Winston Churchill almost bankrupt in 1938? Loans? Helry Stakosch.
Dave
1. In 1938 Winston Churchill had accumulated massive debts via his
extravagant lifestyle and had bankruptcy looming , Churchill was then a
member of UK parliament and knew he would be forced to vacate his seat there
and he would also lose his beloved home, "Chartwell".
2. That a financier by name one Helry Strakosch advanced Churchill a
150,000 pound loan and became his "advisor", reviving his political career.
I believe the above is stated in a book "For Those Who Cannot Speak", by
Michael McLaughlin, 1979.
Can anyone please,
1. Confirm that this information is in fact in McLaughlin's book, and give
any quoted reference therin, also page number etc.
2. Refer to any other historical record confirming the general financial
position of Winston Churchill in 1938.
3. Refer to any other coroberative source concerning the specific loan to
Chuechill mentioned above.
--
Mike
and testament of Austrian-born Sir Henry Strakosch had converted
"interest free" loans to Winston Churchill and Lord Simon into gifts.
Simon had received 10,000 pounds, and Churchill twice as much.
Strakosch was a multimillionaire who made his fortune in gold mining
in South Africa.
Steven James Forsberg
: Can any reader give any coroberative source or evidence on a report that=
:-
: 1. In 1938 Winston Churchill had accumulated massive debts via his
: extravagant lifestyle and had bankruptcy looming , Churchill was then a
here
: and he would also lose his beloved home, "Chartwell".
: 2. That a financier by name one Helry Strakosch advanced Churchill a
: 150,000 pound loan and became his "advisor", reviving his political care=
er.
: I believe the above is stated in a book "For Those Who Cannot Speak", by
: Michael McLaughlin, 1979.
At the risk of walking into an ambush, I'll add what I kow
(which
is not particularly much). Most of my work on Churchill emphasized his
rol=
es
in foreign policy, I don't pretend to be an expert on his domestic
politic=
al
battles or his personal finances -- yet this is a subject that has
come
up from time to time.=20
It is true, apparently, that Strakosch gave Churchill an
interest=20
fee loan and, upon his death (during WWII) that loan became a gift. It
was
reported in the British press of the time. Now, what signifigance did
this
have? To be quite blunt, there are "revisionist" historians who use
this
as evidence of Churchill being "controlled" by Jews/Czecks, etc. as
part=20
of some grand conspiracy. I've heard more reputable historians say
that
it is just a small (if interesting) part of political funding as it=20
existed back then in Britain.=20
Many politicians back then apparently accepted a number of=20
questionable funding methods (what else is new?), and apparently those
wit=
h
businesses were more than eager to help just about anyone in power.
I'll
not delve into the ethics/legality of British politics of the time,
but=20
from what I understand all sorts of people took all sorts of money.
Now,
IIRC the final 'gift' to Churchill was about 20,000 pounds. If
that's=20
all it took to buy the English empire then what a bargain! :-)
Actually,
a more 'somber' explanation I've heard is that several business funds
(predecssors to what we in the States would call 'PAC's) helped
Churchill
out as WWII was coming, largely on the patriotic theme that the=20
government needed good men who might otherwise be lured away by the=20
prospects of making more money in the private sector. Strakosch was
one
such businessman involved. Since Churchill was a highly popular
wartime=20
minster it just made sense to 'gift' him the money upon Strakosch's=20
death (since he was dead, it could no longer be considered a
'bribe').=20
Thus, you have a certain 'historical fact' (teh conversion of
a
loan to a gift) but differeing opinions about "what it meant".
IIRC,=20
Churchill was not the only beneficiary of Strakosch's generosity.
Once=20
again, I'm not certain about the legal/ethical details of political=20
fundraising in Britain at that time, but it was reported in the
press=20
(without any controversy that I know of at the time). If you are
intereste=
d
in delving further, I could try and contact some Churchillian scholars
for further information and references.
regards,
------------------------------------------------------------
sjfo...@bayou.uh.edu
=18
Brad Meyer
wrote:
>Can any reader give any coroberative source or evidence on a report that :-
>1. In 1938 Winston Churchill had accumulated massive debts via his
>extravagant lifestyle and had bankruptcy looming , Churchill was then a
>member of UK parliament and knew he would be forced to vacate his seat there
>and he would also lose his beloved home, "Chartwell".
This is true in part. He was in debt, and Chartwell was put up for
sale at one point. But this was only in part due to lifestyle. In
larger part, it was due to the loss of revenue from journalism as his
European outlets dried up (due to Nazi occupation and/or intimidation)
faster then new outlets could be found.
>2. That a financier by name one Helry Strakosch advanced Churchill a
>150,000 pound loan and became his "advisor", reviving his political career.
Also true in part. Strakosch (Sir Henry -- a member of Churchill's
"intellengence net" for some years at this point.) agreed to manage
Churchill's investment portfolio "for three years, you giving me full
discretion to seel or vary holdings at any time, but on the
understanding that you incur no further liability". All this was
contingent on WSC meeting his publishing deadlines. There is no
indication that he became any more of an adviser then he had been when
advising WSC (along with John Baker White) on details of the German
rearmerment in the early '30's that they were unable to interest HMG
in. The only part he played in Churchill's "revival" was making it
possible for him to remain in the House.
This is mention briefly in the William Manchester bio of WSC and in
more Detail in the Roy Jenkins bio.
--
Steve Richter
Was Strakosch a Zionist?
thanks,
Steve Richter
--
Michael Emrys
brad...@attbi.com wrote on 9/24/02 10:24 AM:
> In larger part, it was due to the loss of revenue from journalism as his
> European outlets dried up (due to Nazi occupation and/or intimidation) faster
> then new outlets could be found.
I have also heard that he lost a lot of assets when the stock markets went
down in 1929.
Does anybody know more about this aspect?
Michael
--
Don Phillipson
news:amq7ta$33lu$1...@nntp6.u.washington.edu...
> > On February 1, 1944 The Times of London discloses that the last will
> > and testament of Austrian-born Sir Henry Strakosch had converted
> > "interest free" loans to Winston Churchill and Lord Simon into gifts.
> > Simon had received 10,000 pounds, and Churchill twice as much. . . .
>
> Was Strakosch a Zionist?
We need to be aware this question unwittingly
puts us in bad company with sundry conspiracy
theorists (pro-Zionists, anti-Zionists, regardless.)
Such people often assume any Briton with an
obviously foreign name (e.g. I used to know an
Englishman called Serebriakoff) is likely to be
either Jewish or in the pay of some pro- or
anti-Jewish lobby.
In this case Strakosch was not Jewish in either
race or religion. Nor was Sir John Simon (Lord
President in Churchill's wartime Cabinet.)
But neither was Balfour, who must of course
be "Zionist" because of his 1917 Declaration
that "a homeland for the Jews" ought to be
established in Palestine.
--
Don Phillipson
Carlsbad Springs (Ottawa, Canada)
dphil...@trytel.com.com.com.less2
--
Andrew Clark
"Dave" <zzdbenne...@optusnet.com.au> wrote
> I believe the above is stated in a book
> "For Those Who Cannot Speak", by
> Michael McLaughlin, 1979.
This is another revisionist anti-Semite publication from the
Noontime Press, the publishing arm of the Holocaust denying
and neo-Nazi IHR. I wouldn't give it any credence
whatsoever.
Andrew Clark
"Dave" <zzdbenne...@optusnet.com.au> wrote
> I believe the above is stated in a book
> "For Those Who Cannot Speak", by
> Michael McLaughlin, 1979.
This is another revisionist anti-Semite publication from the
Brad Meyer
Yes. He took rather a beating in The Crash. Bernard Baruch played a
role in limiting his losses.
--
Dave
twist.
Are you able to give any sorrces of information to confirm the involvement
of Baruch in "limiting his losses"? Was this some sort of rescue plan for
Churchill, and what was their relationship, before / after this event?
"Brad Meyer" <brad...@attbi.com> wrote in message
news:an2035$8cg$1...@nntp6.u.washington.edu...
--
peter zwinikas
depression. Manchester proves this. Churchill was heavily involved
with the Zionists, including Chaim Wiezman from 1936 on and declared
himself a Zionist. See Gilbert. He did have firm connections with a
antifascist society in London called the Focus Group. There is also a
connection between Churchill and the British Board of Jewish Deputies.
"Sir" Henry Strakosch was Austrian by birth, made his fortune in South
Africa. A Alta Vista search of Strakosch is very interesting , but not
in the parameters of this news group.
Brad Meyer
zwinikas) wrote:
>It is clear that Baruch literally bailed WC out during the great
>depression. Manchester proves this.
No, he states it, but he does not "prove" it. His cites are kind of
iffy here. Also, given that WSC's losses amounted to many thousands of
pounds, even after BB's intervention, "bailed out" would seem to
require a fair sized grain of salt.
>Churchill was heavily involved
>with the Zionists, including Chaim Wiezman from 1936 . . .
Even beofre. He was one of the govt that authorized the Balfour
Declaration. He was also largely the author of the post WW I mid east
peace that created Syria, Iraq, TransJordan, and Palestine. In "A
Peace to End All Peace" the current borders in the mid-east are
described as the scars from that area's encounter with WSC.
--
Andrew Clark
"peter zwinikas" <peterz...@msn.com> wrote
> It is clear that Baruch literally bailed WC
> out during the great depression. Manchester
> proves this.
It is well documented, not least by the premier Churchill
biographer, Gilbert, that Baruch, a highly successful
banker, financier and Presidential advisor, advised
Churchill *not* to invest in the NY stock market and helped
him recover some of his losses after the Crash of 1929. It
is quite incorrect to say that "Baruch Baruch literally
bailed WC out during the great depression". I don't think
William Manchester makes this claim in his very poor
biography of Churchill, "The Last Lion". Even if he does, it
proves nothing: the book was panned by critics as ""A
pedestrian effort to popularize the stateman's life, ''The
Last Lion'' - the first of a two-volume work - provides
neither a new perspective nor illuminating new material" and
"Except for the most conventional of descriptions -
Churchill as an ambitious young man with a romantic sense of
destiny; Churchill as a scrappy, pragmatic politician on the
make - the individual who emerges from this biography has
the patched-together feel of a character assembled
mechanically from random facts, quotations and others'
descriptions of him" (both NY Times). The New York Review of
Books described Manchester's biography as "hackneyed, coarse
and hyperbolic".
> Churchill was heavily involved
> with the Zionists, including Chaim
> Wiezman from 1936 on and declared
> himself a Zionist. See Gilbert.
It has been said truthfully that "No British statesman had a
more consistent and more emphatic record of...support for
Zionism as a solution to the Jewish problem than Winston
Churchill". As early as 1908, Churchill stated: "full
sympathy with the historical aspirations of the Jews" to
restore "a centre of racial and political integrity" in
Palestine. As Colonial Secretary in 1922, he published a
White Paper proposing a Jewish state, and was passionately
pro-Jewish during WW2, as his memoirs clearly reveal. In
1940, he proposed, for example, creating a "Jewish Brigade"
which could maintain order in Palestine and free BCE troops
for the fighting front in Egypt. This was opposed by
Cabinet, but recruitment of Jews into
What is your point?
> He did have firm connections with a
> antifascist society in London called
> the Focus Group.
This is an unproven and much disputed claim by the
anti-Semite Holocaust-denying reuined historian David
Irvine.
> There is also a connection between Churchill
> and the British Board of Jewish Deputies.
The British Board of Jewish Deputies is a long-standing
perfectly respectable and reputable group of Jews who lobby
the British government on mainly religious issues. It was
instrumental in exposing the Holocaust to the British public
in and immediately after WW2. It would be highly unusual if
Churchill, a prominent politician and Zionist, did not have
some connection with it. Again, what's your point?
> "Sir" Henry Strakosch was Austrian by birth,
> made his fortune in South Africa.
In 1944, Sir Henry's will revealed that he had earlier
loaned Winston Churchill ?20,000 which was converted on his
death into a gift. Churchill declared the gift immediately
under British government conflict of interest rules. As a
multimillionaire philanthropist, Sir Henry made similar
loans or gifts during his lifetime and in his will to many
people and organisations, including half a dozen British
medical schools. Again, what's your point?