A saga of Churchill, family and defiance during the blitz, WW II.

This in an interesting read, a view of what was happening on the ground in England during the bombing by Germany in WWII. I find “war history” to be vaguely interesting because it fills in a lot of the gaps in my mind concerning questions along the lines of, “What happened to cause this war and why did it go the way that it did?” This book takes a bit of a different approach than most that I have read that are focused on the “big picture” while The Splendid and the Vile is a much smaller, more personal view into what was happening within the leader’s close world of home and personal relationships. One of the things that I found entertaining, and somewhat surprising, is just how quirky many of the powerful leaders are. Several of the leaders described in this book are so “quirky” that I would consider them fairly deranged if I knew them personally. Churchill was certainly no exception to that “rule” (if there is actually a rule of some sort). I really makes me wonder if perhaps being pretty far “off the tracks” isn’t a necessary component of wanting to be in place of great power and great risk.

One of the main points of interest to this book that makes it stand out in the crowd of books of just about every aspect of WWII is the descriptions of how people (the general public as well as the leaders) reacted to being bombed on a regular basis, with the cities crashing down around them amide piles of broken bricks and windows, and mountains of dead bodies to be picked up and identified each morning. Because of the difficulty of effectively repelling bombers and fighters in the dark, almost all of raids were nighttime events during clear and moonlit nights (they locals called them bombers moons).

Apparently, when the bombing first started the English realized that it was next to impossible to hit enemy aircraft with their anti-aircraft guns at night, so they did very little shooting in order to conserve ammunition. This approach amounted to just sitting and letting the bombs drop made people feel like helpless sitting ducks (which is what they were), and caused much fear and anxiety. Realizing the stress this was causing, Churchill greatly increased the number of cannons “protecting” the cities (especially London) and told the gunners to fire away with abandon. This didn’t help defend the city, having little or not impact on the enemy, but it made people feel much better. So much better it seems, that they just started going about their normal business as much as they could what with the broken infrastructure and rubble everywhere. The cities were busy and bustling in the day, and at night folks either went to their shelters, or went partying in the black outed restaurants and bars. Many of the diaries from the time talk about how joyous it was, with nobody being scared or terrorized. There were lots of parties, including going onto rooftops during raids to watch the “fireworks” created by all of the bombs, fires, emergency vehicles, search lights, and anti-aircraft guns blasting away and nothing in particular.

It seems that for a lot of folks they came to the realization that if they were still alive, that was good and life it fine. If they weren’t alive, then that was just that. They lost their dread, and at the same time opened up to much of the beauty of life that we so often miss because we just take it for granted. This carefree attitude extended to personal relationships, where it became the norm that if it felt good and was fun, why not? One-night stands became a thing that had to be entered in your personal calendar to make sure you had set aside time for your new friend. People were able to get together and enjoy/appreciate each other in ways that were not possible during times of peace. Churchill’s daughter fretted about what she would be losing when the war was over because she could no longer be free to follow her will during times of peace. During the war time events nobody particularly cared to interfere with other people’s lives and great freedom came with that lack of interference.

The book is interesting because of the behind the scenes nature of the leadership roles and actions, but perhaps more so as an interesting view into how people adjust to great danger and trauma. It reminds me a little bit of what many are saying about the current pandemic being a time of reflection, change of pace, and enjoying many aspects of life more than had been the case.