Tag: Winston S. Churchill

issues
“Short words are best, and the old words, when short, are best of all.” Churchill addressing his old Regiment, the 4th Hussars. Loretto Aerodrome, Italy, 25 August 1944. (Imperial War Museum, public domain)
The Language: Canceling Clichés and Issues over “Issues”

The Language: Canceling Clichés and Issues over “Issues”

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Commentator Bill O’Reilly proposes a new Cancel Culture for a collection of jargon that Churchill would define as “grimaces.” A cliché, he says, is “a phrase or opinion that is overused and lacks original thought.” Good on Bill, and we reproduce his nominations for grimaces we never need to hear again. He forgot “issues” but it’s not a bad list! Let us celebrate Mr. O’Reilly’s modest proposal. Avoid fashionable filters and “fad-words” in language. “Short words are best,” Churchill said, “and the old words, when short, are best of all.”

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Benson
Tim Benson and the Cartoonists’ Churchill

Tim Benson and the Cartoonists’ Churchill

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Benson devotes himself mainly to the Second World War. The uplifting spirit of British cartoonists in the black days of 1940-41 is at once evident. A glow of resolve swept Britain; there were no carping media midgets such as we hear from today. That was a time, as Churchill put it, “when it was equally good to live or die.” The pace picks up as Hitler invades Russia. The Daily Sketch pictures Roosevelt leading a sailing race in a boat marked “Lend-Lease.” Melbourne’s Herald adds Aussie humor: Tojo being fed a cigar (lit end first), and wrestler Churchill putting a toe-hold on a screaming Mussolini. This is a first-class work of scholarship in addition to high entertainment.

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Diesel
Meeting of great minds: Rudolf Diesel (left) with Thomas Edison (seated) in Edison’s Menlo Park laboratory, with (from left) Ellen Rice, Edison engineer J.W. Lieb Jr. and Martha Diesel, 1912. (U.S. National Park Service, public domain)
Unanswered Questions: Churchill and Rudolf Diesel

Unanswered Questions: Churchill and Rudolf Diesel

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It is known that Rudolf Diesel boarded the “Dresden” that fatal October in 1913 intending to meet with the British about licensing his invention. By then Churchill and Fisher were well along on the conversion from coal to oil for capital ships, and WSC had secured an oil supply through the Anglo-Persian Oil Company. How far Diesel developments had affected designs for submarines or Churchill’s “landship” (the tank) bears further investigation. 

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Second World
Pickering, Yorkshire, 31 March 1944: WSC inspects “Blenheim,” a Cromwell Mk IV tank of No. 2 Squadron, 2nd (Armoured Reconnaissance) Battalion, Welsh Guards. With him is Squadron Commander Major John Ogilvie Spencer, who was killed in Belgium on 9 September 1944. (Photo by Capt. Horton, War Office, public domain)
Questions on Books: The Second World War

Questions on Books: The Second World War

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Not all translations spanned the complete six volumes. The Turkish Edition contained only the first two volumes. Wendy Reves, wife of Churchill’s literary agent, Emery Reves, told me that the publishers refused to pay for the rest! The first Russian edition (1956-58) contained only the first three volumes, though Ronald Cohen also lists a later, complete Russian edition published in 1997-98. There were also eight translations of Churchill’s one-volume abridged edition, first published in 1959.

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charter
The White House, 25 June 1954. L-R: Secretary of State John Foster Dulles, WSC, President Eisenhower, Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden. (Photo by Thomas O’Halloran, Library of Congress)
The Second Atlantic Charter? A Seventieth Anniversary

The Second Atlantic Charter? A Seventieth Anniversary

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“We will continue our support of the United Nations and of existing international organizations that have been established in the spirit of the Charter for common protection and security. We urge the establishment and maintenance of such associations of appropriate nations as will best, in their respective regions, preserve the peace and the independence of the peoples living there. When desired by the peoples of the affected countries, we are ready to render appropriate and feasible assistance to such associations.” Eisenhower & Churchill, 1954    

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Greeks
“Was there no ancestral spirit to conjure up before this unfortunate Prince, the downfall of his House, the ruin of his people—the bloody cellar of Ekaterinburg?” L-R: Olga, Maria, Nicholas II, Alexandra, Anastasia, Alexei, Tatiana at Livadia, Crimea, 1913. (Photo by the Levitsky Studio, public domain)
Russians and Greeks: “Falling Below the Level of Events”

Russians and Greeks: “Falling Below the Level of Events”

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Churchill to Grey: "I beseech you at this crisis not to make a mistake in falling below the level of events. Half-hearted measures will ruin all, and a million men will die through the prolongation of the war. You must be bold and violent. You have a right to be. Our fleet is forcing the Dardanelles. No armies can reach Constantinople but those which we invite, yet we seek nothing here but the victory of the common cause." Grey and the Foreign Office "felt as we did. They did all in their power. It registers a terrible moment in the long struggle to save Russia from her foes and from herself.”

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statue
(Photo by Tim Buss, Creative Commons)
Interview: Some Thoughts on Churchill’s London Statue

Interview: Some Thoughts on Churchill’s London Statue

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The statue dilemma: All those statues on Parliament Square—not just Churchill's—are of people with human faults. During the craze to tear down statues a few years ago, French President Macron boldly announced that no French statues would go. They are part of France's heritage, he said, for good or ill. That was very courageous of him. Statues tell a nation's story. If you object to one, erect one to balance it. There is no virtue in hiding from history.

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jargon
“Let us not shrink from using the short, expressive phrases”: Campaigning at Uxbridge, Middlesex, 27 June 1945. (Imperial War Museum, public domain)
Churchill on Jargon: “Let Us Have an End to This Grimace”

Churchill on Jargon: “Let Us Have an End to This Grimace”

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Churchill said, “Short words are best, and the old words, when short, are best of all.” How would that peerless practitioner of English, would react to the kind of language around us today? We can imagine what he would think about substituting fashionable jargon like “challenges” for “handicaps” or “issues” for “difficulties.” What would he make of that stand-by cliché “reaching out”? Oh dear....

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Pamela
“The Life of the Party,” Christopher Ogden’s entertaining biography, is strongly recommended.
Pamela Beryl Digby Churchill Hayward Harriman 1920-1997

Pamela Beryl Digby Churchill Hayward Harriman 1920-1997

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Pamela Harriman was a noble spirit devoted to friends, family and both her countries. Not many people could have journeyed so successfully and far She was grace personified, at home equally in Churchill’s air raid shelter or the Élysée Palace. President Chirac was saddened by her death: “To say that she was an exceptional representative of the U.S. does not do justice to her achievement. She lent to our longstanding alliance the radiant strength of her personality. She was elegance itself...a peerless diplomat.” That old Francophile, her father-in-law, would have smiled.

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Black Forest
Vickers Wellington; KA letters designate the 1448 Flight. (Painting by Jkdomus, Creative Commons)
Myths and Heresies: “Firebombing the Black Forest”

Myths and Heresies: “Firebombing the Black Forest”

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The great Tucker Flapdoodle: Adolf Hitler was misunderstood, we are told. He invaded Poland only because Chamberlain and Churchill forced him. He never wanted France, dropped peace leaflets on Britain. The Germans were baffled over what to do with millions of Russian POWs because Churchill kept fighting long enough to bring Stalin in. Then Churchill got America involved. Here we consider just one of these unique charges: that in his bloodlust, Churchill firebombed Germany's Black Forest. (We hadn't heard that one before.)

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Winston Churchill, Myth and Reality

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The Patriot’s Churchill

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