Subscribe now and receive weekly newsletters with educational materials, new courses, interesting posts, popular books, and much more!
Articles
Moments in Time: The Churchills in Criccieth, Wales, September 1913
- By DAVE TURRELL
- | May 9, 2023
- Category: Churchill's Youth Q & A
Who and When?
Nigel Richards and his son Toby sent this fine photograph of David Lloyd George (light suit) and Winston Churchill (nautical cap). They are gathered with a crowd in Criccieth, North Wales, on the Llŷn Peninsula, near Lloyd George’s home. Unusually for the time, the photo was taken with a wide-angle lens rather than a panoramic camera. It was beautifully and expertly colorized by Toby Richards’ company, Bristol Productions.
Nigel was curious about the date and circumstances:
Does any history exist of this meeting between our two World War prime ministers, both subsequently shunned by the electorate? Family legend is that Churchill, with his wife, sailed to Criccieth aboard the Admiralty yacht Enchantress. During the visit they watched the Enchantress crew engage a local team in a cricket match. The venue was an athletic field owned by my great-grandfather, John S. Griffith, likely adjacent to the Railway Hotel, where he was the leaseholder.
My great-grandmother, Jane Owen Griffith, had gone to school with Lloyd George in nearby Llanystumdwy. The families remained friends through the next two generations. My mother, born in Criccieth, remained in contact with Lloyd George’s daughters, Olwen and Megan. She wore a veil of Megan’s when she married my father in 1947.
Dramatis personae
The primary focus is, of course, Churchill and Lloyd George—but there are other notables. To WSC’s left is his wife, Clementine. To Lloyd George’s right is his wife, Margaret, arm-in-arm with their daughter Olwen. We believe that the other young lady dressed in white is their younger daughter, Megan. She was later to gain a significant political standing of her own, both as the first woman to represent a Welsh constituency and, later, as Deputy Leader of the Liberal Party. Next to the wonderful village policeman (hands crossed) is the field owner, John Griffith, Nigel’s great-grandfather.
The photograph is fascinating because so much is going on. This is not just a standard group shot, with everybody staring glassily at the camera. Observe how many different directions people are looking.
Churchill, Lloyd George, Clementine, Olwen and others have their attention captured by something going on to their right. Some are looking toward the photographer, but many seem to be gazing off randomly. The group of five village youth are undecided, although two appear to be keeping a wary eye on the constable. Perhaps there is another story there? And we will never know what so concerned the little girl in the lilac hat at the right rear.
Could this have been an accidental or practice shot, taken as the photographer tried to marshal his subjects into some kind of order? If so, his final effort is lost to history. In any case we may count ourselves lucky. The portrait we do have is one we can ponder a long time, so varied are the characters portrayed.
Setting a date
Assigning the date, using the Official Biography and contemporary newspaper reports, was initially frustrating. Churchill visited Criccieth—and Lloyd George’s house, Brynawelon—in 1910, 1911, 1913 and 1919.1 We finally confirmed that Clementine was not with him in 1911 or 1919, which narrowed the possible dates to two.
Another photo of the principals was dated “probably 1910” by Robert Lloyd George in David & Winston. The Churchills did visit in 1910, but this is not likely the date. Churchill was not then First Lord of the Admiralty. Yet in both photos he wears the nautical cap he habitually wore aboard the Admiralty yacht.
Careful examination identifies the cap as that of an Elder Brother of Trinity House, Britain’s lighthouse authority. Churchill received that title on 29 April 1913.2 The date of the photographs is therefore almost certainly Friday, 5 September 1913.
Richards family tradition is that Churchill arrived by sea. As First Lord of the Admiralty—the office he acquired on 25 October 1911—he was entitled to use of the Admiralty yacht Enchantress. It was a privilege he adored and used to the hilt. In his first two years as First Lord, he spent about eight months aboard, assiduously inspecting virtually every Royal Navy facility. Sometimes with him were family and political colleagues, including Prime Minister H.H. Asquith. However, family tradition had erred slightly in passing down the story of a cricket match. It was, in fact a football match that was played between the village and the crew of the Enchantress.
Reports of the visit
We were able to locate two contemporary newspaper accounts. On 6 September 1913, the Manchester Courier reported:
The Enchantress, with Mr. and Mrs. Churchill on board, arrived yesterday at Criccieth. Mr. and Mrs. Lloyd George left their home at Brynawelon and joined Mr. and Mrs. Churchill at lunch yesterday afternoon…. At five o’clock a football match was arranged between Criccieth Town and the Enchantress eleven, and was attended by Mr. and Mrs. Churchill, Mr. and Mrs. Lloyd George and their guests. The Enchantress eleven scored the first goal, and Mrs. Winston Churchill immediately complied with the request to kick off for Criccieth on the resumption. She kicked the ball vigorously, sending it well to the Enchantress’s half amid cheers…. The yacht leaves Criccieth for Holyhead this afternoon.3
Clementine’s “vigorous” kick comes as no surprise. A keen tennis player, she was always a robust sportswoman.
On September 10th, the Pwllheli Welsh language newspaper Yr Udgorn also reported the event:
[The Enchantress] anchored below [Criccieth] Castle, about a hundred yards from the shore. Mr. and Mrs. Winston Churchill went ashore and were met on the beach by Mr. and Mrs. Lloyd George, Miss Olwen Lloyd George, Miss Megan Lloyd George, Miss Dilys Roberts, Mr. Llewellyn Williams, A.S. and Mrs. Williams. Hundreds of residents and visitors had gathered on the beach and they gave Mr. Churchill a hearty welcome. Mr. Churchill and the Chancellor [watched] the Criccieth club play football against the Enchantress. Criccieth won. Mr. Churchill gave a speech to the boys of Criccieth and congratulated them on their victory.4
Matters of the moment
It was, then, a short visit—arriving at lunchtime Friday, leaving only 24 hours later. All indications are of no formal talks between the Chancellor and First Lord. That is not to say that neither had anything on his mind.
In September 1913 Lloyd George was still suffering reputational fall-out resulting from the Marconi scandal. In mid-1912 he had been accused, along with Attorney General Rufus Isaacs and Postmaster General Herbert Samuel, of using insider information to make profitable investments in the Marconi Wireless Company. A year later, a Select Committee exonerated them. But the taint, of at best naïveté or at worst corruption, would cling to Lloyd George for years.
Churchill, while free from the scandal, was currently challenged by Germany’s burgeoning navy. His preoccupation was his naval estimates—over which he and Lloyd George fought long and bitterly. Of course, their relationship had always been volatile. Once known as the “Heavenly Twins” in their joint battle for social reforms, they fell out over finance. After the war to come, they would argue about British aid to the White Russians against the Bolsheviks.
Churchill was also embattled over Irish Home Rule. At Dundee within a month he would take a position long held by Joseph Chamberlain, his bitter rival from Free Trade days: devolved parliamentary assemblies for Ireland, Scotland and Wales. Churchill would later achieve an extraordinary degree of success with Home Rule for Ireland in 1922. The devolution proposal would remain a distant goal for the next three-quarters of a century. But on this Friday afternoon in Criccieth, all cares were, at least temporarily, set aside. The subjects at hand were photography and football.
A vanishing world
Nigel and Toby Richards possess a wonderful photograph, remarkable for its bucolic tranquility a year before Armageddon. It is to be treasured all the more for the fact that it represents the closing days of what amounts to a lost civilization.
It is sobering to speculate on the fate of those pictured, the young men especially, and the young women who would watch them go. Britain’s last Golden Summer of 1914 was rapidly approaching. If it felt like the height of Empire, it was soon to usher in the end of Empire.
Within a few months the Byzantine components of interlocking treaties would slam inexorably into place. They would drag the world into the catastrophe of what Churchill called “a second Thirty Years War.” He and Lloyd George had enormous roles yet to play. But their days of football in the field would not return.
Credits
Dave Turrell is happily retired from a lifetime career in Information Technology. A longtime Churchill bibliophile and collector, he is proud to have been a deputy editor of Finest Hour. His days are spent in arranging his books on his own plan and, even on the rare occasions where he cannot be friends with them, he is at least content to make their acquaintance. Our thanks to Toby Richards and Bristol Productions in Bristol, Avon, UK for the expert colorized and remastered photograph and permission to reproduce it here; and Nigel Richards of Talaton, Devon for bringing the photo to our attention.
Endnotes
1 WSC was also expected in September 1912, but cancelled that visit. The Lloyd George house, Brynawelon, was built in 1909. It remained the family’s primary home until 1922, when he built a new house in Churt, Surrey. Lloyd George’s quest for a “country nest” closer to London may well have inspired Churchill to find Chartwell, or vice-versa.
2 “Trinity House Corporation. Mr. Churchill Elected an Elder Brother,” Leicester Daily Post, 30 April 1913. Elder Brethren present were Prime Minister H.H. Asquith and First Sea Lord Prince Louis of Battenberg.
3 Manchester Courier 6 September 1913.
4 “Mr. Winston Churchill in Criccieth,” in Yr Udgorn, Pwllheli, Wales, 10 September 1913, approximate translation by Toby Richards.