THE CHURCHILL CONTROVERSY—II MR CHURCHILL DETAILS HIS FATHER’S WORK AFTER 70
<By
RANDOLPH CHURCHILL)
Here is more of the report I have received of my father at that time from the close official collaborator I have mentioned above (in the part of Mr Churchill’s article printed last Saturday):
While out of office, he wrote, the six volumes of his history of the war. It was surely a substantial achievement to turn out this great work in the space of five years between the ages of 70 and 75. Moran quotes a statement i by Masefield that this work is “diffuse.” But Masefield is not a historian, and I doubt whether historians would endorse that view. It may be that Volume VI falls below the standard of the earlier volumes. But, if so, the explanation is, not that W.S.C. was losing his grip, but that he was getting rather bored with this particular job and also that, as the end of the Parliament approached, his mind was turning again to domestic politics and the possibility that he might reverse the verdict given by the electorate in 1945. It is also true that in Volume VI he had to pull his punches to some extent —because by this time Eisenhower had become President of the U.S.A, and W.S.C. had himself become Prime Minister again before this volume was actually published. Some of his judgments of events in the last year of the war had to be blurred in the interests of preserving good current relations between the U.K. and the U.S.A. When he became Prime Minister again in 1951 there is no doubt that he dominated his Cabinet colleagues. Many had said that, though he was pre-eminent as a war leader, he would not make a good Prime Minister in peace. In the event, however, he was seen to tower above his colleagues in the Cabinet —partly by reason of his record in the war, but partly also because of the continuing strength of his personality. It may be that he had not quite the same strength and resilience as he had in 1940. Indeed, it would be surprising if this had been so; for he was by now a man of 77. But he certainly had enough drive and vigour to provide leadership for this country, at home and also in International affairs, viz. his visits to the United States and Canada and his speeches there.
Severe Stroke
Even in 1953, after the most severe of the strokes which afficted him, he did not lose heart. To Moran he may have shown apprehension. To his personal staff and others close to him he showed only determination—to recover and carry on. When he had the stroke I was ill with influenza. As soon as I recovered I went down to see him at Chartwell . There were three of us for dinner— W.S.C., Jock Colville and myself. W.S.C. was in a wheelchair. After dinner, in the drawing room, he said that he was going to stand on his feet. Jock and I urged him not to attempt this and, when he insisted, we came up to either side of him so that we could catch him if he fell. He waved us back with a stick, he then lowered his feet to the ground, gripped the arms of his chair, and by a tremendous effort—with sweat pouring down his face—levered himself to his feet and stood upright. Having demonstrated that he could do this, he sat down again. I shall never forget this demonstration of will-power. It was like 1940 in person—"you can’t do this to me.” He was determined to recover. H e did recover. Though he had what he called “a kick in his gallop,” he could go regularly to the House of Commons and could still dominate it. In the House of Commons he was perhaps at his best, in these last days, when answering Parliamentary questions. Right up to the end he was adept in dealing with supplementaries for which he never needed any notes and relied wholly on his power to improvise. Sense Of Fun _ In the years of Opposition and later in his years of government, he had always retained bis sense of humour and of fun. Thus, Lord Chandos, formerly Oliver Lyttelton, a friend and colleague of my father’s in war and peace, tells ,me that while on one occasion my father was discussing with Lord Woolton the by-election held at Rotherhithe'in 1946. he asked Lord Woolton, chairman of the Tory party, what he was doing about it. Woolton said: “We are sending down the whole circus.”
He was a gloomy figure, and on one occasion abroad one member of my family said to him; “You mean, of
, course, all the leading Tory spokesmen.” Churchill understood this perfectly well, but wishing to tease Woolton said: “Circus? Circus? Well, if there is going to be a circus —who’s going to be the clown?” While engaged in the active work of Opposition and in all ] his travels he nonetheless managed to lead a happy family life at Chartwell. My
sister Mary, who spent most of the Opposition years with her husband Christopher Soames at Chartwell Farm, scarcely two hundred yards from Chartwell, recalls the “conducted tours” which were a regular feature of Chartwell life and which included the farmyard:
If there' were work* of construction or reconstruction these were always visited, supervised and directed. Bulldozers, saws and winches all had a fascination for him. The great tour nearly always ended up at the'pig-styes where Papa would ceremoniously scratch the backs of the pigs. "Dogs look up to men. cats look down on men, but pigs just treat us as equals." he would say.
Of course, as many people recall, Moran intervened only on these tranquil scenes when Sir Winston’s health was a matter of concern, with the natural result that his presence usually cast a mantle of gloom over an otherwise happy family. It was indeed rare that he was ever invited on a purely social level unassociated with his functions as a doctor.
I regret that on reading the book one might have the impression that my father was a hypochondriac, perpetually concerned about his health. But frequently throughout the 25 years during which Moran was my father's doctor, many months would pass between visits, months of enormous creative activity and sparkling health and vigour which Moran never had the opportunity to observe. It is quite natural that as a doctor his observations should be chiefly concerned with ill health, but this limitation imposed considerable restrictions on his opportunity for presenting a really complete portrait of my father.
The “Burnt-out Case”
Let us take up once more the accusation of the “burntout case.”
In the first year after the war my father made 11 major speeches in the House of Commons, at Brussels, the Hague, Zurich, Metz, Fulton (United States), and New York. He took part in Parliamentary debates on 50 different topics. In 1947-49 he made six major speeches and took part in lively Parliamentary debates on nationalisation, capital punishment, which he favoured, electoral reform, social affairs, India, Burma, Pakistan: and in the following year, apart from his vigorous leadership in Opposition in Parliament, he spoke at Brussels, Strasbourg and New York. At the same time he was reorganising his party and preparing it for the electoral victory which returned him to power in 1951. In the year before that election he had again taken part in 50 Parliamentary debates. Between his 80th birthday on November 30. 1954, and his retirement on April 5. 1955, Parliament sat for 13 weeks. During this time he took part In three major debates, answered questions on 23 days—giving 103 answers to 122 questions and dealing with 183 supplementary questions. The last words he uttered In the House as Prime Minister were on March 31, 1955, when in reply to a supplementary question he said: “I think the closer the contact between the United States and Europe the better.”
1 am making a special point of this intense activity because certain political elements have tried to draw some outrageous implication from the dreary and gloomy list of symptoms and diagnoses with which Moran’s book is so liberally padded. “Sufficient Rebuttal” It has been suggested that the retention of my father’s party leadership and return to power in 1951 was a fraudulent trick on the electorate—that though unfit to exercise leadership and perform his duties he was maintained as a sort of decrepit figurehead in order to win the election. The list I have given above of his activities while in Opposition and after his return as head of the Government are a sufficient rebuttal for this dishonourable slander on my father and his party. But the accounts of his activity and state of mind given to me by those who were far closer to him than Moran add up to overwhelming proof of his validity as Prime Minister and leader. Moran makes the great mistake of comparing Churchill at 80 to Churchill at 65 or 70. The proper comparison should have been between the
validity of Churchill at 80 and that of any other man of any age who might have claimed leadership at that time. Here is another letter I have received, and which is worthy of attention, from Anthony Montague Browne, who was my father’s personal private secretary from 1952 until the end of his life. "His working hours wers long by any standard, though Interspersed with his afternoon rest and. If It could be managed, a very lengthy sit over luncheon. "After dinner he Invariably returned to the Cabinet Room to work until the first editions of the newspapers arrived, and he quite often dictated exhorting Minutes to hie Ministers on the news items. (They received these billet-doux early the next day quite often before they had read the newspapers themselves. The small fry who were not aware of the newspaper arrangements were thereby mystified.) "W’ork was in many ways his recreation and when events were pressing it was notable that his good humour increased. When there was a really appetising International situation I more than onre heard him remark that he loved being FTtme Minister and woke up feeling as though he had a bottle of champagne in him. When affairs were slack he notably drooped." But even after he had resigned in 1955 his capacity for interest in world affairs had not been drained away. He was not—even yet—the burnt out case.
He joined in debates on German rearmament, the future of the European Defence Community; made at least three notable speeches in the 1955 elections; and a distinguished and a noteworthy address at Aachen in May, 1956, when he received the Charlemagne Prize. Lord Moran has stated that he has published his diaries on my father without changes or additions under the influence of hindsight of later years. Only Lord Moran himself is in a position to make such a statement. The Boss There is no-one to corroborate Moran’s views. Vet there are certain surprising details in his texts. For instance, he repeatedly quotes member’s of my father's staff as referring to him as “Winston.” In fact, it was always customary among them to refer to him among themelves as “the Boss.” Finally, 1 will quote again from the letter 1 received from Lord Chandos:— I remember particularly in evening at Chartwell when Winston (it was after his stroke) and I sat up till 2. He ranged over a good many topics—"tho indirect approach” to war and tactics, tanks, the deep narrow thrust, etc. Many recollections of the first war, the Russian threat. He was amazingly vital and the uncanny vision into the future as clear and sonorous as ever. AH the dialogue In Moran is suspect. The only checks 1 have made with certain people named all deny Incidents. Tho diary, I'm sure, was written up afterwards. AH the characters speak Moranesque.
The three and a half years of Sir Winston’s second tenure at Downing Street were somewhat frustrating. One of the reasons for which he stayed on was the hope to obtain a * meeting at the Summit with the Americans, Stalin and, later, after Stalin's death, Malenkov. It may be that his hopes were chimerical. But he persevered; in any case it is quite ludicrous for anyone to pretend that his second administration was in any sense a failure, or a strain on his reputation. No great miscalculation or disaster marred these years. He did not, like Lloyd George, traffic in honours; nor like Baldwin lie to his country about its defences, nor like Chamberlain dishonour the country by a Munich. He would never have made the shambles that Sir Anthony Eden created at Suez. Shortly after Suez someone asked whether he would have undertaken this operation. He reflected for quite a time then replied—“l would not have done it without squaring the Americans—but if I had, 1 would never have dared to stop.” He was retired and over 80 years old when he made that sagacious statement. Copyright Randolph Churchill. Paris Match and the Daily Telegraph (Concluded)
This is the second part of an article by Mr Randolph Churchill criticising the biography of Sir Winston Churchill by Lord Moran, Sir Winston Churchill’s doctor. The first part was printed last Saturday.
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Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31109, 12 July 1966, Page 16
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2,229THE CHURCHILL CONTROVERSY—II MR CHURCHILL DETAILS HIS FATHER’S WORK AFTER 70 Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31109, 12 July 1966, Page 16
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