Tom Richmond: Churchill led from front in fight for freedom “AFTER Churchill had gone from under the vast dome of St Paul’s, borne out on the shoulders of the sweating Guardsmen, we wept for ourselves, wondering how much of our island greatness had gone with him, and how little might now remain.” So observed The Yorkshire Post with the downcast melancholy that was emblematic of the sorrowful national sentiment 50 years ago when the country gathered at St Paul’s Cathedral, a lingering beacon of hope and defiance as London withstood the Blitz, to pay its last respects to Sir Winston Churchill – that indefatigable voice of courage and counsel as Britain fought for its survival at the height of the Second World War. Voted the greatest ever Briton in a nationwide poll in 2002, ahead of engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel and Diana, Princess of Wales, whose surprising elevation to third place was driven by the prevailing anti-royal sentiment that has since been reversed, reverence for the “Old Warrior” has grown with the passage of time while respect for more recent leaders has plunged. The absence of Churchillian orators in the Houses of Parliament also explains this outburst by 80-year-old Austin Mitchell, the outgoing Great Grimsby MP. “Politics is no longer [...] leedsinnews/tom-richmond-churchill-led-from-front-in-fight-for-freedom/
Posted on: Thu, 22 Jan 2015 07:02:40 +0000
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