Winston Churchill as Home Secretary

Churchill as Home Secretary Suffragettes, Strikes and Social Reform 1910-1911

written by Charles Stephenson and published by Pen & Sword Books - £25 -

Hardback - Pages 280

There can be few statesmen whose lives and careers have received as much investigation and literary attention as Winston Churchill. Relatively little however has appeared which deals specifically or holistically with his first senior ministerial role; that of Secretary of State for the Home Office. This may be due to the fact that, of the three Great Offices of State which he was to occupy over the course of his long political life, his tenure as Home Secretary was the briefest.

The Liberal Government, of which he was a senior figure, had been elected in 1906 to put in place social and political reform. Though Churchill was at the forefront of these matters, his responsibility for domestic affairs led to him facing other, major, challenges departmentally; this was a time of substantial commotion on the social front, with widespread industrial and civil strife. Even given that ‘Home Secretaries never do have an easy time’, his period in office was thus marked by a huge degree of political and social turbulence. The terms ‘Tonypandy’ and ‘Peter the Painter’ perhaps spring most readily to mind. Rather less known is his involvement in one of the burning issues of the time, female suffrage, and his portrayal as ‘the prisoners’ friend’ in terms of penal reform.

Aged 33 on appointment, and the youngest Home Secretary since 1830, he became empowered to wield the considerable executive authority inherent in the role of one of His Majesty's Principal Secretaries of State, and he certainly did not shrink from doing so. There were of course commensurate responsibilities, and how he shouldered them is worth examination.

This book looks at the year or so Winston Churchill was Home Secretary and his

involvement in a number of issues such as Feminism, Strikes, Suffragettes, Welsh

Miners and more. This was such a nice book to read purely from the fact that it

wasn’t about Churchill during WW2, which is usually the case. It was nice to read

about him during other points of his political career. Actually, I learned quite a bit

from this book in seeing how much social politics he was having to deal and the

way he went about things. Now he was obviously a young man then so I think he

actually improved with age because I found the way he acted sometimes or his

views were maybe a little of their age shall we say. A really good book I would

definitely recommend to others, especially if you want to read about Churchill in

periods other than WW2. 

Reading Hitler's Mind - The Intelligence Failure that led to WW2

Reading Hitler's Mind - The Intelligence Failure that led to WW2 written by

Norman Ridley and published by Frontline Books - £20 - Hardback - Pages 240

Most strongly associated with Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain, it is often stated that

Britain’s policy of appeasement was instituted in the 1930s in the hope of avoiding war

with Hitler’s Nazi Germany. At the time, appeasement was viewed by many as a popular

and seemingly pragmatic policy.

In this book the author sets out to show how appeasement was not a naïve attempt to secure a lasting peace by resolving German grievances, but a means of buying time for rearmament. By the middle of the 1930s, British policy was based on the presumption that the balance of power had already dramatically shifted in Germany’s favour. It was felt that Britain, chiefly for economic reasons, was unable to restore the balance, and that extensive concessions to Germany would not satisfy Hitler, whose aggressive policies intensified the already high risk of war..

The only realistic option, and one that was clearly adopted by Neville Chamberlain, was to try to influence the timing of the inevitable military confrontation and, in the meantime, pursue a steady and economically sustainable programme of rearmament. Appeasement would ‘buy’ that time for the British government.

Crucially this strategy required continuously updated and accurate information about the strength, current and future, of the German armed forces, especially the Luftwaffe, and an understanding of their military strategy. Piercing the Nazis’ veil of secrecy was vital if the intelligence services were to build up a true picture of the extent of German rearmament and the purposes to which it might be put.

The many agents, codebreakers, and counter-espionage personnel played a vital role in maximising the benefits that appeasement provided – even as war clouds continued to gather. These individuals were increasingly handed greater responsibility in a bid to inform British statesmen now scrambling to prepare for a catastrophic confrontation with Germany.

In Reading Hitler’s Mind, Norman Ridley reveals the remarkable efforts made by the tiny, underfunded and often side-lined British intelligence services as they sought to inform those whose role it was to make decisions upon which the wheels of history turned.

This was quite a fascinating read in that it looks at the outbreak of World War Two from a diplomatic viewpoint with regard to the diplomatic services. A department that was in reality underfunded at this time sought to give advice and set the boundaries and aims to the then prime minister Chamberlain. The book also looks at the German intelligence side of things as well as the British role in the run-up to war, and what is good is that we see information about the various conferences and what came about from them. But at the end of the day, Hitler would do what he wanted, so it is intriguing to see how some people were fooled. An excellent book and quite thought-provoking, and certainly a book I would recommend.

Robert Baden-Powell - A Biography

Robert Baden-Powell - A Biography written by Lorraine Gibson and published

by Pen & Sword Books - £25 - Hardback - Pages 256

A conflicted character - militarist and pacifist, macho man and drag artist, elitist and socialist - he was one of the 20th century’s most influential and, latterly, controversial Englishmen, finding fame not once, but twice – and for two very different reasons.

Before donning his trademark shorts, the man known for inventing the Scouts is hailed a hero of the Second Boer War, the first military conflict covered in great detail by the media.

Reports of his unconventional methods of holding a Boer army at bay, despite being woefully outnumbered, at the South African town of Mafeking, make global headlines and when he returns home to England, hordes of adoring fans pack London’s streets, waving flags and declaring him the Hero of Mafeking.

The same ingenuity, reconnaissance skills and spectacular eccentricity that win him this military acclaim become the foundations of his second mission, that of saving Victorian boys from poverty and despair, and himself from having to grow up, by teaching them scouting.

This book examines Baden-Powell’s dual personality, or his ‘two lives’ as he called them, including his difficult childhood with a domineering and unaffectionate mother whom he loved even after she forced him into the army at 19, dashing his dreams of becoming an artist.

It looks at his military career and his love of drama and at why protesters wanted to topple his statue on Poole Quay in the pandemic summer of 2020.

It also considers a recently-discovered telegraph that adds fuel to the speculation over the nature of his relationship with a fellow-soldier that endured for 30 years - until he married a 22-year-old woman in secret when he was 55.

I should point out from the start of this review that I was in Scouting since I was 8, as a youth member and leader and only left a couple of years ago at 45. So you could say I already knew most of what was said in this book and taught bits of the information to the members I led. But I would say Baden Powell was an unusual character but someone who I would say was a decent man, and most of today's thoughts about him are down to modernist revisions of him. You will always get people who will always put their own views and opinions on people, which then distorts the actual person. This book I found to be very detailed, balanced and just a good read, that paints Baden Powell in a remarkably accurate light. I very much enjoyed the ‘war years’ information about the book and after he set up Scouting in 1907, this was quite well known and publicised quite often promoted through Scouting even to this day. A really good read and one of the better biographies I have read of the man.

The Kennedy Assassinations - JFK & Bobby Kennedy - Debunking the Conspiracy Theories

The Kennedy Assassinations - JFK & Bobby Kennedy - Debunking the

Conspiracy Theories written by Mel Ayton and published by Frontline

Books - £25 - Hardback - Pages 248

Few events have been the subject of more conspiracy theories than the assassinations

of the two Kennedy brothers. Indeed, a great many people consider that there were other

individuals than Lee Harvey Oswald and Sirhan Sirhan involved in both murders. Was a

shot fired from Dealey Plaza’s grassy knoll? Why did Jack Ruby shoot Oswald? Was it

the CIA, the Soviets, Cuban nationalists or the Mafia that arranged John Kennedy’s

assassination? Was Robert Kennedy shot from in front and behind, and who had the

most to gain from his death?

These are just a few of the questions that have been put forward by a myriad of conspiracy theorists and it is those people and their ideas that Mel Ayton has tackled head-on. Over many years, Mel Ayton has examined all the more substantial conspiracy theories and, through careful analysis of documents and eyewitness statements, he has demolished each one.

In each case, Mel Ayton presented the results of his detailed investigations in periodicals as he worked through the various theories. These have now been brought together to provide a comprehensive analysis of all the main theories as to who, how and why the two Kennedy brothers met their deaths in such unusual circumstances.

Though wild ideas will continue to be proposed and efforts will still be made to demonstrate that Oswald could not have fired off three shots with great accuracy in the few seconds available to him as the presidential cavalcade passed beneath the window where he crouched, or that there were sinister reasons why three CIA men were allegedly present on the night of Robert Kennedy’s assassination, the harsh reality is that the Kennedy brothers were each killed by lone gunmen.

This is an absorbing read, brought up to date with the addition of new material as it has been uncovered. Maybe, just maybe, this book will persuade people that the official accounts of both murders, although flawed, are not cover-ups but simply statements of fact.

Whenever you talk about the Kennedy Brothers now, you’re rarely going to talk about

their presidency or political life. Your sadly and usually going to be talking about their

assassinations. Both of these took place at a time of social and political turmoil in America,

there is a lot of conspiracy debate, conflict and myth-making. This is a really good book

as the author Mel Ayton takes the two presidents separately and goes through the differing

conspiracy theories one by one, ranging from the CIA, to a lone gunman, the Mafia and so

on and so on. Having read a good number of books on this subject previously I would
say that it is a well set out book and Mel Ayton argues each point very well. Certainly, an

excellent book if you are new to the subject and even if you’ve had a passing interest

previously. A book even I enjoyed and I quite like the author and his writing style having

read his previous book Protecting the Presidential Candidates.