Closing the Ring (87 page)

On the morning of Friday, June 2, I set out in my train for our siding by Eisenhower’s Headquarters near Portsmouth, with Field-Marshal Smuts, Mr. Ernest Bevin, General Ismay, and my personal Staff. Just before we started, a further letter arrived from the King.

B
UCKINGHAM
P
ALACE
June
2, 1944

My dear Winston,

I want to make one more appeal to you not to go to sea on D-Day. Please consider my own position. I am a younger man than you, I am a sailor, and as King I am the head of all these Services. There is nothing I would like better than to go to sea, but I have agreed to stay at home; is it fair that you should then do exactly what I should have liked to do myself? You said yesterday afternoon that it would be a fine thing for the King to lead his troops into battle, as in old days; if the King cannot do this, it does not seem to me right that his Prime Minister should take his place.

Then there is your own position. You will see very little, you will run a considerable risk, you will be inaccessible at a critical time, when vital decisions might have to be taken, and however unobtrusive you may be your mere presence on board is bound to be a very heavy additional responsibility to the Admiral and Captain. As I said in my previous letter, your being there would add immeasurably to my anxieties, and your going without consulting your colleagues in the Cabinet would put them in a very difficult position, which they would justifiably resent.

I ask you most earnestly to consider the whole question again, and not let your personal wishes, which I very well understand, lead you to depart from your own high standard of duty to the State.

Believe me,

Your very sincere friend,

G
EORGE
R.I.

Meanwhile, my train lay just outside Southampton, and we were soon connected by telephone with Eisenhower’s Headquarters. That afternoon we paid him a visit. His tents and caravans were very well concealed in a wood nearby. His Majesty was concerned at not having had a reply from me to his letter. At 11.30
P.M
. in response to inquiries I spoke to Lascelles at Windsor Castle on the scrambler telephone and said that I had cancelled my arrangements in deference to His Majesty’s desire. I wrote the following letter in the small hours of the morning and sent it at once by dispatch-rider to Windsor:

June
3, 1944

Sir,

I must excuse myself for not having answered Your Majesty’s letter earlier. It caught me just as I was leaving by the train, and I have been in constant movement ever since. I had a dispatch-rider standing by in order to take it to you tonight.

Sir, I cannot really feel that the first paragraph of your letter takes sufficient account of the fact that there is absolutely no comparison in the British Constitution between a Sovereign and a subject. If Your Majesty had gone, as you desire, on board one of your ships in this bombarding action, it would have required the Cabinet approval beforehand, and I am very much inclined to think, as I told you, that the Cabinet would have advised most strongly against Your Majesty going.

On the other hand, as Prime Minister and Minister of Defence, I ought to be allowed to go where I consider it necessary to the discharge of my duty, and I do not admit that the Cabinet have any right to put restrictions on my freedom of movement. I rely on my own judgment, invoked in many serious matters, as to what are the proper limits of risk which a person who discharges my duties is entitled to run. I must most earnestly ask Your Majesty that no principle shall be laid down which inhibits my freedom of movement when I judge it necessary to acquaint myself with conditions in the various theatres of war. Since Your Majesty does me the honour to be so much concerned about my personal safety on this occasion, I must defer to Your Majesty’s wishes, and indeed commands. It is a great comfort to me to know that they arise from Your Majesty’s desire to continue me in your service. Though
I regret that I cannot go, I am deeply grateful to Your Majesty for the motives which have guided Your Majesty in respect of Your Majesty’s humble and devoted servant and subject,

W
INSTON
S. C
HURCHILL

I may add that the cruiser squadron concerned was, as I had justly estimated, not exposed to any undue danger. In fact, it did not sustain a single casualty. I should not have referred to this matter if it had not been publicised in a friendly but unwittingly inaccurate form by General Eisenhower.

I may here set down the view I have formed over many years on this sort of thing. A man who has to play an effective part in taking, with the highest responsibility, grave and terrible decisions of war may need the refreshment of adventure. He may need also the comfort that when sending so many others to their death he may share in a small way their risks. His field of personal interest, and consequently his forces of action, are stimulated by direct contact with the event. As a result of what I saw and learned in the First World War, I was convinced that generals and other high commanders should try from time to time to see the conditions and aspect of the battle-scene themselves. I had seen many grievous errors made through the silly theory that valuable lives should not be endangered. No one was more careful of his personal safety than I was, but I thought my view and theme of the war were sufficiently important and authoritative to entitle me to full freedom of judgment as to how I discharged my task in such a personal matter.

*  *  * *  *

The weather now began to cause anxiety. A fine spell was giving way to unsettled conditions, and from June 1 onward a Commanders’ meeting was held twice daily to study the weather reports. At their first meeting, poor conditions were predicted for D-Day, with low clouds. This was of prime importance to the Air Forces, affecting both the bombing and the airborne landings. That same evening, the first warships sailed from the Clyde, as well as two midget submarines from
Portsmouth, whose duty was to mark the assault areas. June 3 brought little encouragement. A rising westerly wind was whipping up a moderate sea; there was heavy cloud and a lowering cloud base. Predictions for June 5 were gloomy.

That afternoon I drove down to Portsmouth with Mr. Bevin and Field-Marshal Smuts and saw a large number of troops embarking for Normandy. We visited the Heaquarters ship of the 50th Division, and then cruised down the Solent in a launch, boarding one ship after another.

On the way back, we stopped at General Eisenhower’s camp and wished him luck. We got back to the train in time for a very late dinner. While it was in progress, Ismay was called to the telephone by Bedell Smith, who told him that the weather was getting worse and that the operation would probably have to be postponed for twenty-four hours. General Eisenhower would wait until the early hours of June 4 before making a definite decision. Meanwhile, units of the great armada would continue to put to sea according to programme.

Ismay came back and reported the bleak news. Those who had seen the array in the Solent felt that the movement was now as impossible to stop as an avalanche. We were haunted by the knowledge that if the bad weather continued and the postponement had to be prolonged beyond June 7 we could not again get the necessary combination of moon and tide for at least another fortnight. Meanwhile the troops had all been briefed. They clearly could not be kept on board these tiny ships indefinitely. How was a leakage to be prevented?

But the anxiety that everyone felt was in no way apparent at the dinner-table in the train. Field-Marshal Smuts was at his most entertaining pitch. He told the story of the Boer surrender at Vereeniging in 1902—how he had impressed on his colleagues that it was no use fighting on and that they must throw themselves on the mercy of the British. He had been assailed as a coward and a defeatist by his own friends, and he had spent the most difficult hour of his life. In the end however he had won through, had gone to Vereeniging, and peace was made. The Field-Marshal then went on to speak about his
experiences at the outbreak of the Second World War, when he had to cross the floor of the House and fight his own Prime Minister, who wished to remain neutral.

We went to bed at about half-past one. Ismay told me that he would wait up to hear the result of the morning conference. As there was nothing I could do about it, I said that I was not to be woken to hear the result. At 4.15
A.M
. Eisenhower again met his Commanders, and heard from the weather experts the ominous report, sky overcast, cloud ceiling low, strong southwesterly wind, with rain and moderate sea. The forecast for the 5th was even worse. Reluctantly he ordered a postponement of the attack for twenty-four hours, and the whole vast array was put into reverse in accordance with a carefully prepared plan. All convoys at sea turned about and small craft sought shelter in convenient anchorages. Only one large convoy, comprising a hundred and thirty-eight small vessels, failed to receive the message, but this too was overtaken and turned round without arousing the suspicions of the enemy. It was a hard day for the thousands of men cooped up in landing-craft all round the coast. The Americans, who came from the West Country ports, had the greatest distance to go and suffered most.

At about five o’clock that morning, Bedell Smith again telephoned Ismay confirming the postponement, and Ismay went to bed. Half an hour later, I woke up and sent for him. He told me the news. He says I made no comment.

*  *  * *  *

The early post brought me a letter from the President, written a fortnight before and withheld for delivery till the fateful moment came. Alas, I cannot find it. F.D.R. expressed in the most kindly terms his feelings about our joint work and comradeship, and his hopes and longings for our success. I cabled a grateful but somewhat discursive reply.

Prime Minister to President Roosevelt
    4 June 44

I was so glad to get your charming letter of May 20. Our friendship is my greatest stand-by amid the ever-increasing complications
of this exacting war. Averell brought me a good account of your physical health, and I have sustained from many quarters impressions that your political health is also greatly improved. I am here near Ike’s Headquarters in my train. His main preoccupation is the weather. There are wonderful sights to see with all these thousands of vessels.

De Gaulle’s Committee by a large majority decided that he should accept my invitation to come here. He hummed and hawed, but Massigli and several others threatened to resign if he did not do so. We expect him on D minus 1. If he arrives, Eisenhower will see him for half an hour and explain to him the position exclusively in its military aspect. I shall return to London during the night of D-Day. I do not expect that very much can be done with de Gaulle, but I still hope the word “leadership,” which I am told you approved in Hull’s speech, may prove serviceable. I do not expect we shall get more than a certain number of miles from the beaches, and probably what we get will be a depopulated area wearing the aspect of a battlefield. This I can explain to de Gaulle safely here when he arrives. I will also deliver him your friendly message to come over to see you. I shall keep you constantly informed.

I see some of your newspapers are upset at my references in the House of Commons to Spain. This is very unfair, as all I have done is to repeat my declaration of October 1940. I only mentioned Franco’s name to show how silly it was to identify Spain with him or him with Spain by means of caricatures. I do not care about Franco, but I do not wish to have the Iberian Peninsula hostile to the British after the war. I do not know how I can depend on a de Gaullist France. Germany would have to be held down by main force, and we have a twenty-years alliance with Russia. You must remember that we are very near to all this pleasant outlook.

We should not be able to agree here in attacking countries which have not molested us because we dislike their totalitarian form of government. I do not know whether there is more freedom in Stalin’s Russia than in Franco’s Spain. I have no intention to seek a quarrel with either.

After D-Day, ought not you and I to send a short message to Stalin, which can be published? Perhaps it would be well to wait till we are definitely established over the other side.

We this month have the all-time high record for the U-boat war—only four ships of all the United Nations, amounting to about twenty thousand tons, sunk. In addition, we have four U-boats sunk for every ship of ours and a tremendous plurality of enemy ships sunk by our own combined fleets.

I am so glad Alex has not belied your support and impressions of him. How magnificently your troops have fought. I hear that relations are admirable between our armies in every rank there, and here certainly it is an absolute brotherhood. I am looking forward to seeing your Chiefs of Staff. I have been delighted to receive increasingly good news about Harry. I earnestly hope that this will be maintained. I am deeply grieved that you cannot come before that very distant [October] date. Let me know if I can help matters by a journey.

  Presently Mr. Eden arrived with General de Gaulle, who had just flown in from Algiers. I told de Gaulle that I had asked him to come because of the forthcoming operation. I could not do this by telegraph, and I felt that the history of our two countries required that the liberation of France must not be undertaken by the British and Americans without the French being informed. I had intended to invite him a little before D-Day, but the weather had forced us to postpone the assault for twenty-four hours, and it might even be later. This was a grave fact. Thirty-five divisions and four thousand ships had been assembled in the ports and camps and a hundred and fifty thousand troops had been embarked for the first wave of the attack. Many of these had to be kept in conditions of extreme discomfort in small craft. Eleven thousand planes were ready, of which eight thousand would go into action, provided the weather was all right. I then went on to say how much we regretted the bombing of the French railways, with its loss of French life, but we had fewer infantry than the Germans, and it was the only way we could stop them bringing up overpowering reinforcements while we built up our front.