(One of a series of weekday posts on the life of Winston S. Churchill.)
November 30, 1955 was Churchill’s eighty-first birthday. Among many gifts and good wishes he received, Churchill was especially touched by a gold medallion and letter from one of those he had worked closest with during the war, the then President of the United States, Dwight D. Eisenhower. The medallion, Ike told him, was :
a token of America’s enduring gratitude…Churchill replied that same day with a letter addressed "My dear Friend,"
The English-Speaking peoples, and the entire world, are the better for the wisdom of your counsel, for the inspiration of your unflagging optimism and for the heartening example of your shining courage.
You have been a towering leader in the quest for peace, as you were in the battle for freedom through the dark days of war.
Your letter has moved me more than I can tell you. As you know, it is my deepest conviction that it is on the friend ship between our two nations that the happiness and security of the free peoples rest – and indeed that of the whole world.Churchill and Eisenhower had many policy difference during the war and when Ike became President. But their relationship was extraordinarily productive and marked by mutual professional respect and personal affection.
Your eloquent words have once more given me proof, if it were needed, that you share my own feeling and reciprocate my personal affection.
______________________________________________________
Martin Gilbert, Winston S. Churchill: Never Despair. (Vol. 8)
1 comments:
Churchill and Eisenhower had a special relationship and the world is a better place because of it.
On the subject of courage, Churchill said, "Courage is rightly esteemed the first of human qualities because it is the quality which guarantees all others."
Churchill also said,
The water was not fit to drink. To make it more palatable, we had to add whiskey. By diligent effort, I learned to like it."
He was a smart man.
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