“We've all heard that a million monkeys banging on typewriters will eventually produce THE ENTIRE WORKS OF SHAKESPEARE. Now, thanks to the Internet, we know this is not true.” ―Robert Wilensky
Churchilliana: Return to Glory for an Icon or Two (Update)
(Updated from 2016). Home to Secretaries of State for War Lord Haldane, Lord Kitchener, David Lloyd George and Winston Churchill, it was a key venue in two global conflicts. But in 2016 the old War Office building was sold to developers of a five-star hotel and residential apartments. That work is expected to finish in 2022, and residents are being sought.
Built in 1906 for £1.2, million, the Grade II-listed property changed hands for £300 million. The buyers were the Hinduja Group, in partnership with a Obrascon Huarte Lain Desarrollos (OHLD), a Spanish industrial company.…
I have been told that Churchill arrived late for a meeting with HM The Queen, expressing his regret by saying, “My sincere apologies Madam, I started too late.” But I haven’t found any reference to this. Can you help? —A.P.H., England
A: His perennial vice
Churchill had somewhat cured his unpunctuality in later years, when as prime minister he commanded prompt transportation. He was not known to be late for Queen Elizabeth II. But his unpunctuality was known to have displeased the Prince of Wales, later Edward VII (1901-10). And here is the source of your story.…
Excerpted from “Creating Jordan with the Stroke of a Pen on a Sunday Afternoon,” Hillsdale College Churchill Project, August 2021.
Q: On creating Transjordan
What is the veracity of this alleged quote by Churchill, which has many versions? “In his later years, he liked to boast that in 1921 he created Transjordan (6/7ths of the British Palestine Mandate, today’s Kingdom of Jordan, ‘with the stroke of a pen, one Sunday afternoon in Cairo.’” The source cited by The New York Times is “Borderlines and Borderlands: Political Oddities at the Edge of the Nation-State,” edited by Alexander C.…
N.B. “Be Ye Men of Valour” is from the original Appendix IV in my book Churchill By Himself. It was deleted in the later edition, Churchill in His Own Words, to make room for an index of phrases. Concluded from Part 2…
From the Book of Maccabees
On 19 May 1940, Churchill made his first broadcast as Prime Minister, a speech which lifted the hearts even of former critics:
A tremendous battle is raging in France and Flanders. The Germans, by a remarkable combination of air bombing and heavily armoured tanks, have broken through the French defences north of the Maginot Line, and strong columns of their armoured vehicles are ravaging the open country, which for the first day or two was without defenders.…
N.B. “A House of Many Mansions” is from the original Appendix IV in my book Churchill By Himself. It was deleted in the later edition, Churchill in His Own Words, to make room for an index of phrases. Continued from Part 1…
“A house of many mansions”
The New Testament Gospel according to St. John, Chapter 14, contains an inspiring passage that Winston Churchill absorbed as a boy:
1. Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me. 2. In my Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you.…
N.B.”The Biblical Churchill” was the original Appendix IV in my book Churchill By Himself. It was deleted in the later edition, Churchill in His Own Words, to make room for an index of phrases.
Churchill’s Biblical storehouse
“In my Father’s house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you.” —St. John 14:2 [1]
We have often said of our own British Empire: “In my Father’s house there are many mansions.” So in this far greater world structure, which we shall surely raise out of the ruins of desolating war, there will be room for all generous, free associations of a special character, so long as they are not disloyal to the world cause nor seek to bar the forward march of mankind.…
When did Churchill first read Mein Kampf, and did he have any early reaction to it?” Of Mein Kampf in his war memoirs, he wroe:
…there was no book which deserved more careful study from the rulers, political and military, of the Allied Powers. All was there—the programme of German resurrection, the technique of party propaganda; the plan for combating Marxism; the concept of a National-Socialist State; the rightful position of Germany at the summit of the world. Here was the new Koran of faith and war: turgid, verbose, shapeless, but pregnant with its message.[1]…
“Churchill on South Africa Prison Camps”: excerpted from my essay for the Hillsdale College Churchill Project. For the unabridged original, together with endnotes, and WSC’s complete letter to The Times, click here.
1. Same old, same old…
An Indian colleague writes:
I’ve noticed that the same accusations about Churchill repeated frequently. Many writers seem to recycle them on trust. Take for example a new anti-Churchill article which I think needs a thorough debunking. In fairness to the author, it is not all bad; she concedes for instance that Churchill wanted to use tear gas in Iraq, not poison gas.…
The London Daily Telegraph is sponsoring a series of podcasts featuring conversations with historians about attacks on national heroes. On September 1st, Steve Edginton engaged with Churchill biographer Andrew Roberts on the Woke Movement’s number one bogeyman: Winston Spencer Churchill….
Winston Churchill is the man who saved not only Britain but the world from Nazi tyranny. But to some, Churchill represents the evils of the British Empire: racism, colonization and violence.…
