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. Ambassador Sir Robin Renwick kindly hosted a reception for her and us at the British Embassy, inviting Colin Powell and Caspar Weinberger. Here I first caught sight of the famous leader, though my wife, a much better talker, spent more time chatting with her.

I did overhear a conversation between Lady Thatcher and General Powell, which at the time I thought singular. “Now Colin,” she was saying in her most powerful tones, “you must do it—you know you must. There is no getting around your duty.” I am told she was asking him to use his influence in solving the strife in Bosnia that had erupted the previous year.

Falklands reveries

She gave an eloquent little speech thanking America for supporting Britain in the 1982 Falklands War. The next evening at the Mayflower Hotel, I was seated next to former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Jeane Kirkpatrick. She wanted to know what Lady Thatcher had said.

Unknowing, I repeated her words: “Many voices in America were opposed to helping Britain. But Cap Weinberger was not one of those voices.”

There was a pause. Then Mrs. Kirkpatrick said quietly: “I was one of those voices.”

Realizing my gaffe, but opting for Napoleon’s “l’audace, toujours l’audace,” I screwed up my courage and replied: “But you were wrong, weren’t you?”

An even long pause ensued, bringing to mind Churchill’s remark: “It certainly seemed longer than the two minutes which one observes in the commemorations of Armistice Day.”

Finally Ambassador Kirkpatrick kindly said: “Yes, on reflection, I probably was.” I think this showed the power of personality that Margaret Thatcher exerted, even on those who had disagreed with her.

Lady Thatcher and The Dream

At the Embassy I presented her with a finely bound copy of Churchill’s 1947 short story, The Dream. Therein he tells the ghost of his father all that happened since Lord Randolph Churchill died in 1895. At one point, Winston says there are now women in the House of Commons. “Not many,” he assures his flabbergasted papa. “They have found their level.”

Lady Thatcher wrote me that she stayed up all that night reading the story. Later she remarked, “I roared at that one.”

“He’s with me.”

We met again at Fulton in 1996, when the National Churchill Museum marked the 50th anniversary of the “Iron Curtain” speech. They invited Lady Thatcher to give the address. Afterwards, she was surrounded by Fulton people—and by heavy security.

Celia Sandys asked, “Have you been ushered into The Presence?” No, I said. “Follow me,” she replied, approaching the guard at the inner sanctum: “I am Sir Winston Churchill’s granddaughter—and he’s with me.” We were allowed in to say hello.

Payback: at dinner that night, our generous hosts inducted two new Fellows of the Churchill Memorial. One was Margaret Thatcher. The other was me.

To my relief, they presented my gong first, which gave me a chance to say thanks and get out of the way:

“To receive this at the same time with the greatest prime minister since Winston Churchill is a unique experience.” I said that looking directly at the great lady….who gave me a benignant wink.

The debt we owe

It was years before the gratitude due to her was toted up. As a regular visitor in those years, I could not help but notice the palpable improvement in the lot of Britons. Anyone who saw her in Parliament witnessed her devastating effectiveness in debate.

No one who admires principle and courage could help but admire her devotion to them, win or lose. The poll tax issue some say was her downfall in 1992 manifested her principle that the cost of local government should be paid by all, including those who previously paid nothing, while voting for everything.

Internationally, she was always out front. Her reaction to tyrants, from Leopoldo Galtieri to Saddam Hussein, was consistent. She was the first to say “we can do business” with Gorbachev. More than talk, her support of the Anglo-American alliance was an article of faith.

Her relationship with President Reagan was a model we may never see again. Yet when she disagreed, as over Grenada or Strategic Defense, there was no doubt where she stood. She fought the good fight and made a huge difference, for a time.

I fear betimes that her era is past, lost in a collectivist and globalist dream. Be that as it may, I have no hesitation in paraphrasing Sir Winston’s words about Roosevelt. She was the greatest British friend we have known since Churchill, and one of the greatest champions of freedom who ever brought help and comfort from the old world to the new.

Further reading

“Margaret Thatcher and Winston Churchill: Two Meetings,” 2023.

“Thatcher to Congress, 1985: Worth Remembering,” 2016.

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! —M.A.

A: Frank Clarke’s in Miami Beach

Churchill did not visit Baruch in New Canaan before the Iron Curtain speech (Fulton, Missouri, 6 March). Indeed I can find no record of his ever being there. Baruch often hosted him at his Fifth Avenue apartment in New York City, and at Hobcaw Barony, his South Carolina estate, but not, it seems, New Canaan.

Except for a week’s side-trip to Cuba, Churchill’s prep for the Iron Curtain speech was done at 5905 North Bay Road in Miami Beach. It was then the home of Col. Frank Clarke, the Canadian wood pulp magnate. Clarke had hosted him at Lake of the Woods after the 1943 Quebec Conference.

I’m obliged to you for the question, though, because it put me on to a Churchill press conference I hadn’t noticed. It occurred in New York after he and Clementine arrived on the Queen Elizabeth, 14 January. I really had to write it down. His press conferences were rare, but always fun. From a book worth having: Robert Pilpel, Churchill in America 1895-1961……

At 9:30 P.M. Winston and Clementine descended the gang-plank to the sounds of cheers and applause. Churchill flashed the V sign and remarked, “I thank you for this very private reception.” He and his wife were then ushered into a large heated waiting room, and a proper press conference began:

New York Press Conference

Q. Are you available for any syndicate offers?

A. I am always prepared to accept any offer.

Q. Will you comment on the socialist program of the Labour Party?

A. I never criticize the government of my country abroad. I very rarely leave off criticizing it at home.

Q. Do you expect to eat much in America?

A. After rationing I hope to make up for lost time; I cannot say for lost weight.

Q. What is your reaction to the British White Paper fixing a quota for Jewish immigration into Palestine?

A. I am opposed to it. As you know, I am a Zionist from the very beginning of this great experiment.

Q. What is your reaction to the fact that you will be living in Florida near Al Capone?

A. Oh, you refer to the former distinguished resident of Chicago. I had not addressed myself to the problem.

Q. Are you taking a train tonight?

A. I am leaving on a train which is going out.

All Ready on the Firing Line

“And indeed he was.” Robert Pilpel continues. “He posed for a last few photographs and then announced cheerfully, ‘I’m off for Alabam’ – or thereabouts.’ He went directly to Pennsylvania Station. Next stop: Miami Beach via the Seaboard Coast Line.

The Iron Curtain speech had been long in his mind. But he drafted the text, vetted wisely by his wife, at Clarke’s. The Iron Curtain draft complete, the Churchills left Miami Beach on March 1st. Again the used a Pullman sleeper, now bound for Washington. Ahead lay another train ride with President Truman, and the historic events that followed.

___________

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. Coinciding is a Hillsdale College cruise around Britain. A fitting climacteric.

After World War II,  The Churchill Documents offer testimony to Churchill’s vast preoccupations. Volume 22 (August 1945-October 1951, due late 2018) brings the stark realization of a new threat to liberty. Urgent messages flew across the ether between Washington, London, Ottawa, Paris. Speeches were made, partisans quarreled, editorials raged. There were communist incursions in the Balkans. The Red Army stalled on removing its troops from Iran. There was Churchill’s “Iron Curtain” speech at Fulton, a coup in Czechoslovakia. The Berlin Airlift was won, China was lost. War broke out in Korea.

These critical papers, amassed  by Sir Martin, represent every day of Churchill’s life. Woven between the weighty issues are lighter interludes. Documents of small importance—except to Churchill, his family, his colleagues, scholars. They round out our picture of a the man in a unique and personal way.

One of these was written by a Labour Member of Parliament. He became Lord Wilson of Rievaulx, KG OBE PC FRS (1916-1995).  He served thirty-three years in the Commons. His first cabinet position was the same as Churchill’s: President of the Board of Trade. By canny electioneering, he became prime minister in 1964-70 and 1970-76.

Wilson fancied himself part of the “soft left.” No one could ask for a more partisan advocate. And yet there was this deep collegial respect between him and the veteran Leader of the Opposition, Mr. Churchill.

Early on Wilson supported socialist firebrand Aneurin Bevan, founder of the National Health Service. But in April 1951, the Labour government introduced NHS medical charges to meet the financial demands of the Korean War. In protest, Wilson, Bevan and John Freeman resigned from the government. Churchill, leading the opposition and smelling an election, trumpeted the split. Privately, however, there was this interlude. I post it as bait, for there is much more like it to come in The Churchill Documents. Order them today.

Harold Wilson: Recollection

(A Prime Minister on Prime Ministers, pages 267-68)

Winston Churchill was, above all things, a Parliamentarian. He loved the House, he had dominated it over the years. In its most degenerate days it had refused to listen to his warnings and had treated him with disdain and hostility. His loyalty to Parliament, and his obeisance to the courtesies of an almost forgotten age, caused him to take personal initiatives which the world of today might find it hard to understand.

When Aneurin Bevan and I resigned from the Attlee Government in April 1951, because we could not accept the unrealistic arms policy forced on the Government—and in Bevan’s case its consequences for the National Health Service—Winston came up to us. He expressed sympathy with us: we were facing a situation which had been much familiar to him, though, as he pointed out, we would never be obsecrated as he had been. We had gone out with honour, but, he added with a twinkle in his eye, he and his party would make the most of the situation which resulted.

* * *

That evening Brendan Bracken sought me out. He had been charged, he said, “by the greatest living statesman, for that is what Mr. Churchill is,” to give me a message to convey to my wife. First, Mr. Churchill wanted me to know, he had been “presented” to my wife, otherwise he would not presume to send her a message. The message was that whereas I, as an experienced politician, had taken a step of which he felt free to take such party advantage as was appropriate, his concern was with my wife, an innocent party in these affairs, who would undoubtedly suffer in consequence.

He recalled the number of occasions his wife had suffered as a result of his own political decisions. Would I therefore convey to her his personal sympathy and understanding? Thanking Bracken, I went home about 1 am…. I conveyed the message, which was greeted with gratitude and tears. I was enjoined to express her personal thanks. On leaving home the next morning I was again enjoined to see “the old boy” and make sure I delivered the message.

* * *

In the early evening I saw Winston in the smoke-room. I went up to him and told him I had a message from my wife…. I expressed her thanks. Immediately—and with Winston this was not a rare event—tears flooded down his face, as he expatiated on the way that wives had to suffer for their husbands’ political actions, going on to recall a number of instances over a long life.

When I reached home it was 2 am, but she was awake. I was asked if I had seen the old boy and thanked him. I had, and recounted the interview. She burst into tears, and I was moved to say that whereas 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 her and Winston Churchill, each of whom burst into tears on receipt of a message from the other. Of such is the essence of Parliament, or at least of bygone Parliaments, But this was the essential Winston Churchill.

Days past

What must strike the reader is this sheer affection between the idealistic socialist and dominant Tory. Would President Trump offer condolences if Senator Schumer resigned? Will Adam Schiff when Paul Ryan leaves as Speaker of the House? Yet as recently as 1981, Tip O’Neill prayed by the bedside of a stricken Ronald Reagan. Politics have changed. Not for the better.

Of course, Churchill was quick to assure Wilson he would take political advantage. And he did. As The Churchill Documents report, he was soon hard at it. Wilson and his colleagues had “rendered a public service,” he said, “by exposing to Parliament the scandalous want of foresight in buying the raw materials upon which our vital rearmament programme depends.”

“Of such is the essence of Parliament,” Harold Wilson mused, “or at least of bygone Parliaments.” And not just Parliaments.

* * *

In his book Lord Wilson also reprised what he said in 1965 after Churchill death. Naturally he remembered that kind action fourteen years before. Politicians today might ponder his sentiments:

For now the noise of hooves thundering across the veldt; the clamour of the hustings in a score of contests; the shots in Sydney Street, the angry guns of Gallipoli, Flanders, Coronel and the Falkland Islands; the sullen feet of marching men in Tonypandy; the urgent warnings of the Nazi threat; the whine of the sirens and the dawn bombardment of the Normandy beaches; all these now are silent. There is a stillness. And in that stillness, echoes and memories.

To each whose life has been touched by Winston Churchill, to each his memory…. Each one of us recalls some little incident—many of us, as in my own case, a kind action, graced with the courtesy of a past generation and going far beyond the normal calls of Parliamentary comradeship. Each of us has his own memory, for in the tumultuous diapason of a world’s tributes, all of us here at least know the epitaph he would have chosen for himself: “He was a good House of Commons man.”

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.

One of the joys of this work is the vast trove of hitherto undiscovered (or at least obscure) facts it provides. Take the 1945-51 volume, for example. One has no concept of the extent and collegial communication, after the July 1945 election, between Churchill and Clement Attlee. Labour had routed the Conservatives. Churchill was embittered over his dismissal, and conventional wisdom is that they were at daggers-drawn. Not so. Churchill and Attlee went out of their way to communicate. Even when they disagreed on issues, they respectfully wrote and met with each other. That was indeed a different age.

Above all, they tried to maintain a united front in British foreign policy as the Cold War accelerated. Churchill’s alleged cracks about Attlee— “an empty taxi arrived and Clem got out”; a “sheep in sheep’s clothing”—are apocryphal. Churchill made only one remark at Attlee’s expense. It was in private, and it is in this volume. It occurred as he and President Truman rode to Fulton for the “Iron Curtain” speech  aboard the Ferdinand Magellan, “U.S. Railcar No. 1.”

All Aboard!

This volume exhaustively covers Churchill’s invitation to speak at Fulton, Truman’s support for it, Churchill’s visit to America, and every aspect of the event down to who was assigned to which car on the Presidential train. One was Clark Clifford who worked for Democrat presidents from Truman to Carter and served briefly as Lyndon Johnson‘s Secretary of Defense. Aged only forty in 1946, he was White House counsel to the President. His recollections were published in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Before he died he sent them to me with permission to use for any educational purpose. They are among the few additions I could offer to this volume, so masterfully assembled by Martin Gilbert and Hillsdale’s Churchill fellows. It is in Clifford’s recollection that Churchill committed a momentary lapse in his usual respectful references to Attlee.

The Magellan, Clifford wrote:

had an observation platform on the back and it was equipped so that in the rear portion you walked into a very attractive living room, furnished as you might furnish a men’s club. There was a series of closed-in staterooms with separate baths, and at the other end of the car, there was a dining room and what the Navy would call a galley. So those two lived on that car and the rest of us lived on the car in front, which was a standard Pullman. The reason they went by train was to give Churchill and Truman an ample opportunity to talk. Mr. Truman wanted the opportunity to visit with Churchill, and Churchill, who had been very close to Franklin Roosevelt, felt he had no relationship with Truman and wanted to develop one.

* * *

We left Washington around noon, and we all sat down in the living room. Mr. Churchill said, “Mr. President, we’re going to be together now for a week or so. I would like to dispense with formality, and to have the privilege of calling you Harry.” And Truman said, “Mr. Churchill, I would be honored if you would call me Harry.”

Then Mr. Churchill said, “Well, if I am going to call you Harry, then you must call me Winston.” Mr. Truman, as you know, was a very modest fellow, so he said, “That would be very difficult for me to do, Mr. Churchill. I have such a high regard and enormous respect for you.” But Churchill said, “You must do it, or I can’t call you Harry.” And Mr. Truman said, “All right, then. It’s Harry and Winston.”

The next thing Truman said was, “About six weeks ago, Clement Attlee came over to see me.” There was a very chill silence. Then Churchill said, “There is less there than meets the eye.” Mr. Truman, knowing that he’d kind of put his foot in it, just bravely felt he had to go on. So he said. “Well, he seems to be a very modest fellow.” “Yes,” Churchill said, “He has much to be modest about.”

“If I were to be born again…”

It was “a great deal of fun,” Clifford continued, because “Churchill punctuated the conversation with philosophical musings.” He remembered only one, but in Harry Truman’s vernacular, it was a humdinger. Until Mr. Clifford’s testimony, it was hard to believe Churchill said it:

One evening, we stayed up late. Everybody else went to bed, and [Truman Press Secretary] Charlie Ross and I stayed up and talked to him afterwards. He was kind of mellow by that time. He had the reputation of being a fairly formidable drinker, and I think I know the reason why. It was because he always had a scotch highball in front of him, but he would nurse the highball, and it would take him about an hour and a half to drink it. I did not find him to be a heavy drinker at all.

This evening, he said, “If I were to be born again, I would wish to be born in the United States. At one time it was said that the sun never sets on the British Empire. Those days are gone. The United States has the natural resources; they have an energetic, resilient people. The United States is the hope of the future. Even though I deplore some of your customs. You stop drinking with your meals.”

* * *

For the archetypal Englishman, with such reverence for his country, this seems astonishing. And yet as you think about it, it becomes easier to believe. Britain after two world wars was exhausted and broke. Churchill knew it—knew it first hand. His documents are full of his depression over Britain’s plight. Yet he had this overwhelming respect and faith in what he always called “my mother’s land.” He saw in “the Great Republic” the hope of the world.

Poker

Without leaking the full contents of the Clifford document, I can’t resist some of the poker bits. The story is redolent of Churchill and Truman humor, their ripening friendship as the train rumbled on. Clark Clifford continues:

Churchill said, “Harry, I’ve read in the press over a period of years that you play poker.” And Truman said, “Yes, I guess I’ve played poker for a good many years, Winston.” Then Churchill proudly said, “Well, I first learned to play poker in the Boer War. I love the game.” Well, my God, that was very impressive; none of us could remember when the hell the Boer War was.

* * *

We played dealer’s choice: stud, draw, seven-card stud and high-low, which is a great gambling game because it keeps everybody in the pot. Well, we played about an hour and a half, and Mr. Churchill excused himself to go to the men’s room. And the President looked over to his staff and counsellors and said, “Men, Mr. Churchill has lost $850. Now, remember, he is our guest. We certainly are not treating him very well.”

Charlie Ross spoke up, and said, “Boss, you can’t have it both ways. Which do you want us to do, play poker or carry this fellow along?”

The President said, “Boys, I want Mr. Churchill to have a good time. I recognize the standards of poker as played in Great Britain aren’t nearly up to the standards in the United States. But I want him to have a lovely time.”

So he was nursed along, and he won some wonderful big pots. I saw some people drop out with three aces, and he’d win with a pair of kings. He had a marvelous time, and yet he couldn’t go back and say he’d beaten this group playing poker. When the last game was over he’d lost about $80.

The occasion was the opportunity of a lifetime. Here we were, encapsulated in this railroad car, having meals during the day and the poker at night. I don’t know anybody else who had the opportunity of spending that kind of time with Mr. Churchill.

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…. Ever since he was stricken, Sir Winston has been remembered here far less for what Mr. Krishna Menon today called “his belligerent days against Indian nationalism” than for his long association with India and his regard and respect for India. President Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan said in a message to The Queen:

It is with profound sorrow that the Government and people of India have learnt of the passing away of the Rt. Hon. Sir Winston Churchill, greatest Englishman we have known. The magic of his personality and his mastery of words renewed faith in freedom in most difficult areas of the Second World War. He left his imprint on the face of Europe and the world. His unforgettable services will be cherished for centuries. I convey to Your Majesty, the British Government and people, our deepest sympathy in your great loss. It must be some comfort for you to know that your grief is shared by millions all over the world.

“Never was so much owed…”

Ambaassador B.N. Chakravarty, permanent representative of India to the United Nations, praised Churchill’s courage, fortutde, vision, wit, vitality, and “super-human endurance.” Speaking to the General Assembly, Chakravarty continued:

It is with pride that I recall my brief association with him in 1954, when I was acting as High Commissioner for India in the United Kingdom and had the privilege of participating in his eightieth birthday celebration.  His was a many-splendoured life, full of adventure, tragedy and triumph. Now the glory has departed, but the memory will endure, and the phrases that he coined will stir the hearts of men for generations to come. He enlarged the scope of man’s activity and thus uplifted us all….It is no exaggeration to say that never was so much owed, by so many, to one man.”

Looking back

My colleague is writing a fuller piece on world reaction to Churchill’s death for the Hillsdale College Churchill Project. It is worth noting that the tributes back then arrived from Germany, Japan and Italy, the three former Axis powers. Kenya and South Africa, where Churchill supposedly did the reprehensible, sent similar messages. There was one from the Soviet Union, which, after the war, had denounced him as a war criminal. They came from the Anglosphere, where his name was already legend. Friends and former enemies alike, they all had tributes in his memory.

Tributes to Churchill