Churchill’s Hour. Michael Dobbs
finish the job. One extra maid. How are we supposed to manage wi’ just one extra maid?’
‘The tools to finish the job?’ Suddenly Churchill let out a roar of merriment and clapped the servant on the shoulder. ‘Sawyers, at times you can be brilliant. You are simply too stupid to realize the fact. Ah, but you are fortunate to serve a man like me, someone who is able to pick the diamonds out from the slag heap of your mind.’
Sawyers stared back blankly.
‘Hurry up, man,’ Churchill barked. ‘We’ll be wanting luncheon in a little while.’ And with that he strode happily down the hill.
The broadcast he made the following evening from Chequers was his first in five months. It was still being written right up to the moment of delivery. It bore no resemblance to any earlier draft, for Sawyers’ moment of insight had unleashed a flood of fresh thoughts.
Churchill sat at his working table surrounded by the books and oil paintings that filled the walls of the Hawtrey Room, his back to the fire, his script lit by nothing more than a single bulb beneath a green shade, the atmosphere dense and theatrical, almost conspiratorial. He was still scribbling fresh thoughts in the margin of his typed script even as the sound engineer, standing in the doorway, indicated it was time. A growl grew in his throat, a little like the sound of a torpedo about to burst from its tube, and he had begun.
He welcomed them, reassured them, drew them in, recounted to them what they already knew, but gave them fresh heart in the retelling.
After the heavy defeats of the German Air Force by our fighters in August and September, Herr Hitler did not dare attempt the invasion of this island, although he had every need to do so and had made vast preparations. Baffled in this mighty project, he sought to break the spirit of the British nation by the bombing, first of London and afterwards of our great cities.
He made it seem like times past. Oh, if only they were…
It has now been proved, to the admiration of the world, and of our friends in the United States, that this form of blackmail by murder and terrorism, so far from weakening the spirit of the British nation, has only roused it to a more intense and universal flame than was ever seen before!
Through the words of defiance they could hear him sipping his whisky, wetting his lips for what was to come.
All through these dark winter months the enemy has had the power to drop three or four tons of bombs upon us for every ton we could send to Germany in return.
If he seemed to falter a little, it was only for dramatic emphasis, to lead them on.
We are arranging so that presently this will be rather the other way around…
Defiance—and mockery. The universal sign that the British were not yet completely buggered.
Meanwhile, London and our big cities have had to stand their pounding. They remind me of the British squares at Waterloo. They are not squares of soldiers. They do not wear scarlet coats. They are just ordinary English, Scottish and Welsh folk—men, women and children—standing steadfastly together. But their spirit is the same, their glory is the same, and in the end their victory will be greater than far-famed Waterloo!
In every corner of the country, in places of work, of rest, of relaxation, even in places of suffering, chins came up and the blood flowed a little faster. But this was not to be a message simply for British ears. Thanks to Sawyers, Churchill’s words were to find both a new focus and a new audience. His words were weapons in this war, and now he aimed them directly at Americans.
While this has been happening, a mighty tide of sympathy, of good will and of effective aid has begun to flow across the Atlantic in support of the world cause which is at stake. Distinguished Americans have come over to see things here at the front and to find out how the United States can help us best and soonest. In Mr Hopkins, who has been my frequent companion during these last few weeks, we have the envoy of the President, a President who has been newly re-elected to his august office. In Mr Wendell Willkie we have welcomed the champion of the great Republican Party. We may be sure that they will both tell the truth about what they have seen over here, and more than that we do not ask. The rest we leave with good confidence to the judgement of the President, the Congress and the people of the United States.
He said these words, but he did not believe them. Churchill had never met the President and had grave doubts about his judgement. He didn’t trust the Congress and he knew that the last thing on earth the American people desired was to get involved in Churchill’s bloody war.
It now seems certain that the Government and people of the United States intend to supply us with all that is necessary for victory.
All that is necessary for victory—short of actual help. They’d sent those ancient destroyers, of course, but demanded their thirty pieces of silver in return. Many of those much-vaunted destroyers had been useless, little more than rusting barges with clapped-out engines and rotting hulls—although someone had taken the trouble to ensure that the washrooms were equipped with towels and fresh soap. When would the Americans learn? You couldn’t fight a war with clean hands.
In the last war the United States sent two million men across the Atlantic. But this is not a war of vast armies firing immense masses of shells at one another. We do not need the gallant armies which are forming throughout the American union. We do not need them this year, nor next year, nor any year that I can foresee.
He swallowed his shame, telescope to unseeing eye, even as he uttered these profound deceits. He had no choice. Step by step, as he had explained to Randolph. He had to pretend to be at one with Roosevelt, to be alongside him, joined to him at the hip—otherwise he would never be able to lead him astray.
In order to win the war, Hitler must destroy Great Britain. He may carry havoc into the Balkan States. He may tear great provinces out of Russia…
Yes, an attack on Russia, that would happen some time, of that Churchill was certain. It was the nature of the Nazi beast, couldn’t restrain itself. But when? Would it be in time to save Britain?
He may march to the Caspian; he may march to the gates of India. All this will avail him nothing. It may spread his curse more widely throughout Europe and Asia, but it will not avert his doom. With every month that passes the many proud and once happy countries he is now holding down by brute force and vile intrigue are learning to hate the Prussian yoke and the Nazi name as nothing has ever been hated so fiercely and so widely among men before. And all the time, masters of the sea and air, the British Empire—nay, in a certain sense the whole English-speaking world—will be on his track, bearing with them the swords of justice.
‘In a certain sense the whole English-speaking world’? In what sense, pray? Roosevelt and his Americans might pretend they were up to wielding the sword of justice, but the last place they intended to bury it was deep inside the guts of the German war machine.
The other day President Roosevelt gave his opponent in the late presidential election a letter of introduction to me, and in it he wrote out a verse in his own handwriting from Longfellow, which he said applies to you people as it does to us. Here is the verse:
Sail on, O Ship of State!
Sail on, O Union, strong and great!
Humanity with all its fears,
With all the hopes of future years,
Is hanging breathless on thy fate!
Roosevelt was sending poetry and bars of soap when what Churchill wanted was guns, more guns and bloody shells! But he must turn it, use the cascade of words to excite the passions and dull their wits, to avert their gaze so that he could launch his monstrous deception…
What is the answer that I shall give, in your name, to this great man, the thrice-chosen head of a nation of a hundred and thirty