The War Time Leader of Great Britain
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Sir Winston Churchill- 1874-1965 (November 30th 1874 to January 24th 1965)
Second World War saw the emergence of Germany as a rejuvenated world power under the guidance of Adolf Hitler where the Great Britain had the task of almost single handedly to resist Germany in the initial stages of the War. The British Politician who took on this endeavour to fight against Germany at the time was the first lord of the Admiralty, Sir Winston Churchill.
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill was a British Politician a Military officer and a Writer who served as the Prime Minister of Great Britain from 1940 to 1945 & from 1951- to 1955 and similarly as with other influential world leaders, Churchill too left behind a complicated legacy.
Winston Churchill was one of the greatest Prime Ministers of Great Britain who was also a Brilliant Orator, Writer, Historian as well as a Painter hailing from a highly influential family background. He received the Nobel Prize for English Literature in 1953 which stands at a very rare achievement for someone of this calibre; a Politician thus with the famous saying of his “I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat” much to his credit.
Churchill made planning & decision making both political and military to be simpler and with more efficacy. His force of personality was instrumental in cementing the ‘Big three’ Alliance with Britain’s powerful allies, Russia and the United States. His unbounded energy & determination meant that he was not always easy to work with yet nevertheless as Field Marshal Sir Alan Brooke wrote, it is worth all these difficulties to have the privilege to work with such a man!
During the dark era the early days of the Second World War, when Churchill had a few real weapons in his defence, it was his words he used as weapons to attack instead! The speeches he delivered were among the most powerful ever delivered in the English Language, his words being defiant, heroic and human, lightened by flashes of humour reaching out to everyone in Britain & throughout the world.
As journalist Beverly Nichols wrote “He took the English Language & sent it into battle”. Churchill regularly worked 18 hours a day working at a continued pace even during weekends & travelled abroad many times a year in attending conferences and for battlefronts. He was a man of charisma and generosity but also a man of exasperation, rudeness & bad temper. He drove his staff very hard and drove himself even harder.
Winston Churchill became Britain’s Prime Minister on 10th May 1940. In which respect he once quoted “I felt that all my past life had been but a preparation for this hour and for this trial”
Being a Brilliant Orator he roused the feelings of the British public and inspired them to resist Germany during the World War and also It was somewhat notable that he later coined the term ‘Iron Curtain’ to denote the division between Eastern and Western Europe on the grounds of political affiliations of the European nations.
Churchill travelled all over the world building & sustaining the ‘Grand Alliance’ which was an exhausting task as well as involving himself on many dangerous journeys overseas, and in December 1941, he suffered a mild heart attack at the White House and two years later he was affected by a severe bout of pneumonia.
On the very day that Churchill fulfilled his life’s ambition, Germany had that morning invaded France, Belgium the Netherlands & Luxembourg. Britain faced it’s supreme test. It is for his leadership through these fraught years of 1940-1941 through Dunkirk, ‘The battle of Britain and the Blitz’ that Churchill was best remembered.
The Right Honourable Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill was born on November 30th 1874 at Blenheim castle. His father was Lord Randolph Churchill and his mother was an American named Jennie Jerome. In 1888 Winston entered Harrow School but never made it to the upper school and later graduated from Royal Military College at Sandhurst. Later he served as a Military Observer with the Spanish Forces in Cuba.
In 1897 he served in the Indian army in the Malakand expedition, and in 1899 went to South Africa as a war correspondent for the London Morning Post to report on Boer War. He was later captured and taken to prison camp in Pretoria. He later made a dramatic escape which made him world famous.
On January 23rd, 1901 Churchill became a Member of Parliament of Oldham (Lancashire) under the Conservative Party ticket. In 1908 to 1910 he served as a President of the Board of Trade and served as the Home Secretary from 1910 to 1911. At the outbreak of the Second World War he was appointed as the First Lord of the Admiralty: a post he held earlier from 1911 to 1915. There by Churchill and Lord Beaverbrook being the only two people to be members of cabinet of UK during both World Wars.
Churchill’s literary career began with campaign reports: the story of the Malakand Field Force (1898) and the River War (1899). In 1910 he published his only novel Savrola which strangely anticipated later developments in history. Later he published biography of his father Lord Randolph Churchill and his great ancestor the Duke of Marlborough. Churchill’s ‘History of the First World War’ which appeared in four volumes under the title of ‘The World Crisis’ (1923-1929) And his memoirs on the Second World war ran to six volumes (1948 -1954) He later wrote his history of the English Speaking People (1956-1958). His brilliant speeches were recorded in the Unrelenting Struggle (1942), the Dawn of Liberation (1945) and Victory (1946).
Winston Churchill would have been well renowned during his tenure as the Prime Minister of Great Britain during World War II, but he contributed much more to the world than just his political career. Churchill was at the forefront of the political scene in Europe for almost 50 years his political accolades spanning towards a timeframe all the way to his death in 1965.
He is recognised as one of the greatest statesmen of the 20th century and is viewed as a hero by many people worldwide as well as an interesting man of overall credentiality from experiencing a plane crash to enjoying painting as his recreation or even in respect of his career in music thereby a lot being accomplished within his life span of 90 years.
Churchill is remarkable man of speeches yet what makes it more interesting is that he had a speech impediment which he dealt with and overcame by saying “My impediment is no hindrance.” On which he continuously worked on through exercises never giving up hope(uttering repeated phrases such as “The Spanish ships I cannot see for they are not in sight”)
Furthermore it is believed that Churchill had a lateral lisp, which is a defect when a person struggles with “s” and “z” sounds where as these speech issues were much of a hindrance and once described by reporters in the 20’s and 30’s as a stutter which was quite rough on the ear! And also it is claimed that he had a school life of eternal struggle and at the age of 7 he was sent to a boarding school, which was not of his best interests to be recalled by! And although he was enrolled at Harrow in 1888 his entrance exam scores were so sub-par that they placed him at the bottom of the class!!
Yet nevertheless with all these impediments he was not seen as an unintelligent child at school where he did well in the subjects he enjoyed the most which were History and English. Once he completed his studies at Harrow he attended Royal Military College where he failed the entrance exam twice!!! All in all it is clearly proven that Sir Churchill was never discouraged in life facing each day through much positivity and hard work never giving up on life thus achieving his maximum.
Sir Churchill was a man of much interest he was an avid painter with over 500 paintings to call his own yet nevertheless his passion in painting wasn’t something that he started until he reached the age of 40 years yet something which quickly grew in skill. His paintings were quite high in value. In 2014, a collection of his 15 paintings were sold for £11.2 million.
Sir Churchill was known to have faced many accidents in his life like jumping off a bridge and suffering a ruptured kidney, as well as a concussion and while in United States he was hit by a car in New York City since he was not concentrating on both sides of the road before crossing and also crashing a plane while learning to fly. Miraculously, although Sir Churchill was accident-prone, none of these accidents really affected him in living a life of 90 years!
Interesting Facts:
Winston Churchill received a letter in 1917 from Lord Fisher regarding the war. Towards the end of the letter, Lord Fisher uses the term ‘OMG.’ Here is how it was typed in the letter: “I hear that a new order of Knighthood is on the tapas-O.M.G. (Oh! My God!) – Shower it on the Admiralty.” This is the first known instance of this popular phrase being used, and Churchill was the receiver of it.
In the 1890’s, Winston Churchill was a war correspondent for The Morning Post. He was sent to cover the Anglo-Boer War in South Africa, but once he arrived in South Africa the train he was on was ambushed and he was taken as a prisoner of war. Miraculously, Churchill managed to escape the camp.
Once back in England, the escape caused him to be regarded as a hero, which helped launch his political career.
In 1908 Winston Churchill married Clementine Hozier and had one son and 4 daughters. It was later revealed by Churchill that the act of courting and marrying Clementine was one of his greatest achievements. On April 09th 1963 he received by a special Act of the US Congress, the unprecedented honour of being made an honorary American citizen by President Kennedy.
Sir Winston Spencer Leonard Churchill
Born : 30th November 1874, Blenheim, Oxfordshire, England
Died : 24th January 1965 (aged 90), Hyde Park, London, England
Resting place : St Martin’s Church, Bladon
Nationality : British
Political party : Conservative (1900-1904, 1924- 1964), Liberal (1904-1924)
Spouse : Clementine Churchill
Children : Diana Churchill, Randolph Churchill, Sarah Tuchet- Jesson, Marigold Churchill, mary Soames
Residence : Chartwell
Profession : Member of Parliament/
soldier/writer/historian
Religion : Anglican
Winston Churchill had members of parliament arguing with him specially Lady Nancy Astor one of the first women MP’s in Britain. He once told her that having a woman in parliament was like having an intruder in the bathroom, to which she retorted, “You are not handsome enough to have such fears” yet another instance when Lady Astor was giving a costume ball, Churchill asked her what disguise she would recommend for him. She replied “Why don’t you come sober, Prime Minister” The most famous of all such anectodes was that when Lady Astor said to Churchill, “If you were my husband I would poison your tea” to which he quickly responded “Madam if you were my wife I would drink it!” However the most interesting of all exchanges between Churchill and Lady Astor was : Lady Astor: “Mr Churchill you are drunk! Winston Churchill: “Yes and you Madam are ugly but tomorrow I shall be sober and you will still be ugly!”
Famous quotes by Winston Churchill
“A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity, and an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.
“Courage is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm”.
“There are terrible lot of lies going about the world, and the worst of it is that half of them are true”
“Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak : Courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen”.
Nilanthi Wickramasinghe