Winston in America
Churchill visited Washington and New York many times after becoming Prime Minister 75 years ago, writes Sonia Purnell
ested in that other great Democrat dynasty, the Kennedys. These include Martin’s Tavern, where JFK is said to have popped the question to Jackie in booth number three.
It was fun being Obama’s neighbour for a few days but soon I was heading north by train to New York City and the Churchills’ favourite American hotel, the Waldorf Astoria Towers. It was here that they were staying when Churchill was run over by a taxi on Fifth Avenue in 1931. When word reached Clementine in her room she was so shocked she forgot to put on her shoes before rushing to the hospital. Churchill returned to the Towers to begin his recuperation from head, chest and thigh injuries.
A hotel-within-a-hotel, the Towers occupies the 27th to 42nd floors of this Art Deco landmark. Winston and Clementine stayed many times after that first visit in 1931, not long after the hotel was built, and made the revolutionary idea of room service its own. Back then, it was the only really tall tower in its Midtown neighbourhood and the views and its novel facilities — not least its luxurious bathrooms — must have dazzled even the Churchills. Today it is merely one of many skyscrapers and despite its wonderful bell-hops — who hail taxis with such panache — there is a sense of fashion passing by the Waldorf Astoria to visit newer and sleeker competitors.
Clementine loved the city and particularly shopping on Fifth “Ave” — as she learned to call it — but Winston was more a country man. His favourite spot in the US was almost certainly Presid e n t Ro o s e ve l t ’s f a mi l y e s t a t e in upstate New York at Hyde Park, which he visited several times.
Back on the train, I continued 90 minutes north of the city to Poughkeepsie and onto Hyde Park by taxi. The house featured in the Bill Murray film Hyde Park on Hudson is not authentic; the real Roosevelt retreat is set back from what is now an incongruous strip of diners and burger bars. Drive off the main road, though, and FDR’s old home — now a National Historic Site — has a distinctly mid-20th-century feel.
A short walk from the presidential library — the first of its kind — is the family mansion, Springwood, which overlooks the mighty Hudson River and woods teeming with groundho gs. Extended piecemeal to form a large, but not grandiose dynastic home, Springwood has an authentic, lived-in feel.
For $18, a park ranger will guide you around its narrow winding passages. Most of the rooms are modest; the only truly impressive space is the spacious wood-pannelled library. Here the president sat in his wheelchair by the fireplace to mix cocktails for the Churchills — new-fangled concoctions the champagne-loving Prime Minister disliked so much that he would discreetly pour them down the lavatory before replenishing his glass with water.
At the other end of the house is a spartan study. You are encouraged to peer through the window and contemplate the modest desk at which the two leaders of the free world discussed the Manhattan Project, the code-name for the development of the atom bomb.
Little has been moved since FDR’s death in April 1945. Suddenly, the immensity of the decisions taken in such a domestic setting hit you. America has so much fascinating history to offer the visitor, much of it inextricably bound up with our own. British Airways flies from Heathrow to Washington and back from New York from £595 (0344 493 0787; ba.com). Hay-Adams Hotel (hayadams.com). Doubles from $329. Waldorf Astoria Towers Hotel (hilton. com). Doubles from $279. Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library: fdrlibrary.marist.edu.