The Churchill War Papers: Never Surrender

In the first eight months of his prime ministership, Winston Churchill surmounted more crises than many leaders face in an entire career: a fast-disintegrating ground war in Europe as the German blitzkrieg overran Holland, Belgium, and France, and drove the British army to retreat and evacuate at Dunkirk; the consolidation of the German occupation of Norway and Denmark; an ongoing state of emergency at home as Britain struggled to modernize its army, navy, and air forces at breakneck speed; and the pivotal weeks of the Battle of Britain, the "finest hour" when Britain stood fast against the unremitting onslaught of the German Luftwaffe.

This extraordinary book brings these months before us in the diaries, memoranda, letters, telegrams, cabinet minutes, and speeches of Churchill and his closest colleagues. It puts us at Churchill's side in some of the most tumultuous events of world history and offers an unparalleled view of his leadership qualities and his flaws, as he organizes the war effort, bolsters morale, bullies those who stand in his way, schemes to outstrategize his own generals, and works tirelessly to involve the United States in the fight against Fascism. This is truly history as it was lived, in the war whose outcome formed the modern world.

Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965) was prime minister of Great Britain during World War I. Throughout his long and distinguished political career, his writing was prolific. Churchill received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1953.

Sir Martin Gilbert, the distinguished official biographer of Churchill, is a fellow at Merton College, Oxford. His impressive body of work includes Churchill: A Life, The Holocaust, and The Second World War: A Complete History. In 1995, he was knighted for services to British history and international relations, and in 2009, he was appointed to the British Government’s Iraq War Inquiry. He lives in London.