Chris: Following is running in FINEST HOUR 141 (Winter 08-09). For copyright reasons I should not post whole letters here. Email me offline for the full text or consult the relevant Companion Volume-- available very inexpensively from Hillsdale College Press, www.hillsdale.edu/news/freedomlibrary/churchill.asp or telephone (800) 437-2268.
WSC’S DEATH LETTER LONDON, OCTOBER 22ND— A letter to be shown at “Last Post,” a World War I exhibit at the Churchill Museum in the Cabinet War Rooms in November “reveals” that Churchill would have left his wife £3000 in savings (£195,000 today), and enough shares to pay off his debts. But what the Mail, Express, Mirror and Sun all find remarkable was first published thirty-six years ago by Sir Martin Gilbert in Companion Volume III, Part II to Winston S. Churchill, the official biography (page 1098). Although millions of men going off to war wrote similar letters to be opened in the event of their death, Churchill’s message to Clementine (17 July 1915) is well worth reading for its lyrical prose and poignant reflections. It was written at a time when his political ambitions lay shattered, following his ouster from the Admiralty in the midst of a Cabinet crisis and an anxious battle for the Gallipoli Peninsula—an imaginative idea Churchill had not invented, but had championed all too blindly as support among his colleagues fell away. “I am anxious that you shd get hold of all my papers,” he wrote her... “some day I shd like the truth to be known. Randolph will carry on the lamp. Do not grieve for me too much. I am a spirit confident of my rights. Death is only an incident, & not the most important wh happens to us in this state of being. On the whole, especially since I met you my darling one I have been happy, & you have taught me how noble a woman’s heart can be. If there is anywhere else I shall be on the look out for you. Meanwhile look forward, feel free, rejoice in life, cherish the children, guard my memory. God bless you. Good bye. W.” --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "ChurchillChat" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/ChurchillChat?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
