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Articles
The Churchill Documents Volume 21: The Shadows of Victory
- By DAVE TURRELL
- | November 17, 2021
- Category: Books
Martin Gilbert and Larry P. Arnn, eds., The Churchill Documents Volume 21: The Shadows of Victory, January – July 1945. Hillsdale, Mich.: Hillsdale College Press, 2018, 2149 pages, $60.
Looming shadows
Volume 14 of The Churchill Documents, so long ago, led us into September 1939. Over 13,000 pages later, Volume 21 takes us through the final months of the war in Europe. It goes on through the end of Churchill’s premiership in late July. This period is also covered in the final volume of Churchill’s The Second World War, aptly titled Triumph and Tragedy. Shadows of Victory offers copious servings of both.
As with previous volumes in the series, Shadows is a researcher’s dream come true. Sir Martin and Dr. Arnn combed through numerous archives, leaving out nothing of significance. The period covered is a well-trodden path for historians, but never has such a wealth of documentation been so readily available.
And as I have frequently argued before, The Churchill Documents are not just 23 volumes to be mined for research. They are also books which can and should be read in their own right. The material in this volume is too plentiful to allow a meaningful review of everything it contains, but the following may serve as a sample.
Inevitability
The triumphs in the last months of the war were primarily military. By the beginning of 1945 it was evident that victory in Europe was weeks away. Hitler’s Germany was assaulted from two sides. In January Hitler abandoned efforts to direct the war from either front, and returned for the last time to Berlin. One of his SS colonels had the courage to offer him a joke: “Berlin will be the most practical as our headquarters: We’ll soon be able to take the tram from the Eastern to the Western Front.” Shadows tells us that “Hitler laughed.”
The Allies’ final major concern ended on 27 March, when the last V2 rockets were launched against England. The next day, Churchill was expressing concern about the Allies’ ability to bomb Germany at will. “The destruction of Dresden remains a serious query against the conduct of Allied bombing,” he wrote. “I am of the opinion that military objectives must henceforward be more strictly studied in our own interests rather than that of the enemy.”
But as the war swept on towards its now inevitable conclusion. It became clear that the problems that had faced the Allies in the waging of all-out battle were in danger of being overshadowed by the problems that faced them in implementing the peace, and in dealing with each other. As the armies converged, Churchill had no qualms wishing that the Anglo-Americans shake hands with the Russians “as far to the east as possible.”
Victory, of a kind
Greece had been temporarily quietened over the previous Christmas, but was by no means settled. Russian shadows broke over Europe, as Stalin wanted as much of the spoils as possible. There was the almost intractable postwar boundary of Poland, which Britain had gone to war to defend. France was eager to once again be regarded as an equal ally with a commensurate seat at the table. Regardless of the imminent collapse of Germany, there was still an ongoing war with Japan to be fought and won.
The public saw triumph, and for them it was a triumph. They were the ones who had fought, bled and died, and now they could see the end in sight. Perhaps the message sent Churchill by Anthony Eden best sums up their feelings: “All my thoughts are with you on this day which is so essentially your day. It is you who have led, uplifted and inspired us through the worst days. Without you this day could not have been.”
It is mildly surprising that the ultimate sign of victory, Hitler’s death, seems to have evoked underwhelming responses. One assumes that by that point it had a sense of inevitability. John Colville simply notes in his diary that Churchill remarked: “Well I must say I think he was perfectly right to die like that.” (Some thought this an encomium, but at the time, Churchill did not know the details of Hitler’s squalid suicide.) The execution of Mussolini merely provoked Harold Nicolson to remark: “It was terribly ignominious.”
“The lowest point of degradation”
As the Allies advanced further into German–held territory, the liberation of the concentration camps began. The existence of the camps had long been known. But as Shadows tells us, the full extent of what was done in them was not.
On 19 April Churchill notified Eden and Halifax that he was adding a delegation to a Congressional and press party Eisenhower was sending to Germany immediately. Its task was to: “[I]nspect the indescribable horrors, far beyond any hitherto exposed…. Especially in the neighbourhood of Weimar the atrocities have surpassed all example or indeed imagination.” Eight members of the Commons and two from the Lords attended. Shadows records their report, on 27 April.
…it is our considered and unanimous opinion, on the evidence available to us, that a policy of steady starvation and brutality was carried out at Buchenwald for a long period of time; and that such camps as this mark the lowest point of degradation to which humanity has yet descended.
The Third Reich had sealed its legacy.
“The deadly hiatus”
Tragedy on a very personal scale had already affected Churchill. On 12 April President Roosevelt suffered a massive stroke and died. The premature ending of a relationship and friendship, which Churchill had cherished, came as a blow, especially coming as it did so close to victory. In Shadows we read Edward Stettinius’s telegraph:
Knowing your deep affection for the President and your close and loyal association with him through these past vital years I know how fully you share my deep personal grief over the catastrophic loss which this country and the whole world has just suffered.
Stettinius was right. It wasn’t just a personal loss for Churchill. It was a strategic blow. Roosevelt tormented Winston Churchill at times, but he was his strongest ally in standing up to Stalin. Never an easy partner, the Russian dictator had been increasingly worrisome since Yalta. In his penultimate message to Churchill, sent on the day of his death, Roosevelt wrote of Russia: “We must be firm, however, and our course thus far is correct.”
Churchill himself pointed out the problem of the timing in Triumph and Tragedy: “We can now see the deadly hiatus which existed between the fading of President Roosevelt’s strength and the growth of President Truman’s grip of the vast world problem.”
Potsdam and beyond
Shadows of Victory includes all the correspondence between party leaders over the British election. Churchill lost his plea that the wartime coalition could be preserved until the defeat of Japan, and polling day was set for 5 July. Meanwhile, the Allies headed to Potsdam to try to win the peace. Ballot counting was delayed to record the overseas and service votes, and on July 25th Churchill left Potsdam for London to hear the result. When the conference resumed, Clement Attlee was in the prime minister’s chair.
The book thoroughly documents the shock and disappointment of Churchill and those around him. His wry crack that it was a blessing “very effectively disguised” is well known. But Shadows has much more. Jock Colville recalled WSC’s remark at dinner a few days later. “The new government would have the most difficult task of any government in modern times and it was the duty of everybody to support them in matters of national interest.” The words of a statesman.
Predictably, letters of thanks, commiserations, encouragement and admiration poured in. We are treated to a good selection of them. From Jan Masryk to Harry Truman, all expressed regret—even Lord Alanbrooke, who, in his exhausted state, had often been driven to apoplexy by Churchill’s demands: “I thank God for the wonderful privilege of working so closely with you in the worst world crisis we have come through.”
“Finis”
Perhaps the most heartfelt judgment came from King George VI, a fundamentally shy man who had been no fan of Churchill at the start of his reign or the beginning of the war. “I am writing to tell you how very sad I am that you are no longer my Prime Minister.” The last word belongs, as it so often does, to his daughter Mary:
On Sunday, 29th July, we sat down fifteen to dinner, and before we went to bed we all signed the Chequers Visitors Book. My father signed last of all, and beneath his signature he wrote: “Finis.” We know now that it was no such thing, but that is how he and my mother and all of us felt then.
Shadows of Victory ends on 31 July 1945. Six days later a glimpse of the future, which Churchill would have to grapple with, mushroomed into the skies over Hiroshima.
The author
Dave Turrell is happily retired from a lifetime career in Information Technology. He is a longtime Churchill bibliophile and collector. 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 proud to make their acquaintance.