Maggie S.

Meeting the Führer

Winston Churchill was one of the most successful politicians of the twenty-first century, and his life was very eventful. Churchill was born on November 30, 1874 to Lord Randolph Churchill and Jennie Jerome (Churchill Archives Centre). His father was the youngest son of the seventh Duke of Marlborough, and so Winston was born into a high social status. Despite his privilege, Churchill was generally neglected by his parents, and his nanny, Mrs. Everest, became the main maternal figure for both Winston and his younger brother, John S. Churchill (Churchill Archives Centre). Churchill was a bright kid with a good education, and attended the Royal Military College until 1894, when he left school to join the British cavalry (Library of Congress). From 1895 to 1900, Churchill witnessed combat in Cuba, India, Sudan, and South Africa. This experience helped him in his future as First Lord of the Admiralty in World War II. 

Churchill resigned from the British Army in 1900 in order to embark on a career of writing and politics (Library of Congress). That same year, he became a Conservative Member of Parliament (The Nobel Prize). The next few years were very eventful for Churchill, as he was appointed to be a Cabinet Minister as the President of the Board of Trade in 1908. This was the same year Churchill married Clementine Hozier (Churchill Archives Centre). Due to his distant relationship to his parents, Churchill was devoted to the five children he had with Clementine. Despite his care for them, though, most of his children had unhappy lives. Their first child was named Diana and she was born in 1909. She was a hopeless romantic, but had two divorces. After getting a divorce with the father of her three children, Diana committed suicide (Churchill Archives Centre). This was tragic for the family, but not the end of their bloodline’s bad luck. During his grief, Churchill was appointed Home Secretary in 1910, but held the position for just a year (Churchill Archives Centre). In 1911, Churchill's second child, Randolph, was born. He failed as a politician but was a successful journalist and wrote his fathers biography during the 1960s. Like his older sister, he also had two unsuccessful marriages (Churchill Archives Centre). Failed marriages were a common theme for the children, as Churchill’s third child, Sarah had two unsuccessful marriages and was widowed during her third (Churchill Archives Centre). Their fourth child, Marigold, was born in 1918, but contracted septicaemia and died at just three years old. This was heartbreaking for Winston and Clementine, and so they tried again for one last child. Luckily, their last child, Mary, was born in 1921 and did not cause any distress for her parents. She had a good life and a long, happy marriage that resulted in five healthy children (Churchill Archives Centre).  

In 1924, Churchill was appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer by Stanley Baldwin, an office in which he served from until 1929 (Simpson). In the beginning of the 1930s, Churchill visited Nazi Germany and was horrified by the danger he knew was approaching. He attempted to sell articles about the evils of Nazism to the press, but the UK did not often believe the claims or buy the articles until news of the Nazis became more extreme (Simpson). When war broke out in September, 1939,  Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain appointed Churchill First Lord of the Admiralty (Taylor). Months before Italy declared war on Britain in June of 1940, Churchill became the Prime Minister and the Minister of Defense (America’s National Churchill Museum). Churchill played a significant role in strengthening Britain’s ties to the United States during the war, and persuaded President Roosevelt to fight Germany before Japan. In 1942, Churchill convinced Britain and their allies to follow the British strategy of trying to slit open the “soft underbelly” of Europe by invading North Africa and Sicily in order to take down Hitler (Taylor). In May of 1945, Germany surrendered and Britain celebrated their victory. 

After the war, Churchill expected to be the Prime Minister, but he lost the election in 1945. After losing the election, Churchill lapsed into depression, which resulted in many angry outbursts. Churchill was very stressed at this time, which caused him to lash out at his many secretaries, whom he had to write and proofread his work (Stelzer). In order to cope with this stress, Churchill picked up some hobbies. Churchill always loved painting and the arts, but he found himself interested in a new, more exciting hobby: horse racing. In the summer of 1949, Churchill bought his first racehorse. He had much success with his new interest, and was made a member of the Jockey Club in 1950 (Churchill Archives Centre). After getting some confidence back from his horse racing, Churchill ran again for Prime Minister in 1951, and won. In 1953, Queen Elizabeth II appointed Churchill a Knight and invested him with the duty of the Order of the Garter (The Nobel Prize). 

After only five years of his second term as Prime Minister, Churchill resigned from the premiership due to a stroke that he tried to keep a secret (America’s National Churchill Museum). Churchill struggled with his health from that point on, but only officially retired from politics in 1963 (Churchill Archives Centre). After having a total of eight strokes since 1949, Churchill died from an unrecoverable stroke on January 24, 1965 (America’s National Churchill Museum). He passed away in his home in London exactly seventy years after the death of his father (Churchill Archives Centre). Through his long political experience and his helpfulness in the victories of World War II, Winston Churchill is one of the most famous and admirable politicians of the twenty-first century. 

Works Cited

Callahan, Raymond. “The Churchill Documents." International Churchill Society, July 2018. Accessed 9 October 2024. 

"Churchill and Women." The Churchill Archive. Accessed 9 October 2024. 

“Famous Quotes and Stories." International Churchill Society, 13 Dec. 2022, Accessed 9 October 2024.

“Funny Winston Churchill Outtakes." YouTube, uploaded by British Pathé, Dec 13, 2014. Accessed Oct 11, 2024. 

Heyden, Tom. “The 10 Greatest Controversies of Winston Churchill’s Career." BBC News, 26 Jan. 2015. Accessed 9 October 2024. 

"History of Sir Winston Churchill." Past Prime Ministers. GOV.UK. Accessed 9 October 2024.

Mclaughlan, Scott. “The Dark Side of Britain’s Great Hero." The Collector, 13 Dec, 2023. Accessed October 10, 2024. 

“The Nobel Prize in Literature 1953.” The Nobel Foundation. Accessed October 9, 2024. 

Simpson, John. “Winston Churchill: How a Flawed Man Became a Great Leader.” BBC News, 23 Jan. 2015.

“Sir Winston Churchill: A Biography.” Churchill Archives Centre, 2 Feb. 2022.

Stelzer, Cita. Working With Winston. United Kingdom, Head of Zeus, 2019.

Taylor, James. “How Churchill Led Britain To Victory In The Second World War." Imperial War Museums, 24 July 2020. Accessed October 10, 2024. 

“10 Facts About Winston Churchill." The Royal Mint.  10 Aug. 2020. Accessed October 9, 2024. 

"Warrior for Empire, Churchill and the Great Republic." Library of Congress. February 2004. Accessed October 9, 2024. 

“Winston Churchill Addresses the Nation following Defeat of Germans.” YouTube, uploaded by British Pathé, Nov 10, 2020. Accessed Oct 11, 2024. 

"World War II, Winston Churchill’s Finest Hour." America’s National Churchill Museum, Accessed Oct 11, 2024. 

Artist's Statement

I chose to do my project on Winston Churchill for many reasons. Firstly, because he played a very big role in World War II, but also because my grandfather is obsessed with him, so I knew he would have some good suggestions. Many of Churchills experiences are famous, so I wanted to do something more abstract and less cliche for my dramatization. Instead of doing a well known moment of Churchill’s, I chose to do an already dramatic scenario that is not well researched. I chose to dramatize a moment almost a decade before World War II when Chruchill invited Hitler to dinner, but he rejected the invitation. There are few sources on this moment, but I liked that because it meant that there was more room for my artistic vision. Overall, this project came pretty easy to me, but I will say that editing this video was very difficult. Doing this project made me understand the pre-World War II period a little better, as the tensions between Churchill and Hitler’s foreign press secretary show that there was some suspicion about Hitler’s plans long before the war officially began. My project connects to the present day because it depicts political figures being suspicious but having to remain polite, which I believe still happens a lot in modern politics.