in the Dai­ly Beast, Mr. Mar­low Stern prais­es Kristin Scott Thomas (“Clemen­tine Churchill” in the new movie Dark­est Hour) and announces: “Don­ald Trump is No Win­ston Churchill.” (Past doubt, but who is?)

Mr. Stern him­self offers only one Churchill quote and gets it right: “A free press is the unsleep­ing guardian of every oth­er right that free men prize; it is the most dan­ger­ous foe of tyran­ny.” (Col­liers, 28 Decem­ber 1935.)

Bin­go! That’s an obscure one. For­give him for vast­ly exag­ger­at­ing Churchill’s alco­hol intake. (WSC’s “six whisky sodas” were described by his pri­vate sec­re­tary as “scotch-fla­vored mouth­wash.”…

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Winston Churchill, Myth and Reality

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