If Great Britain goes down Roosevelt said, all of us in all the Americas would be living at the point of a gun. Then in early August, determined to do more for the British, Roosevelt headed out to see for a secret rendezvous in U-boat infested waters. Under cover of darkness, he slipped away from reporters, boarded an American warship, and headed north to meet the British battleship The Prince of Wales. On board was Winston Churchill. The course of the war would be determined by the convergence of these two extraordinary personalities. I was told as a deathless secret that this meeting was going to happen. It was perfectly clear to my father, perhaps also to the President, that of course it did matter very much whether they would see eye to eye. Churchill, his bodyguard later reported, was as excited as a schoolboy. At stake, the Prime Minister believed was the fate of Western civilization. The President was also on edge. He was not used to sharing the stage with any man, and Churchill was already a legend. A Roosevelt aide who knew both men, worried about a clash of primadanas. With the Navy band playing the stars and stripes forever, Churchill came aboard the American ship. At last Roosevelt said, we've gotten together. They talked for four days. Two Titanic egos each taking the others measure. Churchill was determined to bind the Americans ever more firmly to the British cause. Roosevelt was wary. He was unwilling to ask Congress for declaration of war without the rock-solid support of the American people. But he was searching for some way to help Great Britain before it was too late. What Churchill needed to do was to convince Roosevelt that Britain was not going to give up. And what Roosevelt was saying to Churchill was, I understand what your needs are. I understand the importance of the danger to us, both of us, from Adolf Hitler and Reagan stand together against this monster. On Sunday, Roosevelt was carried on board the British battleship for a morning service. If nothing else had happened while we were here, Roosevelt told an aide, that joint service will have cemented us. All the ship's companies all mixed up and sharing the hem sheets and everything. And it really did seem rather wonderful and very moving. My father sat with the President. I mean, normally he would have stood during such a service, but he and the President sat and everybody else stood on the quarter deck. My father chose the hymns very carefully, his favorites. The same language, the same hymns Churchill said later. It was a great hour to live. It was sort of like a beam of brilliant sunshine, like a genuine ray of hope. And of course, now it's, I find anguishing looking at those photographs because three months later, the Prince of Wales was under the waves with its entire ship's company. As the two men parted, a message flashed from the British battleship to the American cruiser. That blessed the President and the people of the United States. When Churchill returned to England, he told his cabinet that Roosevelt had made a secret promise that he would wage war against Nazi Germany, but not declare it. Everything was to be done to force an incident. Roosevelt would find his incident in the cold waters of the North Atlantic. By the middle of 1941, Nazi U-boats had sunk over 1,500 British ships, all but cutting England's lifeline to America.