The Churchillian Winter 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 4

The Magazine of the National Churchill Museum

Churchill in the Nuclear Age

Churchill, Science and the Bomb • Scientific Weaponry The Bomb and the future Board of Governors of the Association of Churchill Fellows

FROM THE Jean-Paul Montupet MESSAGE EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR Chairman & Senior Fellow St. Louis, Missouri

A.V. L. Brokaw, III Hello from Fulton and welcome to another St. Louis, Missouri

edition of The Churchillian. At this time of Robert L. DeFer year, a time of reflection on life in general, Chesterfield, Missouri it’s always good to look back and assess the Earle H. Harbison, Jr. year in retrospect and what a busy year it was! St. Louis, Missouri William C. Ives A wonderful Enid and R. Crosby Kemper Chapel Hill, North Carolina Lecture, delivered by eminent Cambridge Rob Havers at US Capital with R. Crosby Kemper, III Roger Daltry from British rock Professor Peter Clark was matched by a Kansas City, Missouri and roll band legend The Who record crowd in attendance and marvelous Barbara D. Lewington reviews of Peter’s lecture and his willingness St. Louis, Missouri to engage with all he encountered during his time in Fulton. Hard on Richard J. Mahoney the heels of this bumper weekend we presented the Churchill Medal to St. Louis, Missouri William R. Piper Westminster alumnus, St. Louis businessman, former US Ambassador to St. Louis, Missouri Belgium, Stephen Brauer and longtime ‘Churchillian’. This event was an Suzanne D. Richardson unprecedented success both in terms of the actual evening as well as for St. Louis, Missouri

the funds raised in support of the National Churchill Museum’s strategic The Honorable Edwina Sandys, M.B.E. plan. These funds saw a quick, initial, deployment in the culmination of New York, New York a long held ambition fully to install a more sophisticated heating and air James M. Schmuck conditioning provision in our temporary gallery space. This, a necessary Wildwood, Missouri Lady Mary Soames L.G., D.B.E. prerequisite to bolster our array of exhibition offerings, is a vital step London, U.K. forward for our institution. Linda Gill Taylor Edgerton, Missouri

We continue to emphasize our role as America’s National Churchill John C. Wade Museum on a much broader stage with our active participation in the Wildwood, Missouri planning committee for the commemoration of the 50th Anniversary of Hjalma E. Johnson, Emeritus Dade City, Florida Churchill’s death in 2015. This committee, and associated plans, will John R. McFarland, Emeritus mark this date in an appropriate fashion looking back to 1965 but also St. Louis, Missouri forward as Churchill’s memory and legacy is cemented in the wider Harold L. Ogden, Emeritus public consciousness. The committee is chaired by Professor Sir David Seal Beach, California Cannadine, our Kemper Lecturer from 2012, and this group is in good William H. Tyler, Emeritus hands with him at the helm. With the wider Churchill world in our minds, Pebble Beach, California new Senior Fellow Jean-Paul Montupet and I were delighted to be present Churchill Institute & Museum Committee of the Board of Trustees, at the dedication the new Churchill bust in the Capitol in Washington DC. Westminster College More details and photographs can be found on page 28. James M. Schmuck, Chair Wildwood, Missouri As ever I hope you find this edition of The Churchillian stimulating Jane Bell, Vice Chair and insightful. In a seemingly unstable world it is of course well worth Fulton, Missouri Bruce Brookby reminding ourselves that twas ever thus and the articles in this issue speak Bartlesville, Oklahoma to that time when ‘the bomb’ was a topic of concern and consternation, Ron J. Kostich security for some and confidence for others. Upland, California

Ken Meyer As this year ends we, of course, look forward to next year, and the 100th Springfield, Missouri anniversary of the outbreak of The Great War. We look forward too to the J. Christopher Panettiere 2014 Kemper Lecture and I am delighted to announce, as a well as our Atlanta, Georgia William H. Roedy Kemper Lecturer Paul Reid that we will welcome special guest Randolph London, U.K. Churchill, son of the late Winston Churchill who will join us for a very Linda Gill Taylor special Churchill Fellows’ dinner in advance of the Lecture. Edgerton, Missouri

Ronald D. Winney I wish you all a very Happy Christmas and look forward to seeing you in Edwardsville, Illinois the New Year! George K. Parkins Dr. Rob Havers Prairie Village, Kansas Executive Director, Suzanne D. Richardson National Churchill Museum St. Louis Missouri

Rob Havers Executive Director 2 the Churchillian | Winter 2013 The Churchillian The Magazine of the National Churchill Museum

Winter 2013 | Volume 4 | Issue 4

Churchill, Science and the Bomb 4 Richard M. Langworth

Scientific Weaponry: How Churchill Encouraged 6 the “Boffins” and Defied the “Blimps” by Antoine Capet — Page 6 — The Bomb and the Future: 16 Excerpts from Speeches and Conversations by Winston S. Churchill

Book Review: Scientists and Statesmen, 22 Churchill and the Nuclear Age by Erica Chenoweth

Book Review: Churchill the Indispensable 24 by Richard M. Langworth

26 Churchill in the News

Meet the New Marketing Specialist 30 Caroline Slavin

— Page 16 — 31 Message from the Director of Development by Kit Freudenberg The National Churchill Museum is located on the Westminster College campus in Fulton, Missouri, and From the Archives designated by Congress as America’s 32 by Liz Murphy National Churchill Museum. 573-592-5369, www.nationalchurchillmuseum.org

Educational and Public Programming Copyright material by Winston S. Churchill 33 by Mandy Plybon is reprinted within The Churchillian with the permission of Curtis Brown, London, on behalf of the Estate of Sir Winston Churchill. Letters to the Editor 34 by Dr. Rob Havers Cover: Intaglio print by Sarah Churchill and Curtis Hooper, part of a series issued in the 1970s, reproduced by kind permission of 35 Calendar of Events Lady Soames.

the Churchillian | Winter 2013 3 Churchill, Science and the Bomb Richard M. Langworth

e knew the world would not politics than bad physics. 3) Somewhere along be the same. A few people the line, around 1940-41, Winston Churchill, by “Wlaughed…A few people cried… refusing to stand down when no one else was Most people were silent. I remembered the standing, saved civilisation. line from the Hindu scripture the Bhagavad Gita....‘Now I am become death, the destroyer of Notwithstanding that Churchill was worlds.’ I suppose we all thought that, one way proclaimed Person of the Century by most or another.” authorities, Time’s choice was a disappointment. Churchill is forever seen by casual thinkers as a The speaker was J. Robert Oppenheimer, man of war, who had his moment in 1940 and head of the Secret Weapons Laboratory at Los faded away. Few recall his early warnings of Alamos. The date was July 16, 1945, culmination “a bomb no bigger than an orange,” or his late, of the Manhattan Project: the successful first test lonely campaign for a “final settlement” with of the atomic bomb. the Soviets in the 1950s, as the hydrogen bomb emerged and the terror of imminent extinction When Time magazine named Churchill flickered. “Man of the Half-Century” in 1950, it was widely assumed that, nobody of his stature having since Hardly for the first time, this issue reminds emerged, Time would name him Person of the us that Churchill, far more than the defiant war Century in 2000. Before Time gave its accolade leader, was a thinker who considered “Things to Albert Einstein, when editor Walter Isaacson That Matter”—and still matter in our own asked for comment, I offered him three facts: 1) time. I believe he is so frequently remembered, Churchill wrote “Shall We All Commit Suicide?,” quoted, misquoted and referenced today because warning of a possible nuclear holocaust, fifteen we believe he really stood for something. He years before Einstein sent his famous letters exemplified certain critical human possibilities to President Roosevelt warning of the same that are always worth bringing to the attention possibility. 2) Einstein suggested that the world of thoughtful people, who mean to perpetuate was far more likely to come to grief from bad what he held dear: respect of country, the

4 the Churchillian | Winter 2013 fraternal relationship of the Great Democracies The decades that followed saw fresh tyrants and English-speaking Peoples, their common come and go, but Kennedy’s common link, heritage of law, language and literature; and fragile and wavering sometimes, still held. Even above all their love of liberty. the worst of them, Mao and Khruschev and Kim Jon Il, were not suicidal. Churchill was far from a scientist, as Antoine Capet tells us in the following article. But he had a “But that’s the point,” argues Charles scientist’s curiosity. He made sure he was advised Krauthammer, whose Things That Matter we by experts not only eminent but able to explain also review herein. “We’re now at the dawn technical matters in terms he could grapple with. of an era in which an extreme and fanatical The first of these was Frederick Lindemann, religious ideology, undeterred by the usual a leading subject in Dr. Capet’s piece, and calculations of prudence and self-preservation, is Graham Farmelo’s new book, Churchill’s Bomb, wielding state power and will soon be wielding reviewed herein by Erica Chenoweth. But there nuclear power….This atavistic love of blood and were many others whom Churchill listened to, death, and indeed, self-immolation in the name and he never automatically accepted everything of God may not be new—medieval Europe had any one of them recommended. He looked an abundance of millennial Christian sects—but around. He kept his options open. He never until now it has never had the means to carry out risked ignoring a threat, even when Lindemann its apocalyptic ends.” himself dismissed it. The nuclear deterrent, Churchill said in 1955, And isn’t this rare among politicians—the “does not cover the case of lunatics or dictators ability to buck the strongest opinions of their in the mood of Hitler when he found himself in favorite advisers? Churchill was not a leader who his final dug-out. That is a blank.” Thirty years just went with the flow, questioning little. He earlier he wrote: “Death stands at attention, questioned everything. He argued and cajoled. obedient, expectant, ready to serve, ready to He thought for himself, particularly over the shear away the peoples en masse; ready, if called greatest secret weapon of them all. He regarded on, to pulverize, without hope of repair, what is the bomb as no less the destroyer of worlds than left of civilisation. He awaits only the word of Oppenheimer. But he refused to accept it with command. He awaits it from a frail, bewildered fatalistic apathy. He preferred, and tried, to do being, long his victim, now—for one occasion something about it. only—his Master.”

Lady Soames always reminds us that we must  never ask the question, “What would Churchill do?” because we have no way of telling. She Somehow we survived it all. We survived always replies, when someone ventures to answer because the most dangerous political movement that question: “How do you know?” in history pulled back from unleashing the calamity Churchill feared at Fulton. It pulled We don’t know. Her father is not here to back, John Kennedy said, because in the end consider the options and make his judgments, both sides shared something: “Our most basic based on his wealth of experience from common link is that we all inhabit this planet. Omdurman to Hiroshima. We are. We are not as We all breathe the same air. We all cherish our well equipped to decide. But we may learn from children’s future. And we are all mortal.” his criteria.

the Churchillian | Winter 2013 5 Scientific Weaponry : How Churchill Encouraged the “Boffins” and Defied the “Blimps”

Churchill’s scientific adviser, Frederick Lindeman, Lord Cherwell, was of decisive influence on Churchill’s thought about weapons of war—and his leading ally in the incessant, mostly successful, battle of the “Boffins”

Churchill and Frederick Lindemann, “The against the Prof”: a sketch by Emmwood for the Daily Mail, 1952. “Blimps.”

ANTOINE CAPET

Dr. Capet is Professor of British Studies at the University of Rouen, France. This article is derived from a longer paper delivered at the Science and Technology in Contemporary Britain Summer Conference, Institute of Contemporary British History, King’s College, London, July 2013, available to readers by email.

6 the Churchillian | Winter 2013 In his “Finest Hour” speech of explosive energy incomparably June 18, 1940, Churchill speaks of “a more intense than anything new Dark Age, made more sinister, heretofore discovered? Might not and perhaps more protracted, by the a bomb no bigger than an orange lights of perverted science.” Churchill be found to possess a secret had a passion for war, but his interest power to destroy a whole block of in applied science, particularly when buildings—nay to concentrate the applied to weapons, is not as well force of a thousand tons of cordite known. He did not always rejoice and blast a township at a stroke? in technological progress. In his 1930 autobiography, for example, He returned to the theme in 1931, he deplored the replacement of close in a Strand Magazine article entitled combat by technological weaponry: “Fifty Years Hence”: “War, which used to be cruel and magnificent, has now become cruel Nuclear energy is incomparably and squalid.” greater than the molecular energy which we use today....There is no Yet Churchill was an eminently question among scientists that this practical man. If new weapons could gigantic source of energy exists. Churchill’s devotion to “The Prof,” deeply be developed, it was the duty of What is lacking is the match to set repaid, vouchsafed their long relationship in peace and war. (Wikimedia Commons) responsible leaders to make sure their the bonfire alight, or it may be the countries had them before potential detonator to cause the dynamite enemies. Thus he supported creation to explode. The Scientists are “the bomber will always get through,” of the Fleet Air Arm when First looking for this….Could not was currently true, Churchill was sure Lord of the Admiralty 1911-15 and explosives even of the existing science could find a defence. And here furthered research for what became type be guided automatically we may perceive his close association the tank, which was resisted by in flying machines by wireless with the Boffins, chief among which military authorities as hopeless. That or other rays, without a human was Frederick Lindeman (1886-1957), was one of his early experiences of pilot, in ceaseless procession on whom Churchill called “the Prof.” conflict between the “Blimps” and the a hostile city, arsenal, camp, or “Boffins,” as they were called later. dockyard? Churchill met Lindeman in 1921 The “Blimps” were the generals and at the Duke of Westminster’s country admirals who thought conventionally, His latter prediction—what house and was immediately impressed. based on wars past. The “Boffins,” with would come to be known as guided A physicist of repute, Lindeman was a whom Churchill came increasingly to missiles—was owed to H.G. Wells, wealthy man at ease in the high society associate, were scientists engaged in with whom Churchill disagreed Churchill also frequented. His father back-room research on new weapons politically but read avidly. “Wells the was an Alsatian who had emigrated to or defences against them. magician, the seer,” he wrote, “saw Britain when Alsace became German quite clearly, nay in meticulous detail, in 1871. His mother was an American Early Warnings all that flying meant, as soon as the of part-Russian origin. Frederick was After World War I, Churchill’s first man could fly. He visualised and born in Germany, and his parents sent interest in weapon science led him portrayed hateful developments…like him to a German Gymnasium, which to contemplate the consequences of the bombing of undefended cities and they thought best suited to his early splitting the atom, first achieved by Sir wholesale slaughter of men, women aptitude for mathematics. He took his Ernest Rutherford in 1917. Churchill and children.” Ph.D. in Physics in Berlin in 1910. first expressed the potential dangers in a 1924 magazine article, “Shall We The operative word in that Back in England just before war All Commit Suicide?”: quotation is “undefended.” Churchill broke out in 1914, Lindeman joined the was alarmed by the absence of Royal Aircraft Factory at Farnborough, Then there are Explosives. Have effective means to protect cities where he experimented at the peril we reached the end? Has Science from air bombardment. While of his life. Discovering a scientific turned its last page on them? May acknowledging that Baldwin’s famous explanation for the phenomenon of there not be methods of using pronouncement in November 1932, aircraft “spin,” he learned to fly and

the Churchillian | Winter 2013 7 deliberately caused his plane to spin reinforced, since the Prof was by then “I knew nothing out of control, proving his theory a prominent member of Churchill’s about science, but with scientific measurements. After entourage, almost part of the family the war he was elected Professor of circle. I knew something of Experimental Philosophy (Physics) scientists, and had at Oxford and rose rapidly in the Small wonder that Churchill, academic world. The great centre when Chamberlain made him First had much practice for Physics was then the Cavendish Lord of the Admiralty in September as a Minister in Laboratory at Cambridge; Lindemann 1939, should have appointed strove to create a credible challenge in Lindemann ”personal adviser to the handling things I did the Clarendon Laboratory at Oxford. First Lord on scientific development.” not understand.” These were the exact words of the —Churchill, 1948 Lindemann’s Qualities official announcement, which added: As Churchill saw it, the Prof “the appointment will be temporary possessed two incomparable virtues: and unpaid.” The Prof was duly he was able to explain highly released from his Oxford duties and complicated scientific questions totally immersed in the “Wizard War,” concisely in plain English; and he to which Churchill would devote shared Churchill’s concern over a whole chapter in his memoirs. Britain’s vulnerability to air attack. At Whether Churchill knew that the word the risk of oversimplifying, we might “wizard” was connected with science say that Churchill’s 1930s campaign to in Old English (Wissenschaft in abandon Baldwin’s passive resignation modern German) is impossible to say, to aerial bombing took two forms: the but he candidly explains his approach: gathering of statistics on the true state “I knew nothing about science, but I of German and British rearmament; knew something of scientists, and had and supporting urgent research on the had much practice as a Minister in Sir Henry Tizard (1885-1959) detection of enemy aircraft. handling things I did not understand.” began as a friend and colleague of Lindemann, ended an In 1934-35, when the government World War II’s Wizard opponent, and even resigned out of differences with the Prof, appointed a committee to promote Weapons but rejoined the argument over development of “radio detecting and The best example of “wizardry” bomber allocation. ranging” (RADAR), Churchill made came in Spring 1940 after Churchill (Imperial War Museum) sure that Lindemann was among its became Prime Minister—when, members. Conflict soon developed, naturally, he kept the Prof as his especially between the Prof and his scientific adviser: friend and colleague Sir Henry Tizard. With all his virtues Lindemann had In June I received a painful shock. a serious fault: the inability to admit Professor Lindemann reported to he might be wrong. And here he was me that he believed the Germans wrong. Tizard and the others believed were preparing a device by means radar was the only practical solution to of which they would be able to detecting enemy aircraft. Lindemann bomb by day or night whatever wanted to explore aerial mines and the weather. It now appeared infra-red technology. that the Germans had developed a radio beam which, like an The clash of opinions and invisible searchlight, would guide personalities led to Lindemann’s the bombers with considerable Russell Victor Jones was 28 when exclusion, which in a way reflected precision to their target….No he was summoned to explain Churchill’s own conflict with longer, therefore, had we only his ominous discovery about his unimaginative Conservative to fear the moonlight nights, in German radio beams before the leadership of the war at Downing friends. Paradoxically Churchill’s which at any rate our fighters Street. (Wikimedia Commons) trust in Lindemann’s judgment was could see as well as the enemy,

8 the Churchillian | Winter 2013 but we must even expect the heaviest attacks to be delivered in cloud and fog….Lindemann told me also that there was a way of bending the beam if we acted at once, but that I must see some of the scientists, particularly the Deputy Director of Intelligence Research at the Air Ministry, Dr. R.V. Jones, a former pupil of his at Oxford.

Russell Victor Jones, then only 28, received an invitation to come to the Cabinet Room to expound before Churchill. He thought it was a practical joke. He was soon disabused of this notion. Appearing before a group including the P.M., Sir Archibald Sinclair (Secretary of State for Air), Lord Beaverbrook (Minister of Aircraft Production), Air Chief Marshal Sir Philip Joubert de la Ferté (Commander-in-Chief Coastal R.V. Jones explained the presence of Knickebein transmitters directing German Command), Sir Robert Watson-Watt bombers, already in place for a raid on Derby, East Midlands, where Rolls- Royce was building Merlin fighter aircraft engines. (Wikimedia Commons) (father of British radar), and others including Lindemann and Tizard, he ”Frederick Lindemann was not the evil genius was asked to tell what he knew. or éminence grise his many opponents “For twenty minutes or more,” reported him to be. It is true that he had Churchill recounted, “he spoke in quiet tones, unrolling his chain of Churchill’s ear—but only when his advice did circumstantial evidence, the like of not go against Churchill’s instinct.” which for its convincing fascination was never surpassed by tales of Sherlock Holmes or Monsieur Lecoq battles with Lindemann, whereupon he (a small rocket to equip anti-aircraft [the detective in Émile Gaboriau’s moved to Magdalen College, Oxford batteries). In almost each case the Prof stories]. When Mr. Jones had finished, but remained an unofficial influence was instrumental in indicating where there was a general air of incredulity.” on government policy. the solution might lie—or knew the right person in the appropriate research Tizard, probably out of spite for “The battle of the beams” and laboratory. Lindemann and his protégé, led the “high-frequency war,” in Churchill’s skeptics. But Churchill could not run words, were only beginning. He gives A good example is the “proximity the risk. After many obstructions by a long list of measures and counter- fuse,” which allowed a shell or bomb the “Blimps,” an experiment was measures taken on both sides, with to detonate near the aerial target organized which showed a German arcane code names: “X-apparatus” without actually having to strike it. Its beam, the “Knickebein” (German (later “Y-apparatus” or “Smeller,” importance was revealed when the first for “curtsy”), already in place for an a form of radar which equipped pilotless planes or flying bombs (V1s) attack on Derby, where the Rolls- British bombers); “Gee” (the British were launched against London. Before Royce factory built Merlin engines for version of the Knickebein); H2S (a long, Churchill tells us, six out of Spitfires and Hurricanes. Jones and navigational instrument); “Starfish” seven V1s were being destroyed before Lindemann were vindicated. Tizard (decoy fires which confused German reaching London, notably by the shells later resigned because of ongoing pathfinders); “unrotated projectile” with proximity fuses. After the war,

the Churchillian | Winter 2013 9 the joint inventor of the proximity fuse on the grounds that the Germans would paid tribute to Lindemann: “There is quickly understand how it worked no doubt that it was thanks to Lord and use it against British radars when Cherwell that the slow progress which bombing England. had hitherto hampered this invention was accelerated.” In a way, Lindemann was the perfect Utilitarian. Like Jeremy Clearly Churchill loved the high- Bentham, father of Utilitarianism, tech gadgetry, especially when the he weighed the costs and expected results proved that he had been right to benefits of every measure. Window, he encourage applied scientific research was sure, would cost more in civilian which might benefit the war effort. lives than its benefits (even though Like the Prof, he no doubt perceived he was a great believer in massive air every victory of the Boffins over the In its infancy when the war began, radar raids over Germany). But Churchill Blimps as a personal triumph. In a (radio detecting and ranging) was highly did not always follow his advice, sophisticated at the end and played its revealing passage in his memoirs, he and authorized Window for a raid on decisive role in affairs. pays tribute to General Sir Frederick Hamburg on July 24, 1943. The result Pile, in charge of “Ack-Ack,” the was spectacular: losses were only anti-aircraft ground defences: “an his wartime proposals. The first a quarter of what they had been on officer of great distinction…who involves a radar jamming device previous raids. Of course by mid-1943, was singularly free from the distaste codenamed “Window,” based on a the Germans were no longer launching of novel devices so often found in principle developed before the war massive air raids, so the device was professional soldiers.” by R.V. Jones: specially cut pieces of little use to them. Their effort was of aluminium foil which, dropped now directed at building the miracle The Prof’s Faults from airplanes, would confuse enemy weapons Hitler said would win the Lindemann was not infallible. radar and render it almost useless. By war: the V1 flying bomb (ultimately In fact he made a number of bad 1942 the system was operational, but defeated by the proximity fuse) and mistakes. Three stand out among Lindemann opposed its introduction the V2 rocket.

Lindemann also went hopelessly Duncan Sandys, Churchill’s son-in- law, was nominated by the Chiefs of wrong on the V2 which, when the Staff to explore the V2 rocket threat British heard about it, he declared because the Chiefs thought a member impractical. Here several strands in his of the Churchill family would be best personality emerged. The first was his able to resist the doubtful Lndemann. irreducible self-confidence. Once he (LondonRemembers.com) had pronounced against the feasibility of something he never budged from his position. Second was his utilitarianism and rationalism. An expert in statistics, he presumably thought the Germans were also. Surely they had calculated how to kill the maximum number of British civilians at the minimum cost? Just as surely, that had to be the bomber raids, not complex and expensive rockets. Of course Hitler was not altogether rational. Fundamentally, technically and financially Lindemann was right, but he seriously discounted Alwyn Crow, inventor of the unrotated the psychological aspects. projectile, a critical part of anti-aircraft batteries, supported Lindemann in discounting The V2 argument involved the seriousness of the V2 rocket. (National Churchill in a conflict of loyalties. Portrait Gallery)

10 the Churchillian | Winter 2013 In April 1943, the Chiefs of Staff had persuaded him to take the threat “Bomber” Harris, determined head of seriously and to appoint an official to Bomber Command, opposed what he investigate and report on the rocket. called “slide-rule warfare,” which was not They nominated his son-in-law, calculated to win him points with the pro- Boffin Prime Minister. Duncan Sandys, Joint Parliamentary Secretary at the Ministry of Supply, probably thinking a member of the family would counterbalance Lindemann’s influence. Sandys duly produced photographs of the weapon; Lindemann said they were decoys, and dismissed Sandys as an amateur.

Again Churchill would take no chances. As he reportedly said at a meeting of the War Cabinet Defence Committee, including Sandys and Churchill observes the first American- built aircraft arrive under terms of Lindemann: Unless it could be the Lend-Lease Bill, signed into law by shown that scientifically a rocket was Roosevelt on March 11, 1941. impossible, they “could hardly ignore the existence of unexplained facts.” The P.M. was backed by Herbert to believe the V2 was a serious threat, later wrote in his published diaries, Morrison, Minister for Home Security. even though they overestimated the The Fringes of Power, Churchill By the end of 1943, except for Jones explosives it would carry. Lindemann and Alwyn Crow (inventor of the had been wrong in doubting the always retained unswerving unrotated projectile), Lindemann rocket’s practicality. independence of thought…. was almost alone in pooh-poohing Many people made the mistake of what he called “all this gossip,” still Churchill was nothing if not thinking that somebody—it might insisting that the V2 as technologically loyal to his friends. In a chapter in his be General Ismay or Professor impossible. memoirs entitled “The Pilotless War,” Lindemann—for whom the Prime he deprecates the German rockets and Minister had the utmost respect Both sides were at once right and praises Lindemann’s clear-sightedness, and affection, would be able to wrong. Crow, Jones and Lindemann basing his conclusion on the later “get something through.” Unless based their scepticism on physics. Ten testimony of Albert Speer, Hitler’s the Prime Minister was himself tons of high explosives (the payload architect and close associate, who said impressed by the argument, estimated by Sandys) would require a “twenty flying bombs could have been pressure by others seldom had any rocket weighing 70 to 80 tons. How, made for the cost of one rocket.” This, effect. they asked, could such a monster Churchill writes, confirms “the views even take off? But Sandys’s premise Lord Cherwell had so often expressed The Area Bombing Debate was false. The V2s which first struck before the event.” Considering his Finally, there is the extremely London on September 8, 1944 carried interest in new weaponry his words complex question of “area bombing” the same payload as the V1s—one are uncharacteristically myopic: “It and the best use of bombers equipped ton of explosives—and weighed only was fortunate that the Germans spent with H2S, the navigational instrument 13 tons. Yet Lindemann had told so much effort on rockets instead of in which Lindemann played an Churchill that a lighter weapon made bombers.” ambiguous role. Let us begin with no sense either, since German aircraft the view shared by both Churchill could now carry bombs weighing 2½ Frederick Lindemann was not the (at least early on, after the Blitz) and tons. evil genius or éminence grise his many Lindemann (with no qualms), that the opponents reported him to be. It is true German population had to be made to It made no sense until it fell on that he had Churchill’s ear—but only suffer. As Churchill famously put it in London. Sandys, Churchill, Morrison when his advice did not go against his broadcast of April 27, 1941: “There and the Chiefs of Staff had been right Churchill’s instinct. As John Colville are less than 70,000,000 malignant

the Churchillian | Winter 2013 11 bombers will in its lifetime drop about 40 tons of bombs. If these are dropped on built-up areas they will make 4000-8000 people homeless [each].

So far, the figures were purely factual, but Lindemann continued with more speculative calculations: “In 1938 over 22 million Germans lived in 58 towns of over 100,000 inhabitants, which, with modern equipment, should be easy to find and hit.”

Here, of course, he was neglecting the effect of “Flak,” the German anti- aircraft defences, which dissuaded bombers from approaching too near their targets, even targets that were “easy to find and hit.” This vitiated Teheran, 1943. Stalin, left, considered neither the bomber offensive nor the the Prof’s calculation that “even if half Italian campaign a “second front.” (Behind Stalin are Molotov and Harriman; FDR the total load of 10,000 bombers” was is chatting with Sarah Churchill, flanked by Anthony Eden). dropped on those towns, the “great majority” of their inhabitants would Huns, some of whom are curable and for Zuckerman and Bernal to undertake be homeless (if not dead). others killable.” a scientific survey of the damage caused by bombing in Britain. The We now know that in the event Lindemann certainly believed that idea was to extrapolate the findings these 58 towns were not razed to the massive bombing would weaken both and apply them to the German case. ground. But there were more mistakes the Germans’ resolve and their ability The survey centered on Birmingham to come in the next section of the to go on producing war equipment. and Hull, two heavily bombed minute, where Lindemann wandered Like Churchill he did necessarily cities where records of bombings on psychological grounds: believe in “indiscriminate bombing,” were precise. On March 30, 1942, but was sure that mathematics and Lindemann attached his interpretation Investigation seems to show that physics would show how to obtain the to the Zuckerman/Bernal preliminary having one’s house demolished is most destructive results. report, now sometimes referred to as most damaging to morale. People his “de-housing paper”: seem to mind it more than having The Prof’s view was often their friends or even their relatives denounced by “Bomber” Harris, Careful analysis of the effects of killed. At Hull signs of strain were head of Bomber Command, as “the raids on Birmingham, Hull and evident though only one-tenth slide-rule approach to warfare.” But elsewhere have shown that on of the houses were demolished. Lindemann was not alone in his average one ton of bombs dropped On the above figures we should beliefs. We have already met Jones, on a built-up area demolishes 20- be able to do ten times as much Crow and Tizard. Two other scientists 40 dwellings and turns 100-200 harm to each of the principal 58 involved in the bombing campaign people out of house and home. German towns. There seems little controversy were Solly Zuckerman, We know from our experience doubt that this would break the a rising zoologist who worked at the that we can count on nearly 14 spirit of the people. Ministry of Home Security; and John operational sorties per bomber Desmond Bernal, a physicist at the produced. The average lift [bomb The central issue was whether the same Ministry. payload] of the bombers we are bombing offensive should concentrate going to produce over the next on Germany (the province of Bomber In August 1941, Lindemann fifteen months will be about 3 Command) or the U-boat menace in opened the necessary Whitehall doors tons. It follows that each of these the Western Approaches (the province

12 the Churchillian | Winter 2013 “Like all physicists of his caliber and generation, Lindemann perfectly understood the theory behind the atom bomb. Like most of them, he took an interest in the research involved in transforming the theoretical potential of a nuclear explosion into a practical device….By August 1941 Lindemann was convinced that an atomic bomb was practical.” of Coastal Command, under Sir Philip evidence for that in Birmingham and Second Front—bombing Germany Joubert de la Ferté.) Which would Hull. was the only “front” Churchill then lead to the most efficient use of the had to offer him. Likewise, the British bombers under construction? It was a wonderful row by serious public wanted retaliation after German people, all devoted to Churchill air raids. But the planes allocated to Churchill took Lindemann’s and the war but pulling in opposite Coastal Command were sufficient to extrapolation very seriously—but as directions. Underlying it was the rid the Western Approaches of U-boats usual he considered other sources. rivalry between Bomber Command by the end of 1943. Patrick Blackett, who later (1948) and Coastal Command. Blackett, for won the Nobel Prize in Physics, joined instance, was known for his principled Lindemann lost this battle, Tizard in dismissing Lindemann’s opposition to bombing civilians (and, failing to convince Churchill that figures as fantastic. “I think you have it must be mentioned, his profound Bomber Command have absolute got your facts wrong,” Tizard wrote to dislike of Lindemann). Tizard, who priority. Paradoxically, his role in the Lindemann—possibly the worst insult also disliked Lindemann, was a great development of H2S enabled Coastal that you can imagine for a scientist. believer in attacking the U-boats, now Command to pursue its U-boat made easier by H2S, which enabled offensive with impressive results. The Blackett started all over aircraft to detect the presence of postwar Official History apportioned again from the available statistics, submarines recharging their batteries praise equally: “Cherwell did for arguing that Lindemann’s projected at night on the surface. And Bernal Bomber Command what Tizard did destruction was at least six times too was a supporter of Tizard. for Fighter Command—he gave it high. Unexpectedly biting the hand the scientific means of becoming an that had fed them, Zuckerman and Churchill, at the top, decided effective instrument of war.” Bernal agreed, saying the Prof had to have it both ways: bombers been too quick in deducing from their were allocated to both Commands. The Original Nuclear interim report that massive bombing Admittedly, Bomber Command had Proliferation would destroy German morale. Their a slight priority, if only to placate One failure in Lindemann’s final report, published on April 18, Stalin, who was loudly denouncing functions as Churchill’s scientific 1942, argued that there had been no Britain’s lack of enthusiasm for a adviser was perfectly honourable:

Solly Zuckerman, later Baron Zuckerman, J.D. Bernal, a physicist at the Ministry of German-born Professor Franz Simon (who was a zoologist who proved useful to the Home Security, co-wrote Zuckerman’s later became Sir Francis), joined Lindemann Boffins by studying the effects of bombing bombing report and disagreed completely at Clarendon investigating the weaponry on British cities. He is pictured here at with the spin Lindemann put on it. (Oregon potential of Uranium 235. (Wikimedia Tobruk, 1943. (Wikimedia Commons) State Library) Commons)

the Churchillian | Winter 2013 13 “However much I trust my neighbour and depend on him, I am very much averse to putting myself completely at his mercy. I would not, therefore, press the Americans to undertake this work; I would just continue exchanging information and get into production over here without raising the question of whether they should do it or not.” —Lindemann to Churchill, August 1941

Like all physicists of his calibre of 99% of the commoner….A and generation, Lindemann perfectly process has been devised by which understood the theory behind the atom it seems almost certain that this The Danish physicicist Niels Bohr failed to bomb. Like most of them, he took an can be done, but it is an extremely convince Churchill to share atomic secrets interest in the research involved in elaborate and costly process with the Russians. WSC: “I do not like the man transforming the theoretical potential involving repeated enrichment of with his hair all over his head.” (Wikimedia of a nuclear explosion into a practical the rarer component in something Commons) device. As early as May 1940, he like 70,000 stages. Nevertheless it invited German-born Professor seems feasible. Franz Simon—later anglicized into Sir Francis Simon—to join his Why should Britain pursue such a Clarendon Laboratory with a view weapon? Here Lindemann was leaving to experimenting with Uranium 235. the purely scientific field, and entering By August 1941 Lindemann was the political. Scientists, he said, were convinced that an atomic bomb was doubtful of success within two years. practical. But he was “quite clear that we must go forward. It would be unforgivable if As usual when he formed a firm we let the Germans develop a process opinion, he immediately minuted ahead of us by means of which they Churchill, proposing that the could defeat us in war, or reverse the government generously support all verdict after they had been defeated.” the research being currently pursued (Italics the author’s.) Unforgivable under the aegis of the Ministry of indeed. Aircraft Production. Typically, he summed up a complex question in Next Lindemann considered language Churchill could understand: inter-Allied cooperation: Churchill named John Anderson, later Viscount Waverley, head of the Directorate of Tube Natural uranium consists of Whoever possesses such a plant Alloys, the British atomic bomb project. By mid-1942 Andersn reported that production two components chemically so should be able to dictate terms of a bomb was beyond Britain’s wartime excessively similar that they are to the rest of the world. However capabilities. (National Portrait Gallery) extremely difficult to separate much I trust my neighbour from one another. It is the rarer and depend on him, I am very component which according to much averse to putting myself he failed to persuade Churchill to all physical theory will in its completely at his mercy. I prevent proliferation of nuclear pure form explode with extreme would not, therefore, press the weapons by sharing British research violence if brought together in Americans to undertake this with the Americans. As events proved, quantities of 20 pounds or so. The work; I would just continue however, Churchill had little choice in difficulty is to extract this rarer exchanging information and get the matter. component from its admixture into production over here without

14 the Churchillian | Winter 2013 raising the question of whether was involved. Apparently Bohr had orbiting of Russia’s Sputnik, whose they should do it or not. taken the high ground by citing ethical launch vehicle weighed some 250 tons. principles, which always irritated He didn’t quite live to see it—and was Churchill immediately took Churchill. By 1944, Churchill was therefore proven right after all. the necessary steps to accelerate firmly convinced that the development research in Britain, appointing Sir of the bomb should remain an Anglo- “By 1944, Churchill John Anderson, then Lord President American undertaking—and should of the Council, as head of the remain secret. Churchill of course was firmly convinced appropriate working group, labelled naively believed that the Americans that the development the “Directorate of Tube Alloys.” would share production techniques Lindemann sat on its advisory council, with British scientists—unlike of the bomb the only Cabinet minister who could Lindemann, who never had any should remain an understand the scientific dimension. illusions in that respect. But the Prime Minister was unable Anglo-American to follow Lindemann’s advice about “The Locomotive of History” undertaking—and proliferation. In mid-1942 Anderson Linking all this to the theme of told Churchill that Britain did not the Conference and putting it in the should remain secret. have the massive resources needed perspective of science and technology Churchill of course to develop an atomic bomb: “…the in 20th century Britain, we can say production plant will have to be on that there were three great elements for naively believed that such a huge scale that its erection in which the Second World War acted as the Americans would this country will be out of the question “the locomotive of History,” to take up during the war. Even the erection and Trotsky’s famous phrase. share production operation of a pilot plant would cause techniques with major dislocation in war production.” The first is what is now called “avionics”: a portmanteau word for British scientists— In 1943 the British government aviation and electronics. Here we unlike Lindemann, decided instead to participate in the know with certainty that the Boffins, Manhattan project, giving all the backed by Churchill and the War who never had information it had to the United States. Cabinet, played a major role in any illusions in that Again Anderson wrote to Churchill, brushing aside the Blimps and putting with Lindemann’s approval, proposing British technology at the forefront—a respect.” to let the Russians into the secret with position which it kept. a view to establishing an international body which would forestall the danger The second is nuclear weapons, Source Notes : In addition of nuclear proliferation. But here which, if we are to believe Sir John to Churchill’s The Second Churchill balked. Anderson’s experts, were too costly in World War (London: raw materials and skilled manpower for Heinemann, 1948-54), the Anderson and Lindemann Britain to develop in wartime without main sources used and/ believed that they had found a seriously impairing the conventional or quoted are The Earl of powerful advocate in Niels Bohr, the war effort. But this was only a delayed Birkenhead, The Prof in Two nuclear physicist who had escaped start, because the United Kingdom Worlds: The Official Life of from occupied Denmark and found his did build an atomic bomb in 1952: the Professor F.A. Lindeman, Viscount Cherwell (London: way to London in 1944. Lindemann third country to do so. Collins, 1961) ; Thomas took Bohr to see Churchill and express Wilson, Churchill and the his fears of a nuclear race, but the The third breakthrough, where Prof (London: Cassel, 1995); meeting went awry. “I did not like British science and technology were and Adrian Fort, The Life of the man,” Churchill told Lindemann, almost totally absent during the war, Frederick Lindeman (London: “when you showed him to me, with his was that of rocketry. It is interesting Jonathan Cape, 2003). This hair all over his head.” that a man of Lindemann’s genius text was prepared before discounted the feasibility of building the publication of Graham Churchill had no time for a large rocket in his lifetime. It so Carmelo’s Churchill’s Bomb idealists, let alone pacifists, especially happens that the Prof died on July (reviewed on page 22). when the potential of new weapons 2, 1957—three months before the

the Churchillian | Winter 2013 15 The Bomb and the Future: Excerpts from Speeches and Conversations Winston S. Churchill

In the aftermath of World War II Churchill was content, as he said at Fulton, that the bomb was American, copyright Los Alamos, 1945, solely owned by “a State and nation which we know will never use it except in the cause of right and freedom.” But he knew this wouldn’t last, and added: “…it may well be that in a few years this “My God, what have we done.” The explosion at Hiroshima, 6 awful agency of destruction will August 1945. Eight days later Emperor Hirohito announced Japan’s be widespread and the catastrophe surrender. (U.S. Army Signal Corps) following from its use by several warring nations will not only country or, as Eisenhower said, bring to an end all that we call the same woman of the streets in a civilisation, but may possibly new dress, will forever be debated disintegrate the globe itself.” by historians. But there is no doubt Once Russia had the bomb that Churchill, who had recognised Churchill became preoccupied the nature of nuclear weapons with seeking a “settlement,” as before the rise of Hitler, knew he called it—never wanting to the bomb was not, as Eisenhower be too precise—of at least some held it, just another advance in differences with the former weaponry. And his efforts to reach Soviet ally, to the consternation at least a peaceful stand-off were of Eisenhower, among others. At principled and noble. the 1953 Bermuda Conference he All quotations are from speeches called for a “summit” with Stalin’s in the House of Commons, unless successors. otherwise mentioned. Reprinted We all have our views on the by kind permission of the Churchill validity of that quest. Whether the Literary Trust, Curtis Brown Ltd., USSR post-Stalin was a changed and Randolph S. Churchill.

16 the Churchillian | Winter 2013 1944-45: Dawn of the Nuclear Age so far as possible not be imparted at the present time to any other country in the world. This is in no design Another great war, especially an ideological war, or wish for arbitrary power, but for the common safety fought as it would be not only on frontiers but in the of the world. heart of every land with weapons far more destructive —August 16, 1945 than men have yet wielded, would spell the doom, perhaps for many centuries, of such civilization as It would nevertheless be wrong and imprudent we have been able to erect since history began to be to entrust the secret knowledge or experience of the written….We can only try our best, and if we cannot atomic bomb, which the United States, Great Britain solve the problem we can at least make sure that it is and Canada now share, to the world organization, faced in all its sombre magnitude while time remains. while it is still in its infancy. It would be criminal —December 15, 1944 madness to cast it adrift in this still agitated and un-united world. No one in any country has slept What was gunpowder? Trivial. What was less well in their beds because this knowledge, and electricity? Meaningless. This atomic bomb is the the method and the raw materials to apply it, are at Second Coming in Wrath. present largely retained in American hands. I do not —July 22, 1945, Potsdam (Stimson Diary) believe we should all have slept so soundly had the positions been reversed and if some Communist or This revelation of the secrets of nature, long neo-Fascist State monopolized for the time being mercifully withheld from man, should arouse the these dread agencies.…The dark ages may return— most solemn reflections in the mind and conscience the Stone Age may return on the gleaming wings of of every human being capable of comprehension. science, and what might now shower immeasurable We must indeed pray that these awful agencies will material blessings upon mankind may even bring be made to conduce to peace among the nations, and about its total destruction. Beware I say; Time may that instead of wreaking measureless havoc upon the be short. entire globe they may become a perennial fountain of —March 5, 1946, Westminster College, Fulton world prosperity. —August 6, 1945 following the dropping of the Peace will not be preserved by pious sentiments first atomic bomb expressed in terms of platitudes or by official grimaces and diplomatic correctitude, however On 17th July there came to us at Potsdam the desirable this may be from time to time. It will not eagerly-awaited news of the trial of the atomic bomb be preserved by casting aside in dangerous years the in the [New] Mexican desert. Success beyond all panoply of warlike strength. There must be earnest dreams crowded this sombre, magnificent venture thought. There must also be faithful perseverance and of our American allies. The detailed reports…could foresight. Greatheart must have his sword and armour leave no doubt in the minds of the very few who were to guard the pilgrims on their way. Above all, among informed, that we were in the presence of a new factor the English-speaking Peoples, there must be the union in human affairs, and possessed of powers which were of hearts based upon conviction and common ideals. irresistible…. That is what I offer. That is what I seek. The bomb brought peace, but men alone can —March 8, 1946, General Assembly of Virginia, keep that peace, and henceforward they will keep it Richmond under penalties which threaten the survival not only of civilization but of humanity itself…. It is better to have a world united than a world I may say that I am in entire agreement with the divided; but it is also better to have a world divided President that the secrets of the atomic bomb should than a world destroyed. Nor does it follow that even in

the Churchillian | Winter 2013 17 a world divided there should not be equilibrium from The outstanding feature of the 20th century has which a further advance to unity might be attempted been the enormous expansion in the numbers who are as the years pass by. Anything is better than this given the opportunity to share in the larger and more ceaseless degeneration of the heart of Europe. Europe varied life which in previous periods was reserved for will die of that. the few and for the very few….little did we guess that —June 5, 1946 what has been called The Century of the Common Man would witness as its outstanding feature more common men killing each other with greater facilities 1947-49: Proliferation than any other five centuries put together in the history of the world. We have had nothing else but wars since —March 31, 1949, Massachusetts Institute of democracy took charge…[In the last two,] thirty Technology, Boston million men were killed in battle. In the last one seven million were murdered in cold blood, mainly by the Germans. They made human slaughter-pens 1950-51: Man of the Half Century like the Chicago stockyards. Europe is a ruin. Many of her cities have been blown to pieces by bombs. Moralists may find it a melancholy thought that Ten capitals in Eastern Europe are in Russian hands. peace can find no nobler foundations than mutual They are Communists now, you know—Karl Marx terror. and all that. It may well be that an even worse war is —March 28, 1950 drawing near. A war of the East against the West. A war of liberal civilisation against the Mongol hordes. After the First War, when the victors had disarmed Far gone are the days of Queen Victoria and a settled the Germans and their allies, no powerful organized world order. But, having gone through so much, we army remained upon the scene except the French do not despair. Army. After this war the armed might of Russia has —1947, The Dream. Winston to his father’s emerged steadily.…The second difference, which ghost, a short story arose out of the realization of the first, was that the United States, instead of retiring into isolation, instead Skeletons with gleaming eyes and poisoned of demanding full and prompt repayment of debts and javelins glare at each other across the ashes and rubble disinteresting herself in Europe…has made the great heaps of what was once the august Roman Empire.… counterpoise upon which the freedom and the future [shouldn’t there be a place for] Europe, the Mother of our civilization depends. Continent and fountain source not only of the woes —November 30, 1950. Time had just named but of most of the glories of modern civilisation? Churchill “Man of the Half-Century” —January 17, 1947, “The Highroads of the Future,” Colliers The argument is now put forward that we must never use the atomic bomb until, or unless, it has Tyranny presents itself in various forms but it is been used against us first. In other words, you must always the same, whatever slogans it utters, whatever never fire until you have been shot dead. That seems name it calls itself by, whatever liveries it wears. It is to me undoubtedly a silly thing to say and a still more always the same and makes a demand on all free men imprudent position to adopt. Moreover, such a resolve to risk and do all in their power to withstand it. would certainly bring war nearer. —May 9, 1948, States-General, Amsterdam —December 14, 1950

18 the Churchillian | Winter 2013 I do not hold that we should rearm in order to The report of a recent special survey showing that fight. I hold that we should rearm in order to parley. there is very little animal or bird life on Monte Bello —October 8, 1951, broadcast, London Islands was one of the factors in the choice of the site for the test of the United Kingdom atomic weapon. I Science, which now offers us a Golden Age should add, however, that an expedition which went with one hand, offers at the same time with the other to the islands fifty years ago reported that giant rats, hand the doom of all that we have built up inch by wild cats, and wallabies were seen, and these may inch since the Stone Age. My faith is in the high have caused the Hon. Member some anxiety. However progressive destiny of man. I do not believe we are the officer who explored the islands recently says that to be flung back into abysmal darkness by those he found only some lizards, two sea eagles and what fearsome discoveries which human genius has made. looked like a canary sitting on a perch. Let us make sure that they are our servants but not our [Lt. Col. Lipton (Lab.) asked which governments masters. had been invited to send observers to British atom —October 23, 1951, Plymouth bomb tests.] It was after full consideration of all those points that I gave my somewhat comprehensive or rather 1952: Britain Acquires the Bomb exclusively comprehensive answer, “None, sir.” —May 21, 1952, Question Time What is the scene which unfolds before us tonight? It is certainly not what we had hoped to find …a third World War is unlikely to happen after all our enemies had surrendered unconditionally [because] both sides know that it would begin with and the great world instrument of the United Nations horrors of a kind and on a scale never dreamed of had been set up to make sure that the wars were ended. before by human beings. It is certainly not that. Peace does not sit untroubled —October 14, 1952 in her vineyard. The harvests of new and boundless wealth which science stands ready to pour into the hands of all peoples, and of none perhaps more than 1953: Bermuda Conference and the Call for the people of Canada, must be used for exertions to a “Summit” ward off from us the dangers and the unimaginable horrors of another world war.… What is called the cold war—which is not a legal We have surmounted all the perils and endured term—continues. What we are faced with is not a all the agonies of the past. We shall provide against violent jerk but a prolonged pull. and thus prevail over the dangers and problems of the —March 3, 1953 future, withhold no sacrifice, grudge no toil, seek no sordid gain, fear no foe. All will be well. We have, I …the world also needs patience. It needs a period believe, within us the life-strength and guiding light of calm rather than vehement attempts to produce by which the tormented world around us may find the clear-cut solutions. There have been many periods harbour of safety, after a storm-beaten voyage. when prompt and violent action might have averted —January 14, 1952, Chateau Laurier, Ottawa calamities. This is not one of them. Even if we entered on a phase only of easement for five or ten years that It is my belief that by accumulating deterrents of might lead to something still better when it ended. all kinds against aggression we shall, in fact, ward —October 10, 1953, Conservative Party off the fearful catastrophe, the fears of which darken Conference, Margate the life and mar the progress of all the peoples of the globe. When I was a schoolboy, I was not good at —January 17, 1952, third speech to the U.S. arithmetic, but I have since heard it said that certain Congress, Washington mathematical quantities when they pass through

the Churchillian | Winter 2013 19 infinity change their signs from plus to minus—or 1954-55: Hydrogen Bomb and “Mutual the other way round. It may be that his rule may Assured Destruction” have a novel application, and that when the advance of destructive weapons enables everyone to kill …the hydrogen bomb carries us into dimensions everybody else, nobody will want to kill anyone at which have never before confronted practical human all….. thought and have been confined to the realms of fancy and imagination. There is no doubt that if the human race are to —April 5, 1954 have their dearest wish and be free from the dread of mass destruction, they could have, as an alternative, Then it may well be that we shall by a process of what many of them might prefer, namely, the swiftest sublime irony have reached a stage in this story where expansion of material well-being that has ever been safety will be the sturdy child of terror, and survival the within their reach, or even within their dreams. twin brother of annihilation.… —November 3, 1953 The [nuclear] deterrent does not cover the case of lunatics or dictators in the mood of Hitler when he When I meet [Stalin’s successor] Malenkov we found himself in his final dug-out. That is a blank…. can build for peace.…Ike…doesn’t think any good Major war of the future will differ, therefore, from anything we have known in the past, in this one can come from talks with the Russians. But it will pay significant respect, that each side, at the outset, will him to come along with us. I shall do what I can to suffer what it dreads the most, the loss of everything persuade him. I might stay longer here than I meant, that it has ever known of…. at any rate if I could persuade Ike to stay too. Which way shall we turn to save our lives and —December 3, 1953, to Lord Moran, Bermuda the future of the world? It does not matter so much to old people; they are going soon anyway; but I find it [U.S. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles poignant to look at youth in all its activity and ardour says] nothing but evil can come out of meeting with and, most of all, to watch little children playing their Malenkov. Dulles is a terrible handicap. Ten years ago merry games, and wonder what would lie before them I could have dealt with him. Even as it is I have not if God wearied of mankind. been defeated by this bastard. I have been humiliated We live in a period, happily unique in human by my own decay. history, when the whole world is divided intellectually —December 7, 1953, to Lord Moran, Bermuda and to a large extent geographically between the creeds of communist discipline and individual freedom, and We are to gang up against them [the Soviets] when at the same time, this mental and psychological without any reference to the “Locarno” idea. The division is accompanied by the possession by both statement about Europe ends with the challenge sides of the obliterating weapons of the nuclear age. about a united Germany in EDC [European Defence …when Mr. Sterling Cole, the chairman of the Community] or NATO, for which Russia is to give United States Congressional Committee, gave out a up the Eastern Zone. Many people would think that year ago—February 17, 1954—the first comprehensive we are deliberately riding for a fall. Perhaps we are review of the hydrogen bomb, the entire foundation of [but we] cannot accept as justified or permanent the human affairs was revolutionized, and mankind placed present division of Europe. in a situation both measureless and laden with doom. —December 7, 1953, to Anthony Eden, Bermuda —March 1, 1955, from his last major speech in the House of Commons

20 the Churchillian | Winter 2013 1956: Suez Crisis some part in raising it to the plane on which it has stood. Whatever the arguments adduced here and in There is not much left for me to do in this world the United States for or against Anthony’s action in and I have neither the wish nor the strength to involve Egypt, it will now be an act of folly, on which our myself in the present political stress and turmoil. But I whole civilisation may founder, to let events in the do believe, with unfaltering conviction, that the theme Middle East come between us. of the Anglo-American alliance is more important —November 22, 1956, private letter to today than at any time since the war. You and I had Eisenhower

“I find it poignant to look at youth in all its activity and ardour and, most of all, to watch little children playing their merry games, and wonder what would lie before them if God wearied of mankind.”

the Churchillian | Winter 2013 21 BOOK REVIEW

Scientists and Statesmen: Churchill and the Nuclear Age

Erica Chenoweth Ms. Chenoweth, a fishery Graham Farmelo, Churchill’s Bomb: biologist for the state of How the United States Overtook Alaska, is co-editor of a new Britain in the First Nuclear Arms Race edition of Churchill’s Great Contemporaries (ISI Books, Basic Books, 554 pages, $29.99. 2012). put forth by the Americans, able to “spend money like water” (236), was bound to surpass Britain’s capabilities while Churchill strove to play a n 1893, Winston Churchill was striving weak hand well. (See “The Start of Nuclear with “‘back-to-the-wall’ resolution” to pass Proliferation” in Antoine Capet’s foregoing the entrance exam to the Royal Military article.) College at Sandhurst. In 1930, he recalled From prologue to epilogue Winston Churchill Iin his autobiography this first failed attempt: “… is center stage. Spanning both his premierships, when one surveyed the battlefield, it was evident Farmelo’s book does not neglect Churchill as a that the war could not be won without another young man, unusually thoughtful about scientific army being brought into the line. Mathematics progress and the development of advanced was the only resource available.” Ten years later weaponry. He describes Churchill’s delight in the he was leading Britain in a global war in which filtering of scientific fact through the imagination the “meanings and rhythms” found in Math’s of a favorite author and lifelong friend, H. G. “comical hieroglyphics” would lead to the Wells, and their many encounters. Churchill invention of weapons capable of destroying entire met his adviser on scientific matters, Frederick civilizations. Lindemann, who also excelled in the art of Graham Farmelo’s splendid book is the explanation, in 1921. The fulcrum upon which most readable treatise yet on nuclear scientists Farmelo’s thesis depends, “the Prof,” for all his and their statesmen on both sides of the Atlantic talents, is blamed for making “Churchill’s pool of during the Second World War. He asks why, nuclear advice….too narrow and too shallow” (6) though Churchill’s scientists were the first to early in the war. hand a “blueprint of a nuclear bomb” to their Round the great politician and his Prof swirl government in 1940 (136) and he was “the first the usual international figures—Roosevelt, national leader to approve the development of a Truman, and Eisenhower, and Stalin, Malenkov, nuclear weapon,” the nuclear project became an and Khrushchev—and the more unusual, those American rather than a British venture (189). of the global scientific community. Churchill’s His argument is compelling, but not rare contact with scientists, their committees, and incontrovertible; the prodigious industrial effort their inventions makes this well-paced, multi-

22 the Churchillian | Winter 2013 layered, chronological account a fascinating of lacking depth and imagination, with particular read. Farmelo’s narrative benefits from careful blind spots in nuclear science. His colleagues research, documented in voluminous endnotes and were aware of this weakness; after Lindemann’s supplemented by an index useful to researchers brief visit to Los Alamos, even Oppenheimer told and lay readers. a colleague, “that guy will never understand a Farmelo adroitly weaves together international thing” (280). nuclear research and British and American Carried into ever-higher circles of political diplomacy. He jumps from lab to lab, and from 10 power, the Prof’s friction with respected and Downing Street to the Oval Office, illuminating administratively gifted scientists leads the reader important developments and the personalities to wonder at what cost to Britain the clash of behind them. He includes no scientific jargon but egos came. Lindemann’s skepticism about does stress the significance of each discovery, whether the “super weapon” could be built as particularly that of the neutron, and briefly fast “as the experts were claiming” (188), and his mentions only one equation, E=mc2. underestimation of the “awesome energy” (204) Knowing the history and the leading scientists and monopolistic passion with which America well, he often evokes a chuckle with a frank would pursue the Manhattan Project, “led description or a fresh anecdote, offering welcome Churchill to make an uncharacteristically flat- relief while remembering a time when “No one footed response to the most powerful explosive was quite sure of the contents of Hitler’s arsenal” his scientists devised” (146). Turbulence in their (111). The physicist Niels Bohr was “a man relations during the war did not weaken their of words but he had . . . serious problems with bond, and Churchill later credited Lindemann them” (247), Ernest Rutherford had a “Falstaffian with the idea for Churchill College, an institution presence at the dinner table” (56), and Leó dedicated to teaching technical subjects in Britain. Szilárd loved to “shock lesser minds with his own Before the Second World War, Churchill the boldness and ingenuity” (72). When Lindemann writer knew more of atomic theory and its capacity was created Lord Cherwell, after “the river that to create nuclear weapons than other statesmen in meanders past Christ Church Meadow in Oxford,” Britain, largely owing to Lindemann. Although British scientist Henry Tizard remarked that it even in 1939 European experts did not believe the was “a small and rather muddy stream” (176). atomic bomb would appear, times changed, and Farmelo discusses the feeling of betrayal in 1940 it took the eye of a nuclear physicist to among the scientists when one of their own recognize the implications of rapid developments. became “the spy of the century” (346). While the Churchill as politician, with Lindemann as his wife of the leading British coordinator, James adviser, did not take advantage of Britain’s early Chadwick, was complaining at a Los Alamos advantage over the Americans: he replied late to desert tea party of “the primitive nature of life FDR’s first and only offer of equal collaboration in the United States” (276), American General and was too busy to hear advice from outside his Leslie Groves suspected that “the cunning British inner circle. were trying to freeload on a venture funded Farmelo notes Churchill’s different reactions entirely by American money” (218). The critical to the atomic bomb in the 1940s and the hydrogen contribution of British physicists to the success bomb in the 1950s: the aging statesman’s “final of the Manhattan Project, however, is made clear. great diplomatic initiative” (3) sought to ease The triangle of Churchill, Lindemann, and Cold War tensions, recognizing the threat of other British scientists is central. Farmelo admires thermonuclear weapons more acutely than the Prof’s accomplishments and how he nourishes President Eisenhower did. One of his final acts Churchill’s energetic mind by “rendering a as prime minister was to guarantee Britain had jumble of scientific ideas, statistics and opinion the weapon in its arsenal, so as never to have to into a lucid conspectus” (65) but accuses the Prof use it.

the Churchillian | Winter 2013 23 BOOK REVIEW

Churchill the Charles Krauthammer, Things That Indispensable Matter, Crown Forum, 388 Richard M. Langworth pages, $28.

The reader will ask: why politically. It's a very tough is specifically Churchill? Because am I plugging to a Churchill column. There's no ‘trendy’ in there’s a lot of other material audience a set of essays by a it. You never know what is going that touches his saga: the Middle political columnist? Answer: to happen next.” This reminds East, wars in Asia, bioethics because many are not political, me of Churchill. By the way, (Churchill covered that in and reflect Churchillian they both switched parties. Thoughts and Adventures, and thought. Moreover, the essay C.K. was once Walter Mondale’s serious enquiries into the nature specifically about WSC may be speechwriter. Churchill ended of the man and the universe, just one of the best summaries of the up a Tory, Krauthammer is a like Sir Winston’s writings. man I’ve ever read. By anybody. conservative, but it’s risky to Anywhere. label either of them. Churchill-related columns include insults (“In Defense Significantly, in a book of For instance, C.K. recently of the F-Word”), the “Joy of over nearly ninety columns convinced me to abandon Losing” (that’s something WSC and essays, the Churchill article tradition and support a name knew about), how to define ranks second—in Part I (entitled change for the Washington democracy (Churchill laid out “Personal”)—after a piece on Redskins: “It is simple decency questions, Krauthammer lays the author’s beloved brother. to stop using a slur.” Also, he out Albania), the Holocaust, Churchill is a very personal roots for underdogs. We’re Zionism, Language, Leadership, subject to Mr. Krauthammer, both fanatical followers of the the question of Germany’s who is always quoting him Washington Nationals. And “collective guilt.” There’s plenty (accurately). being Nationals fans is no easy here to interest Churchillians. task. If you want easy, root for The late Meg Greenfield, the Red Sox or Cardinals. “Things That Matter”—to longtime editorial page editor the author as to Churchill— of The Washington Post, But why spend $28 (Amazon include: “the innocence of dogs, called Krauthammer's column $16.80, Kindle $10.99) on a 388- the cunning of cats, the elegance “independent and hard to peg page book less than 1% of which of nature, the wonders of

24 the Churchillian | Winter 2013 space…the difference between 3 beeping frantically: Please Truman, John Paul, Reagan.... historical guilt and historical disregard all previous messages.” “But above all victory required responsibility, fashions and one man without whom the follies…manners and habits, But you want to know fight would have been lost at the curiosities and conundrums what he says about Winston beginning. It required Winston social and ethical. Is a doctor Churchill. He speaks of him Churchill.” ever permitted to kill a patient frequently on the air, but this wishing to die? Why in the age essay is from the run-up to True, if you’re going to read of feminism do we still use the Time magazine’s “Person of C.K. it helps if you agree with phrase ‘woman and children’?” the Century” sweepstakes in him. (Whenever I don’t have These are subjects, C.K. says, 1999. I’ve quoted it so often an answer to some current that “fill my days, some trouble that I’ve almost memorized it. question I always joke that I my nights.” Krauthammer simply declares have to read him first so I’ll Churchill the only possible know what to think.) But look: Churchill read H.G. Wells Person of the Century. Einstein I have very liberal friends who and wrote a piece asking, “Are (Time’s pick) was “the best also read and admire him. So There Men on the Moon?” mind” of the century, but if don’t succumb to labels. He has Krauthammer studied Fermi he hadn’t invented all those his heroes, both left and right. and wonders: “With so many theories, somebody else would Buy the book to enjoy eloquent habitable planets out there, why have. writing, the precise layering in God’s name have we ever of facts and logic, by a deeply heard a word from a single one Churchill, on the other caring man who applies serious of them?” Fermi’s answer, as the hand, was indispensable: “Take brainpower to contemplating author explains, is unsettling. away Churchill in 1940…and everything from “Borat” to the Britain would have settled with Cosmos. Unlike many pundits, C.K. Hitler—or worse. Nazism would laughs at himself and cultivates a have prevailed. Hitler would One more, very Churchillian sense of humor. He read Stephen have achieved what no other thing: there’s no self-absorption, Hawking’s A Brief History of tyrant, not even Napoleon, no self-pity. Churchill was Time “as a public service—to had ever achieved: mastery thrown out in 1915 and 1945. He reassure my readers that this of Europe. Civilization would simply ignored it, rebuilt his life most unread bestseller is indeed have descended into a darkness and career. “Never give in” and as inscrutable as they thought.” the likes of which it had never all that. Krauthammer dove into Speaking of the attempts k n ow n .” a swimming pool in his early (Voyagers 1 and 2) to contact twenties, conked his head, and alien life forms, he mentions I’m not going to spoil it has been in a wheelchair ever that the greetings they carry, on by leaking any more. Here is since. Since then he has become behalf of all mankind, are from the keynote: it comes at the a psychiatrist, a syndicated (who else?) the UN Secretary- end. We are asked: who are the columnist, a writer, a husband General, Kurt Waldheim…a heroes of the last century? C.K. and father, a TV personality, a Nazi. “Makes you wish that we’d provides a list, from the Greatest Pulitzer Prize winner. Now that’s immediately sent out a Voyager Generation to FDR, de Gaulle, a “Churchilllian” performance.

the Churchillian | Winter 2013 25 Churchill in the News

Churchill Centre (UK) presents its 2013 Sir Winston Churchill Award to HRH The Prince of Wales

HRH The Prince of Wales has been presented with the Sir Winston Churchill Award in the United Kingdom. The Sir Winston Churchill Award is given to those in public life who are displaying Churchillian qualities and traits by The Churchill Centre (UK).

The Churchill Centre (UK) exists to preserve "I have very fond memories of Sir Winston and promote the legacy and achievements of and remember him when I was very young Sir Winston Churchill, to inspire and encourage coming to visit The Queen at Clarence House future generations to follow in his footsteps and and at Balmoral. I was brought up on countless develop the Churchillian traits of courage, public stories of Sir Winston Churchill, particularly service, oratory and leadership. from my uncle Lord Mountbatten, which were very funny. In accepting the award The Prince of Wales said: “I am deeply touched, honoured and humbled "What I have tried to do with my life since because of this award. I will cherish the Oscar leaving the Navy can best be summed up by Nemon sculpture as it is one of the best 65th what Sir Winston said in 1908, 'what is the birthday presents I could have been given. use of living if it be not to strive for noble causes and make this muddled world a better community throughout the UK. Collectively, place for those who will live in it when we they raise over £100 million each year in support are gone. How else can we put ourselves in of their charitable aims. It is an incredible legacy. harmonious relations with the great verities and constellations of the infinite and the “Churchill wrote that: “Courage is rightly eternal'. esteemed the first of human qualities because it is the quality which guarantees all others.” There “Thank you for doing me this great honour, are many types of courage: physical courage, I will treasure the bust and it will remind intellectual courage, moral courage. Throughout me above all else of one of the greatest of his long public life, our recipient has demonstrated Englishmen." them all.”

The Rt Hon Sir John Major KG CH, who presented The Rt Hon Nicholas Soames MP, Trustee of the award to The Prince of Wales, paid tribute to The Churchill Centre (UK) and grandson of Sir The Prince and said: Winston, said: “The Sir Winston Churchill Award is given to “The British Royal Family sits at the heart those – in public life – who display Churchillian of Whitehall and at the heart of our national qualities. It is a tough measure. life. My grandfather served six monarchs. I suspect that he appreciated more than most “Sir Winston is probably – some would just how hard members of the Royal Family say certainly – the greatest Englishman in our work, and how important that work is to our long history. Great: not just because of his national interest and wellbeing. I know, from extraordinary achievements, but because of his my own experience, that the current Prince of capacity to hold his course when – as almost Wales is tireless in his work for this country, a lone voice – he was criticised …. only to be both through his official duties and through proved right in the end. his incredible charitable work.”

“Our recipient tonight has – over the years Guests to the award dinner included The Lady – faced his own criticism, his own setbacks, yet Soames and three generations of the Churchill held firm to his own beliefs. That is the first of family. many reasons he is truly worthy of the Award made to him. Dr. Rob Havers represented America’s National Churchill Museum at the event. He will also “He is never simply a “name on the serve on the organizing committee for the 2015 letterhead”. Nor does he just “turn up” at events. observance of the death of Sir Winston. Professor He takes a genuine and personal interest in every Sir David Cannadine, 2012 Kemper Lecturer, organisation with which he is involved – and every chairs the committee with a new global program engagement he undertakes. Today, he actively to observe 2015 and celebrate Churchill’s life presides over a group of charities that collectively and legacy. It includes plans to deliver Churchill form the largest multi-group charitable enterprise resources into all secondary schools in the UK in the United Kingdom. These charities are and high schools in the United States, Canada and active in a wide range of areas, and span every Kuwait.

 The Other Other Club

Honored as the guest speaker, Dr. Rob Havers, addressed over 200 community leaders at the Other Other Club in Tulsa, Oklahoma as they celebrated Churchill’s 139th birthday. The Other Other Club of Tulsa derives its title from the name taken by Winston Churchill and other kindred souls who took it upon themselves to form the “other club” in 1911 for irrepressible, outspoken conduct and unconventional political initiatives. Remarks focused on America’s admiration for Churchill and emphasized his unflinching courage, steady resolve in the face of enormous adversity, strong leadership, staunch commitment to democratic principles, and sharp wit.



The US Capitol Rotunda

Dr. Havers and Senior Fellow Jean-Paul Montupet were in the audience as a bust of Winston Churchill was unveiled at the US Capitol Rotunda. Special guests included Secretary of State John Kerry and Randolph Churchill.

This is one of history's true love stories," said Speaker of the House John Boehner in his opening remarks, "between a great statesman and a nation he called the great republic. And we're here to bring it full circle."

The unveiling comes 50 years after Churchill was granted honorary US citizenship. The Churchill Centre donated the bust. The 2014 Enid and R. Crosby Kemper Lecture

Paul Reid, Author of the final installment of William Manchester’s unfinished triology on Winston Churchill, will deliver the Kemper Lecture on Sunday, March 2, 2014, as part of the Churchill Weekend March 1-2, 2014

Please mark your calendars early for this great Churchillian event!

the Churchillian | Winter 2013 29 MUSEUM INTRODUCTIONS

MEET THE NEW MARKETING SPECIALIST OF THE NATIONAL CHURCHILL MUSEUM

aroline Slavin from Brashear, Missouri, is the new Marketing Specialist at the National Churchill Museum on the campus of CWestminster College. “I’m excited to have the opportunity to promote the National Churchill Museum and highlight its staff, board members, volunteers, and visitors, “ said Slavin. “I can’t wait to share such a special place with the world.”

Slavin will focus on online marketing for the Museum: creating and Caroline Slavin implementing an online marketing strategy, optimizing its social media Marketing Specialist of the accounts, and managing its overall web presence. National Churchill Museum

Previously, Slavin held the position of Interim Marketing Manager for Westminster College where she managed the College’s websites, email campaigns and social media accounts. She holds a B.A. from Westminster College in English Literature.

Holiday festivities are in full swing at the National Churchill Museum. The 30th Annual Victorian Christmas kickoff, featuring the traditional Kettledrum Tea, was a huge success with a record-breaking number of visitors on opening day. Victorian Christmas merchandise will continue to be sold until the new year. You’re sure to find something, whether you’re looking for a new ornament for your tree, a Christmas present for kids to unwrap, or something unique for that person who has everything. We even have a special Doctor Who display for fans of our favorite Time Lord. Stop in and see us soon!

For more information about the Museum Store and the merchandise, please contact the Museum Store Manager Becky McCue at 573-592-5263 or email [email protected].

30 the Churchillian | Winter 2013 MESSAGE FROM THE DIRECTOR OF DEVELOPMENT

Summer visitors and Christopher Wren

his summer, Mr. and Mrs. John Monk from Texas visited the Museum and Westminster College specifically to view the Church of St. Mary, TAldermanbury, and our Christopher Wren pulpit. Their church had acquired a Wren pulpit from England and they were interested in our pulpit’s restoration and presentation.

One of the most celebrated English architects in history, Sir Christopher Kit Freudenberg Wren (1632-1723) is best known as the builder of St. Paul’s Cathedral. He also Director of Development oversaw the design and reconstruction of over 50 other churches after a great fire laid waste to the City of London in 1666. Only some twenty Wren pulpits Caroline Slavin survive in the world today, constructed of oak and pitched pine, the design of Marketing Specialist of the hexagonal piece features arched headed panels, ornamented with hand-carved National Churchill Museum swags and cherub heads.

The pulpit in the adjacent photograph was designed by Wren to grace the sanctuary of St. George’s, Botolph Lane, and the first sermon preached from the pulpit in 1676. After St. George’s Church was demolished on order of the crown in the early 20th century, the pulpit was moved to Christ Church, Fulham. It was later entrusted to a London firm specializing in historic church furnishings, with the stipulation that the pulpit only be sold to another church. Subsequently, it was acquired by Christ Congressional Church of Lufkin, Texas in 2011, which commissioned its professional restoration by British native, Mr. Peter Goodchilds, of Dallas, Restorer Peter Goodchilds with a Wren Texas. pulpit to be installed at new Christ Congressional Church in Lufkin, Texas The Wren pulpit here in the Church of St. Mary came from the Church of All Hallows, London, where it was installed in 1683. All Hallows also burned in the Great Fire of 1666 and was rebuilt by Wren. This pulpit was probably designed by him and executed under his direction, as it is in the Grinling Gibbons style, a craftsman whom Wren used extensively. The pulpit remained at the Church of All Hallows until the 1870s and moved to the Parish Church of St. Paul, Hammersmith, until 2002. It is a gift from the Diocese of London to the Church of St. Mary, Aldermanbury, in memory of September 11, 2001. Wren pulpit graces the Church of St. Mary, Aldermanbury, here in Fulton, Missouri We thank all those who donate to the Church Endowment Fund and support the maintenance and upkeep for historic treasures that have been entrusted to the Museum and Westminster College.

the Churchillian | Winter 2013 31 FROM THE ARCHIVES

2014 Exhibition Schedule 2014 promises to be an exciting year for the Curatorial Department and the Museum’s Exhibition Schedule. Below is a brief synopsis of the exhibitions coming to the Museum. For more information contact Liz Murphy at (573) 592-5626 or [email protected]

1/13/2014-3/9/2014 Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher: Their Special Relationship Curated by Dr. James Cooper, Oxford Brookes, U.K. The story of President Reagan and Prime Minister Thatcher is explored as they challenged the political landscape and moved forward their domestic and foreign policies. Photographs and items from the Ronald Reagan Presidential Museum and Library and his Alma Mater, Eureka College, will be displayed with local history and his breakout film, King’s Row, based in Fulton, Missouri. Churchillian traits such as character, heritage, and determination Liz Murphy guide you through this fascinating look at a special relationship between two world leaders National Churchill Museum not seen since President Roosevelt and Sir Winston Churchill. Archivist/Curator Opening Reception: Saturday, January 17 from 1 pm – 3 pm with special guest Dan Martin, artist, illustrator and political cartoonist for book signing The Quotable Winston Churchill, Richard Mahoney, editor.

3/24/2014-5/25/2014 Fourteenth Annual Watercolor Missouri International Curated by the Missouri Watercolor Society For the last 14 years, more than 80 watercolors annually have graced the gallery walls. The pieces come to the Museum from all over the globe. This juried competition is one of the nation's top 15 watercolor exhibitions. Award Reception: Sunday, April 6 from 1:00 pm - 3:00 pm

5/30/2014-7/20/2014 D-Day Normandy: Operation Overlord From the U.S. Navy Art Museum On the night of June 5, 1944, over 1,000 ships, the greatest armada ever to set sail, left the British isles, bound for the Coast of Normandy--its mission to liberate Europe. Operation Overlord had begun. For this exhibition, three artists have been selected: Mitchell Jamieson, Alexander Russo and Dwight Shepler. These painting by U.S. Navy's combat artists are the visions and images of the greatest amphibious operation ever launched—the invasion of Normandy and D-Day. Opening Reception: Friday, June 6 from 5:30 pm - 7:00pm

8/4/2014-9/8/2014 The Great War Curated by the National Churchill Museum and the Missouri State Museum To honor the anniversaries of WWI, the National Churchill Museum will partner with the Missouri State Museum to bring WWI to life. Explore the experiences of trench warfare and artifacts from the First World War. Opening Reception: Friday, August 8 from 5:30 pm- 7:00 pm

32 the Churchillian | Winter 2013 EDUCATIONAL AND PUBLIC PROGRAMING

School and Community Update his past fall saw a new undergraduate course at Westminster College – ‘HIS200A: Introduction to Museum Work.’ Co-taught by myself and Liz Murphy, Museum Archivist/Curator, students were introduced to the many aspects of museology, including the areas of exhibit design, conservation, Teducation, interpretation, and administration. For the bulk of the course, the National Churchill Museum was used as a lab and case study. The class visited two additional sites during the semester. The first trip was to the Missouri State Archives conservation lab for a behind the scenes tour of the archives and conservation lab. In October, we visited Mandy Plybon the Daniel Boone Home and Heritage Center. Here we experienced their guided house Education & Public Programs Coordinator and grounds tour plus extra one-on-one time with their lead interpreter. As a recap for both trips, students wrote reviews combining personal experience with course readings.

Coursework culminated in a group online exhibit project. After much debate in class, the students chose ‘Everyday Life in Victorian Britain’ as their topic. We spent quite a bit of time discussing what segments to include in the exhibit. Ultimately, they chose fashion; technology/industrialization; family life; philosophy of education; politics; low-culture (culture of the ‘every-day’ man); economy; high culture (bourgeoisie); and, last but not least, Winston Churchill during Victorian Britain, incorporating his story throughout the segments.

Working in small teams, students picked their roles in the project selecting from exhibit design, education, marketing/social media, collections/curation, and development. Each role had its own set of responsibilities and assignments to complete the project. The final product is available at http://www. nationalchurchillmuseum.org/online-exhibits.html.

With new museum courses to further engage Westminster College students, it is an exciting time at the Museum. I am teaching another new another new course – ‘HIS 300B: Museums and Education-Places of Learning’ this spring. Along The Introduction to Museum Work class field with Westminster’s History Department, the Museum is working towards the trip to the Daniel Boon Home and Heritage development of a Museum Studies minor, including the future creation of two Center additional courses-‘Museums and Collections’ and ‘Museums and Society.’

The Introduction to Museum Work class took a field to the MO State Archive’s conservation lab

the Churchillian | Winter 2013 33 LETTERS TO THE CHURCHILLIAN Email us any questions about Winston Churchill under the sun, and we’ll get the answer from our panel of experts! Send your questions, comments and general musings to [email protected].

“CHURCHILL AND BELLOC” (SPRING 2013)

I was interested to read that Churchill never faltered in his support of Belloc, with all his faults. Of course I did not know that they were friends and Belloc had the privilege of being invited to Chartwell. I do wonder how the electors of Salford voted in a recently-naturalised Frenchman at a time when rivalry with France remained intact. An impossible result today! I was staggered to read that Belloc lost a son in each of the two World Wars; this must be a very uncommon case. Asquith lost one in WW1 and Eden one in WW2, but to lose two in the two wars! How he kept his indomitable Roman Catholic faith escapes me. Perhaps it was the old Judaeo-Christian belief that God was only testing him. Churchill the non-believer must have found this very difficult to understand. Two corrections, if I may: (1) “Belloc believed that British civilization had peaked in the high Middle Ages, led by beneficent Catholic monarchs, Charles II and James II.” Actually they reigned in the 17th century, long after the high Middle Ages. Churchill defending James II must have been an uphill task in 20th century Britain. (2) In note 11, it is Feske, not Fiske. You made a great job of it. I wonder how many professional historians of 20th century Britain are aware of this empathy between the two great men. —Antoine Capet, Professor of British Studies, University of Rouen, France

HITLER WARNINGS

What was the single most prescient warning Churchill made about Hitler? Do you have a quote my great friend Dambisa Moyo can use in her next book? —Andrew Roberts, New York      The first is from the House of Commons, November 23, 1932, two months before Hitler became Chancellor: “Now the demand is that Germany should be allowed to rearm. Do not delude yourselves. Do not let His Majesty’s Government believe—I am sure they do not believe—that all that Germany is asking for is equal status.…All these bands of sturdy Teutonic youths, marching through the streets and roads of Germany, with the light of desire in their eyes to suffer for their Fatherland, are not looking for status. They are looking for weapons….” Or, if it must be from after Hitler took charge, consider this Commons remark on November 28, 1934: “What is the great new fact which has broken in upon us during the last eighteen months? Germany is rearming. That is the great new fact which rivets the attention of every country in Europe, indeed in the world, and which throws almost all other issues into the background.…” Equally important though a year later, from “Hitler and His Choice” in the Strand Magazine of November 1935 was a comment that has its applications to modern tyrants with whom we are presently negotiating: “Recently he [Hitler] has offered many words of reassurance, eagerly lapped up by those who have been so tragically wrong about Germany in the past. Only time can show, but, meanwhile, the great wheels revolve; the rifles, the cannon, the tanks, the shot and shell, the air-bombs, the poison-gas cylinders, the aeroplanes, the submarines, and now the beginnings of a fleet, flow in ever-broadening streams from the already largely war-mobilised arsenals and factories of Germany.” (Of course the problem now is not tanks and submarines, but nuclear weapons.) Two years later in the Commons on April 14, 1937: “We seem to be moving, drifting, steadily, against our will, against the will of every race and every people and every class, towards some hideous catastrophe. Everybody wishes to stop it, but they do not know how.” And, on March 24, 1938, not specifically about Hitler but definitely to the point, came this: “I have watched this famous island descending incontinently, fecklessly, the stairway which leads to a dark gulf. It is a fine broad stairway at the beginning, but after a bit, the carpet ends. A little further on there are only flagstones, and a little further on still, these break beneath your feet.…if mortal catastrophe should overtake the British Nation and the British Empire, historians a thousand years hence will still be baffled by the mystery of our affairs. They will never understand how it was that a victorious nation, with everything in hand, suffered themselves to be brought low, and to cast away all that they had gained by measureless sacrifice and absolute victory—gone with the wind!"

34 the Churchillian | Winter 2013 LETTERS THE CHURCHILLIAN EVENTS TO THE CHURCHILLIAN

DECEMBER FEBRUARY 1 5th Annual Holiday Honor Tree 17 Winston Churchill Through January 2 Student Speech Competition On display in Museum entrance State Competition 2 Holiday Tree Lighting & Children’s Crafts MARCH 4pm – 7pm Family activities 6:15 pm Tree lighting 1-2 Churchill Weekend 2 Enid and R. Crosby Kemper Lecture JANUARY By Paul Reid 2pm 13 Ronald Reagan & Margaret Thatcher: Their Special Relationship 5 67th Anniversary of Winston Churchill’s January 13 – March 9 “Iron Curtain” speech at Westminster College Opening Reception January 17 from 1 – 3 pm 12 Homeschool Day 21 Winston Churchill 9am-4pm Student Speech Competition Regional Competitions 24 14th Annual Watercolor Missouri International January 21 - 30 March 24 – May 25 Award Reception April 6 from 1 – 3 pm

the Churchillian | Winter 2013 35 NATIONAL CHURCHILL MUSEUM 501 Westminster Avenue Fulton, Missouri 65251

NATIONAL CHURCHILL MUSEUM

Coming January 2014 New Exhibition:  Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher:  Their Special Relationship

Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher: Their Special Relationship is the story of two political outsiders - President Reagan and Prime Minister Thatcher – who challenged the political landscape to move forward domestic and foreign policies. Photographs, clothing and personal items from the Ronald Reagan Presidential Museum and Library and his Alma Mater, Eureka College, will be displayed. Churchillian traits such as character, heritage, and determination guide you through this fascinating look at a special relationship between two world leaders not seen since President Roosevelt and Sir Winston Churchill.

Ronald Reagan’s 1940 breakout movie, King’s Row, with Ann Sheridan and Bob Cummings was based on local Fulton, Missouri author Henry Belleman’s book. Posters, costumes and film materials courtesy of local collectors will be displayed.

Curated by Dr. James Cooper, Kit Freudenberg and Elisabeth Murphy.