by Celia Sandys
By the time they had become Cabinet colleagues during the First World War, Churchill and Kitchener had put their differences behind them; but for many years the antipathy would persist. This mattered little to Churchill, who was no longer a soldier. But, with his sights set on Parliament, what might have worried him was that in denouncing the desecration of the Mahdi’s tomb he was going against the mood of the Conservative Party, which had looked upon the incident as ‘a bit of a lark’. ‘So here I was,’ he later wrote, ‘already out of step.’ But had this bothered him greatly, he would surely have omitted the criticism from the book. His decision not to do so was an early indication of the honesty which would be a characteristic of his long political career.
The River War would be published in November 1899, but before then Churchill had been drawn to more exciting possibilities, and he was beginning to arrange his participation in the war in South Africa, which most people now regarded as inevitable. On 18 September he had written to his mother: ‘Harmsworth [the owner of the Daily Mail] telegraphed me this morning asking if I would go as their correspondent to the Cape. I wired this to Oliver Borthwick [editor of the Morning Post] and made definite offer to go for M.P. for my expenses, copyright of work, and one thousand pounds – for four months shore to shore – two hundred a month afterwards. He has accepted.’
This was an extraordinarily lucrative contract, which made Churchill the highest-paid war correspondent of the day. But there was more in it for him than the immediate money. Because it left him with the copyright of whatever he wrote, he would be able to turn his dispatches from South Africa into successful books. Although The Malakand Field Force had become a best-seller and he had high hopes for The River War, he still needed every penny his pen would earn.
In acquiring Churchill’s services, Oliver Borthwick would have had in mind the formidable competition. The war correspondents in South Africa included many who would become household names: Rudyard Kipling, who within eight years would be awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature; Edgar Wallace; H.G. Wells; Arthur Conan Doyle, who doubled as a doctor and a writer; Leo Amery, a friend of Churchill’s at Harrow who would be a member of his government forty years on; and H.A. Gwynne, who would go on to edit the Morning Post for twenty-five years.
Having secured his position as a war correspondent, Churchill next pulled every available string in order that he would arrive in South Africa with access to all the important people there. He wrote to the Colonial Secretary asking for a letter of introduction. Chamberlain replied that although he could not officially introduce a press correspondent, he would be ‘most happy to give one as a private friend’, adding: ‘You will not need any other letter as Sir A. Milner himself will be the best person to introduce you in S. Africa & will know who are best worth seeing. I shall be very glad to see you before you go out any time when I am in London.’
Churchill lost no time in taking up this offer, and was given an appointment at the Colonial Office. It says much for the regard in which he was already held in political circles that when he was unable to get there in time for the meeting, he was invited to Chamberlain’s house the following morning. His family connections undoubtedly helped, but it is unlikely that such an important Cabinet Minister would have made himself so readily available had he not valued the young man’s views.
When Churchill arrived at Chamberlain’s house in Prince’s Gardens the Colonial Secretary was smoking a cigar. He presented his guest with another, and the two men sat reviewing the situation in South Africa. Chamberlain was due at the Colonial Office, so he invited Churchill to accompany him in a hansom cab in order that they could continue their talk.
As they clip-clopped towards Whitehall, Chamberlain took the optimistic view that if war did break out it would be over before General Sir Redvers Buller, who had been appointed as Commander-in-Chief in South Africa, even arrived at the Cape. Buller and his staff were to sail on the next available ship, the Dunnotar Castle, which was departing from Southampton Docks on 14 October. ‘He would have been wiser to have gone out earlier,’ said the Colonial Secretary. ‘Now, if the Boers invade Natal, Sir George White with his sixteen thousand men may easily settle the whole thing.’
‘What about Mafeking?’ asked Churchill, sensing the vulnerability of this strategically positioned town a few miles from the Transvaal border.
‘Ah, Mafeking, that may be besieged. But if they cannot hold out for a few weeks, what is one to expect?’ replied Chamberlain. ‘Of course,’ he prudently added, ‘I have to base myself on the War Office opinion. They are all quite confident. I can only go by what they say.’
How Churchill responded we do not know, but it is likely that, in his usual forthright way, he would have questioned the War Office’s judgement. Indeed, he had already reported his misgivings in a letter to Lady Randolph: ‘I fear the War Office is working vy crankily.’ As usual he was remarkably well informed, tapping into different levels of the hierarchy in order to get the complete story. The complacency of the Secretary of State for War, Lord Lansdowne, was in direct contrast to the views of his Under-Secretary, George Wyndham, who had painted a far from rosy picture while dining with Churchill.
Churchill had been planning to visit Germany, where Pamela Plowden was staying. He now cancelled this trip and booked his passage on the Dunnotar Castle. As always, he kept his mother up to date with his plans, writing on 2 October: ‘It is definitely settled that I start on 14th . . . I am not going to Germany. Pamela will be in England before 14th.’ Had Pamela not been visiting England, he would no doubt have sailed without seeing her. In an earlier letter to his mother Churchill had admitted that he was lonely without Pamela; but, smitten though he undoubtedly was, he remained uncommitted. Not only was he somewhat inhibited in the company of the opposite sex – Pamela had once said he was ‘incapable of affection’ – but personal relationships were subordinated to his huge ambition.
His letter of 2 October reflects this. Having disposed of Pamela in half a line, he turns to more absorbing topics: The book [The River War] is finally finished – but my time is busy with preparations for departure. War is certain and I expect that there will be a collision in a few hours . . . they [the War Office] have cheated Brabazon [who had been Churchill’s commanding officer in the 4th Hussars] out of his Brigade – and appointed over his head Babington – a man who has never seen a shot fired . . . if true it is monstrous.’ Brabazon had seen a great deal of active service, which in Churchill’s assessment of soldiers – and later even of Cabinet Ministers – always weighed heavily in their favour.
Churchill was thinking of making a documentary war film while he was in South Africa, and on 4 October he contacted a distant relative, the Member of Parliament Murray Guthrie: ‘About the Cinematograph scheme: I do not expect it would require more than £700 altogether: and I am willing to join with you in the venture on the following simple terms:- Each to pay half the expenses: You to make all the arrangements & do all the business here: I all that is necessary in South Africa.’
He also continued his dialogue with Chamberlain, who wrote on 4 October: ‘My dear Winston, I have your telegraph & will write to Milner tonight asking for the good offices for the son of my old friend. I am sure he will do all in his power. I shall be in London on Monday but I gather that you leave before then. If so good luck & best wishes! Yours very truly J. Chamberlain.’ Chamberlain’s letter to Milner described Churchill as ‘a very clever young fellow . . . He has the reputation of being bumptious, but I have not found him so, and time will no doubt get rid of the defect if he has it.’ Bumptious though he undoubtedly was, Churchill was careful not to let it show to someone as eminent and experienced as Chamberlain, particularly when he was being so helpful. The High Commissioner also received a letter from George Wyndham of the War Office, which enthusiastically recommended Churchill as ‘a very clever fellow . . . bringing out an unprejudiced mind’.
Already a seasoned campaigner, Churchill was well aware of the soldier�
��s maxim that any fool can be uncomfortable, and was energetically provisioning himself with all the means of easing life in the field. His contract with the Morning Post provided for expenses, and we can assume that the newspaper paid for the supplies which Randolph Payne & Sons dispatched to accompany him as the Dunnotar Castle set sail: a dozen and a half bottles of whisky, two dozen bottles of wine, half a dozen each of port, vermouth and eau de vie, and a dozen of lime juice. It was indicative of Churchill’s shaky finances that the account for £26.18s., dated 6 October 1899, included £10.18s. outstanding since early 1895, and was not settled until 1 March 1901.
As Churchill did not intend that the chores of the campsite would divert him from more interesting and profitable activities, he would be accompanied by his valet, Thomas Walden, whom he had inherited from his father. Walden was an experienced traveller, having attended Lord Randolph on many journeys, including one of several months in Southern Africa only a few years earlier.
A glimpse of Churchill as he bustled about London preparing for the forthcoming campaign is provided in a letter to Lady Randolph from her admirer and future husband George Cornwallis-West, a Lieutenant in the Scots Guards who was the same age as her son: ‘I saw Winston today in St James Str, dont tell him I said so, but he looked just like a young dissenting parson, hat brushed the wrong way, and at the back of his head, awful old black coat and tie, he is a good fellow but very untidy.’
Churchill would be going to war as a civilian, a status to which the ambitious young man could see disadvantages. Information might not come to him as readily as it had when he was both an officer and a correspondent. Officially he would be in South Africa only as an observer, a role which would seem to provide little scope for military glory. But he had once been promised a place on Sir Redvers Buller’s staff, and, confident that he could circumvent the new rule that officers could not double as war correspondents, he cast about for a way to secure a temporary commission. He wrote to Lord Chesham, the Honorary Colonel of the Royal Bucks Yeomanry, seeking his support for a commission in that regiment. The letter, however, was not sent, as on second thoughts he felt he would be more likely to obtain a commission under the auspices of his father’s old friend Lord Gerard, who was sailing as an elderly ADC responsible for Buller’s comfort in the field. For the present, no commission materialised, and Churchill would go to war as a civilian.
Anxious to have wider and more varied sources of information than those which might result from Chamberlain’s letter to Milner, he sought help from someone who was intimately involved in the conflict between British interests and Boer independence: Cecil Rhodes’s partner Alfred Beit, who had been a friend of his father. Beit replied with letters of introduction to several influential people on both sides of the South African political divide: ‘I send you herewith some letters for the Cape and wish you every success in your mission. Mr Eckstein who is my partner . . . He knew your father very well . . . Mr Silberbauer is in touch with the Boer people and might give you an introduction to Mr Hofmeyr . . . Mr Solomon is a member of the present government . . . Mr Seymour is our Head Engineer . . . I hope you have a very successful meeting tonight.’
The meeting Beit referred to was in Oldham, the Parliamentary constituency to which Churchill had failed to be elected three months previously. His imminent embarkation was not deflecting him from his long-term aim, and now, only forty-eight hours before he sailed, he was finding time to travel north for constituency business.
The week before his departure was also a busy one socially, with friends giving farewell dinners each evening in his honour. From one of these comes an early example of Churchillian wit. No doubt bubbling with enthusiasm over his coming adventure, he was pulled up short by a friend of his mother’s, who said she liked neither his politics nor the moustache which he was, somewhat unsuccessfully, trying to grow. ‘Madame,’ he replied, ‘I see no earthly reason why you should come into contact with either.’
Even as he travelled in the boat train to Southampton, the indefatigable Churchill wrote again to Murray Guthrie about his filming project: ‘I see the American Biograph Coy have already sent out a machine . . . I have no doubt that, barring accidents, I can obtain some very strange pictures. My only fear is that all the Theatres will be pledged to the American Coy. But even then I might make a lecturing tour. If you wire me Standard Bnk – Capetown “Biograph coming” I shall know business is settled . . .’ Unfortunately, Guthrie was less enterprising than his potential partner. The venture fell through, and the American company was left a clear field.
Churchill’s main worry at this time was that the war would be over before he arrived. On 10 October he wrote to George Sandys, whom he had met on a ship homeward bound from India: ‘Dear Sandys, I am sorry we missed each other. I sail on the 14th for the Cape, but the actual fighting will begin before the week is out and may be over before the main army arrives. I shall hope to meet you again somewhere. Yours sincerely Winston S. Churchill.’ Their paths were to cross again later when they were both Members of Parliament, and, more significantly, when Churchill’s daughter Diana married Sandys’s son Duncan in 1935.*
Letter from the author’s maternal grandfather, Winston Churchill, to her paternal grandfather, George Sandys. (Collection of Steve Forbes, New York)
Churchill need not have worried about missing the action. Almost three bloody years, costing well over sixty thousand British, Boer and African lives, would pass before the war’s end.
* I was their youngest child.
THREE
Cruising to a Catastrophe
‘I thought it very sporting of the Boers to take on the whole British Empire . . . Let us learn our lessons . . . Always remember, however sure you are that you can easily win, that there would not be a war if the other man did not think he also had a chance.’
WINSTON CHURCHILL, My Early Life
SUCH WERE WINSTON CHURCHILL’S SENTIMENTS as he set sail for the Boer War, and his reflections, set down thirty years later, arising from the illusions that war was to shatter.
As the Dunnotar Castle cast off from Southampton Docks on the evening of Saturday, 14 October 1899, an impressive array of military passengers lined the ship’s rails. Rubbing shoulders among them were a few civilian war correspondents, none more at home in the uniformed throng and more impatient to get going than Churchill. On the dockside a large crowd sang ‘Rule Britannia’. Then, seeing the tall, imposing figure of General Sir Redvers Buller on the bridge, they struck up ‘For he’s a Jolly Good Fellow.’ As the ship steamed out into the Solent they ended with ‘God Save the Queen’, the singing led, according to The Times, by Lady Buller.
Britain’s huge confidence in the Commander-in-Chief was reflected in a contemporary ditty, though its subtle comment on his taciturn nature was probably lost on the general public.
Redvers Buller has gone away
In charge of a job at Table Bay;
In what direction Redvers goes
Is a matter that only Buller knows . . .
If he’s right, he’ll pull us through.
If he’s wrong, he’s better than you.
Buller himself had no illusions about the task ahead. As the ship steamed southwards he paced the deck each day, his ADC Captain Algy Trotter constantly at his side. Buller had commanded Boer troops in the Zulu War of 1878-79, defending white settlers buffeted by the tide of Bantu people migrating southward from Central Africa, and knew their stubborn character. Recognising the threat they posed in Natal, he had urged caution on the Secretary of State for War, Lord Lansdowne. He had advised that it might prove disastrous if the generals then controlling operations in South Africa, Lieutenant-General Sir George White and Major-General Sir Penn Symons, risked their forces north of the Tugela River. His words had gone unheeded, and he foresaw trouble.
Churchill lost no time in making the most of Buller’s presence aboard. A thumbnail sketch by one of the other correspondents on the Dunnotar Castle, J.B. Atkins of the Manchester Gu
ardian, noted that Churchill had ‘acquired no reverence for seniors as such, and talked to them as if they were his own age, or younger . . . He stood alone and confident, and his natural power to be himself had yielded to no man.’ Atkins described his subject as ‘slim, slightly reddish-haired, lively, frequently plunging along the deck with neck out-thrust . . . I had not encountered this sort of ambition, unabashed, frankly egotistical, communicating its excitement.’
Churchill’s first letter home was posted when the ship called at Madeira, four days after sailing.
My dearest Mamma,
We have had a nasty rough passage & I have been grievously sick. The roll of the vessel still very pronounced prevents my writing much, and besides there is nothing to say. Sir R. Buller is vy amiable and I do not doubt that he is well disposed towards me. There are a good many people on board – military or journalistic – whom I know and all are vy civil – but I cannot say that I am greatly interested in any of them . . .
I won’t write more – but please fire off weekly letter and stimulate everyone else to write too . . .
Ever your loving son Winston.
Churchill was a notoriously bad sailor, which no doubt explains the perfunctory nature of his letter. Otherwise the mere roll of a ship would hardly deter such an avid correspondent, who had never before allowed uncongenial surroundings to inhibit his pen.
Events would show that Buller was, indeed, well disposed towards the young man. Churchill’s sentiments towards the Commander-in-Chief were presumably influenced both by the fact that he had been awarded the Victoria Cross for his gallantry in the Zulu War, and by the ambitious young correspondent’s need to gain his confidence. As the ship steamed south through the Atlantic swell, Churchill seemed content to take the older man at face value and, unusually for him, to make no comment on his character.
