Dinner With Churchill: Policy-Making at the Dinner Table

by Cita Stelzer

  *Close to £7,000 in today’s money.

  CHAPTER 2

  Meeting off Newfoundland August 1941

  “It is fun to be in the same century with you.”1

  President Roosevelt to Prime Minister Churchill

  When Churchill became Prime Minister in May 1940, he was powerfully aware that his best chance – probably his only chance – of not losing the war was to persuade the United States to come in on Britain’s side. But America in May 1940 was in no mood to have its sons fight again in foreign wars, and, in the election in November of that year, President Roosevelt promised he would never send Americans on such a mission.

  Churchill also knew of a considerable reservoir of anti-British feeling among two important voting blocs in the United States, the Irish- and German-Americans. Many Irish-Americans were “instinctively anti-British”2 and opposed, with a harsh hatred, British rule in Northern Ireland. Joseph Kennedy, a leader of Boston’s Irish community and the American Ambassador to the Court of St. James’s*, sent the President several emphatic reports claiming that Britain could not possibly defeat Hitler. And 20,000 German-Americans rallied at Madison Square Garden in New York in February 1939, in opposition to Roosevelt’s increasing criticism of Hitler’s foreign policy.

  All this made it urgent, in Churchill’s view, that he meet face to face with Roosevelt. The two had been corresponding on a regular basis for several years but Churchill felt correspondence was no substitute for a face-to-face meeting. Harry Hopkins, the President’s closest adviser, had told Churchill on his crucial visit to Britain in January 1941 that the President was also eager for such a meeting.3 The Prime Minister intended to explain Britain’s situation, persuade Roosevelt to help, belatedly, with the loan – better still, the gift – of destroyers, and pave the way for America’s entry into the war as soon as the President felt it would be politically possible for him to take such a step. Churchill believed, as he wrote to the President, a conference between them “would proclaim an ever closer association and would cause our enemies concern, make Japan ponder, and cheer our friends”.4

  Most heartening to Churchill was Hopkins’ news that Roosevelt favoured a meeting. Personally welcome, too, were the gifts Hopkins brought with him from America: “ham, cheese, cigars etc. for the P.M.”,5 the first of many food parcels the Churchills were to receive from the Roosevelts. In Washington, planning for the meeting was top secret: the Washington press corps was told that the President was going fishing off the Maine coast on board the USS Potomac, his presidential yacht. He was then transferred to the USS Augusta on the morning of 5 August to sail to Newfoundland.

  In London, the Prime Minister’s plans were also top secret. Colville writes in his diary: “The PM disappeared to Chequers and I shall not see him for a fortnight as he is very shortly off on a historic journey (Operation Riviera!).”6 On 3 August, Colville notes, Churchill took the train “north with a retinue Cardinal Wolsey might have envied”.7

  The Prime Minister’s railway dining car

  The Foreign Office diplomat, Sir Alexander Cadogan, records in his diary that, on board the Prime Minister’s private train, he and Churchill had a “V. good lunch – tomato soup, sirloin of beef (in unlimited quantities and quite excellent), delicious raspberry and currant tart”.8 On 4 August, Churchill boarded the Prince of Wales, at Scapa Flow, the deepwater harbour of the Atlantic fleet in the Orkney Islands off Scotland’s far north-eastern coast.

  The North Atlantic seas were rougher than usual, and the destroyer escorts were alert to U-boats, whose presence in the area had been confirmed. An erratic course was taken in an attempt to evade the enemy. Churchill, however, was not worried and enjoyed the trip. His mind was on the work to be done to prepare for the meeting with Roosevelt. But he had also planned his leisure time, bringing along his favourite films. On the first night out, he and his staff watched That Hamilton Woman (about Lord Nelson’s mistress, a story of British defiance in the Napoleonic Wars, appropriate for a wartime sea voyage), and Pimpernel Smith, a 1941 remake of the 1934 movie, Scarlet Pimpernel, based on Baroness Orczy’s swashbuckling novel about a dashing hero who saved French aristocrats from the revolutionary guillotine. In the updated version, Leslie Howard (who also produced) smuggles Nazi victims out of Germany.

  Churchill read what he cites as “Captain Hornblower R.N.” by C.S. Forester, and cabled his Minister of State for the Middle East, Oliver Lyttelton, who had recommended it: “Hornblower Admirable”. This created a minor flurry amongst senior officers on board as to what possible military or naval operation had the code name “Hornblower”. Throughout the trip, the Prime Minister clearly enjoyed himself, even though the crew were continually anxious about the U-boat threat.

  Planning for meals had been meticulous: the ovens of the Prince of Wales could bake 1,500 loaves of white bread; and to its distinguished passengers its galley challenged “comparison with the kitchens of The Ritz”.9 Provisions aboard were “ceiling-high”, including chocolates and cigarettes. Cadogan, whose diaries contain more comments on food than do those of any of his contemporaries, tells us: “We took on a cargo of grouse in Scotland, and we have some very nice beef. Masses of butter and sugar”.10 The grouse, a Churchill favourite11, were available because, it seems, the grouse season was opened earlier than usual to allow shooting to supplement rationed foods. The butter and sugar were especially appreciated since they had been rationed since January 1940.

  On 6 August, Cadogan again records a memorable meal. The ship was in mid-Atlantic, in dense fog, awaiting a new flotilla of destroyers that had set out from Iceland to guard the convoy. Harry Hopkins was on board one of the ships in the flotilla, hitching a ride home after his visit to Stalin. Hopkins had brought along

  a tub of admirable caviare, given him by Joe Stalin. That, with a good young grouse, made a very good dinner. As the PM said, it was very good to have such caviare, even though it meant fighting alongside the Soviets to get it.12

  When Hopkins, who years earlier had had two-thirds of his stomach removed due to a cancer, prudently refused a second brandy, the Prime Minister said, “I hope that, as we approach the US, you are not going to become more temperate.”13 It was another instance of Churchill’s contribution to the myth-making and humour about his drinking habits. Hopkins recorded Churchill’s high spirits about his forthcoming meeting with the President: “You’d have thought he was being carried up to the heavens to meet God.”14

  On 9 August, the Prince of Wales sailed into Placentia Bay, Newfoundland. An eager Churchill and his staff then crossed by barge to the USS Augusta, where the Prime Minister handed the President a personal letter from King George VI, smiled, shook hands and lit his signature cigar. The President lit his cigarette and to Churchill’s delight, invited him to remain aboard for a tour and a private lunch. That evening, the President invited the Prime Minister and his party to return for a formal dinner, at which broiled spring chicken, vegetable puree, spinach omelettes, candied sweet potatoes, hot rolls, currant jelly, mushroom gravy, tomato salad and cheeses were served. Dessert was a choice of ice-creams, cupcakes or cookies, or all three for the food-rationed British guests. “In place of liqueurs, they were offered coffee, tea, mints …”15 Surely wines were served, as the presidential party was not subject to a dry Navy rule, but they are not listed on any menus or mentioned in letters or diaries.

  Churchill had spent many hours devising a Divine Service for the following day, Sunday, 10 August, to be celebrated on board the Prince of Wales with Roosevelt and crew members from both ships. Ever alert to possibilities that would enhance what came to be called the special relationship, the Prime Minister instructed members of his staff not to stand at attention during the church parade but to mingle freely and informally with their new American friends.

  It was a very moving occasion. Churchill chose two hymns and asked the President to choose another. Churchill chose “O God Our Help in Ages Past” and “Onward, Christian Soldiers”. The President ch
ose his favourite, “Eternal Father, Strong to Save”, the official US Navy hymn, sometimes also sung on Royal Navy ships (and which was played at Roosevelt’s funeral at Hyde Park, New York). British and American officers and seamen – some 250 men in all – stood together during the church service, which was jointly conducted by the chaplain from the Prince of Wales and the chaplain of the US Fleet.

  President’s dinner for the Prime Minister aboard the Augusta, 9 August 1941.

  the guests.

  The Prime Minister also spent some time deciding what to serve the President for lunch on such a momentous day. He wanted food that was “unusual, seasonable and definitely British … decided to take grouse … It was arranged that sufficient birds for the luncheon party, and an extra brace for the President, should be put on the train at Perth”.16 Duff Cooper had “bagged the grouse in Scotland; on the PM’s orders, another dozen brace had been frozen and brought along as a gift for the president”.17

  H.V. Morton, a British journalist and best-selling travel writer, invited along on the trip by Brendan Bracken, then Minister of Information,18 noted:

  It is typical of the Prime Minister that he should have remembered it was once the custom of the Lords of the Admiralty when they voyaged abroad to take with them a turtle, which they were entitled to draw from a naval establishment. This strange custom began when Britain, in order to watch Napoleon at St. Helena, took over Ascension Island and every warship on its way to England from Ascension Island brought a turtle home with it … Mr. Churchill might have been hard put to it to discover a turtle in war-time London. Nevertheless he served turtle soup to the President. It so happened that Commander Thompson, who had heard Mr. Churchill wish for a turtle, was in a grocer’s shop in Piccadilly and, noticing some bottles of turtle soup and finding that neither coupons nor ration books were required for them, promptly bought them and took them back in triumph to No. 10.19

  Churchill had great affection for animals. When First Lord of the Admiralty, in 1911, on first exploring HMS Enchantress, the Admiralty yacht, he found a “tank of turtles, to be turned into soup. He was much moved by their plight and ordered their immediate release”.20 That affection did not always prevail over Churchill’s appetite.

  During his visit to Williamsburg, Virginia, in March 1946, he apparently specifically requested Maryland diamondback terrapin. His hosts agreed that “the world’s first citizen should have the world’s first food if available” and so we must assume that Churchill’s request was granted.21

  One last word on turtle soup. To celebrate 50 years in the House of Commons, on 31 October 1950, the Conservative Party gave a dinner at the Savoy in Churchill’s honour, with turtle soup a feature

  “Each course traced his Parliamentary life from election in Oldham in 1900. Turtle soup au sherry d’Oldham, and other courses named after some of his constituencies. Fillets of Sole after the Cinque Port, Mushrooms Epping Forest, from his 1924-1945 electorate, followed. Partridge on toast with English sauce Clementine. Les petits pois d’un grand ami de la France.”22

  Thirty-two men sat down for lunch that Sunday to eat Hopkins’ ever-present caviar, along with smoked salmon and roast grouse and the symbolic turtle soup. The menu was printed below the Prime Minister’s cypher. No wines are listed.

  Churchill reciprocates, 10 August 1941

  Certainly there were differences between the conditions faced at home by American and British officers and sailors. One country had been at war for two years, the other at peace. Morton commented on the advertisements in the magazines he found on board the American ships featuring “almost eatable coloured photos of gigantic boiled hams, roast beef and other rationed food, to say nothing of rich, creamy puddings …”23 Another difference: by tradition, all US Navy ships are dry. British ships are not. This made British ships the popular place for meetings, especially around cocktail hour. The presidential party, fortunately, was not subject to the usual US Navy rules and Roosevelt’s reputation among the British for mixing a martini with deadly Argentine vermouth24 probably got its start at dinner on 9 August aboard the USS Augusta. The Americans quipped:

  The American Navy visits the British Navy in order to get drink, and the British Navy visits the American Navy in order to get something to eat.25

  Roosevelt, sensitive to British privations, made a gesture of great courtesy and directed that every British seaman on the Prince of Wales and the other ships be given a gift box of American foods. Morton describes “a pyramid of something like one thousand five hundred cardboard cartons, which a chain of American sailors had soon stacked on our quarter-deck. Each box contained an orange, two apples, two hundred cigarettes, and half a pound of cheese, with a card saying it came from the President of the United States.”

  Churchill and the presidential gift boxes for every British seaman

  On 10 August, Churchill boarded the USS Augusta, this time to dine in a smaller group with the President. The diary of Churchill’s Principal Private Secretary, John Martin, records “a straightforward American meal of tomato soup, roast turkey with cranberry sauce and apple pie with cheese”.26 The dishes’ lack of sophistication might have reassured the Prime Minister and his team that although they could not match the Americans in quantity, when it came to culinary skills, Britain retained its superiority.

  While the leaders were meeting, both staffs continued their separate rounds of dinner-table diplomacy. On 10 August, Cadogan gave a dinner on the Prince of Wales for American generals, admirals and Sumner Welles, then Under-Secretary of State and one of the President’s chief advisers. At Churchill’s direction, and with Roosevelt’s keen endorsement, these staff meetings, at all levels, would continue to the end of the war. They were the initial steps in a plan, brought to fruition during Churchill’s stay in the White House in December 1941, to create a new Combined Chiefs of Staff Committee to prosecute the war.

  These day-long sessions, the sharing of opinions and experiences, the informality created by the many lunches and dinner meetings, established an invaluable camaraderie between the British and the American military and political staffs, and their leaders. One sign of this developing friendship was a letter and package given by Harry Hopkins to John Martin, Churchill’s Principal Private Secretary. The box contained a large supply of foods hard to find in wartime Britain. The accompanying letter, on White House stationery, reads:

  My dear Martin, if your conscience will permit, these are to be taken to London. If the niceties of the war would disturb, I suggest you give them to some other member of the party whose will to live well may be greater than yours.

  Ever so cordially, Harry Hopkins27

  The meetings resulted directly in the joint statement of Allied goals known as the Atlantic Charter. They also had two further important consequences: the military staffs took the first steps towards future cooperation in the execution of the war, and they established a pattern for what would become known as summit meetings – in Churchill’s own words, almost a decade later, a “parley at the summit”.28

  No one says it better than Sir Martin Gilbert:

  On these secret commitments and declarations the British policy-makers and planners were to build their detailed preparations in the months to come, despite formidable obstacles of priority and production. For Churchill, it was the fact that he had established a personal relationship with the President, which constituted the main achievement of ‘Riviera’”29

  as this first summit was then code-named.

  Three weeks later, back in London, the Prime Minister attended a lunch given by Ambassador Ivan Maisky at the Soviet embassy to mark their new-found comradeship. The two main planks of Churchill’s Grand Alliance, the Soviet Union and the United States, were now in place.

  Celebrating the Alliance

  Churchill and Soviet Ambassador Maisky’s tête-à-tête: lunch at the Soviet embassy, London, August 1941

  Notes

  1. FDR to WSC on the occasion of FDR’s 60th birthday, in respon
se to the Prime Minister’s birthday wishes, Moran, p. 25

  2. Larson, Philip P., “Encounters with Chicago”, Finest Hour 118, p. 30.

  3. McJimsey, The Presidency of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, p. 138

  4. Churchill, The Second World War, The Grand Alliance, Volume III, p. 427

  5. Colville, p. 415

  6. Colville, p. 368

  7. Colville, p. 369

  8. Dilks, David (ed.), Cadogan, p. 395

  9. Morton, H., Atlantic Meeting, p. 74

  10. Dilks (ed.), p. 396

  11. Joan Bright in conversation with the author

  12. Lash, Roosevelt and Churchill, 1939-1941, p. 391

  13. Gilbert (ed.), The Churchill War Papers, Volume 3, p. 1036

  14. Lash, Roosevelt and Churchill, p. 391

  15. Wilson, Theodore, The First Summit, p. 92

  16. Morton, p. 104

  17. Wilson, p. 104

  18. Although the press was barred, Morton and Howard Spring, a novelist, were invited to go along to describe what they saw. They were not told where they were going and were sworn to secrecy by Brendan Bracken. Morton asked an important question: “Should I pack a dinner jacket?” Bracken said, “yes”.

  19. Morton, p. 105

  20. Montague Browne, The Long Sunset, p. 230

  21. Langworth, Richard, “On Turtles and Turtle Soup”, Finest Hour 146, p. 25

  22. CHUR 2/96B/224

  23. Morton, p. 95

  24. Wilson, p. 106

  25. Richardson, From Churchill’s Secret Circle to the BBC: The Biography of Lt. Gen. Sir Ian Jacob, p. 67