In his Fake History, Otto English (né Andrew Scott) dismisses many of the books written about Churchill as full of “things [Churchill] never said”. He spends a good deal of his essay on Churchill debunking quotations and statements that have been misattributed to Churchill. This should be low-hanging fruit for English as there are plenty of quotations that have been misattributed to Churchill over the years. However even here English makes mistakes. Consider his take on what is arguably Churchill’s most famous retort.
In fact, we
know Churchill made the “in the morning I will be sober” retort to Bessie Braddock
because there was a witness.
Not original to Churchill, but world-famous and confirmed by Ronald Golding, a bodyguard present on the occasion, as WSC was leaving the House of Commons. Lady Soames, who said her father was always gallant to ladies, doubted the story – but Golding explained that WSC was not drunk, just tired and wobbly, which perhaps caused him to fire the full arsenal. However, he was relying on his photographic memory for this riposte: in the 1934 movie It’s a Gift W.C. Field’s character when told he is drunk, responds, “Yeah, and you’re crazy. But I’ll be sober tomorrow and you’ll be crazy the rest of your life" (Langworth, Churchill by Himself, p.550).
I have no
idea where English got the idea that Churchill was averse to wisecracks.
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