Mussolini Archives - Richard M. Langworth

Churchill said — WSC with Lt. Gen. Stone and his daughter Sarah (whose husband he did not wish to shoot), on a visit to his old regiment, the 4th Hussars, Cairo, 3 December 1943. (Imperial War Museum, public domain)

Churchill Quips: God, Santayana, Musso & Not Getting Scuppered

5 September 2024 Comments 0 Comments

The story goes that in the middle of the Second World War, Churchill's son-in-law Duncan Sandys told WSC that “Hitler and Mussolini have an even greater burden to bear, because everything is going wrong for them.” Supposedly Churchill said in reply: Ah, but Mussolini has this consolation, that he could shoot his son-in-law! I will not dignify that with quotation marks because it is nothing Churchill said. Not even about Vic Oliver, a son-in-law he really disliked. What worried Churchill was what might happen "if God wearied of mankind."

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Fateful Choices, by Ian Kershaw: Japan, Germany, USA (updated 2019)

18 August 2019 Comments 0 Comments

Fateful Choices: Ten Decisions that Changed the World, 1940-1941, by Ian Kershaw. New York: Penguin, 600 pp., $35. At a time when Churchill’s war leadership is vilified in lopsided paeans to Roosevelt, Sir Ian’s classic World War II study reminds us that FDR wasn’t perfect either.

A recent article suggests that Japan’s decision to surrender in 1945 was by no means unanimous. A few years ago, Sir Ian Kershaw said the same thing about Japan’s decision to go to war in the first place. Long before the war, Winston Churchill mused:

“What a story!…

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Fateful Questions: World War II Microcosm (1)

2 April 2017 Comments 0 Comments

Fateful Questions, September 1943-April 1944, nineteenth of the projected twenty-three document volumes, is reviewed by historian Andrew Roberts in Commentary.

The volumes comprise “every important document of any kind that concerns Churchill, and the present volume is 2,752 pages long, representing an average of more than eleven pages per day.” Order your copy from the Hillsdale College Bookstore.

Here is an excerpt from my account, “Fresh History,” which can be read in its entirety at the Hillsdale College Churchill Project.

Fateful Questions: Excerpts

Fastidiously compiled by the late Sir Martin Gilbert and edited by Dr.…

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Winston Churchill: Myth and Reality

13 January 2016 Comments 0 Comments

Per the previous post, I append for reader comment the contents of my next book, Winston Churchill, Myth and Reality: What Churchill Stood For.

I have written on most of these matters in the past; the book recasts it afresh. I also acknowledge and cross-reference the work of experts who know far more than I, particularly in the fields of genealogy and medicine. I would be glad to hear your thoughts; please use the “contact” page.

The historian David Stafford wrote: “Myth only develops and takes hold when the time is right, and the climate has long been ripe for the emergence of myths about a wartime hero who stood firm against a totalitarian foe and smote an evil empire.”…

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Churchill’s “Infallibility”: Myth on Myth

10 July 2012 Comments 10 Comments

Mr. Daniel Knowles (“Time to scotch the myth of Winston Churchill’s infallibility,” (originally blogged on the Daily Telegraph but since pulled from all the websites where it appeared), wrote that the “national myth” of World War II and Churchill “is being used in an argument about the future of the House of Lords.”

Mr. Knowles quoted Liberal Party leader Nick Clegg, who cited Churchill’s 1910 hope that the Lords “would be fair to all parties.” Sir Winston’s grandson, Sir Nicholas Soames MP, replied that Churchill “dropped those views and had great reverence and respect for the institution of the House of Lords.”…

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