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Sir Winston Churchill - Famous Words
Three Days after becoming Prime Minister, Mr. Churchill made a speech to the House of Commons (on May 13th, 1940) as if presenting his credentials, saying:
"I would say to the House, as I said to those who have joined this government: I have nothing to offer but Blood, Toil, Tears and Sweat."
Back to Main Text - May 1940, Neville Chamberlain
Back to Main Text - Churchill Calendar; Prime Minister
But perhaps the one speech for which Winston Churchill is known by all is that made to the House on June 4th, 1940, early in the war and his premiership, was where he warned:
"We shall fight on the beaches. We shall fight on the landing grounds. We shall fight in the fields and in the streets. We shall fight in the hills. We shall never surrender !"
Back to Main Text - War in Europe
Also in June 1940, upon the fall of France and with the fear prevailing that Britain's would follow, the prime minister delivered one of his more inspiring speeches to the House, saying:
"Let us, therefore, brace ourselves to our duties and so bear ourselves that if the British Empire and Commonwealth last for a thousand years, men will still say: This was their Finest Hour."
Churchill would raise the nation's morale, saying:
"Hitler will have to break us in this island, or lose the war."
In a July 14th BBC-broadcast in 1940, Mr. Churchill declared:
"This is a war of the unknown warriors; but let all strive without failing in faith or in duty, and the dark curse of Hitler will be lifted from our age."
On October 29th 1941, in the thick of WW2, during a speech he made to the boys of his old beloved school, Harrow, Churchill declared:
"Never give in - never, never, never, never, in nothing great or small, large or petty, never give in except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never yield to force, never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy."
In 1940, Hitler is reported to have said: "The issue is between Eaton and Adolf Hitler's school." Churchill is said to have grinned when he had heard this, saying "...he forgot Harrow !"
Although he hadn't really enjoyed his schooldays, he was fond of this old school
On August 20th, 1940, at the height of the Battle of Britain, with special recognition to the fighter pilots defending the blitzed nation which was 'fighting and suffering together,' Winston Churchill's speech in the House went:
"Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few."
During a speech made on boxing day (December 26th, 1941) to the United States Congress, following the Pearl Harbor bombing by the Japanese, prime minister Churchill said:
"I am a child of the House of Commons. I was brought up in my father's house to believe in democracy. 'Trust the people' - that was his message ... I can't help reflecting that if my father had been American and my mother British, instead of the other way around, I might have got here on my own ... I owe my advancement entirely to the House of Commons, whose servant I am. In my country, as in yours, public men are proud to be the servants of the State and would be ashamed to be its masters."
On November 10th, 1942, in the thick of WW2, speaking at the Lord Mayor's Luncheon in London, the prime minister declared:
"This is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. It is perhaps the end of the beginning."
On his deathbed, Churchill is reported to have said: " I'm so bored of it all ..."