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Kindle Notes & Highlights
by
Erik Larson
Churchill barred the press from reporting it. “The
“Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duty and so bear ourselves that if the British Commonwealth and Empire lasts for a thousand years, men will still say, ‘This was their finest hour.’ ”
Churchill agreed, with reluctance, to do a separate broadcast that night.
Whether he was drunk or all-in from sheer fatigue, I don’t know, but it was the poorest possible effort on an occasion when he should have produced the finest speech of his life.” One listener went so far as to send a
Churchill had insisted on reading the speech with a cigar clenched in his mouth.
“Gimme,”
suspense
Love me, love my dog, and if you don’t love my dog you damn well can’t love
able to bomb accurately even on moonless nights and in overcast weather. To Churchill, this was dark news indeed,
“one of the blackest moments of the war,”
RAF could devise countermeasures, including jamming the beams and transmitting false signals to trick the Germans into dropping their bombs too early or flying along the
problem that had dogged
him through much of his career, a lack of money.
Jones and a colleague walked to nearby St. Stephen’s Tavern, a popular Whitehall pub situated a hundred yards from Big Ben, and got drunk.
are very close to the end of the war.”
Bletchley Park.
application of mustard than these beaches and lodgments,”
Another threat caused him particular worry: German parachutists and fifth columnists in disguise. “Much thought,” he wrote, “must be given to the trick of wearing British uniform.” — THE STRESS OF MANAGING the war
“One leads by calm.”
The house fostered an easier and more candid exchange of ideas and opinions, encouraged by the simple fact that everyone had left their offices behind
sacred circle.
Randolph had a reputation as a rude house guest. He was known to start verbal fights with
“Beaverbrook was a gossipmonger and Pamela was his bird dog.” Pamela and Randolph had gotten
Churchill had a formula for family size as well. Four children was the ideal number: “One to reproduce your wife, one to reproduce yourself, one for the increase in population, and one in case of accident.”
once returned the boy’s loving letter home with editorial corrections marked in red.
Germans seized and occupied Guernsey, a
Lord Beaverbrook, submitted his resignation. The letter began
But he no longer threatened immediate resignation. Churchill was relieved.
Sailors of all nations, even when at war, felt a strong kinship to one another, as brothers for whom the sea, with all its rigors and dangers, was a common opponent.
Churchill affirmed that the only path was indeed attack, and began to weep. Somerville received his final
Hitler had assumed that England, in one way or another, would withdraw from the war. It
confident was Hitler that England would negotiate, he demobilized forty Wehrmacht
the attack provided vivid, irrefutable proof that Britain would not surrender—proof to Roosevelt and proof, as well, to Hitler. — THE NEXT DAY, THURSDAY, July 4,
Churchill’s great trick—one he had demonstrated before, and would demonstrate again—was his ability to deliver dire news and yet leave his audience feeling encouraged and uplifted. “Fortified” is how Harold Nicolson
Churchill wept.
day, by way of apology, de Gaulle sent her a large basket of flowers.
Hitler believed that in the prior war Germany had made a fatal mistake in provoking Britain to fight.
way or another, Churchill had to be removed from office. In his conversation with Hess,
Hitler remained ambivalent about invasion and still favored a negotiated resolution.
The queen began taking lessons in how to shoot a revolver. “Yes,”
the pilots
were gods. The two girls were spending
Civilians watched air battles unfold from the safety of their gardens or
the most splendid form of hunting conceivable.”
When donations reached a certain level, the contributors could choose to name a specific fighter; a richer total allowed the donors to name a bomber. “The naming
Spitfire Fund,
made easy the way to a more personal interest in the war and to an enthusiastic contribution to its
power of symbols.
Preparations for a Landing Operation Against England,” and code-named the plan Seelöwe, or Sea Lion.
ITLER BEGAN SPEAKING, Shirer, seated in the audience, was struck anew by his rhetorical skills:
