I hold up the teddy bear and say, “I want to see how the people are riding out these storms.”
After talking with one of the soldiers accompanying us, Thompson locates the closest shelter. He directs us to an arched brick structure, not larger than a bus, and after opening the rough wooden door, gestures for us to enter. The pungent smell of sweat, urine, and excrement overwhelms us before we even step inside.
As the light from our torches illuminates the tiny space, a sea of exhausted faces, mostly women and children, stare up from the dirt floor and grimy corners. How are the people withstanding these horrific conditions? I think but do not say. Instead, as they recognize Winston and excitedly stand up and gather around us, I reach out to shake their hands, whispering to myself, “Pray God we don’t let the people down.”
Chapter Thirty-Three
November to December 1940
London, England
What began as a mission to protect my husband becomes a passion project. After witnessing the squalid conditions in which the British people are being forced to spend ten to fourteen hours every night, I make it my goal to transform the shelters. I begin with the people’s own requests. I will not let our citizens go without a voice, just as I will not let this war proceed without giving women a part. I wonder if this is part of my own destiny, a concept Winston discusses often, to expand the understanding of women’s capabilities in this war and beyond. In a way, it is an expansion of my suffragette beliefs.
“Here are today’s letters, ma’am,” the young blond boy, likely too young for military service, says in a heavy accent as he places a bag nearly half his size on the chair adjacent to my desk.
“Thank you,” I answer and gesture to Grace to help me begin sorting, a daily chore. We have developed a system to categorize every missive sent to me. I am determined that every message—whether complimentary, sensible, abusive, or futile—will receive a response from me directly in another effort to let our citizens know that their concerns are being heard. With Winston too engrossed in the military parts of the war to handle the domestic issues, this has become my job among many tasks that directly affect the welfare of our people.
As Grace and I form piles of letters according to the concerns raised within their pages, I note how tall the shelter pile has grown. It seems that each day brings more and more complaints about the state of the air-raid shelters. Just last evening, I completed a month-long tour of a cross section of shelters, accompanied by Mrs. May Tennant of the Red Cross and occasionally Jock Colville, who, of his own accord, has shown interest in this project. Sadly, I’ve learned that the litany of issues raised by these letters does not begin to encompass the list of problems I’ve identified on my own.
The image of an older woman from one of the shelters last night inhabits my mind. Her face covered with grime and without any possessions save the flimsy green coat she wore and her purse, she’d been crying into her handkerchief when I spotted her. Her cheeks were striped where tears had wiped clean the black soil, and a young man sat by her side, clutching on her free hand. Glancing up at the sight of our torches, she rose when she saw me and waved her blackened handkerchief. “Mrs. Churchill, what an honor,” she called out, forgetting her own worries for a moment.
As she reached out to shake my hand, one of my security detail intercepted her, not wanting to allow the poor, filthy woman to touch me. Brushing aside the guard’s arm, I took her damp hands in my own and said, “The honor is all mine, ma’am. I am here to help. Will you please tell me what happened to you and your family?”
Her house, a small, two-room stone concern where she lived with the mentally disabled son who stood at her side, had just been bombed out, and she’d lost absolutely everything. “This will have to be our home for now,” she answered when I asked where she’d be staying, gesturing around the god-forsaken hovel.
I shudder as I think about the freezing-cold shelter with frozen beads of water on the walls and two overflowing buckets serving as latrines, where the poor woman and her son will live until more permanent housing can be found, a project I undertook as soon as I returned home. Incredibly, her shelter is by no means worse than many of the air-raid shelters around London I’d visited in the weeks prior; in fact, it is representative of them. I am determined that the British people will receive better.
“Grace,” I say, “I think I need to add a few more items to my memorandum to Winston.”
“Of course, ma’am,” she replies, rising to fetch her paper and pen.
When she settles back next to me, I enumerate four more categories for the memorandum, which already details my primary concerns about the outbreak of disease and illness in the crowded, often unsanitary conditions. I insist on waterproofing shelters, stopping the spread of disease through clean bedding, and providing sleeping conditions conducive to families. When I move on to the topic of latrines, I notice Grace’s note-taking slows down.
When I stop speaking, I notice that Grace has paused altogether. Her thoughtful face, glasses perched on her long nose, seems frozen. “Did I speak too quickly, Grace? I’m sure you’ve noticed that this has me quite upset, so I might be rattling on too rapidly.”
“No, ma’am. It’s just that”—she hesitates—“that I wonder if these topics are seemly for the prime minister’s wife.”
Grace’s reaction surprises me. She is quite the stoic, and I cannot imagine what she finds objectionable, particularly at this critical juncture in the war. When the Nazis are bombing people nightly in the streets and in their homes. When we might lose hundreds of innocent civilians to typhoid if the shelters aren’t sanitary. “If these conditions are seemly enough for the British people to endure, they are seemly enough for me to discuss with the prime minister.”
* * *
Grace’s words ring in my head five hours later when I push open the door to Winston’s office, and I’m faced with my husband and three of his ministers, the minister of health, the minister of home security, and the minister of supply. Typically, when I meet with Winston to discuss an issue or project I’ve undertaken, Jock Colville might be present, or one other pertinent official, but rarely anyone else. Today, he has assembled all the key players in the matter of the shelters. I appreciate his trust, but he might have warned me.
“Clemmie.” Winston reaches out a hand for me to join him in the open chair to his right. “I was just describing your Red Cross tour of shelters to these gentlemen. It’s been quite the endeavor, taking you nearly a month.”
“Mrs. Churchill, you have gone above and beyond the call of duty, trudging out to these dangerous locations in the dead of night. It really wasn’t necessary.” The minister of health, Malcolm MacDonald, says with a chortle as I sit down. “They are temporary shelters after all. Just to keep the people safe during the hopefully short duration of the Blitz.”
I am tired of the arrogance of the senior members of government, so often raised in luxury with all the advantages of their class and education. While I was born to an aristocratic family, I know the striving of working people as well as the disdain they face. Whatever good these men do in their current roles, this issue cannot be ignored.
“Sadly, Mr. MacDonald, my tour was absolutely necessary. I wish it wasn’t. If we are concerned about the health of our citizenry, we must do something about the abominable state of our air-raid shelters. They may have been rudimentary and improvisational at the outset, but now that we are into the third month of the Blitz and the winter season is upon us, we cannot allow the situation to continue.” I had not intended to begin my conversation with an unyielding tone, but that is what they shall receive. “Have you ever been in an air-raid shelter?” I ask, knowing full well that the answer will be no.
He shakes his head, but before he can make another remark, I say to all the ministers, “There seems to be a general uncertainty as to the policy regarding the creation and maintenance of air-raid she
lters, perhaps, in part, because their administration involves so many ministers and it is an issue involving local governments as well. The reason—or excuse—offered for doing nothing is that, as Mr. MacDonald has just said, the shelters are temporary and it is not worthwhile to spend money on them, particularly given the costs of war. However, the people you represent are living in those same shelters for upward of fourteen hours a day in terrible conditions of cold, wet, dirt, darkness, stench, and, I fear, disease. We must meet certain standards of hygiene and comfort.”
Winston chuckles softly under his breath, although when I turn to him, he tries to hide it with a puff of his cigar. I know he’s not laughing at me, but he is thoroughly enjoying the treatment these ministers are receiving at my hand.
I glance back at Minister MacDonald, whose face is nearly apoplectic with anger and astonishment. His expression telegraphs his thoughts: How dare I, a woman with no appointed or elected position, take such a firm stance against governmental leaders? Indeed, I think. How dare we fail so miserably in his duty to the British people?
But I do not speak my thoughts aloud. Gesturing to the copies of my memorandum I have placed upon the table, I say, “I invite each of you to read and study my report. You will see, in the cross section of shelters we toured and examined, that this is a systemic, widespread problem. And it must be rectified.”
The shrill cry of an infant resonates throughout the room. The ministers look around, as if the source of the jarring, unexpected sound might be found in here. It seems that our grandchild, Pamela and Randolph’s newborn son, has done me an unplanned favor.
“Ah, that will be young Winston, our newest grandchild. Imagine if you will, gentlemen, allowing your own young grandchildren or perhaps your own offspring to pass ten or twelve hours of a cold winter’s night in pitch darkness on a dirt floor with the smell of an overflowing bucket latrine filling the air. Night after night after night.”
“No?” I ask rhetorically to the ministers, whose faces have clouded over with shame. As if on cue, young Winston cries even louder. “It seems our grandson can’t envision it either.”
Chapter Thirty-Four
December 2, 1940
London, England
I stand as close to the edge of the rooftop as the soldiers will allow. I’d wanted to serve my shift as fire watcher without the meddling presence of Winston’s personal guards, but he would not hear of it. In fact, we’d had quite a row over me serving as fire watcher at all.
I’d argued with Winston. “If you hadn’t wanted your citizens to serve in this so-called dangerous role, then why did you push for the Fire Watchers Order?” This law, introduced in September, required business owners to ensure that someone was on-site to scan for fires at all times—both at the building and beyond—so as to prevent further fire damage, particularly from the ubiquitous incendiary bombs that were raining down on London nightly.
“By citizens, I did not mean to include the prime minister’s wife. You do quite enough for your country, and the prime minister needs you by his side. It’s not the place for you,” he barked at me as if I were one of his many underlings.
His behavior only reinforced my commitment to the role, so I stood up and announced, “Winston, I have only informed you about my shift as a courtesy to your schedule. As you know, I publicly responded to Home Secretary Morrison’s complaints that the fire-watching service was understaffed by urging him to request that all middle-aged women of independent means assume shifts as fire watchers. Now that I’ve called on women to serve as fire watchers, how can I urge them to clamber onto rooftops in the dead of night if I won’t do it myself?” I pause and use one of his own arguments against him. “Just like you do when you venture out onto the city streets during the nighttime bombings.”
Sighing heavily, Winston puffed on his cigar for a long moment. His silence told me that I’d won this point but that he would exact some sort of concession from me. “You will take some of my guards with you.”
I wanted to protest, but I knew he’d be worried the entirety of my shift unless his men accompanied me. So I acquiesced, but in this respect only.
* * *
My arrival on the rooftop flusters the older, white-haired gentleman from whom I’m taking over, a Mr. Peacock. Despite the fact that he appears to be over a decade older than myself, he’s remarkably spry, which he demonstrates by jumping at the sight of me. “Mrs. Ch–Churchill? What on earth are you doing here?”
“I’m here to take the shift after yours as fire watcher,” I answer calmly with a smile, trying to imply that my appearance on this rooftop is no more unusual than his own.
“Fire watcher?” he blurts out, then his hand flies to his mouth. “My apologies, ma’am. I’m just so surprised to see the prime minister’s wife up here on the roof.”
I fear the poor man may never recover. In the hopes of smoothing his nerves, I ask, “Can you show me the ropes? This is my first time after all.”
After a moment’s hesitation, he undertakes the instructor role so naturally that I guess he must have been a teacher at one time. Slipping on this seemingly familiar hat, he calms and explains the tasks I’ll be performing for the next eight hours. As he hands me a pair of greasy binoculars, he says, “The most critical part of the job is scanning the horizon for incoming bombs as well as smoke and fire.” He walks me around the perimeter of the rooftop, pointing out the various buildings in the skyline, although, of course, I recognize St. Paul’s myself.
He leads me to a telephone that appears as though it’s been hastily installed on the rooftop wall. “The moment you spot anythin’ like that, you’re to give a warning to the staff in the offices below. The proper number is posted here. That way, they can protect themselves and the building and get the word out to those in the other targeted buildings by sounding an alarm for the staff to get to the basement shelter and with other telephone calls.”
Pointing to the piles of sandbags and buckets of water and sand scattered about, I ask, “What are those for?”
“For shelter if the Germans fire on you directly,” he answers quietly, as if he’s hesitant to share the reality of this post with me. As if I was unaware—until this very moment—of the risks. “And water and sand in case their fire and bombs start a fire up here.”
Ah, I think. They serve the same purpose as they do in the War Rooms, which are littered with buckets of water and sand.
I nod briskly and say, “Well, sir, thanks to your excellent instruction, I feel ready to assume my post.”
“Are you certain, ma’am?”
“Quite. We all need to do our duty.” I see that my words do not mollify him. Gesturing to the soldiers lining the rooftop wall, I say, “Not to worry. Those fellows won’t let a thing happen to me.”
“Wouldn’t let the prime minister down, ma’am. He does so much for us.”
I clasp his gloved hand with my own. “I’ll be sure to share your sentiments with him. But now, I must begin.” I sling the binoculars around my neck, place the required helmet on my head, and begin to patrol the perimeter. I’m thankful that I broke protocol and wore pants.
I try to ignore the guards as I undertake my rounds, but their constant surveillance of me and the rooftop itself makes it challenging. I nearly trip over one silvery-blond young soldier as I round the corner to check the north side of the building. After a few hours of this rather monotonous work, the soldiers begin to relax their vigilance, and I am able to linger at each vantage point and study the cityscape below me.
Even though it is dusk, I can make out the outlines of our citizens scurrying about their evening tasks. Men in topcoats and trilbies returning home from the office, although perhaps to empty houses and apartments as their loved ones have been evacuated. The occasional woman strides down the street, purposefully carrying parcels. The only evidence of the war that I see from my vantage point is the shelters, dotted
across the cityscape.
I am lost in thought, admiring the resiliency of the British people, when I hear a clatter of gunfire and the roar of plane engines. Instinctively, duty calls, and I lift the binoculars to my eyes. Biplanes streak through the sky, and huge fiery incendiaries rain down over buildings, streets, and parks. The smoke billows from the ground toward the dusky sky, and the smell of sulfur fills the air.
Immediately, I race for the telephone to alert the workers in the building below, but I am intercepted by the guards. They form a circle around me to ensure my protection. I know they are simply following instructions, but I am determined to do my job.
“Gentlemen, I have a call to make.”
The blond soldier says, “Ma’am, we’re under orders to protect you. We cannot take the risk that a stray bullet or bomb will harm you.”
“You may follow me to that telephone, but I will make that call.”
The soldiers in tow, I race to the phone and inform the building staff about the bombs in close proximity so they can run to the basement shelter, even though this particular building hasn’t been hit. Returning to the perimeter of the roof, I scan the horizon again with my binoculars. I see nothing except the gleaming dome of St. Paul’s Cathedral rising above the billowing smoke and scattered fires. I have seen the devastation firsthand on the ground, but how different it looks from the air, I think.
The sound of gunfire grows faint, and then the scream of dropping bombs ceases altogether as the action moves into the distance. The soldiers refuse to leave my side, even when the night grows completely quiet. As the smoke clears, through the binoculars in the dim moonlight, I see the detritus left behind on sidewalks as people ran to safety. The outlines of a wrapped parcel of food here, an umbrella there, even a woman’s shoe. I am relieved that I do not spot any human casualties. How terrible is this war.
One of the soldiers clears his throat behind me and then says, “Ma’am, since there is a lull in the action, this might be a good time to return to the Annexe.”
Lady Clementine Page 22
