Frederick Lindemann Archives - Richard M. Langworth

“The Wilderness Years” with Robert Hardy: Original Review

7 November 2019 Comments 0 Comments

“Churchill: The Wilderness Years”

The Hillsdale College Churchill Project has just republished “Scaling Everest,” Robert Hardy’s recollections of playing the Wilderness Years Churchill. They are from 1987, his speech to one of our Churchill Tours, at the Reform Club, London. We are grateful to his executors, Justine Hardy and Neil Nisbet-Robertson for permission to reprint. For Part 1, click here.

I thought the occasion appropriate to republish my original review of the “Wilderness Years” from 1981, some years before we met. I thought at the time I had “laid an egg”—in Churchill’s phraseology, not RH’s.…

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On Time: Winston Churchill’s Pocket Watch and Wristwatch

24 May 2018 Comments 0 Comments

A wristwatch that the Commune de Vaud gave Churchill on 11 September 1946 was sold recently by Sotheby’s. Did he wear wristwatches? One almost always sees him with a pocket watch. —S.R., New Hampshire

From the 1890s until the end of his life Churchill carried his father’s pocket watch, nicknamed “The Turnip.” He did however sometimes wear a wristwatch, as the above photo shows. N.B.: This is a revised, extended version of a 2009 post, which I have left up for the comments by readers: click here.

Wristwatches

William Manchester wrote that the wristwatch was a ”product of trench warfare.”…

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Frederick Lindemann: Churchill’s Eminence Grise?

21 August 2017 Comments 6 Comments

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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Robert Hardy’s “Wilderness Years”

5 October 2015 Comments 3 Comments

5 October 2015: Turning 90 this month and as vivacious as ever, Timothy Robert Hardy spoke tonight on “My Life with Churchill” at a Hillsdale College Churchill seminar, attended by over 500 registrants and 200 students, sponsored by Hillsdale’s Center for Constructive Alternatives. That afternoon I had the privilege to play Alistair Cooke, and introduce four excerpts from Tim’s inimitable portrayal in the documentary, “Winston Churchill: The Wilderness Years.” Here is the introduction to the first excerpt, which may be viewed on YouTube (first 12 minutes). All four excerpts will be published later by The Churchill Project for the Study of Statesmanship.…

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Churchill and Professor Lindemann, Lord Cherwell

4 May 2015 Comments 2 Comments

I reviewed the 1940-45 visitors books at Chequers. I was struck by how often Lord Cherwell (Frederick Lindemann) was there—far more than family and staff. He visited more than Bracken and Beaverbrook, or the Chiefs of Staff. What do you make of him? What’s best to read on him? —A.R., London

Most frequent visitor

After the death of the F.E. Smith, the first Lord Birkenhead, Frederick Lindemann, Lord Cherwell (1886-1957) was probably Churchill’s closest friend. His signature is also the most frequent in the visitors book at Chartwell, where it appears 86 times, more than anyone else (Brendan Bracken only 31, although visitors usually signed only when staying overnight, and Bracken frequently returned to London).…

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