The Churchill Series – Aug. 30, 2006

(One of a series of weekday posts on the life of Winston S. Churchill.

Yesterday’s post concerned Churchill’s stirring “Finest Hour” speech, delivered on June 18, 1940 just after France signed an armistice with Hitler, leaving Britain and the Commonwealth to either negotiate their own armistice with him or fight on alone.

The “Finest Hour” speech was delivered in the Commons and was heard only by the members and a small number of guests in the galleries. In those days, there were no broadcasts or voice recordings of proceedings in the House.
However, the speech’s greatness was immediately recognized; and Churchill was persuaded to deliver it again, this time on the radio a few hours after he delivered it in the House.

The previously unplanned “Finest Hour” radio address came just a day after Churchill delivered a planned address to the nation. It’s very brief but contains the heart and temper of the Finest Hour speech. Here in their entirety are the remarks the British people heard from the Prime Minister on June 17, 1940:

The news from France is very bad, and I grieve for the gallant French people who have fallen into this terrible misfortune. Nothing will alter our feelings towards them or our faith that the genius of France will rise again.

What has happened in France makes no difference to our actions and purpose. We have become the sole champions now in arms to defend the world cause. We shall do our best to be worthy of this high honour.

We shall defend our island home, and with the British Empire we shall fight on unconquerable until the curse of Hitler is lifted from the brows of mankind. We are sure that in the end all with come right

He spoke just a few weeks after Dunkirk. German troops now occupied Paris. And a few hours before he spoke he’d learned that the passenger ship Lancastria, carrying 3,000 civilians and soldiers from Bordeaux had been sunk by German bombers with almost all hands lost. He forbad the immediate release of the news, fearing its effect on public morale.

Churchill once said that it was the British people who “had the lion’s heart; I was just called upon to give the roar.”

Not true. On June 17 and 18, as on so many other days, he showed his lion’s heart; after which the British people found theirs.
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Martin Gilbert, Churchill: A Life. (pgs. 662-665)