Patrick Delaforce

In the welter of popular and well-known stories and reminiscences about Churchill (many of them more legend than fact), it can be easy to forget that he was more than an inspirational leader and figurehead to a nation and its allies. For in spite of his many and varied successes, Britain's last great wartime Prime Minister was also a full-blooded human being, with all of the foibles, fallibility, bad temper, pig-headedness and vanity that are so often the shadows of such greatness. Ebullient, sometimes moody, and often mischievous, he lived a full and varied life beyond the demands of Parliament: sailing with his beloved wife, Clemmie, on the Admiralty yacht Enchantress, owning racehorses, playing polo, entertaining friends and family, all of which, and more, find a place in Winston Churchill: Anecdotes. With a light touch and a great, though not always uncritical, affection for its subject, Patrick Delaforce's wide-ranging collection reveals many little known facets of this illustrious man and his incredible life. It is at once a treasury of anecdote and recollection, an insight into Churchill's larger-than-life personality, a record of his often caustic, yet brilliant wit, and, by the use of long out of print and forgotten sources, a lasting testament to his remarkable, indeed immeasurable contribution to the modern world.