Tag: Iron Curtain Speech

Thatcher
Barbara Langworth with Lady Thatcher, Washington, 1993.
Margaret Thatcher 1923-2013: A Churchillian Remembrance

Margaret Thatcher 1923-2013: A Churchillian Remembrance

Margaret Thatcher: Excerpted from a tribute, 2013

Every­one is famil­iar with Mar­garet Thatcher’s career. Every­one depend­ing on their pol­i­tics will have their own vision. It is left to say here what she meant to the mem­o­ry of Win­ston Churchill, the prime min­is­ter she revered above all. More than any­one who lived at 10 Down­ing Street, she had real appre­ci­a­tion for him. She read his books, quot­ed him fre­quent­ly, even host­ed a din­ner for his fam­i­ly and sur­viv­ing mem­bers of his wartime coalition.

In 1993 she was in Wash­ing­ton to coin­cide with a Churchill Con­fer­ence host­ing 500 peo­ple, includ­ing 140 stu­dents, a dozen lumi­nar­ies, and ambas­sadors from Britain and the Com­mon­wealth.…

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Curtain
Clementine and Winston Churchill with Col. Frank Clarke, Miami Beach, 1946.
Churchill’s Prep for the “Iron Curtain” Speech 1946

Churchill’s Prep for the “Iron Curtain” Speech 1946

Q: Where did Churchill write the Iron Curtain address?

When we first moved to the Unit­ed States we bought a home in New Canaan, Con­necti­cut that had once been owned by Bernard Baruch and used has his get-away. We were told that, as he and Churchill were friends, Churchill had been invit­ed by Baruch to stay there and it was there he wrote his Iron Cur­tain speech. We were nev­er sure whether this was true or whether it was some­thing a local real estate agent had dreamed up. There was anoth­er house down the road where George Wash­ing­ton was said to have slept on his way through!…

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Wilson
Harold Wilson and Aneurin Bevan around the time of their resignation. (History Today)
Hillsdale’s Churchill Documents: Harold Wilson, 1951

Hillsdale’s Churchill Documents: Harold Wilson, 1951

“Two days ear­li­er I had been a Min­is­ter of the Crown, red box and all. Now I was reduced to the posi­tion of a mes­sen­ger between my wife and Win­ston Churchill, each of whom burst into tears on receipt of a mes­sage from the oth­er.” —Harold Wilson 

___________

The Hills­dale Col­lege Churchill Project is rapid­ly com­plet­ing final vol­umes of Win­ston S. Churchill, the offi­cial biog­ra­phy. (The name is some­what of a mis­nomer; no one has ever cen­sored any mate­r­i­al.) Suit­ably, all thir­ty-one vol­umes will be com­plete by June 2019: the 75th Anniver­sary of D-Day. It will be fifty-six years since Ran­dolph Churchill and his “Young Gen­tle­men” includ­ing Mar­tin Gilbert began their work.…

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poker
Around this table, Harry and Winston played poker, March 1946. Dining car of the “Ferdinand Magellan,” President Truman’s special railcar. (Wikimedia Commons)
Churchill, Truman and Poker on the Train to Fulton, March 1946

Churchill, Truman and Poker on the Train to Fulton, March 1946

How Harry fleeced Winston at poker, and the PM wished to be born again…

The Hills­dale Col­lege Churchill Project is clos­ing in on fin­ish­ing Win­ston S. Churchill, the offi­cial biog­ra­phy. At thir­ty-one vol­umes, it is the longest on record and will have tak­en fifty-six years to com­plete. It is an hon­or to be part of the team now review­ing proofs for the penul­ti­mate doc­u­ment (com­pan­ion) vol­ume. This runs from August 1945, after Churchill was turned out of office, through Sep­tem­ber 1951, when he was about to regain it. The last vol­ume (1951-65) will be pub­lished next year, with suit­able celebrations.…

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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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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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