But he suffered under the strain of having to decide when and how to part not merely with Balfour and company but also with his friend Lord Hugh, who would rather die than leave the Tories. Just as Hugh had tried to persuade him to stay in the party, so he tried to coax his friend into leaving with him. But Hugh wouldn’t hear of it. Winston would have to do it on his own.
The strain showed on April 22 as Churchill was speaking in the House. He was discussing the history of the Tory party’s relationship with the working classes and had just finished pointing out that the two groups were on better terms twenty-five years ago, when the party “was not the sham it was now.” He knew that he was pushing his luck to say such a thing and that members might start walking out again. But no one moved, and something seemed to snap in his brain. He faltered and suddenly lost the train of his thought. He tried to continue but couldn’t find the words, and was forced to sit down without finishing his remarks. For a few moments he held his head in his hands; finally he stood up and left the chamber. It was so unlike him to be at a loss for words that many in the House showed genuine sympathy for his plight and wondered if he had fallen ill.
MOVING INCIDENT IN THE HOUSE, said one headline the next day. “Mr. Winston Churchill Unable to Continue His Speech.” Later reports raised the question of whether the young man had suffered a nervous collapse: “Mr. Winston Churchill’s dramatic breakdown in the House of Commons has naturally caused a considerable amount of anxiety among his friends. Mr. Churchill may not be universally popular as a politician, but everybody recognises that he is a power to be reckoned with in the future.”
He recovered quickly and insisted that nothing was wrong, saying that it was merely an unfortunate lapse. But it was obvious that the walkout in March had unsettled him. In fact, he had begun his remarks on April 22 by self-consciously expressing “the hope that the House would not resent his taking part in this discussion.”12
But, in addition to the political turmoil surrounding him, there was a personal matter weighing on his mind, one with which few people were familiar. In just six days he was expecting a reunion with the woman he wanted to marry. On April 28 Ethel Barrymore would be arriving from New York to begin rehearsals for a play that her backers expected to be a big hit. It was set to open in mid-May, and Winston was hoping for a long run, by the end of which—if he happened to be lucky—the Broadway star might agree to stay on as his wife.13
* * *
Charles Frohman, the Broadway producer who had launched Ethel’s career in America, was counting on her to bring him success in London playing the title character in Cynthia, a new comedy by the young English playwright Hubert Henry Davies. This was her first chance to shine in a major British theatrical production. Opening night was already the subject of much discussion, largely because Millicent Sutherland—Ethel’s host for the summer—planned on bringing all her literary and society friends to give the star a warm reception. For the first two weeks of her stay Ethel had little time to herself as she tried to meet her social obligations with Millie and also complete her rehearsals at Wyndham’s Theatre. But Winston was anxious to see her alone and didn’t waste time arranging to dine with her. His engagement diary lists the dinner date as May 3, with her name discreetly given as “EB.”
This meeting seems to have marked merely the opening salvo of Winston’s campaign to woo Ethel. Many years later one of his daughters would say of the romance, “Papa besieged her with flowers and notes, and every night he used to go to Claridge’s for supper where she always went after her performance.” In old age Ethel herself confirmed that Winston had proposed, and she admitted that “she had been much attracted to him.” Preoccupied with her play, she didn’t give him a firm answer right away. And, then, while he was settling in for a long romantic siege, something went wrong. It wasn’t through any fault of his own, but it caused Ethel to make a hasty departure from London and to put aside any thought of marrying him.14
The trouble began on May 16, the opening night of the play. Despite the friendly audience, the comedy fell flat, and the critics showed no mercy for the author, though they did praise Barrymore’s performance. The review in the Times was typical. The play was so slight, observed the critic, “that it can hardly be said to have been written at all. It can hardly be said to exist. It is not a play but a part, and the part is not a part but Miss Ethel Barrymore.” The verdict was that the star’s performance alone had made the comedy worth watching, but that even her charm couldn’t compensate for the weak plot and bad dialogue.
Winston brought flowers to Ethel’s dressing room, but she knew the play was in trouble, and so did he. “Oh, my poor darling,” he said. The production limped along for two more weeks, but at the beginning of June, word came that it would close on the eleventh. It was a very short run for a play that had raised such high expectations. Embarrassed, Ethel announced that she would return home to America immediately after her last performance. The closing was regrettable, said the Daily Express, “because it unfortunately shortens the stay in London of the charming American actress, Miss Ethel Barrymore. It is a pity that Mr. Frohman is not able to ‘present’ Miss Barrymore in another and more attractive play.”15
Ethel not only fled London at the first opportunity, but kept going all the way to San Francisco, where she spent July acting at a local theater, avoiding the spotlight in New York, where the short run of her London play had made news. Though she admitted to a San Francisco paper that her stay in England had been disappointing, she made it clear that she would go back soon. “London means so much to me,” she said.16
But she wasn’t referring to Winston. Whatever interest he had held for her quickly faded. By the time she showed up in London again, a year had gone by and she was already in love with another man. She didn’t have any time for Churchill. “I was so in love with her,” he recalled half a century later. “And she wouldn’t pay any attention to me at all.”17
It wasn’t for lack of effort that he was failing to find a wife. For the second time in his quest he had aimed high and fallen short.
With her sketchy understanding of British politics, Ethel may not have realized, however, that while she was struggling with Cynthia, Winston had staged a brief dramatic performance of his own. It was lightly attended, and its significance may not have been widely appreciated at the time, but for those who understood its importance, it was unforgettable.
On May 31, 1904, when the House was almost empty on a rainy afternoon, Churchill entered and, in the words of the Manchester Guardian, “glanced at his accustomed place . . . made a rapid survey of the corresponding bench on the Opposition side, marched a few paces up the floor, bowed to the Chair, swerved suddenly to the right, and took his seat among the Liberals.”
And the man he sat next to wasn’t an ordinary Liberal. He was David Lloyd George—already Lucifer incarnate to Joe and his followers. Churchill’s break with his party could not have been sharper. All the Hooligans had drifted away from him except for Hugh, who nonetheless was so offended by Lloyd George’s criticisms of the landed classes and the Anglican Church that he vowed not to “touch such . . . propaganda with a punt pole.” So, at twenty-nine, Winston was restarting his political career with a new set of allies and aiming high again.18
VIII
THE BACHELOR AND THE HEIRESS
At the end of June 1904 the journalist Herbert Vivian visited Churchill at the House of Commons and was impressed by the attention the young MP was receiving. Much had changed since their meeting at Winston’s rooms the year before, when Chamberlain had launched his ill-fated campaign for protection. Now Winston had become much more of a national figure, and it showed. Making their way to the terrace for tea, the two men passed several other members with guests—including a number of well-dressed ladies—and Winston created a little stir of excitement among these visitors. “I marked the general interest which he aroused,” Herbert Vivian recalled. “All turned to observe him, the greater part with a smile of approv
al. He seemed little concerned with the attention which he aroused, but led the way with many a merry quip.”
On the terrace all the tables were occupied except for a few in the area reserved for the House of Lords. For Churchill, this was no inconvenience. He simply strode across the invisible line separating the two groups and sat down with his friend at one of the empty tables. The servants, however, were aghast at this breach of decorum and refused to bring them tea. Smiling, Winston got up and walked back to his proper side, where he pointed and said, “Very well. Put the tea down there, and I will carry it across myself.”
After that, no one troubled Churchill and his guest for the rest of the afternoon. They talked politics, and as far as Winston was concerned, it was the only subject for the terrace. “If I had my way,” he said, casting a severe gaze at the many tables of visitors who were laughing and enjoying their tea, “I would abolish all this nonsense. The House of Commons should be a place of business, not a place of entertainment.”1
Even on the terrace, he couldn’t resist looking for something to reform. Now that he was a Liberal, he was eager to throw out the Tories and get his hands on the machinery of government, tinkering here and there, or overhauling parts that no longer worked, and making the whole thing run much better. No longer a Hooligan taunting his elders from the wings, he was a political star preparing to occupy the limelight when—as he felt was sure to happen—the Liberals swept into power on a wave of antiprotectionist feeling.
Already political cartoonists were portraying him more often in their work, though one complained that his features weren’t distinctive enough for a good caricature and suggested, tongue in cheek, that he should wear a monocle. To satisfy the growing curiosity about him, Madame Tussaud’s added Winston to its waxworks, which caused no small amount of resentment among critics who considered his prominence undeserved. “He has won the blue ribbon of advertisement,” said a satirical article in a weekly magazine. “His struggles after notoriety have raised him to the level in popularity of murderers and card-sharpers, millionaires and crowned heads. Everything comes to the man who knows how to advertise.”
Many others, however, didn’t think his reputation was inflated at all. The old bearded veteran of Victorian journalism, W. T. Stead, wrote in July, “Today Winston Churchill is the centre of the political arena. He is the most conspicuous, and in many respects the ablest, of our rising statesmen.” And in August a journalist sympathetic to the Liberals cheered the party for now having in Churchill and Lloyd George a one-two knockout punch. They embodied “the bull-dog spirit” that would put the Tories flat on their backs.2
The Liberals were pleased enough with their new recruit so that he wasn’t questioned too closely about his overall political views. Whether he was now a real Liberal or simply a Tory dissident looking for respect was a question that everyone—including Churchill himself—seemed happy to put off until the next general election. For the time being, the main thing was to chip away at Balfour’s authority until he saw the hopelessness of his position and stepped down, clearing the way for a new government.
Though the prime minister pretended in public not to be troubled by Churchill joining the Liberals, he knew the defection had set a bad example for others in the party, and he was always worried about further losses. For months it nagged at him, and a few Conservatives did slip through his grasp to join Winston on the other side. But when—out of the blue—Hugh Cecil began to waver one day, Balfour was so alarmed that he wrote to his cousin in a near panic, begging him “to remain in the party!! . . . Never talk of leaving the Party!”3
As it turned out, Hugh was only letting off steam after Joe had made some irritating remark. But Balfour didn’t want to endure another embarrassing defection by a prominent member. It was bad enough having Churchill unleashed on the other side. There was no mistaking the danger he posed. In October Winston told a Welsh audience that his goal was “to harass, to embarrass, and ultimately to drive from power an Administration which has forfeited the confidence of the country.”4
* * *
In his October visit to Wales, Churchill shared the platform with Lloyd George, who said that his new friend was trying “to strengthen his infant steps as a Liberal.” What this meant in practice was that Winston now had Lloyd George as his guide to modern liberalism, whose aims were much more ambitious than those of the old Victorian party. The new Liberals wanted to use the power of government to transform society, making major improvements in the lives of the poor, the sick, and the elderly. In his Liberal “infancy” Winston was willing to loosen some of his aristocratic roots and give the new ideas close attention. All the same, what he really wanted now from Lloyd George wasn’t social policies, but a war plan to topple Chamberlain and the Conservatives. As he told the audience in Wales, “Mr. Lloyd George is the best fighting general in the Liberal ranks.” (Everyone liked to call Churchill by his first name, but in the political world it was unusual for Lloyd George to be called David, though in private Winston usually addressed him that way once their friendship began in earnest.)5
The prospect of a good fight against Balfour’s government created one of the most unusual partnerships in British political history. Until now the only political partner Winston had known was Linky Cecil. In Lloyd George he had found someone who was Cecil’s polar opposite. The ancestral mansion, the relatives in high places, the comfortable private income, and the noble title—all these were alien to the Welshman who had risen from modest beginnings to become a powerful figure in the Liberal Party. Just as alien was Lord Hugh’s prim, ascetic character. Lloyd George was nearly twelve years Churchill’s senior and in 1904 had already been married for sixteen years and fathered five children. He didn’t care much for religion—except when it suited his political purposes—and his fondness for women kept him constantly involved in clandestine affairs.
Lacking the polish of the typical Edwardian gentleman, Lloyd George was a convenient figure for the Tories to ridicule, which is why Churchill had found it so easy at first to dismiss him as “a vulgar, chattering little cad.” But after a few years of watching him stand up to Chamberlain, Winston didn’t care whether the Liberal fighter was a proper gentleman or not. He was simply relieved to find in him the kind of Hooligan he had been looking for all along—a fearless sharpshooter to cover his advance. The only problem was that Winston would insist on viewing the relationship through a romantic prism, just as he had with Hugh Cecil. He innocently assumed that the partnership was essentially for his benefit, and that this faithful marksman wouldn’t one day plug him in the back.
But even if Churchill had been more realistic about their relationship, he couldn’t have guessed at this stage that Lloyd George had resolved long ago to allow almost nothing to stand in the way of his own ambition—including friendship. “My supreme idea is to get on,” he had confessed in the 1880s in a remarkably candid letter to his wife, Margaret. “To this idea I shall sacrifice everything—except, I trust, honesty. I am prepared to thrust even love itself under the wheels of my Juggernaut if it obstructs the way.”6
Among old admirers who had known Lloyd George from his early days in Wales, there was no doubt that his new partnership could easily erode into an intense rivalry. As his friend D. R. Daniel noted, it was inevitable that Churchill and Lloyd George would “meet face to face one day on that narrow path which leads to the highest pinnacle of honour.” Winston probably assumed that if that day arrived, he would prevail. But what would happen if they weren’t face-to-face? He didn’t seem to give much thought to the risks of leaving his back turned to Lloyd George.
In one thing, however, the characters of the two men were perfectly attuned. Though he had no experience of real battlefields, and had never served as a soldier, Lloyd George saw himself as a warrior in the political realm. It was not just in Winston’s imagination that the Liberal stalwart was like a general bravely preparing an assault on some political stronghold. Lloyd George had always looked on his oppon
ents as soldiers who, as the need arose, could be mown down by relentless fire. Where he differed from Churchill was in his cold, bloodless manner of imagining the battlefield.
“I recollect,” he once told an audience in Cardiff, “what an American soldier once said when he was asked: ‘When you aim your rifle at the men on the other side, do you hate them?’ . . . His reply was: ‘No, I don’t fire at anybody. I simply fire at the line of battle.’ Really, that is what I have been doing all my life.”7
* * *
For Churchill the next election would be fought in a new constituency. There was no place for him as a Liberal in Oldham, so he accepted an offer to contest a seat in nearby Manchester. Though he couldn’t predict when the general election would occur, he knew the costs would force him to dig deeper into his dwindling supply of cash. He was quickly running through the money he had saved up three years ago, and was now counting on his biography of Lord Randolph to replenish his bank account. But it was far from being finished. The intense political activity of the last year and a half had delayed his work on the book. He would need at least another year to complete it.
He had lived well and spent his money freely. When he traveled, he stayed at the best hotels and ate well—he was fond of treating himself to oysters and champagne. He was also playing polo fairly often, on the excuse that it gave him good exercise, despite the expense.
Before Ethel Barrymore had fled London with little warning, he had been planning to make another trip to America. When it had become clear that her play would close in June, his first thought seems to have been to follow her home to New York. On May 31—the very same day that he sat for the first time with the Liberals—he accepted an invitation to attend the Democratic National Convention in July as the guest of his mother’s old friend New York congressman W. Bourke Cockran. Presumably, he would be able to combine business with pleasure, observing the American political system up close while reserving some time to continue his gentle siege of Ethel. Staying with Cockran, a strong free trader, would also give him the chance to talk strategy with a man he admired.
Young Titan Page 12