The Greatest Briton

Essays On Winston Churchill's Life And Political Philosophy

Jeremy Havardi

• Publisher: Shepherd Walwyn Publishers
• Year: 2012
• ISBN:
  9780856833359
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Political Biographies
• Index: Politics & International Relations

After several decades of historical revisionism, Winston Churchill remains one of the most controversial figures in modern history. Critics allege he was a diehard imperialist and warmonger, a bitter opponent of the working classes and a maverick opportunist with an insatiable appetite for power. Despite his record as 'the man who won the war', he is often accused of being a war criminal. This book sets out to correct the historical record in a stimulating collection of essays. Arranged in chronological order to show his life in the context of 20th century world history, these essays are both detailed and analytical while still highly accessible to a general audience. Each one answers a specific historical question (see Contents below) about Churchill through a critical examination of the existing historical record. The author believes that Churchill deserves to be remembered as much for his domestic policy as his wartime achievements. Of particular interest is an evaluation of his role in introducing old age pensions and unemployment benefits for the very poorest in Edwardian Britain. This, some historians argue, made the difference between revolution and evolution at the end of the war. A special section examines his political philosophy, which is revealed to be more consistent than many imagine. While attention is given to Churchill's prodigious political accomplishments, the book also shows how he anticipated many important debates facing the world today. In 2002 Churchill was voted 'The Greatest Briton' in a BBC conducted survey Jeremy Havardi teaches history and philosophy in London, works as a freelance journalist and is the author of Falling to Pieces: Self deception and the divided mind.

CHAPTER ONE

The Promise of Youth

WINSTON SPENCER-CHURCHILL was born at Blenheim Palace on November 30th 1874, the first son of Randolph Churchill and Jennie Jerome. He was the grandson of an aristocrat, the 7th Duke of Marlborough, and was proud to trace his descent from the illustrious John Churchill, the 1st Duke of Marlborough, who died in 1722.

He was educated at St George’s school in Ascot before attending Harrow at the age of 13. He received mixed reports during his five years there but excelled at history, English and fencing. He rarely received parental visits but developed a close relationship with his beloved nanny, Mrs Everest. In 1893 he enrolled at Sandhurst Military Academy and within two years, he had been commissioned into the 4th Hussars. While on leave in 1895, he travelled to Cuba, where he wrote dispatches for the Daily Graphic. He witnessed the Cuban insurrection against the Spanish authorities and developed a love of Havana cigars which would last for the rest of his life.

He went to India and, in 1897, fought in the North-West Frontier against Pashtun tribesmen. From his experiences there he wrote his first book, The Story of the Malakand Field Force. A year later, he saw action at Omdurman in Sudan under Lord Kitchener, which led to his second book, The River War. In his account, he condemned Kitchener’s tactics as inhumane, in particular his decision to disinter the corpse of the Mahdi. In 1899 he stood, unsuccessfully, as a Tory candidate in a by-election at Oldham.

He then travelled as a correspondent to South Africa at the start of the Second Boer War, where he was commissioned to write for the Morning Post. He was subsequently captured and imprisoned by the Boer authorities but managed to escape captivity, becoming an overnight sensation when he turned up safe in Portuguese controlled Lorenço Marques. He returned to South Africa, where he took part in the relief of Ladysmith and saw action in Pretoria. He wrote two further books about his experiences, From London to Ladysmith and Ian Hamilton’s March.

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In 1900 he was elected as Conservative MP for Oldham and went on a speaking tour of the United States and Canada.

Was Churchill a neglected child?

CHURCHILL OFTEN DESCRIBED himself as a child of the Victorian age and nowhere is this more evident than in his relationship with his parents. Winston’s mother, the American Jennie Jerome was, in the words of her grandson, ‘a woman of exceptional beauty in an age of famous beauties’.¹ Her father, Leonard Jerome, was a self-made American millionaire stockbroker who had won and lost fortunes on the US stock exchange and whose political career involved a stint as US ambassador in Trieste. Jennie’s great grandmother was said to be an Iroquois Indian, though this claim has recently been questioned.²

Jennie was 19 when she met Randolph Churchill at a regatta at Cowes on the Isle of Wight. The younger son of the 7th Duke of Marlborough, Randolph had been an MP since 1873, and a rapid ascent up the ‘greasy pole’ led to his appointment as Chancellor of the Exchequer under Lord Salisbury. A year later a reckless misjudgement led to his swift downfall and within a few years, he entered political oblivion. Together Jennie and Randolph, with all their influential connections, became thoroughly immersed in the London social circuit, something that would have an impact on the young Winston.

In My Early Life Winston describes both his parents in glowing terms. His mother was a ‘fairy princess’ and ‘radiant being’ who shone ‘like the evening star’.³ His father, Lord Randolph Churchill, was a career politician and Winston later wrote that he took his politics ‘almost unquestioningly from him’. Churchill described him as ‘the greatest and most powerful influence’ in his early life and ‘conceived an intense admiration and affection for him’.⁴

But Winston’s idolisation of his parents was tempered by their frequent absences during his early years. Some of Winston’s letters from his various schools ‘abound in pathetic requests for letters and for visits’ but both parents were too busy to visit him.⁵ Lady Randolph was caught up in the world of fashionable society while Randolph was absorbed in high politics. Of course in many ways Winston was spoiled, as one would expect for someone of his class and background. He was brought up in the luxury of Blenheim Palace and enjoyed frequent holidays abroad and on the Isle of Wight. He also had an indulgent nanny, Mrs Everest, to cater for his every need. In this sense, he was not a victim of parental neglect.

But his parents rarely visited him at school and Winston took offence. His letters home contained a variety of requests for attention, money and visits, often using a blatant form of emotional manipulation to get his way. In 1886 Winston asked his mother to attend his school play. Jennie replied that she could not do so because she was hosting a dinner party in London but Winston was persistent: ‘Now you know I was always your darling and you can’t find it in your heart to give me a denial. I want you to put off the dinner party…’⁶ To the young boy’s chagrin, Jennie ended up hosting the dinner party.

In another letter, the 12-year-old Churchill expressed his desire to watch the 1887 Jubilee. He urged his mother to pull strings for him, assuring her that ‘you love me too much to disappoint me’.⁷ On this occasion he was more successful. Typical of his requests was one he made in a letter to his father in 1889: ‘I do hope both you and Mamma will come as last speech day nobody came to see me and it was vy dull. You have never been to see me…’⁸

In another letter, Winston had demanded to be at home for Christmas rather than be sent abroad. In a typically demanding manner, he declared that he had no intention of going abroad and added: ‘If you in spite of my entreaties force me to go I will do as little as I can and the holidays will be one continual battle.’ Winston’s overbearing tone elicited a sharp response from his mother: ‘When one wants something in this world, it is not by delivering ultimatums that one is likely to get it.’⁹

In truth, Churchill’s parents paid young Winston little attention while he was at school but as Celia Sandys has pointed out: ‘Neglectful though this may seem in the twentieth century, Victorian parents, once they had dispatched their sons to school, did not feel obliged to spend their time going to see them.’¹⁰ It was normal for the boys of upper-middle-class families to be sent to public schools for a term at a time, during which they would not be expected to see their parents.

If Winston enjoyed only brief glimpses of his mother’s affections, those with his father were rarer still. He regretted not having a closer relationship with his father and not living long enough to know him intimately. When Randolph died in 1895, Winston wrote that his ‘dreams of comradeship with him, of entering Parliament at his side and in his support’ came to an end. Winston later claimed that he had had but two or three deep conversations with Randolph and, after the latter’s death, all that remained was to ‘pursue his aims and vindicate his memory’.¹¹

Evidence of the remoteness of father and son comes in a letter written by Winston on finding out that he was to go to Harrow and not Winchester. ‘Did you’, Winston enquires, ‘go to Harrow or Eton?’¹² Randolph Churchill remarks in the official biography how strange it was that a boy of 13 would not know of his father’s choice of schooling, while Winston himself found out indirectly of his father’s choice for him.

On the rare occasions that his father corresponded with him, it was often to rebuke him for some personal failing. Randolph once returned one of his son’s letters with the following note: ‘This is a letter which I shall not keep but return to you that you may from time to time review its pedantic and overgrown schoolboy style.’¹³ He even suggested in another letter that Winston substitute ‘Father’ for ‘Papa’ in his letters.¹⁴

The most famous example of fatherly displeasure followed Churchill’s entrance into the Sandhurst military academy. In June 1893 Churchill had taken the entrance exam for the third time and, though his marks were too low for an infantry cadetship, he gained one for the cavalry. Winston was relieved but his father offered a stern and destructive rebuke. In his letter, Randolph reprimanded his son for his ‘slovenly happy-go-lucky harum scarum style of work’, while no longer attaching ‘the slightest weight’ to anything he said about his own acquirements and exploits. He then warned his son that if he did not abandon ‘his idle useless unprofitable life’ he would become ‘a mere social wastrel’ and ‘degenerate into a shabby unhappy & futile existence.’¹⁵

Winston was clearly affected by the sternness of this rebuke and merely promised his father that he would try to improve. Randolph did little to deserve his son’s hero worship. But Winston still felt that his father owned ‘the key to everything or almost everything worth having’ even if the admiration was all one way. When Winston showed his father signs of comradeship, he was ‘frozen into stone’.¹⁶

Jennie made up for her former aloofness by assisting Winston during the early part of his public career. While he was serving in India she sent him dozens of volumes from the world’s famous authors, as well as 27 volumes of the Annual Register. She later served as his literary agent, helping to find him a suitable newspaper to publish his articles on the Malakand war, as well as a publisher for his early books. While Churchill’s relations with his mother improved in his twenties, he had no opportunity to repair relations with his father. Randolph died after a lingering illness in 1895, with Winston declaring that he would seek ‘to lift again the flag I found lying on a stricken field’.¹⁷

Without doubt though, the spirit of Randolph Churchill hovered over Winston in the early stages of his political career. In 1901 Churchill delivered his maiden speech in the House of Commons on the Boer War. At the end, he thanked the House for their attention: ‘I cannot sit down without saying how very grateful I am for the kindness and patience with which the House has heard me, and which have been extended to me, I well know, not on my own account, but because of a certain splendid memory which many Hon Members still preserve.’¹⁸

During the first half of the next decade, Churchill would write a biography of his father while starting out on his own political journey. In a sense, this was no mere coincidence. Churchill sought to vindicate his fathe...

Table of contents

• The Greatest Briton
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• Dedication
• Introduction
• CHAPTER ONE - The Promise of Youth
• CHAPTER TWO - Political Firebrand
• CHAPTER THREE - The Challenge of Total War
• CHAPTER FOUR - Rebuilding a Shattered World
• CHAPTER FIVE - Gathering Storm
• CHAPTER SIX - Saviour of the Free World
• CHAPTER SEVEN - Towards Triumph and Tragedy
• CHAPTER EIGHT - Churchill as War Leader
• CHAPTER NINE - Elder Statesman
• CHAPTER TEN - Churchill’s Political Philosophy
• Acknowledgements
• Select Bibliography