Facts About Winston Churchill

Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill was the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from October 1951 through April 1955

And although it may be what he is most famous for, he was much more than the British bulldog who held Britain together during the Blitz

So, today we're going to take a look at some of the facts about the one, the only, Winston Churchill

In 1891, a 17-year-old Winston Churchill prophetically told a school friend, I can see vast changes coming over a now peaceful world

The young Churchill predicted great upheavals and terrible struggles in the future

declaring the world would face wars such as one cannot imagine. Now keep in mind this was decades before two world wars threatened Britain

Amazingly, Churchill even predicted, I tell you London will be in danger, London will be attacked

and I shall be very prominent in the defense of London. 50 years later, Churchill would lead Britain during the dark days of the London Blitz

when Germany's planes dropped explosives on the city. Churchill's friend responded, how can you talk like that

And added, we are forever safe from invasion since the days of Napoleon

It probably seemed like a reasonable response at the time, but ooh wee, talk about being wrong

Churchill told his friend, I see further ahead than you do. I see into the future

This country will be subjected somehow to a tremendous invasion. And I shall be in command of the defenses of London

And I shall save London and England from disaster. Woo-wee. Talk about being right

During the Blitz, the Luftwaffe dropped 9,000 incendiary devices on London. And thanks to Churchill's instincts, the kitchen staff at 10 Downing Street survived one

On October 14, 1940, Churchill and his wife, Clementine, hosted a dinner at the prime minister's residence during an air raid

The blitz began as usual, Clementine later wrote. But the party went on, and the cook and maid continued working in the kitchen

next to a 25-foot-high plate glass window. But suddenly, Churchill jumped up and ordered the kitchen staff to head for the bomb shelter

Put dinner on a hot plate in the dining room, Churchill told his butler. Only three minutes afterward, Churchill later wrote

The dinner party heard a really loud crash close at hand, and a violent shock showed that the house had been struck

A nearby detonation had completely destroyed the kitchen and pantry. Churchill's quick thinking saved the lives of his entire kitchen staff

Quite a dinner host. Let's hope he was a good tipper as well. The story of an American girl from New York marrying into the English aristocracy sounds like the plot of a movie But it actually the real life story of Winston Churchill mother Jenny Jerome was born in Brooklyn in 1854 As a teenager Jerome met Lord Randolph Churchill

at a sailing regatta, where the future King Edward VII introduced the couple

Months later, they married, and Jerome became Lady Randolph Churchill. But Winston's mother did not exactly

match the stereotype of a formal Victorian aristocrat. For starters, she had a tattoo of a snake on her left wrist

She also attended anti-suffrage meetings with her son, Winston, facing down the booze of suffragettes

And after her first husband passed, she remarried a man 20 years her junior

During the Boer War, Churchill sailed to Cape Town to work as a war correspondent

The young man hadn't expected to see combat. In fact, it was so far from his mind that he brought a liquor cabinet and a valet to the conflict

But just weeks after arriving in South Africa, Churchill's train was ambushed by Boers

With bullets flying everywhere, the future prime minister organized the British troops on the train so they could escape

But the Boers captured Churchill and took him to a POW camp

Churchill pleaded with his captors to let him go. I am a newspaper correspondent, and you ought not to hold me prisoner

But the Boers saw the young man as much more than just your average reporter and replied that

We do not catch Lord's sons every day. If they weren't going to let him go, Churchill would arrange for his own release

and he immediately started plotting an escape from prison. One night, he jumped over the fence and ran for it

carrying nothing but four slabs of melting chocolate and a crumbling biscuit

But the Boers put a bounty on Churchill's head, offering a reward for his capture, dead or alive

After crossing swamps and sneaking onto trains, Churchill made it back to British territory

Most know that Churchill was a journalist, a soldier, a historian, and a prime minister

However, he was also a prolific painter. In 1921, Churchill secretly showed his paintings

in a Paris gallery. But rather than sign his own name on his works, Churchill used a pseudonym

At first, he planned to use the name Mr. Spencer, which Churchill had used when seeking to travel

incognito to France on munitions business during the war. For whatever reason, Churchill decided

not to use the Spencer alias and ultimately settled on the name Charles Morin. We can only

guess as to whether the assumed name helped or hurt sales. But we know that over the course of

the gallery show, six of Churchill's paintings were sold. In 1939, Germany and Russia signed

a non-aggression pact. But less than two years later, Hitler plotted to break his word and blindside Stalin Germany moved over 3 and 1 half million soldiers into position on the border of Poland which the Soviets occupied at the time Over a 10 period

the Germans barreled across 300 miles, wiping out more than 40,000 Soviet soldiers each day

and bringing 20 million people under the Third Reich's control. Despite the fact he was staunchly

anti-communist, Churchill saw the incursion coming and tried to warn Stalin. Months before

the sneak attack, Churchill sent a secret message to Stalin warning of the strike. Franklin Roosevelt

also tried to warn Stalin, but Stalin refused to believe the Fuhrer would wage a two-front war

since that exact scenario doomed the Germans in World War I. In retrospect, Stalin was both wrong

and right. The Germans did indeed attack, and it took a heavy toll on the Russian military

But the attack didn't do much to help Germany either, and was arguably a key turning point in

the war, just like in World War I. In 1927, Churchill visited Italy. According to the New

York Times, while on the trip, Britain's chancellor of the exchequer expressed approval of the fascist

regime and his own admiration of Premier Mussolini, its dictator. It certainly makes for a pretty

awkward historical moment in retrospect. But why did Churchill praise Mussolini in the first place

Well, to Churchill, communism was a much greater threat than fascism. He approved of the dictator's authoritarian style for imposing order and discipline

In a letter to his own wife, Churchill wrote, This country gives the impression of discipline, order, goodwill, smiling faces, a happy, strict school

Speaking to Mussolini directly on the visit, Churchill said, If I had been an Italian, I am sure that I should have been wholeheartedly with you

From the start to the finish in your triumphant struggle against the appetites and passions of Leninism

I guess nobody's right all the time. In 1911, the siege of Sydney Street erupted when a Latvian gang suspected of slaying three police officers barricaded themselves in an East End building

The police rushed to surround the building, flooding the block with 200 armed men

The Latvians opened fire, triggering a standoff that would eventually pull in Churchill

The police laying siege to the building called to the Tower of London for backup from the army

Churchill, who was home secretary at the time, received the call and sent troops to the siege

In the middle of the gunfight, Churchill decided to personally go to Sydney Street

In these circumstances, Churchill wrote, I thought it my duty to see what was going on myself

and my advisors concurred in the propriety of such a step. But Churchill actions weren motivated purely by a sense of duty saying I must however admit a strong sense of curiosity which perhaps it would have been well to keep in check Wearing a top hat and a fur coat Churchill took control of the

siege. But before he could order the police to storm the house, a fire broke out in the building

When a fire brigade appeared to put out the blaze, Churchill ordered them not to intervene

allowing two Latvians to perish in the fire rather than risk the lives of the firefighters

Have you ever heard of a seaplane? Well, no one did before 1913, because that's when Churchill coined the term

As First Lord of the Admiralty from 1911 until 1915, Churchill took a hands-on approach to defense

In 1912, Britain authorized a naval wing of the Flying Corps to use planes for harbor

estuary, and coast defense and scouting, according to the Kendall-Mercurian Times. The military developed a hydro airplane called Waterbird

Britain's first successful float plane. Churchill, fascinated by the invention, told the House of Commons that the results so far attained have been promising

In addition to supporting Waterbird, Churchill also coined the term seaplane on the spot

during a House of Commons hearing in 1913. At the end of World War I

the Treaty of Versailles imposed harsh penalties on Germany, demobilizing its army and placing its government in debt

for billions of dollars in reparations. Churchill declared the treaty monstrous and malignant

That's because Churchill saw an even bigger threat to Britain than Germany

Russia had recently fallen to the Bolsheviks and emerged as a communist power

Demobilizing the German army would mean one less power fighting against communism, in Churchill's mind

I think the day will come when it will be recognized without doubt, Churchill predicted

that the strangling of Bolshevism at its birth would have been an untold blessing to the human race

Like his admiration of Mussolini, not all of Churchill's political positions seemed so enlightened in retrospect

For example, Churchill opposed letting women vote and even ended up in a physical confrontation with a passionate suffragist

In 1910, a group of suffragettes held a demonstration demanding Parliament extend the right to vote to women

Police targeted the demonstrators, and some suffragettes blamed Home Secretary Winston Churchill for the vicious tactics

Hugh Franklin, a suffragist, confronted Churchill on a train a few weeks after the demonstration

Armed with a dog whip, Franklin yelled, Take this, you cur, for the treatment of the suffragists

Franklin ended up in jail for this act, where he went on a hunger strike to demand women's suffrage

Churchill might have won World War II, but he lost to this one. Women in England would have their right to vote recognized with the passage of the Representation of the People Act in 1918