February 10, 2015

Churchill, as First Lord of the Admiralty, was now a cabinet colleague and fellow member, in the Other Club, of the War Minister, Lord Kitchener. In his early days as a subaltern he had been an ambitious critic of the famous general, but now his senior colleague told him: “Please do not address me as Lord as I am only yours, K.”

Kitchener assisted him in a reconciliation with his cousin, “Sonny,” the 9th Duke of Marlborough. Two years previous the Churchills had severed social relations with the Duke over his behaviour when Clementine had used Blenheim Palace paper to correspond with the hated enemy, Lloyd George. At Churchill’s request, Kitchener now gave the Duke a position in the War Office which was suitable to his title and age.

The Churchills were apart during the first month the war and they worried about each other. Clementine was at Cromer, a Norfolk coastal town. Winston, concerned about an invasion, suggested that she “strike your flag and come ashore.” She worried about his workload and made some suggestions on how he could avoid exhaustion: “Never missing your morning ride. Going to bed well before midnight and sleeping well and not allowing yourself to be woken up every time a Belgian kills a German. Not smoking too much and not having indigestion.”

One of his earliest accomplishments was to import 80,000 men, 30,000 horses, 315 field guns and 125 machine guns to the continent between 10 and 22 August. On 23 August British and German troops clashed for the first time since the eighteenth century and within a day British troops were in full retreat. Churchill noted: “Poor Kitchener! It was like seeing old John Bull on the rack!”

2024 International Churchill Conference

Join us for the 41st International Churchill Conference. London | October 2024
More

Ever on the lookout for allies, Churchill warmly welcomed Japan’s entry into the war. Biographer Martin Gilbert was later told that when asked what inducement Japan might need to get them into the war, Churchill replied: “They can have China.”

Very early in the war Churchill showed the kind of strategic thinking which would lead to Gallipoli. As German and Russian armies faced each other on the Eastern Front he proposed an attack on Germany from the Baltic Sea, west of Danzig, and then a march to Berlin. Although he offered to provide the transport for Russian troops, nothing came of his proposal.

In September the Royal Navy assumed responsibility for the aerial defence of Britain. On the western front the first Battle of the Marne was unfolding but, as Churchill had predicted, the German drive stalled short of Paris within forty days of the attack. On 10 September Churchill crossed the Channel to see for himself that the defences of Dunkirk were adequate, should the Germans turn their attack away from Paris and towards the sea.

Back home he made his famous speech in which he compared the Royal Navy to a bulldog: “The nose of the bulldog has been turned backwards so that he can breathe without letting go.” He also sent out the kind of call to arms for which he would become famous in a later war: “We did not enter upon this war with the hope of easy victory … the war will be long and sombre … we must derive from our cause and the strength that is in us, and from the traditions and history of our race, and from the support and aid of our Empire, the means to make our British plough go over obstacles of all kinds and continue to the end of the furrow, whatever the toil and suffering may be.” Later we wrote a friend that “the Navy has been thrilled by all their prowess and valour. Doom has fallen upon Prussian military arrogance. Time and determination are all that is needed.”

This confidence was badly shattered when 1400 men were drowned after their ships were torpedoed on the Dogger Bank. Although vindicated by a Court of Inquiry it was widely believed that Churchill was responsible.

Although Churchill was exhausted early in the war the exhilaration was almost too much for him to bear. After he toured the defences of Antwerp he cabled an offer to resign from the Cabinet so that he could take up a field command of the troops stationed there. The Cabinet received the request with much laughter but Kitchener immediately offered to make Churchill a lieutenant-general. Asquith declined the offer. Notwithstanding Churchill’s heroic efforts, Antwerp surrendered on 10 October and his political enemies, and many of the public, blamed him for the loss of Royal Marines in its defense.

The public was also losing confidence in the Royal Navy and its First Sea Lord, Prince Louis Battenberg, whose German birth was becoming a major issue. An embittered retired Admiral, Lord Charles Beresford spoke for many when he suggested that Prince Louis should have the good taste to resign because the public knew that he kept German servants and still owned property in Germany, and that he had entered the British navy for his own advantage, not Britain’s.

Churchill’s decision to replace Prince Louis with Sir John Fisher became another in a long list of disputes between the First Lord and King George V. The King had supported Lord Charles Beresford in his quarrels with Fisher many years before and he now believed that the Navy would never accept the 73-year old former First Sea Lord again. Furthermore, he thought that a clash between Fisher and Churchill was inevitable. But Churchill would have no one else so, under pressure from Asquith, the King approved the appointment.

Churchill wrote Prince Louis that “this is no ordinary war but a struggle between nations for life and death. It raises passions between races of the most terrible kind. If raises the old landmarks and frontiers of our civilization… The Navy of today, and still more the Navy of tomorrow, bears the imprint of your work.” Prince Louis responded that the letter would be treasured by his sons. His younger son changed his name to Mountbatten, later served Churchill as Supreme Allied Commander in South East Asia, and rose to the rank of First Sea Lord himself.

A tribute, join us

#thinkchurchill

Subscribe

WANT MORE?

Get the Churchill Bulletin delivered to your inbox once a month.