Q: Do you have a standout story or anecdote about Churchill that you discovered while writing the book? Could you share it with us?
SG: I’ve always had a special interest in Churchill’s relationship with women – both the women of his own family, and those with whom he either clashed or collaborated in the course of his Parliamentary career. He’s gone down in history as being no friend to the Suffragettes, part of whose battle for emancipation coincided with his time as Home Secretary.
But towards the end of his life, when Churchill College in Cambridge was founded as his memorial, Winston himself told the trustees he hoped it would be one of the first colleges in the University to admit women and men on equal terms. ‘When I think what women did in the war I feel sure they deserve to be treated equally.’ What I love about that story is, it reflects one very important thing about Winston Churchill. Whatever his foibles or his failings he had the humility, and the courage, to change . . .
If I’m allowed two stories, though, I’d add Churchill at the Chartwell dinner table. Making his wife Clemmie carve the Sunday roast, because he couldn’t bear to cut up any creature to which he’d said ‘Good morning’ . . .
MG: Mine also relates to women, and goes back to Sarah’s point about the importance painting played in his life. It was his sister-in-law who spotted that painting might spark his interest, Clemmie who bought him oil paints – and artist Hazel Lavery, a friend of the family, who rescued him from his fear of the blank canvas.
Churchill is such an entertaining writer and I love his account of how he was sitting in the garden, cowed before it, when she drove up in her motor car, got out, grabbed the brush from his hand and began sploshing paint boldly across the pristine white – and after that there was no stopping him.