To Rab Butler, referring to nelson his cat "This cat does more for the war effort than you do. He acts as a hot water bottle and saves fuel and power"
On Lord Charles Beresford: "He is one of those orators, of whom it is well said,"Before they get up, they do not know what they are going to say; when they are speaking, they do not know what they are saying; and when they have sat down, they do not know what they have said""
Regarding the French leadership and Britains resolve: "When I warned them that Britain would fight on alone whatever they did, their Generals told their Prime Minister and his divided Cabinet: "In three weeks England will have her neck wrung like a chicken." Some chicken! Some neck!"
"I hate nobody except Hitler - and that is professional."
On Field Marshall Lord Alanbrooke: "When I thump the table and push my face towards him, what does he do? Thumps the table harder and glares back at me."
On Liberal and Conservative statesman Joseph Chamberlain (no relation to me!): "Mr Chamberlain loves the working man; he loves to see him work."
On Joseph's son and twice Chancellor of the Exchequer, Austen Chamberlain: "He always played the game and he always lost it."
On Conservative politician and Prime Minister 1902-06 Arthur Balfour: "If you wanted nothing done, Arthur Balfour was the best man for the task. There was no equal to him."
On another Conservative Prime Minister, Stanley Baldwin: "He occasionally stumbled over the truth, but hastily picked himself up and hurried on as if nothing had happened."
On Britain's first Labour Prime Minister, Ramsay MacDonald: "We know that he has, more than any other man, the gift of compressing the largest amount of words into the smallest amount of thought."
On Joseph Chamberlain's other son Neville, the Conservative Prime Minister 1937-40 and champion of appeasement of Nazi Germany, Winston had much to say. Here are some examples:"An old town clerk looking at European affairs through the wrong end of a municipal drainpipe"
"He has a lust for peace."
"You were given the choice between war and dishonour. You chose dishonour and you will have war."
"In the depths of that dusty soul there is nothing but abject surrender."
When it was remarked that Chamberlains efforts to persuade Clement Attlee to accept the Munich agreement was akin to a snake dominating a rabbit, Churchill responded with: "It's more like a rabbit dominating a lettuce!"
After Chamberlain's death in 1940, Churchill spoke kindly of his personally brave, decent and principled predecessor: "The only guide to a man is his concience; the only shield to his memory is the rectitude and sincerity of his actions."
On Field Marshall Viscount Montgomery, two similar quotes are attributed to Churchill: "In defeat, unbeatable; in victory, unbearable." and "Indomitable in retreat, invincible in advance, insufferable in victory."
On Conservative Chancellor, Rab Butler: "I am amused by the Chancellor of the Exchequer. He is always patting himself on the back, a kind of exercise that contributes to his excellent physical condition."
On Free French Leader and President of France 1958-69, Charles de Gaulle: "He looks like a female llama who has just been surprised in her bath."
On Aneurin Bevan: "He will be a great curse to this country in peace as he was a squalid nuisance in time of war." and "I can think of no better step to signal the inaugauration of the National Health Service than that a person who so obviously needs psychiatric attention should be among the first of its patients."
On Labour leader and Winston's sucessor as Prime Minister, Clement Attlee, Churchill again had much to say. For example:"A sheep in sheep's clothing"
"He is a modest man who has a good deal to be modest about."
"An empty taxi arrived at 10 Downing Street and when the door was opened Attlee got out."
On Herbert Morrison, Labour deputy Prime Minister: "A curious mixture of geniality and venom"
On his friend, Lord Beaverbrook: "He is a foul weather friend."
On the Russian Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Mikhailovich Molotov: "I have never seen a human being who more perfectly represented the modern concept of a robot."
On T.E. Lawrence (of Arabia fame): "He was not in complete harmony with the normal." and "He has a way of backing into the limelight."
On the deeply religious, teetotal, austere and clean living socialist Chancellor of the Exchequer,Stafford Cripps, after being told of Cripps's decision to give up smoking: "Too bad - that was his last contact with humanity." and on another occasion: "He has all the virtues I dislike and none of the vices I admire."
On US Secretary of State J.F. Dulles: "He is the only bull I know who carries his own china closet with him." and "Dull, Duller, Dulles."
On receipt of a telegram from George Bernard Shaw saying "Two tickets reserved for you, first night Pygmalion. Bring a friend. If you have one.", Churchill replied with a telegram saying: "Cannot make first night. Will come to second. If you have one."
"The English never draw a line without blurring it."
"Frightfulness is not a remedy known to the British pharmacopoeia."
"There are few virtues that the Poles do not possess - and there are few errors they have ever avoided."
On Russia: "Here we have a state whose subjects are so happy that they have to be forbidden to quit its bounds under the direst penalties; whose diplomatists and agents sent on foreign missions have often to leave their wives and children at home to ensure their ebentual return."
"In Russia a man is called a reactionary if he objects to having his property stolen and his wife and children murdered."
On being asked by a Canadian journalist if he had any complaints about America: "Toilet paper too thin. Newspapers too fat."
"The Almighty in his infinite wisdom did not see fit to create Frenchmen in the image of Englishmen."
On aging Admiral Sir Dudley Pound: "Dudley Pound's a funny old boy. People think he's always asleep, but you've only got to suggest reducing the naval estimates by a million and he's awake in a flash."
