50 Years Ago: Remembering Churchill's funeral and the sunset of the Empire

Churchill’s passing at 8am that Saturday morning – 50 years ago this week – at his home in Hyde Park Gate in London did not come as a surprise to anybody. He was 90 years old, after all, and he had suffered a massive stroke two weeks previously.

Yet it did seem a historically significant moment, coming at a time when the Labour government was considering withdrawing all troops from east of Suez and so closing down the last remnants on the British Empire. “Now Britain is no longer a great power,” said Charles de Gaulle when he heard the news.

Many commentators in the British press agreed with him, and saw in the ceremony at St Paul’s the end of the era of British greatness. With the uninspiring Harold Wilson in Downing Street – about as un-Churchillian a figure imaginable – wrestling with recurrent economic problems that were soon to force the government into a humiliating devaluation of sterling, it was natural to fit Churchill’s death into an overall narrative of decline and malaise.

“The day of giants is gone for ever,” the historian Sir Arthur Bryant wrote in the Illustrated London News. Churchill’s own detective agreed, saying: “If the king dies you can say 'Long live the king’, but now Sir Winston’s gone, who is there? There’s no one of his stature left.” A L Rowse, the Oxford don, was equally pessimistic, writing: “The sun is going down on the British Empire.”

Read the rest here.

Quote of the day...

'There are three things I like about Italian ships. First, their cuisine, which is unsurpassed. Second, their service, which is quite superb. And then - in time of emergency - there is none of this nonsense about women and children first.'

- Sir Winston Churchill when once asked why he had booked on an Italian liner when the RMS Queen Elizabeth was available.

Source.

70 years ago today: A fateful moment for civilization

Nazi Germany launched its long planned invasion of France, Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg. In Britain a long simmering political crisis came to a head. Neville Chamberlain was forced to resign and Winston Churchill became Prime Minister in one of the darkest hours in history. Within a month Continental Europe would be lost and Britain would be living under the threat of invasion for the first time since Napoleon's era.

The Netherlands surrendered within days, Rotterdam was bombed with thousands killed even after the Dutch had sued for peace. Belgium fought for ten days before capitulating with her king becoming a prisoner of war. Luxembourg was swallowed in hours. The French army fought well but they were outmaneuvered and unable to stop the massive rush of tanks and bombers. Their vast system of much vaunted fortifications were shown to be of little use. Defeatist sentiment swelled up.

And the British army was forced to retreat to the harbor city of Dunkirk. With their back to the sea and hopelessly encircled the British undertook one of the epic military evacuations of history. Under continuous attack from air and artillery the Royal Navy supported by nearly every water craft in the British Isles that was able to get underway removed the vast bulk of Britain's army and many French troops, sans their heavy equipment which was lost to the enemy.

On June 4th 1940 Winston Churchill stood up at the Treasury Bench in the Commons to report on the events of the war. It was one of the most sobering and at the same time inspiring speeches of the 20th century.


Part 1


Part 2

The final three words of the speech were cut off. They were "...of the old."