Authors: Martin Gilbert
ISBN-13: 9780805023961, ISBN-10: 0805023968
Format: Paperback
Publisher: Holt, Henry & Company, Inc.
Date Published: October 1992
Edition: Reprint
One of Britain's most distinguished historians, Martin Gilbert was knighted in 1995. A fellow of Merton College, Oxford, he is also the official biographer of Winston Churchill. Among his books are The Holocaust, The Second World War, Churchill: A Life, Auschwitz and the Allies, The First World War, and Never Again.
This edition of the highly acclaimed, one-volume Churchill: A Life, is a story of adventure. It follows Winston Churchill from his earliest days to his moments of triumph. Here, the drama and excitement of his story are ever-present, as are his tremendous qualities in peace and war, not least as an orator and as a man of vision.Martin Gilbert gives us a vivid portrait, using Churchill's most personal letters and the recollections of his contemporaries, both friends and enemies, to go behind the scenes of some of the stormiest and most fascinating political events of our time, dominated by two world wars, and culminating in the era of the Iron Curtain and the hydrogen bomb.
Author of an eight-volume official biography of Winston Churchill, Gilbert here distills his vast knowledge into a lucid, comprehensive and authoritative life of the man considered by many to have been the outstanding public figure of the 20th century. Photos. (Oct.)
Illustrations | ix | |
List of Maps | xv | |
Preface | xvii | |
Acknowledgements | xxi | |
1 | Childhood | 1 |
2 | Harrow | 19 |
3 | Towards the Army | 35 |
4 | Second Lieutenant | 51 |
5 | In Action | 75 |
6 | To Omdurman and beyond | 85 |
7 | South Africa: Adventure, Capture, Escape | 107 |
8 | Into Parliament | 133 |
9 | Revolt and Responsibilities | 167 |
10 | The Social Field | 193 |
11 | Home Secretary | 211 |
12 | At the Admiralty | 239 |
13 | The Coming of War in 1914 | 263 |
14 | War | 277 |
15 | Isolation and Escape | 309 |
16 | In the Trenches | 331 |
17 | 'Deep and Ceaseless Torments' | 361 |
18 | Minister of Munitions | 375 |
19 | At the War Office | 403 |
20 | Colonial Secretary | 431 |
21 | Return to the Wilderness | 455 |
22 | At the Exchequer | 467 |
23 | Out of Office | 491 |
24 | The Moment of Truth | 535 |
25 | No Place for Churchill | 571 |
26 | From Munich to War | 603 |
27 | Return to the Admiralty | 623 |
28 | Prime Minister | 645 |
29 | Britain at Bay | 679 |
30 | The Widening War | 701 |
31 | Planning for Victory | 735 |
32 | Illness and Recovery | 763 |
33 | Normandy and Beyond | 777 |
34 | War and Diplomacy | 803 |
35 | 'Advance, Britannia!' | 829 |
36 | 'An Iron Curtain' | 843 |
37 | Mapping the Past, Guiding the Future | 871 |
38 | Prime Minister in Peacetime | 899 |
39 | Recovery, Last Ambition, Resignation | 915 |
40 | Last Years | 943 |
Maps | 961 | |
Index | 983 |