Churchill Documents - Volume 9 (ePub)

Through the documents in volume 9 of The Churchill Documents, editor Sir Martin Gilbert leads the reader on a fascinating journey from July 1919 to March 1921, covering a wide range of domestic and international affairs. Churchill's vivid personality is evident as each event unfolds-traced through private letters and secret Cabinet records. Martin Gilbert's explanatory notes, never obtrusive, illuminate both the individuals and the events during twenty-one dramatic months in history.

For Churchill, the period was dominated by the early problems of peace, the continued intervention in Russia against the Bolsheviks, the Russo-Polish war, terrorism and the search for conciliation in Ireland, revolt in Iraq, Britain's Palestine Mandate, and the future of Britain's position in the Middle East. His wife Clementine is an ever-present influence.

In the writing of the official biography of Sir Winston Churchill, Randolph Churchill-and later Sir Martin Gilbert, who took up the work following Randolph's death-had the full use of Sir Winston's letters and papers, and also many hundreds of private archives. The work spans eight volumes, detailing Churchill's youth and early adventures in South Africa and India, his early career, and his more than fifty years on the world stage. No other statesman of modern times-or indeed of any age-has left such a wealth of personal letters, such a rich store of private and public documentation, and such vivid memories in the minds of those who worked closest to him. Through these materials, assembled over the course of more than twenty years, one is able to know Churchill in a way never before possible. Churchill's personal papers are so extensive that it was only possible to include in the narrative volumes a part of the relevant documents. The volumes titled The Churchill Documents run parallel with the narrative volumes, and with them form a whole. The letters, documents, and correspondence contained within are drawn from the Churchill Papers, now at Churchill College, Cambridge, and from many other archival sources, both private and public.