Churchill saved us from Nazi tyranny
HARRY Parfitt (Your Views, January 25), as is his right, chose to “put a different perspective on Churchill”, in which he highlighted instances from Churchill’s military and political careers that are meant to paint our wartime leader in a less favourable light than usual.
First, I think it is worth noting the inescapable fact that no other man or woman has had so much researched and written about their deeds, actions, behaviour and errors and faults than him. From early days at school, to his death in the 1960s, and well beyond, ‘Winnie’ had a massive influence on all he touched and, despite many setbacks, embarrassments, character assassinations and much political poison, he stuck to his guns, defended his sometimes unpopular decisions, and did so with eloquence, straight-talking and unflinching doggedness.
If anyone who dislikes him for his background and politics, reads from writers of repute, they cannot help but be aware of this being a very special person who did what no one else could have done, whose leadership saved Britain and the Western world from Nazi tyranny.
Harry offered a different perspective, so here’s mine, starting with an 11-year-old boy standing alone on a street corner in Manchester with buildings burning around him after an overnight blitz. Out of a stately black, open-top limo stepped a man in a long black coat, wearing a black hat and smoking a cigar, as he handed me a cup of tea and a corned beef sandwich and sat down on the pavement beside me. He observed I was wearing school uniform, ruffled my hair and said: “Get home safely, son, and don’t worry your mother, eh?”
Twenty years later I sat in an auditorium in Alabama as he received a five-minute standing ovation from a mainly military audience of 2,000; and a few years later in Westminster I stood in full military mourning as countless thousands filed past his coffin to pay their respects to a man, faults and all, who made English, Scots, Welsh and Irish proud to be British.
Thanks for yours, Harry, I’ll stick with my perspective. Kel Palmer Mountain Ash