Churchill broadcasts to America

18th March 1941: Britain 'founded on long-enjoyed freedom and steadily-evolved democracy' is in mortal danger without American help

Churchill watching a demonstration of a new Anti Aircraft projectile in early March 1941. “Well protected against the bitterly cold weather and smoking his inevitable cigar, the Prime Minister watches the shooting.”

The Britsih were desperate for a more effective counter to the aerial assault from the Luftwaffe. The Royal Artillery were experimenting with rocket projectiles

One of the new weapons. In the centre is Major General K.M. Lock and on the right is Major Duncan Sandys, M.P., the Prime Minister’s son-in-law (married to his eldest daughter Diana in 1935), who is a gunner officer. Sandys had caused controversy in 1938 when he had asked a question in Parliament about the inadequacy of Britain’s air defences.

Churchill had wanted to make a more fulsome thank you to the American people following the passing of the Lend Lease Act. He chose to do so in a speech to the Pilgrims’ Society, welcoming the new US Ambassador to Britain, John Winant, at the Savoy Hotel, London.

John Winant (1887-1947), a former Governor of New Hampshire was US Ambassador to the United Kingdom 1941-1946. He made a favourable impression when he announced on his arrival in the midst of the Blitz on London “I’m very glad to be here. There is no place I’d rather be at this time than in England.”

He and Roosevelt were building a narrative around the moral purpose of the war. Roosevelt wanted America to be the ‘Arsenal of Democracy’. Churchill spoke of a ‘free society’ in ‘mortal danger’.

… the sense of encouragement and fortification in our resolve which has come to us from across the ocean …