CHURCHILL, WINSTON LEONARD SPENCER ), British statesman, elder son of Lord Randolph Churchill and Jennie, daughter of Leonard Jerome, of New York, U.S.A., was born on Nov. 3o, 1874. He was educated at Harrow and Sandhurst. Entering the army in 1895, his principal war service was with the Malakand field force (1897) and the Tirah expeditionary force (1898) ; these campaigns gave him material for two brilliant books, The Story of the Malakand Field Force (1898), and The River War (1899). During the South African War (1899-1902) he was correspondent for The Morning Post and wrote an account of his experiences as London to Ladysmith via Pretoria (1900). He was taken prisoner by the Boers, but escaped.
Churchill was elected Conservative M.P. for Oldham in 1900, and immediately made his mark in a House which expected great things from his father's son. He excelled in the set speech elaborately prepared on the classic models, but was not at first a ready speaker. Lord Balf our once said of him that he carried "heavy but not very mobile guns," and it was only later that he became a master in the cut and thrust of debate. He had a filial reverence for the political memory of his father and his Life of Lord Randolph Churchill (1906) is one of the most inter esting political biographies in the language.
In his first session Churchill opposed the Brodrick scheme of army reorganization mainly on financial grounds, and when Joseph Chamberlain began his tariff reform campaign he threw himself into the ranks of the Free Traders with uncompromising vehemence. He then joined the Liberal party, and fought a severely contested election at North-West Manchester at the general election of 1906. He was under-secretary for the colonies in Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman's Govt. (1905-08), and the spokesman of his department in the House of Commons. Even at the time of the South African War he had held liberal views about the treatment of the Dutch. As under-secretary, he ex pounded Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman's policy of self-govern ment for the Transvaal and Orange River colonies, leading up to the federation of South Africa, with such skill and authority that his position in the House of Commons was much advanced. Place was made for him (1908) in the cabinet as president of the Board of Trade. There, and later at the Home Office, he showed a keen interest in social legislation. He carried a Trade Boards Act establishing a minimum wage in certain sweated in dustries, an act setting up labour exchanges, and a Shops Act. It may fairly be said that these three measures reorganized those trades which were then unorganized or feebly organized; the Trade Boards Act, developed and expanded, removed a dark blot on English industrial life. The Old Age Pensions Act and other social measures, for which he was not immediately respon sible, found in him a brilliant advocate.
By 1909 Churchill had become a great power in the Liberal Party. His platform oratory had a vivacity, a boldness and an epigrammatic quality that stirred popular gatherings. Into the conflict that followed the rejection of the Lloyd George budget by the House of Lords, he threw himself with characteristic im petuosity. As president of the Budget League he was a driving force in the campaign against the Lords' veto on finance. On the question of Irish Home Rule he had also made a definite advance. During the Ulster agitation in 1912 against the Home Rule Bill Churchill was announced to speak in favour of the Bill at the Ulster hall, Belfast. On Jan. 16, the Ulster Unionist Council declared that he should not be allowed to speak there. He was not the man to be intimidated, and the meeting took place on Feb. 8 on a Nationalist club football ground. At that meeting he defined his position in the words "that any plan for Home Rule put forward would be an integral part of parlia mentary devolution, and would not be inconsistent with the de sign of the ultimate federation of the empire." But events on a larger stage were shaping themselves to give a new direction to Churchill's career. In July 1911 Great Britain came into dangerous clash with Germany over what was known as the Agadir incident (q.v.) . A conflict was avoided, but the German menace now loomed as a reality. Churchill was trans ferred from the Home Office to the Admiralty, with explicit injunctions laid upon him by Asquith, to "put the fleet into a state of instant and constant readiness for war in case we were attacked by Germany"—a disclosure made at Dundee by Churchill in June, 1915. The reason for Churchill's appointment to the Admiralty was that a serious disagreement had arisen be tween the War Office and the Admiralty concerning the strategy to be adopted in the event of war, and Haldane had told Asquith that he would resign from the War Office unless the Admiralty worked in accordance with the War Office plans and a naval war staff was created. To that the existing admiralty board and McKenna were opposed and it was therefore one of Churchill's first duties to make a new board. "He is knocking over the ad mirals like ninepins," it was said at the time. The formation of a naval war staff was less easy and some years were necessary before it could do its work adequately. He was, at this time, in constant communication, though not always in agreement, with Lord Fisher; but he did not recall him to the Admiralty. In addition to the creation of a naval war office Churchill carried out many major reforms in the navy and its administration. His tenure of office saw the introduction of the 15 in. gun, the de velopment of the light cruiser type and the creation of a famous division of fast battleships ("Queen Elizabeth" type). In the personnel of the navy changes were effected ; Sir John Jellicoe was his second sea lord (1912-14), and at the outbreak of war was placed by a strong decision of the Admiralty in command of the Grand Fleet, while Sir David Beatty was in close touch with Churchill as his naval secretary (1912), and was given the command of the 1st Battle Cruiser Squadron in the same year.
Gradually a rift appeared between Churchill and Lloyd George, for Churchill was convinced that war was coming, whereas Lloyd George, despite his speech at the Mansion House on the Agadir crisis, was not. When the World War came it found the fleet, owing to the coincidence of the manoeuvres, on a war footing. Churchill had done important work in preparing the fleet for war, but the operations of the navy in the first few months of the struggle suffered from the lack of clear and consistent direc tion which a naval war staff would have supplied. Nevertheless, at the outset of the war troops were safely transported, the outer oceans cleared and the German High Seas fleet contained. Churchill presently found himself the leader of a minority and opposition school of war strategy of which the Antwerp expedi tion and the Dardanelles enterprise were the main projects. In both cases the strategical conception was not only sound but brilliant, but the forces required for their success were not forth coming, and Churchill's own impatience contributed to their failure. Lord Fisher in particular, who had been recalled to the Admiralty (Oct. 1914), disliked the Dardanelles enterprise, and his resignation in May, 1915, was one of the causes of the down fall of the Liberal Government. Churchill suffered a great blow. He was succeeded at the Admiralty by Balfour. For a few months he remained in office as chancellor of the duchy of Lan caster, but resigned on Nov. 13 on the ground of his non-inclu sion in the new war committee of the cabinet.
This step was followed by a lengthy and vigorous speech of personal explanation and vindication in the House of Commons, which was a performance of great power. Denying an improper usurpation of authority while at the Admiralty, Churchill de scribed the Dardanelles adventure as a legitimate war gamble. He blamed Lord Fisher for not speaking out in the War Council if he did not approve the operation, declaring at the same time that he had not received from the first sea lord either the clear guidance before the event or the firm support after that he was entitled to expect. After this Churchill went on active service in France, where he commanded the 6th Royal Scots Fusiliers.
Lloyd George recalled him to high office. He was again on the Treasury bench in 1917 as minister of munitions and then as secretary for war and air minister (1918-21). He supervised the return of the army to a voluntary basis. Apart from his con spicuous part in the Irish settlement he began to be less in agree ment with the premier. Lloyd George disliked his Russian policy and the expensive campaigns conducted against the Bolshevists under his inspiration. The outward sign of this estrangement was the appointment of Sir Robert Horne instead of Churchill to the chancellorship of the exchequer left vacant by the retire ment of Bonar Law. This was one of the temporary disappoint ments of Churchill's career. Churchill went to the Colonial Office (1921-22). Less in favour with Lloyd George and still unpopular with the Conservatives, he seemed to be drifting into extreme insecurity and isolation.
The downfall of the Coalition which seemed likely to complete his political ruin was in fact his salvation. After his rejection by Dundee (1922), Churchill had a period of retirement, during which he devoted himself to writing, painting and other pursuits. He now wrote the first volume of The World Crisis 1916-18 (published with the remaining volume in 1927), in which he expressed the opinion that the great allied offensives of 1915, 1916 and 1917 were wrongly conceived and costly operations and maintained his "Eastern front" thesis.
In March 1924 Churchill challenged attention by presenting himself as an independent anti-Socialist candidate at a by-election in the Westminster Abbey division. Backed by powerful Con servative support against the official nominee, he was only de feated by 4o votes on a very heavy poll. The idea of a strong Centre Party, combining Conservatives and Liberals against Socialism, had appealed strongly to him, but in the following September he was adopted as Conservative candidate for the Epping division. Elected to the House of Commons he obtained at last the post his father had held, being called to be chancellor of the exchequer in the second Baldwin administration (Nov. 1924). On April 28, 1925, he presented his first budget, his pro posals including a return to the gold standard, a new duty on silks, an extension of imperial preference, a reimposition of the McKenna duties, provision for pensions for widows and a re duction of the tax on earned incomes. His second budget (1926) was less striking; the salient feature was the extension of the McKenna duties to cover commercial motor vehicles, and the reimposition for ten years of those key industry duties due to expire. In the budget of 1927 he marked time, but in 1928 he put forward historic proposals for the readjustment of rating; industry in distressed districts was to be relieved of part of its heavy burden from the proceeds of new taxes imposed. The years of Churchill's chancellorship saw the progressive settle ment of outstanding war debts questions and other important readjustments in national finance. He left office in June 1929.