August 19, 2021

Churchill was fond of alcohol and fuelled the perception that he had great capacity for it. He never felt that there was ever any need to apologise for his drinking or to explain it, despite some (including both Hitler and Goebbels) accusing him of drinking to excess. He clearly had the constitution for it.

‘Whatever else they may say of me as a soldier, at least nobody can say I have ever failed to display a meet and proper appreciation of the virtues of alcohol.’

Churchill, 1916, Belgium; in Taylor: ‘Winston Churchill: An Informal Study in Greatness‘