The Seven Lives of Winston Spencer Churchill by Joseph C
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Torch Magazine • Winter 2017 The Seven Lives of Winston Spencer Churchill By Joseph C. Huber, Jr. I first encountered Winston Churchill * * * nearly sixty years ago in the six volumes The first additional life was the most of his Marlborough, the biography of unusual one, for an author, of his ancestor John Churchill, First professional soldiering. Not considered Duke of Marlborough, for whom the smart enough for Oxford or grateful Queen Anne commissioned Cambridge, he graduated (after some the construction of magnificent Blen- difficulty with the entrance exams) heim Palace, named for his great 1704 from England’s military school, victory in the War of the Spanish Sandhurst, and joined the cavalry, in Succession. which he fought, was shot at by, and probably killed enemy soldiers on four Joseph C. Huber, Jr. John’s diplomacy with a fragmented continents. coalition army, his logistics innovations, Home schooled on an isolated Philippine rubber plantation (less 31 and his series of successful battles Fighting in Cuba before America’s months a Japanese prisoner) and graduate against France put England in first “little war” and later in what was then of a rural Ohio high school, Joseph C. place in Europe; Winston’s command northern India, he supported himself Huber, Jr., earned an SBEE and an SMEE of the English language, inventive use in the style he wished by writing at MIT in electromagnetic waves. of words, lucid and succinct narrative, newspaper articles and successful For 50 years he created designs, and fascinating content were irresistible. books on the wars. received patents and led programs to keep the Cold War cold, drugs out of the US, and Though not the overwhelming best- soldiers safe in the War on Terror. In so seller his history of the Second World Always on the lookout for the next doing he traveled a good part of the world, War was, the biography has many other English conflict, he pulled strings and drove in a dozen foreign countries, and admirers; it is nothing less than “the used holidays to “go to the sound of the visited the Blenheim Palace room in which greatest historical work written in our guns.” Off to Africa, he joined the Winston Churchill was born. century, an inexhaustible mine of fighting near Khartoum. Scouting, he Currently he is secretary of the Akron Club; active in church, Rotary, and WWII political wisdom and understanding, found the enemy, then joined in the Round Table; a member of historical which should be required reading for world’s last great cavalry charge at societies and a bibliophilic organization; every student of political science,” Omdurman in 1898, driving his horse and has nearly finished his second book. according to political philosopher Leo through twelve-deep ranks of He has been married to Julia McMillen Strauss. Dervishes, killing several. Huber for over fifty wonderful years, and they have two great sons, two delightful Churchill earned his living by daughters-in-law, and five grandsons to be Resigning his commission, he sailed proud of. writing, and five feet of my shelves hold to the Boer War as a correspondent, This paper was presented to the Akron some of his fifty-eight books and 9,000 but soon joined the army. When Torch Club on April 25, 2016. speeches. He published more than accompanying an armored train, his Dickens and Shakespeare combined, valiant efforts to rescue it when earning a Nobel Prize for Literature. ambushed failed, and he was captured by the Boers. Escaping alone from a His literary production alone would Pretoria prison, he made his way with amount to a full industrious life for help to friendly lines, with a bounty on most, but not for Churchill, who his head. achieved six more successful interwoven lives. He was the first descendant of Continuing his dual military/ John Churchill to match his ancestor’s correspondent role, he took part in achievements. lifting the siege of Ladysmith, then 28 Torch Magazine • Winter 2017 scouted and found the critical point 21st Regiment of the Royal Scots Minister, through most of World War through which he signaled the attack Fusiliers in trenches on the Western II, he had, for an author, quite a military that proved the war’s final turning front. Despite making twenty-six trips career. point at Diamond Hill. into no-man’s-land, he again escaped shot and shell, and was once only a * * * Brave to the point of rashness and couple of hundred yards from a Invention and innovation constituted deserving a Victoria Cross, he was not corporal named Adolf Hitler. Urged to a third life. Among the first to learn to viewed with favor by the old-line stay, he felt he needed to return to fly, and crash, piloting in over 130 officers who awarded medals. His Parliament, later serving as Minister of training flights, he started the Naval Air widely read writings lambasting senior Munitions at a time of severe shell Force. officers for their failings would not shortages. Even in this position he have made him any more popular with regularly visited the front, once in a Crucially, he converted the Royal his superiors. He could be called, in combat aircraft over no-man’s-land. Navy to oil from coal in time for World today’s parlance, an aristocratic show- When America entered the war, his War I. Seeking a solution to the boater. efforts to equip the AEF earned him quagmire of trench warfare, he used the US Distinguished Service Medal. Navy money to fund development for It is also true that some of his a project he gave the non-army cover opportunities arose because of name of “tank,” and then worked connections his mother had through assiduously for its use to end her liaisons, not then uncommon in Britain’s brilliant horrendous casualties. Six hundred that social stratum. The beautiful “tanks” in the Battle of Amiens started American Jenny Jerome was the widow Professor modern maneuver warfare. of the 8th Duke of Marlborough’s younger brother, Lord Randolph, a Henry Tizard In World War II, Churchill was leader of Parliament till his irrational and his team of receptive to bold ideas offered by behavior cost him the job; he is believed others, to which he often contributed to have died of syphilis or its mercury experts developed his own ideas. Britain’s brilliant treatment. dozens of useful, Professor Henry Tizard and his team of experts developed dozens of useful, Elected to Parliament in 1900, occasionally occasionally bizarre, devices, whose Churchill brought his military tests Winston loved to watch. experience to new responsibilities. bizarre, devices, Appreciating the value of joint efforts, Prior to and in the first year of World whose tests he insisted on sharing with the United War I, Winston served as first Lord of States the secrets of radar, of jet engines, the Admiralty and was responsible for Winston loved and of the decoding work done at the sea and air defense of England, to watch. Bletchley Park. ordering successful air raids on their Friedrichshafen air-docks when * * * Zeppelins first bombed London. In Churchill’s first priority, and the life 1915, he was forced out in a change of In World War II, he stood on rooftops for which he is most remembered, was government and berated over the to witness German bombings. Only a as a politician. He served in the House Gallipoli debacle, which, in his view, direct order from the king kept him of Commons almost continuously had resulted from the timidity and from being on a ship in close support from 14 February 1901 until 15 Octo- vacillation of commanding generals at D-Day; nonetheless, in a few days he ber 1964, dying January 24, 1965, 70 and admirals that allowed Turkey, managed to be on a ship firing at the years to the day after his father. Not under German leadership, time to shore. Later he stood calmly under shy, in his first two weeks he gave three create a trench warfare defense. heavy shellfire to the discomfort of effective speeches in Parliament, and Hundreds of thousands of casualties accompanying Allied generals, as he was always at the fore with speeches, resulted, and the success of the had done trying to save Antwerp in ideas, and programs in ten different Bolshevik revolution can be traced in World War I. cabinet posts. He approached each new part to this failure. ministry and issue with vigor and new Serving as Home Secretary with the ideas, faltering only when as Chancellor He then served for five months power to use the military in England, of the Exchequer he followed bad commanding the 6th Battalion of the and Defense Secretary, as well as Prime advice on the price of gold. 29 Torch Magazine • Winter 2017 Though grandson of a Duke of best—unsuccessfully—to convince monument on her London grave. Marlborough (and next in line to be Roosevelt and Truman. As early as the 10th Duke before the 9th Duke’s 1945 he spoke of the Iron Curtain and Though a powerful speaker, Winston wife, the American heiress Consuelo the need, not for a balance of power, had a problem with women. Enamored Vanderbilt, produced an heir and a but the affordable strategy of enough of attractive Pamela Plowden, whom spare), he strove to improve life for the power to dissuade any gambler. His he met serving in India, he pursued her common man. His efforts led to many 1946 “Iron Curtain” speech at West- so slowly that she married the Earl of reforms, labor laws, and early welfare minster College in Fulton, Missouri, Lytton.