Churchill's Bunker: The Secret Headquarters at the Heart of Britain's Victory'This is the room from which I will direct the war,' Churchill declared, shortly after becoming Prime Minister in 1940. And he did just that, as the distinguished Churchill biographer Richard Holmes explains in the first history of the Cabinet War Rooms. It was from these cramped, uncongenial confines that Churchill turned a seemingly inevitable defeat at the hands of the Nazis into a famous victory. Yet he was not working deep in a distant forest or hidden in a walled-off suburb: he was in the very heart of the capital, within sight of Buckingham Palace and the Houses of Parliament. Built in 1938 as a temporary refuge in case of air raid attack, this secret bunker became a second home to Churchill - and to large numbers of military personnel and civil servants whose work until now has been largely unsung. Here was the Map Room that charted the advances and retreats of armies, the locations of warships and the often painful progress of the convoys that kept the nation supplied. Here the planners worked on future operations and the intelligence staff pondered the enemy's next moves. And all this work was known only to those who needed to know.Drawing on a fascinating range of original material, including new first-hand accounts of the people who lived there, Holmes reveals how and why the bunker and its war machine developed; how the inhabitants' lives were transformed; and how their work led to victory. Elegant and illuminating, Churchill's Bunker is a unique exploration of one of the most important sites in British history. |
Contents
The blast of war | 33 |
Running the show | 77 |
Life in the bunker | 119 |
Copyright | |
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Other editions - View all
Churchill's Bunker: The Secret Headquarters at the Heart of Britain's Victory Richard Holmes No preview available - 2009 |
Churchill's Bunker: The Cabinet War Rooms and the Culture of Secrecy in ... Richard Holmes No preview available - 2010 |
Churchill's Bunker: The Cabinet War Rooms and the Culture of Secrecy in ... Richard Holmes No preview available - 2010 |
Common terms and phrases
accommodation Admiral Admiralty advisers Air Ministry Air Raid Precautions air-raids Alanbrooke Alexander Cadogan allied Americans Annexe army attack basement became bedroom Blitz bombers bombing Bridges Britain Brooke Burgis Cabinet Office Cabinet Room Cabinet War Rooms Cairo centre Chamberlain chiefs of staff Churchill's civil servants civilian command conference courtesy of Imperial Cypher Office December departments Diaries Downing Street evacuation France French German Guards headquarters Hollis Home Forces Ian Jacob Ilene Adams Imperial War Museum Inner Circle invasion Ismay Joan Bright Astley Joan Williams John Colville Joint Intelligence Joint Planning Lady Llewellyn Lindemann London Lord Map Room Marshal Sir meeting Memoirs ment military moved naval Norman Brook North Africa Olive Christopher operations preparations prime minister prime minister's private secretary raids Rance Roosevelt Royal Marine secret secretariat senior Sir John Soviet Union Stalin Teheran tion typists WAAF War Cabinet Whitehall Winston Churchill women