Tag: Fitzroy Maclean

Present at the Creation: Randolph Churchill and the Official Biography (1)

Present at the Creation: Randolph Churchill and the Official Biography (1)

“Ran­dolph Churchill: Present at the Cre­ation,” is tak­en from a lec­ture aboard the Regent Sev­en Seas Explor­er on the 2019 Hills­dale Col­lege Cruise around Britain, 8 June 2019.

Most every­body has an inkling of who Win­ston Churchill was. But how many know of his son Ran­dolph? How many British school­child­ren do you think have heard of him? Do they know that Arthur Conan Doyle cre­at­ed Sher­lock Holmes, who some think was a real per­son? They should, Sir Arthur was a great writer. Like Ran­dolph Churchill, who found­ed the longest biog­ra­phy ever writ­ten. In the words of Dean Ache­son, he was “present at the creation.”…

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Fitzroy Maclean: Wit & Wisdom

Fitzroy Maclean: Wit & Wisdom

Sir Fitzroy Maclean was a swash­buck­ling adven­tur­er, sol­dier, writer and politi­cian. In World War II he was Churchill’s rep­re­sen­ta­tive to Tito, who led Yugoslav Par­ti­sans against the Ger­mans. One of my great priv­i­leges was know­ing him and Lady Veron­i­ca, and hear­ing their cap­ti­vat­ing recollections.

Proof­ing gal­leys for Win­ston S. Churchill: Doc­u­ment Vol­ume 20, May-Decem­ber 1944, the Hills­dale Col­lege Churchill Project comes across many gems. Not least of these was Maclean’s account of Churchill’s first meet­ing with Tito—and a minor adven­ture in Bay of Naples in August 1944.

Maclean on Tito:

I found him to be a tough, alert man of about fifty, at the head of a far more for­mi­da­ble resis­tance move­ment than any­one out­side Yugoslavia could pos­si­bly have imag­ined….…

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