Born on this day - Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill

Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 1874 – 24 January 1965) was a British politician who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1940 to 1945 and again from 1951 to 1955. A noted statesman, orator and strategist, Churchill was also an officer in the British Army. He has been studied to a unique extent as part of modern British and world history. A prolific author, he won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1953 for his own historical writings.[1]

During his army career Churchill saw combat with the Malakand Field Force on the Northwest Frontier, at the Battle of Omdurman in the Sudan and during the Second Boer War in South Africa. During this period he also gained fame, and not a small amount of notoriety, as a correspondent. At the forefront of the political scene for almost sixty years, Churchill held numerous political and cabinet positions. Before the First World War, he served as President of the Board of Trade and Home Secretary during the Liberal governments. In the First World War Churchill served in numerous positions, as First Lord of the Admiralty, Minister of Munitions, Secretary of State for War and Secretary of State for Air.

He also served in the British Army on the Western Front and commanded the 6th Battalion of the Royal Scots Fusiliers. During the interwar years, he served as Chancellor of the Exchequer. After the outbreak of the Second World War, Churchill was appointed First Lord of the Admiralty. Following the resignation of Neville Chamberlain in May 1940, he became Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and led the British war effort against the Axis powers. His speeches were a great inspiration to the embattled Allied forces. Churchill’s greatest achievement was his refusal to capitulate when defeat seemed imminent, and he remained a strong opponent of any negotiations with Germany throughout the war. Few others in the Cabinet had this degree of resolve.

By adopting a policy of no surrender, Churchill kept democracy alive in the UK and created the basis for the later Allied counter-attacks of 1942-45, with Britain serving as a platform for the supply of Soviet Union and the liberation of Western Europe. Among the many consequences of this stand was that Britain was maintained as a base from which the Allies could attack Germany, thereby ensuring that the Soviet sphere of influence did not extend over Western Europe at the end of the war. Churchill’s speeches were a great inspiration to the embattled British. His first speech as Prime Minister was the famous “I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears, and sweat”.

He followed that closely with two other equally famous ones, given just before the Battle of Britain. One included the immortal line, “we shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender.” The other included the equally famous “Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duties, and so bear ourselves, that if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years, men will still say, ‘This was their finest hour.’ “

After losing the 1945 election, Churchill became the leader of the opposition. In 1951, Churchill again became Prime Minister before finally retiring in 1955. Upon his death, he was granted the honour of a state funeral which saw one of the largest assemblies of politicians in the world. More at The Free Dictionary.