Tag: John Colville

Stalin
First Meeting, Moscow 1942: WSC’s interpreter Arthur Birse, Churchill, U.S. envoy Averell Harriman, Stalin, Soviet Foreign Minister V.M. Molotov. (Photo by Mikhail Mikhaylovich Kalashnikov, Wikimedia Commons, public domain)
“Stalin never broke his word to me.” Were these Churchill’s words?

“Stalin never broke his word to me.” Were these Churchill’s words?

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A mag­a­zine fact check­er writes ask­ing if Churchill ever said, “Stal­in nev­er broke his word to me.” The short answer is yes. The long answer shows how care­ful we should be when quot­ing Churchill.

The source of this quote is the jour­nal­ist C.L. Sulzberg­er (1912-1993), in his 1970 book, The Last of the Giants, page 304. In it Sulzberg­er reports his “five hours with old Win­ston Churchill” at Chartwell on 10 July 1956.

Churchill, wrote Sulzberg­er, thought Stal­in “a great man, above all com­pared to Khr­uschev and Bul­ganin,” and quot­ed Churchill as follows:

Stal­in nev­er broke his word to me.…

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wrong pig
“In the name of humanity; Broke the staff over them. Too much talking.” Not sure about the precise translation, but the Nazi message is clear: FDR and Churchill, with Stalin’s help, executing liberty. (Der Stürmer, Berlin, June 1943.)  
Not Churchill, re Germany: “We butchered the wrong pig”

Not Churchill, re Germany: “We butchered the wrong pig”

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Digital scans of 80 million words by and about Churchill, including his books, articles, speeches and published papers, offer no instance of this phrase, either with the word “slaughtered” or the word “butchered.” Neither did I find any statement of his suggesting Britain had “fought the wrong enemy.”  One of Churchill's virtues was to recognize the main threat to peace at each juncture in his career. From 1933 to 1945, he was certain that Nazi Germany was not the "wrong pig." He did begin to think, late in the war, that one mortal foe had given rise to another. But he always kept things in perspective.

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Athens
Negotiations by lamplight: Churchill in Athens, December 1944, assured the survival of Greek democracy by installing Archbishop Damaskinos (to WSC’s left) as regent in a coalition government. (Hillsdale College)
Athens 1944: Not Churchill’s Finest Hour? Hmm….

Athens 1944: Not Churchill’s Finest Hour? Hmm….

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Question:

A r ead­er writes: “Rather late in the day, I have been read­ing The Spec­ta­tor (UK) Christ­mas Spe­cial dat­ed 15/21/29 Decem­ber 2018. Page 28 refers to one Ron­nie Boyd, who had been a teenage Ordi­nary Sea­man aboard HMS Ajax in Decem­ber 1944, when Win­ston Churchill arrived in Athens to try to end the ongo­ing civ­il war.

 “British forces ‘helped put down, with con­sid­er­able force of arms, a per­ceived partisan/communist uprising—the so-called Bat­tle of Athens, or the Dekemvri­ana in Greece,’ the arti­cle states. There fol­lows the extra­or­di­nary state­ment ‘Not Win­ston Churchill’s Finest Hour, it has to be said.’…

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Quotes
Teheran, 1943: Stalin, Roosevelt, Churchill. Contrary to persistent rumors, WSC issued no encomiums when Stalin died in 1953.
All the “Quotes” Churchill Never Said (4: Sexism to Ypres)

All the “Quotes” Churchill Never Said (4: Sexism to Ypres)

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Fake Quotes, concluded

Red Her­rings: Quotes not by Churchill (or things he said quot­ing some­one else), con­tin­ued from Part 3.  Com­piled for the next expand­ed edi­tion of Churchill by Him­self. Chap­ter ref­er­ences are to present edi­tions of that book.

Earthy or sex­ist gags were not real­ly Win­ston Churchill’s méti­er. His daugh­ter Mary doubt­ed an alleged crack to Bessie Brad­dock MP, who accused him of being drunk: “And you, my dear…are dis­gust­ing­ly ugly, but tomor­row I’ll be sober….” But I pro­duced the Scot­land Yard body­guard who was stand­ing next to him dur­ing the Brad­dock encounter.…

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Dewey
Governor Dewey with President Truman and Admiral Jonas Ingram, Navy Day, New York, 27 October 1945. Three years later Dewey would run again, and lose again. (United States Navy. Harry S. Truman Library & Museum)
Dewey, Hoover, Churchill, and Grand Strategy, 1950-53

Dewey, Hoover, Churchill, and Grand Strategy, 1950-53

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“Dewey, Hoover and Churchill” is excerpt­ed from an arti­cle for the Hills­dale Col­lege Churchill Project. For the com­plete text, click here. The lat­est vol­ume 20 of The Churchill Doc­u­ments, Nomandy and Beyond: May-Decem­ber 1944, is avail­able for $60 from the Hills­dale Col­lege Bookstore.

A great joy of read­ing The Churchill Doc­u­ments is their trove of his­tor­i­cal side­lights. Vol­ume 22 (August 1945—September 1951, due late 2018) cov­ers the ear­ly Cold War: the “Iron Cur­tain,” the Mar­shall Plan, Berlin Air­lift and Kore­an War. It reminds us of the polit­i­cal bat­tles swirling around the Anglo-Amer­i­can “spe­cial rela­tion­ship.”…

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Dream
“The Dream,” 1947. Painting by Sal Asaro (www.salasaro.com)
Introduction to “The Dream”: Churchill’s Haunting Short Story

Introduction to “The Dream”: Churchill’s Haunting Short Story

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The Dream is repub­lished (from Nev­er Despair 1945-1965, Vol­ume 8 of the offi­cial biog­ra­phy) by the Hills­dale Col­lege Churchill Project. To read it in its entire­ty, click here.

The Dream…

… is the most mys­te­ri­ous and ethe­re­al sto­ry Win­ston Churchill ever wrote. Yet the more we know about him, the bet­ter we may under­stand how he came to write it.

Replete with broad-sweep Churchillian nar­ra­tive, The Dream con­tains many ref­er­ences to now-obscure peo­ple, places and things. The new online ver­sion pub­lished by Hills­dale pro­vides links to all of them. You need only click on any unfa­mil­iar name or term for links to online ref­er­ences.…

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Lindemann
Frederick Lindemann Viscount Cherwell (1886-1957), arriving for a Cabinet meeting, 1951. (Fred Ramage, history.net)
Frederick Lindemann: Churchill’s Eminence Grise?

Frederick Lindemann: Churchill’s Eminence Grise?

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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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“Churchill’s Secret”: Worth a Look

“Churchill’s Secret”: Worth a Look

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Churchill’s Secret, co-pro­duced by PBS Mas­ter­piece and ITV (UK). Direct­ed by Charles Stur­ridge, star­ring Michael Gam­bon as Sir Win­ston and Lind­say Dun­can as Lady Churchill. To watch, click here. 

Excerpt­ed from a review for the Hills­dale Col­lege Churchill Project.

PBS and ITV have suc­ceed­ed where many failed. They offer a Churchill doc­u­men­tary with a min­i­mum of dra­mat­ic license, rea­son­ably faith­ful to his­to­ry (as much as we know of it). Churchill’s Secret limns the pathos, humor, hope and trau­ma of a lit­tle-known episode: Churchill’s stroke on 23 June 1953, and his mirac­u­lous recov­ery. For weeks after­ward, his faith­ful lieu­tenants in secret ran the gov­ern­ment.…

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Re-Rat Awards to Senators Gregg, Specter

Re-Rat Awards to Senators Gregg, Specter

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In Finest Hour 142, Spring 2009, I proud­ly pre­sent­ed the Churchill Re-Rat Award (issued infre­quent­ly) to Sen­a­tor Judd Gregg (R.-NH), who accept­ed nom­i­na­tion as Pres­i­dent Obama’s Sec­re­tary of Com­merce but then with­drew, say­ing he could not bal­ance “being in the Cab­i­net ver­sus myself as an indi­vid­ual doing my job.” Gregg’s nom­i­na­tion had sewn fear among con­ser­v­a­tives who learned that NH’s Demo­c­ra­t­ic Gov­er­nor, John Lynch, would appoint a lib­er­al Repub­li­can in his place. 

On 26 Jan­u­ary 1941 Win­ston Churchill, who had desert­ed the Con­ser­v­a­tive Par­ty for the Lib­er­als in 1904 but oozed back into the Con­ser­v­a­tive Par­ty in 1925 (after being appoint­ed Chan­cel­lor of the Exche­quer the pre­vi­ous year by Con­ser­v­a­tive Prime Min­is­ter Stan­ley Bald­win) remarked to his pri­vate sec­re­tary John Colville: “Any­one can rat, but it takes a cer­tain amount of inge­nu­ity to re-rat.”…

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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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