A Day For Thanksgiving

In the ongoing rush of events many of them disheartening, it is easy to forget how much we have to be thankful for. Today we can remember with gratitude the life of the late, the Right Honorable Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill Knight of the Garter, Order of Merit, Companion of Honor, Fellow of the Royal Society, Privy Counselor, Privy Counselor for Canada, twice Prime Minister, Leader of the House of Commons, Chancellor of the Exchequer, the first ever Minister of Defense, twice First Lord of the Admiralty, Secretary of State for War, Secretary of State for Air, Minister of Munitions, Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, Home Secretary, President of the Board of Trade, Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports, Elder Brother of Trinity House, Chancellor of the University of Bristol, Father of the House of Commons, Nobel Laureate for Literature, first Honorary Citizen of the United States, etc.

Today is the 42nd anniversary of the death of this great leader of our people. Among his many achievements is one that touches the heart of this blog, his four volume “A History of the English Speaking People” which is one of the first self consciously Anglospherist works. He also wrote multi volume histories of the First and Second World Wars and multi volume biographies of the First Duke of Marlboro his distant ancestor and Lord Randolph Churhill, his father. He was also a great painter aswell as a member of that most British of all professions, a practical inventor.

He was born 30 November, 1874 at Blenheim Palace, Oxfordshire, the home of his fathers, the first son of Lord Randolph Churchill and Jennie Jerome. He was a graduate of Harrow and the Royal Military College Sandhurst. He served in India with the 4th (Queen’s Own) Hussars and fought on the Northwest Frontier. He charged with the 21st Lancers at Omdurman, the last real cavalry charge of the British Army. He served with the South African Light House during the Second Boer War. He was elected to parliament for the first time in 1899 and sat almost without interruption through the reign of six monarchs. He joined the cabinet for the first time in 1908. During the First World War he served with the Royal Scots Fusiliers commanding the 6th battalion (territorial army) on the Western Front. He held all of the important offices open to a commoner and refused elevation to the peerage as the Duke of London. He died 24 January, 1965 and after a state funeral was laid to rest in the graveyard of St. Martin Church, Bladon a short drive from where he was born. May his memory endure as long as our people.