Early 1950s Winston Churchill's "The Second World War" Complete Volume Set : EBTH View More Items from Jewelry, Fashion, Décor & More Early 1950s Winston Churchill's "The Second World War" Complete Volume Set Wednesday, October 5th 2016 @ 10:09pm EDT Ended Wednesday, October 5th 2016 @ 10:09pm EDT Ended Item Details A six volume book set of Winston Churchill’s The Second World War. This set published by the Houghton Mifflin Company features The Gathering Storm , copyright 1948; Their Finest Hour, copyright 1949; The Grand Alliance, copyright 1950; The Hinge of Fate, copyright 1950; Closing the Ring, copyright 1951; and Triumph and Tragedy, copyright 1953. Also included is a nearly complete mid 1940s set of Pictorial History of the Second World War by Wm. H. Wise and Co. This set is missing volume six. The Second World War by Churchill, Winston S The Second World War.

CHURCHILL, Winston S. London: Cassell & Co. Ltd.,, 194854. [The Gathering Storm; Their Finest Hour; The Grand Alliance; The Hinge of Fate; Closing the Ring; Triumph and Tragedy.] 6 volumes, octavo. Finely bound by the Chelsea Bindery in dark blue morocco, titles gilt to spines, raised bands, single ruled gilt panel to compartments with rampant lion device gilt to the first, fifth and sixth, single rule to boards, autograph block to front boards, twin rule to turn-ins, burgundy endpapers, gilt edges. With diagrams and tables throughout the text. The occasional minor blemish, an excellent set in fine bindings. First editions, first impressions of the single most important historical account of the Second World War. Signed and dated 1950 by Churchill to the half-title of volume 2.

Max Beloff observed that there was no statesman of the twentieth century "whose retrospective accounts of the great events in which he has taken part have so dominated subsequent historical thinking." A man who had always primarily made his living by his pen, Churchill was the only major war leader to give an authoritative account of the conflict, and his ringing phrases seeped into the collective memory. As J. H. Plumb noted in his essay in A. J. P. Taylor's Churchill: Four Faces and the Man "Churchill the historian lies at the very heart of all historiography of the Second World War, and will always remain there [we still] move down the broad avenues which he drove through war's confusion and complexity." The Second World War. CHURCHILL, Winston S. London: Cassell & Co. Ltd.,, 194854. 6 volumes, octavo. Original black cloth, titles gilt to spines, top edge red, grey endpapers decorated with a design that alternates a lion rampant with the initials WSC. In the typographical dust jackets with background design as per the endpapers. Maps and diagrams, some folding.

Each volume with the bookplate of the Association of Men of Kent and Kentish Men. Top edges faded as usual, jackets a little rubbed, and a touch sunned at the spines, which are slightly crumpled at ends, but the cloth unspotted and the text-blocks clean, a very good set indeed. First editions, first impressions, except vol. II, which is the fourth edition of 1954; signed in full by the author on the half-title of vol. I and initialled in the same place in the others, for the Association of Men of Kent and Kentish Men, at the request of Wykeham Cornwallis, 2nd baron Cornwallis (18921982). Together with a one-page letter on the letterhead of La Pausa, Churchill's literary agent Emery Reves's house.

In the letter, dated 9 February 1956, Churchill tells Lord Cornwallis, president of the association, that he "would be happy to do as you ask", signing the set as requested, that he is "returning to England for some days on February 10, so perhaps you would let me have the books sometime before I leave the country again towards the end of this month", and concluding that he is "indeed complimented by the wish of Kent County Society" for him to sign the books. After he left office in 1955 Churchill spent long periods with Reves and his partner Wendy at their home in the Alpes-Maritime. On this occasion he was there for a month. "He returned for another 11 substantial visits during the next three and half years, a total of 54 weeks" (Jenkins, Churchill, p. 904), during which time he worked on the completion of English-Speaking Peoples.

At La Pausa, originally built by Churchill's friend Bendor, 2nd duke of Westminster, for his lover Coco Chanel, Churchill "was made an immensely welcome guest the central purpose of the Reveses' lives became the entertainment of Churchill", who much enjoyed "the poetic justice" of sharing in the "elegant luxury" which came from Reves's "highly profitable marketing of Churchill's post-war writings". An extremely appealing association copy, inscribed for a proud Man of Kent by an adoptive, but equally proud Kentish Man. Churchill had been smitten by the view across the Weald of Kent from Chartwell when he first visited in 1922, and the house and estate became one of the loves of his life, famously he declared that "A day away from Chartwell is a day wasted". Lord Cornwallis was born in Linton, east of the Medway. He is probably best remembered for his role in creating the County of Kent squadron of the RAF during the Battle of Britain.

Inspired by a meeting with Squadron Leader Bob Stanford Tuck when he was shot down over his home near Maidstone, Cornwallis established the Kent County Spitfire Fund, which raised £100,000 for the purchase of planes in a little over a year, which generosity he acknowledged with an exhortation to "remember that when you look upward to the skies, it may be your squadron that is defending the gateway of England and ask for God's blessing and protection for those glorious men who are riding on the wings of the White Horse of Kent". The Second World War. CHURCHILL, Winston S. London: Cassell & Co. Ltd.,, 194854. [The Gathering Storm; Their Finest Hour; The Grand Alliance; The Hinge of Fate; Closing the Ring; Triumph and Tragedy.] 6 volumes, octavo (206 x 136 mm). Contemporary fine binding by Maltby's of Oxford in red half morocco, twin blue-green morocco labels, raised bands with dotted rule gilt, compartments panelled in gilt, red cloth sides, top edges gilt, marbled endpapers. With diagrams and tables throughout the text. A fine set.

First editions, first impressions, of Churchill's masterpiece, the single most important historical account of the Second World War. As Max Beloff observed, there was no statesman of the twentieth century "whose retrospective accounts of the great events in which he has taken part have so dominated subsequent historical thinking". A man who had always primarily made his living by his pen, Churchill was the only major war leader to give an authoritative account of the conflict, and his ringing phrases seeped into the collective memory. As J. H. Plumb noted: "Churchill the historian lies at the very heart of all historiography of the Second World War, and will always remain there [we still] move down the broad avenues which he drove through war's confusion and complexity. The Second World War: The Gathering Storm; Their Finest Hour; The Grand Alliance; The Hinge of Fate; Closing the Ring; Triumph and Tragedy. Churchill, Winston S London: Cassell & Co, 1948-54. First editions of Winston Churchill's masterpiece. Octavo, six volumes. Bound in three-quarters red morocco, gilt titles and tooling to the spine, top edge gilt, maps present. In fine condition.

"Winston Churchill himself affirmed that this is not history: this is my case" (Holmes, 285). Churchill was re-elected to the post of Prime Minister in 1951. "The Second World War is a great work of literature, combining narrative, historical imagination and moral precept in a form that bears comparison with that of the original master chronicler, Thucydides. It was wholly appropriate that in 1953 Churchill was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature" (Keegan). Named by Modern Library as one of the 100 best non-fiction books of the twentieth century. The Second World War: The Gathering Storm; Their Finest Hour; The Grand Alliance; The Hinge of Fate; Closing the Ring; Triumph and Tragedy. Copy Churchill, Winston S London: Cassell & Co, 1948-54. First editions of Winston Churchill's masterpiece. Octavo, six volumes. Bound in three-quarters green morocco, gilt titles and tooling to the spine, top edge gilt, maps present. In fine condition. "Winston Churchill himself affirmed that this is not history: this is my case" (Holmes, 285).

Churchill was re-elected to the post of Prime Minister in 1951. "The Second World War is a great work of literature, combining narrative, historical imagination and moral precept in a form that bears comparison with that of the original master chronicler, Thucydides. It was wholly appropriate that in 1953 Churchill was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature" (Keegan). Named by Modern Library as one of the 100 best non-fiction books of the twentieth century. The Second World War CHURCHILL, Winston S. London: Cassell & Co. Ltd.,, 194854. [The Gathering Storm; Their Finest Hour; The Grand Alliance; The Hinge of Fate; Closing the Ring; Triumph and Tragedy.] 6 volumes, octavo. Recent burgundy morocco, titles and decoration to spines gilt, rule to boards gilt, marbled endpapers, all edges gilt. With diagrams and tables throughout the text. The occasional minor blemish, an excellent set. First editions of Churchill's masterpiece, the single most important historical account of the Second World War.

As Max Beloff observed, there was no statesman of the twentieth century "whose retrospective accounts of the great events in which he has taken part have so dominated subsequent historical thinking". A man who had always primarily made his living by his pen, Churchill was the only major war leader to give an authoritative account of the conflict, and his ringing phrases seeped into the collective memory. As J. H. Plumb noted: "Churchill the historian lies at the very heart of all historiography of the Second World War, and will always remain there [we still] move down the broad avenues which he drove through war's confusion and complexity. The Second World War - 6 Volumes - Leatherbound - Complete Set All First Editions. Churchill, Winston S. London: Cassell and Co. Ltd. All are first editions. A very handsome set finely bound in half royal blue morocco and blue cloth stamped in bright gilt. Truslove and Hanson binding of Clifford Street and Bond Street West with their small stamp in each volume. Two bright red leather labels with title, subtitle and author on spine of each volume. 5 raised bands on spine. All 8vo 8 1/2" x 6". Top page edges bright gilt.

Marbled endpages. Volume 1: "The Gathering Storm" "First Published 1948" on copyright page. xv, 640 pages. Volume 2: "Their Finest Hour" "First Published 1949" on copyright page. xvii, 684 pages. Volume 3: "The Grand Alliance" "First Published 1950" on copyright page. xviii, 818 pages. Volume 4: "The Hinge of Fate" "First Published 1951" on copyright page. xviii, 917 pages. Volume 5: " Closing the Ring" "First Puiblished 1952 on copyright page. xviii, 673 pages. Volume 6: "Triumph and Tragedy" "First published 1954" on copyright page. xviii, 716 pages. Appendices. Facsimile messages. Many maps and diagrams. Index in each volume. A great set. Tightly bound.

Volume one has a bookplate and gift inscription of previous owner dated XMAS 1948 on free endpaper otherwise clean and sharp. A beautiful set. All in very nice Fine condition. . The Second World War (6 volume set) CHURCHILL, Winston S Cassell, 1948-01-01. First Edition. Hardcover. Like New/Like New. Comprising: The Gathering Storm (Vol 1); Their Finest Hour (Vol 2); The Grand Alliance (Vol 3); The Hinge of Fate (Vol 4); Closing the Ring (Vol 5); Triumph and Tragedy (Vol 6). London: Cassell & Co., Ltd., (1948-54). 1st Editions, 1st printings. Original cloth, original dust jackets. Six volumes. Books remarkably fine, with spine gilt extremely bright. Top edge stains are somewhat faded with Vol. 6 unfaded. Dust jackets in outstanding condition with volume titles strong on all spines (very rare with this set). An extraordinary set! THE SECOND WORLD WAR Churchill, Winston S. London: Cassell & Company Ltd. 6 Volumes.

Vol.1 - 1948, The Gathering Storm; 724 pages. Vol.2 - 1949, Their Finest Hour, 683 pages. Vol.3 - 1950, The Grand Alliance, 818 pages. Vol.4 - 1951, The Hinge of Fate, 917 pages. Vol.5 - 1952, Closing the Ring, 673 pages. Vol. 6 - 1954, Triumph and Tragedy, 716 pages. Several maps and diagrams throughout. Beautifully bound in black half leather with marbled boards, raised bands, gilt titles, gilt trim and gilt illustration of lions on spine are sharp in colour. Top edge pale red. Inside pages are clean and white. Books are tight. Top right corner of spine on volume 6 has a small dark spot. VG+.. Leather. Very Good+. SECOND WORLD WAR Churchill, Winston S London: Cassell & Company Ltd. 6 Volumes. Vol.1 - 1948, The Gathering Storm; 724 pages.

Vol.2 - 1949, Their Finest Hour, 683 pages. Vol.3 - 1950, The Grand Alliance, 818 pages. Vol.4 - 1951, The Hinge of Fate, 917 pages. Vol.5 - 1952, Closing the Ring, 673 pages. Vol. 6 - 1954, Triumph and Tragedy, 716 pages. Several maps and diagrams throughout. Beautifully bound in black half leather with marbled boards, raised bands, gilt titles, gilt trim and gilt illustration of lions on spine are sharp in colour. Top edge pale red. Inside pages are clean and white. Books are tight. Top right corner of spine on volume 6 has a small dark spot. VG+.. Leather. Very Good+. The Second World War. CHURCHILL, Winston S. London: The Educational Book Company Ltd,, [1955]. 6 volumes, octavo. Original quarter blue morocco on blue linen boards, titles gilt to spine, compartment panels formed of triple fillet gilt, marbled endpapers, blue top-stain.

Coloured frontispiece to each, and 185 half-tone plates, numerous maps, plans and diagrams, many of them folding; title pages printed within red ruled borders. Spines slightly sunned and lightly creased in top compartments, a few marks to some covers, touch of foxing to fore-edges otherwise a very good set. The Chartwell Edition, not in the standard red cloth, but in the uncommon deluxe binding of "moderate blue" quarter morocco. Issued on the completion of the first edition (194854) of Churchill's masterly account of the Second World War, this edition includes the author's last revisions and is also fully illustrated. It was published at 19 guineas, or £21 by subscription, as against the standard binding at £12 9s 6d or 13 guineas by subscription. The Second World War: The Gathering Storm; Their Finest Hour; The Grand Alliance; The Hinge of Fate; Closing the Ring; Triumph and Tragedy. Churchill, Winston S London: Cassell & Co, 1948-54. First editions of Churchill's World War II masterpiece. Six volumes.

Octavo, original black cloth. Each are near fine in very good near fine dust jackets. "Winston Churchill himself affirmed that this is not history: this is my case" (Holmes, 285). Churchill was re-elected to the post of Prime Minister in 1951. "The Second World War is a great work of literature, combining narrative, historical imagination and moral precept in a form that bears comparison with that of the original master chronicler, Thucydides. It was wholly appropriate that in 1953 Churchill was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature" (Keegan). The Second World War (Complete Set) Churchill, Winston S. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1983. Chartwell Edition. All six volumes are in fine condition in recent 1/2 blue leather and light tan cloth covered boards with gilt text on the spine and a recessed paper label on the front boards. The end papers are decorated with maps of Europe and the Pacific theater. All volumes are octavos measuring 9 by 6 inches with a light yellow stain to the top edges of the text blocks.

This stain and the absence of the blind embossed dot at the lower corner of the rear boards distinguishes this set as not being one of the more frequently seen Book-of-The-Month Club printings. The set includes: Vol. I is The Gathering Storm, with 784 pages; Vol. II is Their Finest Hour, with 751 pages, The Grand Alliance, with 903 pages is volume III; Vol. IV is The Hinge of Fate, with 1000 pages; Volume V is Closing the Ring, with 749 pages; and, Volume VI is Triumph and Tragedy, with 800 pages. An extremely clean and handsome set with no prior owner's names, dates or notations. The Second World War. CHURCHILL, Winston S. London: The Educational Book Company Ltd.,, [1955]. 6 volumes, large octavo. Original red cloth, brown leather labels to the spines, portrait medallion embossed on similar leather to the upper boards, gilt panels to the spines, volume titles gilt to the upper boards, dark red top-edge and endpapers.

Coloured frontispiece to each, and 185 half-tone plates, numerous maps, plans and diagrams, many of them folding. Spines lightly sunned, a few scuffs to labels, one lower corner of volume VI bumped. An excellent set. The Chartwell Edition, issued on the completion of the first edition (194854) of Churchill's masterly account of the Second World War, includes the author's last revisions and is also fully illustrated. It was published at £12 9s 6d or 13 guineas by subscription, the standard Cassell edition cost a total of £8 on first publication. The Gathering Storm by Winston Churchill, First Edition - AbeBooks The Gathering Storm by Winston Churchill, First Edition You Searched For: Results (1 - 30) of 57 1 Published by Bantam, U.S.A.

(1977) Used Soft cover First Edition Quantity Available: 1 Published by Penguin, London (1960) Used Paperback First Edition ISBN 10: 0395075378 ISBN 13: 9780395075371 Used Hardcover First Edition Destination, Rates & Speeds Item Description: cassell & co. Hardcover. Book Condition: COLLECTIBLE. No jacket. First Edition. Hardcover; English language; No jacket; First Edition; a fair reading copy. Your book will be securely packed and promptly dispatched from our UK warehouse. For buyers outside the UK we now offer significantly lower rates on our airmail shipping. Bookseller Inventory # 11707dco026 Published by The Reprint Society, London (1949) Used Hardcover First Edition Destination, Rates & Speeds Item Description: The Reprint Society, London, 1949. Cream Cloth Minor Foxing. Book Condition: Very Good + (AVERAGE). No Jacket. Not Illustrated (illustrator). This Edition 1951 Four Impression. Please Email for further details.

Size: 8vo - over 7¾" - 9¾". Not Signed or Inscribed. HARDBACK. Bookseller Inventory # 567037 Published by Cassell, London (1949) Used Hardcover First Edition Destination, Rates & Speeds Item Description: Cassell, London, 1949. Black Cloth. Book Condition: Very Good (AVERAGE). No Jacket. Not Illustrated (illustrator). New Revised and Reset Edition. .FEEL FREE TO E-MAIL FOR PHOTOGRAPHS AND FURTHER DETAILS. Size: 8vo - over 7¾" - 9¾". Not Signed or Inscribed. HARDBACK. Bookseller Inventory # 1003201 Winston S. Churchill / Timothy Baker Published by The Reprint Society, London (1953) Used Hardcover First Edition Destination, Rates & Speeds Item Description: The Reprint Society, London, 1953. Pale Yellow Cloth. Book Condition: VERY GOOD ( AVERAGE). No Jacket. Not Illustrated (illustrator). Ninth Impression. Grubby boards and page edges.POSTED AT OUR STANDARD RATES AND FULLY INSURED!

(UK ONLY) .Please e-mail for further details. Size: 8vo - over 7¾" - 9¾". Signed By a "Dalgety , Passara 1954". HARDBACK. Bookseller Inventory # 011718 Published by Cassell, London (1948) Used Hardcover First Edition Destination, Rates & Speeds Item Description: Cassell, London, 1948. Cloth. Book Condition: Good. Dust Jacket Condition: No DJ. 1st Edition. 1ST EDITION, 8VO, HARDCOVER NO DUST JACKET, 640 PAGES. THE BOOK IS IN GOOD CONDITION WITH SOME SHELFWEAR AND BUMPING TO EDGES. INTERIOR CLEAN AND TIGHT. BLUE CLOTH. Size: 8vo. Hardcover. Bookseller Inventory # 022687 Destination, Rates & Speeds Item Description: Cassell, 1948. Hard Cover. Book Condition: Good. No Jacket. 8vo - over 7¾" - 9¾" tall. Cassell, 1948. 1st Australian edition.

hardcover no dustwrapper.xv, 640pp. fold-out map. 8vo. Good Foxing to closed-edges and prelims. Spine faded. Boards chipped at edges. Name to htp. Bookseller Inventory # 129487 Published by Cassell & Co Ltd, London (1948) Used Hardcover First Edition Destination, Rates & Speeds Item Description: Cassell & Co Ltd, London, 1948. Black Cloth. Book Condition: Very Good Minor Foxing. No Jacket. Maps & Diagrams (illustrator). First Edition. There Are Also Some Small Stains To The Edge Of The Boards.Please Email For Further Details Size: 8vo - over 7¾" - 9¾". Not Signed or Inscribed. Hardback. Bookseller Inventory # 559752 Published by Houghton Mifflin Company/Thomas Allen Limited, Toronto, ON, Canada (1948) Used Hardcover First Edition Destination, Rates & Speeds Item Description: Houghton Mifflin Company/Thomas Allen Limited, Toronto, ON, Canada, 1948. Hardcover. Book Condition: Good. 1st.

Red cloth boards with gilt lettering and black graphic. FIRST CANADIAN EDITION. There is a 1 cm. tear at the top of the spine, otherwise the book is in Very Good condition. Previous owner's name on the front free page. Two books in one - Book One "From War To War 1919 - 1939" and Book Two "The Twilight War September 3, 1939 - May 10, 1940". 784 pages. Weight over 1 lb. Bookseller Inventory # 8357 Published by Cassell, London (1948) Used Hardcover First Edition Destination, Rates & Speeds Item Description: Cassell, London, 1948. Hard Cover. Book Condition: Good. No Jacket. First Edition. The first volume of Churchill's memoirs is devoted to the examination of events which led Britain to a point where war with Germany became more or less inevitable; to the drama surrounding the actual outbreak; and to the first seven months which ended in him becoming Prime Minister. Good clean hardback which has previous owner's bookplate on front pastedown and previous owner's name on front endpaper. .

A little foxing to page edges but text block is clean. 640 pages including index. No dustjacket. Size: 8vo. Bookseller Inventory # 060381 Used Soft cover First Edition Quantity Available: 1 Destination, Rates & Speeds Item Description: Cassell, 1948. Hardcover. Book Condition: Near Fine. Dust Jacket Condition: Very Good. 1st Edition. 8vo - over 7¾ - 9¾" tall. Fist edition, first printing. A very decent example of this title. There is very slight spotting to the fore-edge and the d / w. has slight edgewear and tiny loss to top of spine. Bookseller Inventory # 000515 Published by Cassell And Co Ltd, London (1948) Used Hardcover First Edition Destination, Rates & Speeds Item Description: Cassell And Co Ltd, London, 1948. Hard Cover. Book Condition: Good. No Jacket. First Edition. 640 pages. Book is in general good condition. There is some light reading wear present, but still a presentable copy. The only exception is a small inscription to the inside page.

Bookseller Inventory # 120534 Published by Cassell and Company, Ltd, London (1948) Used Hardcover First Edition Destination, Rates & Speeds Item Description: Cassell and Company, Ltd, London, 1948. Book Condition: fair to good. First U.K. Edition. 640, maps, appendices, errata, index, small stains to boards, slight darkening to text. This book starts with the interwar years (1919-1939), and goes through the twilight war (September 3, 1939-May 10, 1940). Bookseller Inventory # 56447 Published by Cassell & Book Society (1948) Used Hardcover First Edition Published by The Educational Book Company., London (1954) Used Hardcover First Edition Destination, Rates & Speeds Item Description: The Educational Book Company., London, 1954. Hardcover. Book Condition: Very Good. No Jacket. 1st Edition. 4to - over 9¾ - 12" tall.

First Edition:First Printing:Book Condition:A Very Good copy, gently bumped and rubbed top and bottom of the spine, top of page edges a deep maroon colour, title label on spine worn, internally very clean and bright, tight binding. Bookseller Inventory # 001888 Published by Heron Books, London (1967) Used Hardcover First Edition Destination, Rates & Speeds Item Description: Heron Books, London, 1967. Hard Cover. Book Condition: Very Good. No Jacket. Ninth Edition. Marbled cloth, brown leatherette spine with gilt decoration. Gilt profile of Winston Churchill on front cover. Yellow ribbon bookmark attached. 396pp. includes Appendices & Index. B/w illustrations & Maps. Illustrations researched and selected by Roger Jean Segalat. Dust spotting to top edge. Slightly bruised corners. Contents clean and tight. Stated theme of the book is how the English-speaking peoples through their unwisdom carelessness and good nature allowed the wicked to rearm. Size: 8vo - over 7¾" - 9¾" tall.

Bookseller Inventory # 000432 More Information About This Seller | Ask Bookseller a Question 18. Bookseller Image The Second ( 2nd ) World War: Gathering Storm; Their Finest Hour; Grand Alliance; Hinge of Fate; Closing the Ring; Triumph and Tragedy ---book 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 ( volume i, ii, iii, iv, v, vi ) Churchill, Winston S. ( Spencer ) Published by N.Y. / New York: Bantam Books, 1961 and 1962, 1st Bantam Editions, First Printing for all, New York, NY (1962) Used Soft Cover First Edition Quantity Available: 1 Destination, Rates & Speeds Item Description: N.Y. / New York: Bantam Books, 1961 and 1962, 1st Bantam Editions, First Printing for all, New York, NY, 1962. Soft Cover. Book Condition: Good. Photo Cover (illustrator). First Printing.

----------6 volumes, paperbacks, all are solid Good copies, all in uniform format and condition, some cover and spine creases, a bit of rubbing but overall tight copies,somewhat scarce as all of these are the 1st BANTAM printings, ----truly a monumental work, 713, 652, 777, 873, 653 and 683 pages, overseas shipping (outside of Canada and the USA ) will require additional postage, any image directly beside this listing is the actual book and not a generic photo. Not Signed. Bookseller Inventory # 152388 Published by Cassell & Company, London (1948) Used Hardcover First Edition Destination, Rates & Speeds Item Description: Cassell & Company, London, 1948. Hardcover. Book Condition: Very Good. Dust Jacket Condition: Poor. 1st Edition. 8vo - over 7¾ - 9¾" tall. First edition first printing. Hardback book is tight clean and square. Boards sharp and clean, gilt perfect. Text block with toning to edges, pink top edge faded, fore edge has light markings.

Feels lightly read. Bump to head and foot of spine, very good condition. Jacket poor front and rear panels present, spine missing. This copy is not ex-lib, not priced clipped and has no inscriptions. This book is fitted with a non adhesive archival quality book protector to make a quality addition to your collection. Note we do not use stock images, the book pictured is the book described. Please note : this book is very heavy (1250g) all overseas purchasers may be charged additional shipping. Please contact bookseller for exact price. A solid copy of the first volume of Churchill's classic text. To browse the rest of our extensive Churchill and related listings search using the keyword: Durdchurch. Bookseller Inventory # 001952 Destination, Rates & Speeds Item Description: Cassell & Co, London England, 1948. Cloth. Book Condition: Very Good. Dust Jacket Condition: Fair. First Edition. First Edition Hardback The Second World War. 1. The Gathering Storm. wear and tear to D/J water stain to bottom edge This is the first of twelve books which together make up the Sir Winston Churchil's classic memoirs, The History of the Second World War.

Here, full and unabridged, is the greatest Englishman of our time, describing in unforgettable words the follies which brought about the most terrible war known to mankind, and the sacrifices, determination and matchless courage by which it was brought to an end. Illustrated with B/W photos. (We carry a wide selection of titles in The Arts, Theology, History, Politics, Social and Physical Sciences. academic and scholarly books and Modern First Editions ,and all types of Academic Literature.) Size: 12mo - over 6¾" - 7¾" tall. Hardback. Bookseller Inventory # 096474 Destination, Rates & Speeds Item Description: Cassell and Co, 1948. Hardcover. Book Condition: Very good. Dust Jacket Condition: Very good. First edition.

VGC.Cassell and Co,1948.First UK edition-first impression.Volume I.Black hardback(gilt lettering to the spine,a couple of small nicks and dent on the edges of the cover and spine) with Dj (very small tear,some nicks and creases on the Dj cover),both in VGC.Illustrated with b/w maps,colour,b/w drawings,tables.Nice and clean pages with a couple of small ink marks on the outer edges,a couple of small creases and ink marks on the edges of the pages.The book is in VGC for its age with light shelf wear inside the edges of the Dj cover.670pp in total including List of maps and diagrams,appendices A to R,index.Price un-clipped.A collectable first edition.Volume II to V also available.Heavy book (approx 1.1 Kg). Bookseller Inventory # 8715 Churchill’s Workshop | Hoover Institution Churchill’s Workshop In Command of History: Churchill Fighting and Writing the Second World War. Random House. 631 pages. $35.00. Churchill’s wartime memoir, the six-volume The Second World War, is among the most influential works of history of all time.

From boyhood, one remembers the great set pieces from the abbreviated one-volume edition: His description of the fall of France, where outside in the garden of the Quai d’Orsay feeble French officials were pushing wheelbarrows of archives onto bonfires; the calm efficiency of the operations room of Fighter Command at the height of the Battle of Britain; his telegrams to fdr signed “Former Naval Person”; the sinking of the Bismarck; and, of course, his reaction to Pearl Harbor. With the memoirs, Churchill decided how we see World War ii, shaping its content, structuring it. With the individual titles, he provided the war with its shorthand vocabulary. The Gathering Storm, Their Finest Hour, The Grand Alliance, The Hinge of Fate, Closing the Ring, Triumph and Tragedy.

Unforgettably, on the title page of each volume he set out the principles that ought to guide every democratic war effort: “in war: resolution, in defeat: defiance, in victory: magnaminity, in peace: good will.” Volume One, The Gathering Storm, taught us “how the English speaking peoples through their unwisdom, carelessness and good nature allowed the wicked to rearm.” And in the great rolling cadences of his prose, with their echoes of Gibbon, Shakespeare, and the Old Testament, you can hear his voice. Appearing between 1948 and 1954, The Second World War was the world’s most popular publishing venture after the Bible. Running at some two million words, of course the books were not read by everybody who bought them. But millions read the one-volume version or excerpts in serialization in Life magazine, the New York Times, and the Daily Telegraph. The books were hailed as the “literary event of our generation, possibly of the century,” earning their author the Nobel prize for literature; and he was acclaimed greater than William Pitt the elder, the victor of the Seven Years War, and greater than Lloyd George, the victor of World War I.

At the time it was assumed that the books were the work of one man. A typical review of The Gathering Storm — this one from Newsweek — read, “the tremendous personality of the author glowers and shines in almost every sentence.” “One of the most engaging things is that he wrote it himself,” added the New Yorker. By contrast, the magazine noted, “when we read the speeches and public papers of Roosevelt, it is hard to know whom we have hold of.” And one critic wondered how Churchill managed it all at his age “through all the accumulated perils of brandy and black cigars.” We now know that things were a little more complicated. In his absorbing study, In Command of History: Churchill Fighting and Writing the Second World War, from which the above review quotes are taken, David Reynolds tells the story of how these books came to be and of what he calls Churchill’s “second wilderness years.” Reynolds is a professor of international history at Cambridge University, and his is the most delightful Churchill book since Martin Gilbert’s 1994 In Search of Churchill.

As Reynolds’s book opens, we find Churchill lolling in the waters of the Mediterranean in July 1945, enjoying his first holiday in the south of France since taking over the leadership in 1940, “‘floating like a benevolent hippo,’” as his private secretary Jock Colville puts it. Confidently awaiting the result of the general election that had taken place on July 5, he was reminiscing about the war and preparing himself for meetings with Stalin and Truman in Potsdam. In the middle of the Potsdam conference, he briefly flew back to London to hear the election returns, expecting to be back at the conference within a day. He was in for a rude awakening. When the result of the election was announced July 26, he had been thrown out of office in one of the worst defeats in Conservative history. Labour’s Clement Attlee was Britain’s new prime minister. If there is a moment that proves that one should not expect gratitude in politics, this is it. Churchill’s wife, Clementine, tried to console him, suggesting that this might be a blessing in disguise.

To this he growled, “At the moment it seems quite effectively disguised” and went into a deep funk. “I cannot explain how it is but in the misery we seem instead of clinging to each other, to be always having scenes. I’m sure it is all my fault, but I am finding life more than I can bear. He is so unhappy and that makes him very difficult,” Clementine wrote to her daughter. But, Churchill being Churchill, he soon started preparing for his comeback. A two-pronged plan emerged, where each line of attack would reinforce the other: One was to play the role of international statesman and visionary, giving speeches and warning against the dangers of communism. The high points were the Fulton, Missouri speech of 1946 on the Iron Curtain and the speech in Zurich that same year about the tragedy of Europe, in which he advocated a “United States of Europe.” The other was to cement his reputation as Britain’s wartime leader by writing his memoirs. According to Reynolds, criticism of him — designed to undermine that reputation — had already appeared in America.

Harry Butcher, an aide to General Eisenhower, had published My Three Years With Eisenhower in 1946, in which he revealed Churchill’s doubts about an invasion of France and his resentment of American “bullying” on the subject. The book also contained some unflattering descriptions of some of his eccentricities, including “slurping his soup to the accompaniment of loud gurglings” and calling out for new socks in the middle of the evening. Even more critical was As He Saw It by fdr’s son Elliott, who, claiming to speak for his father, accused Churchill of being haunted by memories of World War i and obsessing about the Balkans. Churchill knew there would be more to come, so it was a question of getting in his punches early by supplying the first draft of history. This is entirely in accordance with his view of history, namely that he who writes it wins the argument. In a 1932 debate with Stanley Baldwin in the House of Commons, Churchill had proclaimed: “History will say that the right honourable gentleman was wrong on this matter.

I know it will, because I shall write that history.” And in his view, not believing in an afterlife, this was the only way to ensure his immortality. “Words are the only thing that lasts forever,” he said. Publishers were salivating at the prospect. But certain obstacles had to be cleared away first. Churchill had received an offer from the American publishing house Houghton Mifflin of $1 million, the equivalent of £250,000, which, being a man of expensive tastes, he was eager to earn. But Britain’s punitive tax system would have had him paying 97.5 percent of it in taxes. “Under this system, in fact, I should only get 250,000 sixpences,” he said. “I agree with Dr. Johnson that only a blockhead writes except for money.” An ingenious solution was devised in which a trust could hold Churchill’s papers and sell them to the publishers without being liable to taxation. The publishers could then hire Churchill to write his book. The legal side of the matter was equally annoying.

Under Britain’s draconian secrecy laws, which prevented private researchers from getting access to government World War 11 papers until sometime in the twenty-first century, it was hard to write memoirs. When he had been prime minister, Churchill had been careful to grant exceptions to other ministers wishing to use their papers — among them one of his predecessors, Stanley Baldwin, whom he despised — thereby establishing a useful precedent. Throughout the war, he had his minutes and his telegrams to world leaders printed out every month and marked as “personal minutes” and “my personal telegrams.” When leaving office, he had the whole lot carted off to Chartwell, his country house in Kent. In his effort to publish his memoirs, Churchill secured the vital backing of the Cabinet Secretary, Sir Edward Bridges, who regarded the project as a sort of semiofficial British history and hence deserving of the government’s support. According to Reynolds, a deal was worked out between Churchill and Bridges by which he could keep his papers, but would agree to have the text approved. Houghton Mifflin won the U.S. rights, and in Britain Cassell and Company was the publisher. To this he added lucrative serialization deals.

Having fought these preliminary skirmishes, he now gathered around him a crack team of academics and military men to help him in the immense task ahead. The group, which became known as the Syndicate, consisted of Bill Deakin — an Oxford don who had worked for Churchill in the ’30s and who had been the liaison officer to Tito’s partisans in Yugoslavia; Sir Henry Pownall, the former vice chief of the Imperial General Staff; and Lord Ismay, the former military secretary to the cabinet. Commodore Gordon Allen, who had been senior naval officer at Combined Operations Headquarters, took care of naval matters, and Denis Kelly, a young barrister, was available for all tasks. In addition, a host of specialists were asked to contribute on specific topics on which they were knowledgeble. Thus, as Reynolds makes clear, rather than being an original work, this was a collaborative effort, and over time Churchill’s team learned to write in his style.

Commenting on Churchill’s wartime correspondence, his wartime secretary, Jock Colville, had once noted “how difficult it will be for future historians to know what is ‘genuine Churchill’ and what is ‘school of.’ We were all fairly good imitators of his epistolary style now.” The same came to apply to the members of the Syndicate, especially Bill Deakin. In Churchill’s own words, the memoirs were written “the way they built the Canadian Pacific Railway. First I lay the track from coast to coast, and after that I put in the stations.” The “track” consisted of his documents, wartime telegrams, and minutes, which formed the core of the books. The “stations” were his personal reminiscences, which sometimes, in a mellow after-dinner mood, he would dictate late at night to a secretary using a muffled typewriter, or they were the potted histories worked up by his assistants. To make it all come together, to “bulldoze” the work, as he put it, he would go for a brief working holiday every year in some exotic spot like Marrakesh or Monte Carlo with Life and the New York Times footing the bill.

On these working vacations, Churchill did most of the vacationing, painting a lot, while his assistants did most of the work. Yet at other times he was very engaged: The book supplies photographs of his work on the drafts, sharpening up the adjectives and adding dramatic suspense. He was very particular on the point of commas, chastising his former private secretary: “They should only come in when it is absolutely necessary to make the bloody fools understand.” Never the easiest of men, he drove his publishers up the wall with his constant revisions and tinkerings. His manuscripts were marked “Final — Subject to Full Freedom of Proof Correction,” and this veritable blitz of overtakes went on even at the stage where the pages were about to be bound. In a telegram to his boss at Houghton Mifflin, an American editor grumbled: “Author insists on reading proof. Cartographer in Brighton with nervous breakdown.” But this was Winston Churchill, and of course he got away with it. As Reynolds notes, what publisher was going to take on the man who had beaten Hitler?

After the first volume appeared, one more member was added to the team — Carlyle Wood, a proofreader who had worked for Churchill back in the ’30s on Marlborough and on The World Crisis, Churchill’s account of the First World War. For despite all the effort that had gone into it, The Gathering Storm contained many gaffes, the chief of which being a reference to the French army as “the poop of the life of France” instead of the “prop of the life of France,” a Freudian slip of a certain charm, perhaps, but serious nevertheless. Wood was a pedant of the first rank, as proofreaders can sometimes be, and Churchill called him “indefatigable, interminable, intolerable.” From volume two onward, Wood’s green pen is much in evidence, exhibiting what the other members referred to as “Wooding.” In his prefaces Churchill modestly stressed that these were the personal experiences of an individual. “I do not describe it as history, for that belongs to another generation,” he said, “but I claim with confidence that it is a contribution to history that will be of service to the future.” Modesty thus duly dispensed with, he proceeded to lay down the law.

But while stupendous in their breadth, the memoirs are not without flaws and omissions. Some of the problem is structural, arising from the constraints imposed on him by the government. Churchill had gotten permission to quote from his own papers, but Clement Attlee had been unwilling to let him quote from papers he had not himself originated, despite the warnings of Sir Edward Bridges that “Mr Churchill quotes so many of his own documents, that there is some danger of his creating the impression that no one but he ever took an initiative.” Though this impression cannot have been unwelcome to Churchill, he can hardly be blamed for sticking to the agreement. What he can be blamed for is the uneven quality of the memoirs. Due to the pressures of time and the demands of his job as leader of the opposition, and finally as prime minister once again, they vary a great deal in their narrative intensity. Volume one, The Gathering Storm, is generally regarded as the best. The origins and curious mindset of appeasement were clearly a topic close to Churchill’s heart, not least because of its renewed urgency vis-à-vis postwar Soviet behavior.

Here, notes Reynolds, and in volume two, Their Finest Hour, Churchill holds center stage, and the story of Britain and his own story are one. In the later volumes, with the war widening and Churchill’s influence waning, a constant refrain of his publishers and editors was that there were too many documents and too little Churchill. His standard defense of the inclusion of all this material was that “People say my speeches after Dunkirk were the thing. That was only part, but not the chief part. They forget I made all the main military decisions,” and the war-time minutes prove the point. This may be so, but as Reynolds notes, two-thirds of volume four, The Hinge of Fate, is documents, (four-fifths if one includes the appendices), which does seem excessive. Sometimes even his wife joined the critics, complaining that “The minutes are too wholesale and there is hardly any fresh stimulating material.” Of particular interest is the stuff Churchill left out, which, not surprisingly, tends to show him in a less than flattering light. Thus, missing from Their Finest Hour are cabinet discussions at the time of Dunkirk about a negotiated peace using Mussolini as a go-between.

Pressured by his foreign minister, Lord Halifax, Churchill at one point seemed to be willing to consider conceding Malta or Gibraltar or some African colonies if an accommodation with Hitler could be reached. This, of course, does not quite square with our image of him as the bedrock of anti-Nazi fortitude. Despite his public stance of imperturbability, privately Churchill was less than certain of the outcome. At one point he worried aloud to General Ismay that they “probably would be dead in three months time.” But he also realized that Britain was in a very poor bargaining position and that even the hint of using Mussolini would be terrible for morale. “One cannot easily make a bargain at the last gasp. Once we started the friendly mediation of the Duce, we should destroy our power for fighting on.” The whole idea was quickly dropped. But we should not let this glimpse of a less confident Churchill diminish him, Reynolds cautions. Instead of “the almost blindly pugnacious bulldog of popular stereotype,” we should see him as a normal human being, subject to normal fears. What mattered was that he was capable of overcoming his private doubts to project utter confidence. Certain things he had to leave out on national security grounds.

He could not mention Ultra and Britain’s secret codebreaking facility at Bletchley Park, which had managed to crack the German signals traffic and had been of vital importance for the British war effort, as it enabled them to know what the Germans were planning. The Brits did not want to alert the Russians to their codebraking skills. Furthermore, they did not want to allow a myth to grow in Germany that the Germans had been unfairly defeated. These were arguments Churchill understood better than anybody. Back in the ’20s, the Baldwin government, of which Churchill had been a member, had published Russian intercepts as a preliminary to breaking off diplomatic relations with the Soviets. The Russians immediately changed their codes, with the result that British intelligence was unable to read Soviet signals until 1944. An especially intriguing point is Churchill’s relations with his military advisers, which he presents in the memoirs as rosier than they were. One who suffered most bitterly was the Chief of the Imperial General Staff, General Alan Brooke, who later became Lord Alanbrooke. A notation in his diary reads: “I don’t think I can stand much more of it.

My God, how tired I am of working for him.” Churchill had casually deprived him of the role of commander of the allied invasion of France, which he had been promised, and in retirement Lord Alanbrooke became one of Churchill’s severest critics. Churchill’s weaknesses as a commander-in-chief are well known. Always an admirer of military dash — he had been a cavalry officer, after all — Churchill had little patience for humdrum but rather necessary things like logistics. He was constantly meddling in operations, and he had too many crackpot ideas — his late-night brainstorming sessions were known as the “Midnight Follies” by his staff — that needed curbing. Reynolds calls him a man of “iron whim.” On the other hand, generals tend to be a cautious lot who want ideal circumstances in which to perform. Somebody needs to prod them on. Churchill certainly knew how to do that. There are occasional problems of emphasis in the later volumes, giving them a somewhat parochial perspective, and sometimes amounting to an outright distortion of the historical record.

In volume four, The Hinge of Fate, Reynolds notes, Churchill depicted the battles of Midway and El Alamein as the hinges of the war while giving Stalingrad short shrift (a mere four pages). Alamein was certainly important for the Brits — “Before Alamein we never had a victory. After Alamein we never had a defeat,” Churchill wrote — but its significance does tend to pale in comparison with Stalingrad. According to figures supplied by Reynolds, half a million Russians died in Stalingrad, and the Red Army killed 150,000 Germans and captured 91,000. At El Alamein the British 8th Army lost 13,500 men and took 30,000 Germans prisoner. The neglect of Stalingrad is no doubt explained by the Cold War — The Hinge of Fate was published at the time of the Korean War — which understandably was not the moment to be praising the Russians. On the vital topic of Overlord, the allied invasion of France, Churchill particularly wanted to prove that he had not been opposed to it, as certain factions in the United States alleged.

But, says Reynolds, he did not make a particularly good job of it. Though he had always paid lip service to Overlord as the keystone of Anglo-American cooperation, he saw as a fatal error the 1943 failure to exploit the Italian collapse by grabbing the Aegean islands and persuading Turkey to enter the war. Churchill’s problem with Overlord was not that he doubted the Allies could land in France; he worried what might occur between days 30 and 60 after the landings. Accordingly, he forwarded to Stalin a telegram he had received from Eisenhower’s headquarters. Three-fourths of the telegram, composed by General Harold Alexander, contained an exceedingly gloomy assessment of the Italian situatuion following German reinforcements, making a cross-Channel invasion impracticable. But Churchill deliberately omitted a fourth section, written by Eisenhower himself, containing a much more optimistic view of the future and of Overlord’s chances. In what Reynolds considers “one of the most blatant distortions of the memoirs,” Churchill included in Closing the Ring the pessimistic portion of the cable, but again excluded Ike’s more optimistic view. Having been forced to commit to Overlord, Churchill had at least arranged for it not to have a British commander.

In a draft version that did not appear in the final work, he wrote: “I had the fear that if a bloody and disastrous repulse were encountered, far bigger than the first day on the Somme in 1916, there might be an outcry in the United States, it would be said that another result would have attended the appointment of an American general.” Finally, with Triumph and Tragedy Churchill was prime minister again, and a number of political considerations had come into play in his relations with international leaders, making him pull his punches. While with The Gathering Storm the reader was meant to draw implicit parallels to the Soviet threat and the Korean War, in Triumph and Tragedy the overall aim was to strengthen ties with Washington and simultaneously try to reduce tension with Moscow. The result is duller history. One of Churchill’s aims in Triumph and Tragedy was to pin the responsibility for Yalta and its aftermath on the Americans — though letting Roosevelt off easy on the grounds that the president had been dying at Yalta. And on the final race toward Berlin he blamed the U.S. generals for thinking in purely military terms and for ceding Berlin to the Soviets.

But he could not criticize Eisenhower too directly, since Ike was now in the White House and Churchill did not want to damage the special relationship. Thus the line “Berlin, Prague and Vienna were needlessly yielded to the Soviets: Here may be discerned the tragedy of our triumph” ended up on the cutting room floor. But that was how he felt. Trying to reduce tensions with the new Soviet leadership made him go easy on Stalin and shift blame for Soviet behavior onto shadowy “men behind him” and to the marshals. This is of course nonsense; Stalin had always been calling the shots in Moscow. With the working methods, priorities and flaws of the memoirs having thus been laid bare by Reynolds, what does this do to our view of Churchill’s genius? Since the Romantics’ day, we have been operating with the notion of the writer or artist as a lonely, anti-social and half-crazed individual, who produces his masterworks from the great solitude of a rat-infested garret. This was clearly not Churchill’s way.

Reynolds quotes Syndicate member Denis Kelly as saying: “I am often asked: ‘How much of his books did he really write himself?’ It’s almost as superficial a question as asking a master Chef: ‘Did you cook the whole banquet with your own hands.’” Reynolds himself compares Churchill to the head of a modern research group. A more apt comparison would perhaps be to the methods of a baroque master painter like Rubens, who ran a workshop. A contemporaneous description of his opulent house in Antwerp shows Rubens presiding over a swarm of assistants while he has Tacitus read aloud to him and dictates a letter to a secretary. In the main room, a group of young painters sit working out his concepts until the last minute, when the master moves in and adds the finishing touches. While there are weak spots, Churchill’s memoirs are a work on a Rubensian scale: The ideas and the directions are his, and his creative spirit suffuses them from start to finish.

Question: What's missing: The Gathering Storm, The Grand Alliance, The Hinge of Fate, Closing the Ring, Triumph and Tragedy
Answer: Their Finest Hour