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Introduction
Churchill and his friend F.E. Smith, Lord Birkenhead, founded a dining club in 1911 called The Other Club. A very restricted number of people were invited to be members, on the basis of being both eminent and entertaining.
The same two criteria have been applied in choosing which of Churchill’s many friends to include in this volume. Another factor was whether the stories about them could provide illuminating insights into some of the issues of the era and some of the controversies associated with Churchill.
The thirty selected characters include three members of UK royalty, two US presidents, two prime ministers (of the UK and South Africa), six British lords and ladies, and three key influencers in the American political system. Churchill loved the theatre and movies; included here are four of his actor and film producer friends, all of whom were co-opted into his political schemes. Also incorporated are an American broadcaster, three international businesspeople (a Greek man and two French women), two artists (French and British), a Hungarian-British publisher, a UK writer, a British socialite and an Indian religious leader.
Many of the individuals are still household names today, such as Franklin D. Roosevelt, Charlie Chaplin and Vivien Leigh. Some were very well known in their day but are less so now, such as the actress Maxine Elliott. Americans are more familiar than others with Averell Harriman, Bernard Baruch and Kay Halle. Similarly, the British are likely to be more familiar than others with its royalty such as George VI, Edward VIII and Elizabeth II.
Art enthusiasts will recognise the names of post-impressionists Walter Sickert and Paul Maze, two of Churchill’s painting mentors. His other artist friends, William Nicholson, John Lavery and his wife Hazel Lavery, are not included here but may be included in a ‘Painting’ section of a possible additional theme of Pastimes.
Amongst Churchill’s business friends were the shipping tycoon Aristotle Onassis, champagne executive Odette Pol-Roger, fashion designer Coco Chanel and publishing magnates Lords Beaverbrook, Camrose and Rothermere. Politicians included David Lloyd George and former army leader Jan Smuts.
Seven of the selected friends were women, two of whom were of romantic interest to Churchill: Pamela Plowden (later Lady Bulwer-Lytton) and Violet Asquith (later Violet Bonham Carter, Lady Asquith). Five were Jewish and one was Muslim, Aga Khan III. Four left their home country and became UK citizens: Alexander Korda and Emery Reves (formerly Hungarian), the fabulously wealthy Philip Sassoon (formerly French), and Beaverbrook (Canadian). Artist Paul Maze gained UK citizenship but remained in France.
Some of Churchill’s good friends were also staff, including Field Marshal Montgomery, Professor Lindemann and Brendan Bracken, and family, such as Charles ‘Sunny’ Spencer-Churchill, 9th Duke of Marlborough. They and others are covered in the Staff and Family sections of this series.
Even so, many of Churchill’s connections have not been included because of space. ‘Winston loves meeting people’, wrote David Lloyd George’s private secretary, A.J. Sylvester. ‘Winston would go up to his Creator and say that he would very much like to meet his Son, of Whom he had heard a great deal and, if possible, would like to call on the Holy Ghost.’1
Churchill’s wife Clementine was not keen on various of Winston’s friends, particularly those congregating in villas on the French Riviera in the 1930s. She thought that the Riviera brought out Winston’s shallow side, which is perhaps why he enjoyed it so much. She also had concerns about some of his other companions, including his best friend, Lord Birkenhead, because of his drinking and smoking habits. She was, however, tolerant of his choices, as he was of hers, and had some good friendships with some of his coterie.
What constitutes a ‘friend’ rather than simply a ‘contact’ in the context of public figures who are so well connected? Were Churchill’s relationships with royalty, presidents and prime ministers perhaps more political than personal? It can be seen from the stories about each of them that Churchill formed close personal bonds (unlike, say, the distant General de Gaulle), regardless of issues of protocol, politics and age difference. He had a remarkable capacity to establish friendly and enduring relationships with people of widely different backgrounds, opinions and experience.
Charlie Chaplin, for example, was described as ‘Bolshy’ by Churchill, meaning a supporter of Bolshevik communism, an ideology which Churchill loathed. Yet they enjoyed meals together in California and at Chartwell, Churchill’s home in Kent. Chaplin was brought up in difficult circumstances, as were Coco Chanel and the writer H.G. Wells. Many of Churchill’s other friends had less challenging beginnings but were also ‘self-made’, establishing themselves in different walks of life by initiative and force of personality. Others were born into wealthy families, but had a drive that propelled them to capitalise on their opportunities rather than to coast.
Churchill’s own career was forged by means of a mix of exploitation of his aristocratic family’s contacts (particularly his mother’s) and the need to pay for his high-spending lifestyle. Although his side of the Spencer-Churchill family initially had resources that would provide comfortably for most people, they were never enough for his mother’s and his own expenditure, resulting in a near-constant threat of financial disaster that was not alleviated until the early 1940s. Churchill’s friends, particularly Korda, Bracken, Camrose and Reves, came to his rescue, with Camrose saving Churchill’s home Chartwell in Kent from being turned into a hotel or a block of apartments.
1 A.J. Sylvester, Life with Lloyd George: The Diary of A. J. Sylvester, 1931-45, ed. by Colin Cross (Barnes & Noble, 1975), p. 166.