Winston Churchill: A look at the last great British Prime Minister

                                                       By                              

                                                Claudia Cullen 

                                        Riversdale Community College

                                                                        4L.

                                                     

Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill was born on the 30th of  November, 1874 at Bleinheim Palace Oxfordshire. As much as his two parents loved him he spent most of his childhood  being  raised by nannies and governesses. His mother and father did not show affection towards him as he was getting older and this explain depression and self doubt during his later life. In April 1888 he was sent to a boarding school at Harrow. At school, he performed adequately academically, why socially he was considered to be an outcast because of his speech impediment and his shyness. His father did not believe in him and instead of encouraging him, he thought that he never achieved enough. It was not a great time for the future leader.

 

At the same time Churchill did not show any appitud for military tactics and awareness. As a result of this he went to a military academy In Sandhurst. Churchill found a niche for himself at Sandhurst and preformed far better there. He studied many tactics like musketry, riding, fortifications and military administration. Of the 130 in his class he finished twentieth. Around 1895 his father, Randolph died. Thus perharps, lifted a weight off his young shoulders. He entered the 4th Huzzars and embarked on a military life.

 

 

 

During his time in the military academy Churchill supplemented his soldiers wages by writing for newspapers. In Cuba he chronicled the war of independence from Spain for the Italics. While also being attached to Lord Kitchener’s Nile expeditionary force, in 1899, he penned the “italics” which brilliantly describes the campaign. He later resigned his commission and returned to Britain to a life of politics.

 

 

 

He fought the 1899 by-election in Oldham but lost. Briefly recapturing his journalistic life he travelled to South Africa to cover the Boer War war for the Italics. The train that he was travelling by had been attacked just a month later. He had fought very bravely but he was captured. The young Churchill decided that this was not good enough and escaped captivity. He then returned home to Britain as a hero. In 1900 he ran for election again in Oldham and won. He was 25 years old. During this part of his political life he served in several posts – Home Secretary in 1910, first Lord of the Admiralty in 1911, Chancellor of the Duchy of  Lancaster in 1915. the only black mark on his career was his questionable handling of the navy in the Dardanelles in 1915. While he was first Lord of  the Admiralty he ordered a naval expedition to free up the passage between the Aegean sea and the sea of Marmara so that the stalement on the western front would be broken and direct communication with Russia would be gained. The attacked failed dismally and Churchill was blamed by many. After the war there was a brief  interlude in his political life. He returned to parliament in 1924 as m.p. for Epping and was appointed chancellor for the Exchequer. However the national government of  1931, a coalition of  the conservatives, the Liberals and labour, left Churchill in the political wilderness again. The rise of Hitler and the coming of World War two would ultimately be his finest hour.

 

 

On the afternoon of May 9, 1940, Neville Chamberlain (who had stepped down as Prime Minister), Edward wood, Earl of Halifax, Churchill and David Margesson met at 10 Downing street. Wood was offered the prime ministership but turning it down saying that he felt the he did not have the qualities to lead a county at war. The task fell to Churchill who rose to the challenge. He also made himself  Minister for Defense and went about taking on Hitler. The Middle East and the Medditeranean dominated his early strategic thinking. This, combined with his later fixation with Italy, would cause a serve drain of troops and resources. It became clear to him that he needed strong allies. To this extent he looked toward the USSR and the USA. In June 1941 he proclaimed the Stalin would be recognised as a full partner in the war and two months later he met with Franklin Delano Roosevelt. On August 9, 1941, at Placentia Bay off the coast of Newfoundland, Roosevelt and Churchill cemented Anglo-American solidarity. In December of that same  year Japan bombed Pearl harbour. American joined the allies in fighting the axis powers.  

 

 

The strategy used was one of bombing, blockade and subversion. The final goal being a large-scale invasion of mainland europe. It was to prove successful. Germany and Japan capitulated in 1945.

 

 

Despite the triump in the war the British people thought Churchill not up to the task of rebuilding their dismantle country. Churchill was defeated in the general election. Labour took power for the first time in their own right. Churchill went into opposition. In 1946 at Fulton, Missouri, he coined the phrase, “the iron curtain” which was to later to become a more tangible reality with the construction of the berlin wall. Thus proving churchill to be a shrewd political observer. However failing health was to spell the end of his political career.

 

 

Although Churchill laid down the burdens of office he stayed on in the house of commons. He also published “A history of the english-speaking peoples”, four volumes between 1956 and 1958. on Avpril 9, 1963, he was accorded the distinction of having an honourary U.S. citizenship conferred on him by an act of congress. He died in london, January 24, 1965. He was given a state funeral at which almost the entire world gave tribute. Winston Churchill is buried in the family grave in Blandon Churchyard, Oxfordshire.

 

  Short Questions

 

  Q1.Bibliography

 

  Q2.Skills

  As I was doing my essay, I learnt the faibwing these skills.

 

1. I have learnt how to search libraries for the different type of books I needed.

2. I used the Internet to find some information for my topic.

3. I have learnt new skills and how to do different things on the Microsoft Word.

4. I have also learned how to  read and compare many different things and sources for my topic.

                                             

 

  Q3.Review

  The wicked wit of Winston Churchill by Dominique enright                                                                                                       

 

 

Winston Churchill is synonymous with the Second World War and the defeat of Nazism, and his name will be forever remembered in British and indeed world history, predominantly for his role in the Allied victory in 1945. However, Winston Churchill: The Greatest Briton uncovers other sides to this famous leader, whose life encompassed careers as a soldier journalist, at various times a Liberal and a conservation politician, historian and biographer. It provides a detail examination, partly biographical and partly anecdotal, of the work and life of one of the most remarkable figures of the twentieth century. Packed with examples of Churchill's legendary sayings, quotations from his world-famous speeches and broadcasts, and from his writings (including the magisterial six-volume Italics this new book examines an almost unequalled political career that spanned nearly sixty years.

 

 

It is a colourful, vibrant and highly readable appreciation of a man whose life and work remain as significant in today’s global arena as they did at the height of the Second World War. He took his seat in parliament in the reign of Queen Victorìa, and died when Lyndon Johnson was in his second year as US President. He fought as a soldier in four campaigns and as a war correspondent madean epic escape from Boer captivity. He wrote histories, biographies, memoirs, and even a novel, while his journalism, speeches and broadcasts run to millions of word from 1940 he inspired and united the British people on the brink of defeat a guided their war effort first to resist  and ultimately to crush the axis powers Sir Winston Churchill was also a man of vast humanity and enormous wit. His most famous speeches and sayings have passed into history but many of his aphorisms, puns and jokes are less well known. This enchanting collection brings together hundreds of his wittiest and wickedest quips as a record of all that was best about this lovable, infuriatingly conceited, wildly funny, and brilliantly talented Englishman.

 

 

Q4. How the essay was completed

 I was told about the essay during class,and we were all given a week to think about a topic we wanted to do. We went to our local school library and got books out. We also went on the Internet and looked up for information the information came from Microsoft Encarta, we then read the books and information from the net. We planned out our essay and wrote out first draft added on little bits from books and checked all the dates. We typed up essay using Microsoft Word, printed it out made changes and corrections. Then I printed it out and put it onto the school website.