Courage, Honor, Truth: Lifelong Watchwords of Winston Churchill

Brunswick welcomed British historian and biographer Andrew Roberts — Lehrman Institute Distinguished Fellow at the New-York Historical Society and Visiting Professor at the War Studies Department at King’s College, London — to Baker Theater on Tuesday, December 8.
 
Roberts has written or edited 12 books and is an accomplished public speaker, delivering the White House Lecture in 2007, as well as speaking at Oxford, Cambridge, Yale, Princeton, and Stanford universities.
 
In 2012, he was awarded the William Penn Prize: Former recipients include President Ulysses S. Grant, Gen. George C. Marshall, and Walt Whitman.
 
Roberts, a renowned Winston Churchill scholar, is this year’s Louise Lehrman Visiting Senior Fellow.
 
The Fellowship, established in 2013 by a gift from the Lehrman Institute, engages experts in American History to visit Brunswick, instilling in students a greater understanding of the rights, privileges, and duties of American citizenship.  
 
Roberts began his address by citing a passage from Churchill’s autobiography, My Early Life: 1874–1904, in which the British statesmen recalled the day — May 10, 1940 — he became his country’s prime minister.
 
“I felt as if I were walking with destiny and all my past life had been but a preparation for this hour and this trial,” Churchill wrote.
 
Roberts set out to examine — through the prism of Churchill’s early life and his autobiography — the extent to which his youth, indeed, served as preparation for his political career in Britain.
 
“It shows stories of leadership, stories of character, and stories of moral courage that came from the many vicissitudes that Churchill experienced in life,” Roberts explained.
 
Roberts asked the audience of Brunswick Upper School students and faculty to focus on the effect Churchill’s family life had on his psychological development, his powerful sense of not having much time in life, and his extraordinary lust for adventure — along with his intense competitiveness, his brilliant sense of humor, and how incredibly accident-prone he was.
 
“From the ages of 20 to 25, those are the years,” Churchill wrote. “Don’t be content with things as they are. You’ll make all kinds of mistakes. But as long as you’re generous and true and also fierce, you cannot hurt the world or seriously distress her. She was made to be wooed and won by youth.”
 
“When he came to the premiership in May 1940 at age 65,” Roberts explained, “he came as a fully formed leader, possessed of all the attributes and personality traits necessary for this hour and this trial.”
 
He came with physical and moral courage, a fierce commitment to his own and his country’s honor, and a fearlessness to speak the truth.
 
“Courage, Honor, and Truth: These were the lifelong watchwords of Winston Churchill,” Roberts concluded. 
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