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Winston Churchill was a British statesman, writer, and orator who twice served as prime minister of the United Kingdom and became one of the central political leaders of the 20th century.

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Early life and family

• Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill was born on 30 November 1874 at Blenheim Palace in Oxfordshire, into an aristocratic family; his father was Lord Randolph Churchill, a prominent Conservative politician, and his mother was Jennie Jerome, an American heiress.

• He was educated at Harrow School and then at the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, where he trained as a cavalry officer before being commissioned into the British Army in the 1890s.

 

Soldier, journalist, and rising politician

• Churchill saw active service in Cuba, India, Sudan, and South Africa, and he gained early fame as a war correspondent and author of books based on these campaigns.

• He entered Parliament in 1900 as Conservative MP for Oldham, then crossed the floor to join the Liberal Party in 1904, quickly rising through government posts including President of the Board of Trade and Home Secretary.

 

World War I and between the wars

• As First Lord of the Admiralty before and during the early part of World War I, Churchill championed naval modernization but was blamed for the failure of the Dardanelles and Gallipoli campaigns, leading to his resignation and temporary return to front-line military service in France.

• He later returned to high office as Minister of Munitions, Secretary of State for War and Air, and then, back in the Conservative Party, as Chancellor of the Exchequer (1924–1929), where he controversially returned Britain to the gold standard.

 

World War II leadership and later premiership

• In May 1940, during World War II, Churchill became prime minister and minister of defence, forming a coalition government and rallying Britain with speeches such as “blood, toil, tears and sweat” while leading the country from near-defeat to victory over Nazi Germany.

• Working closely with Franklin D. Roosevelt and Joseph Stalin, he helped shape Allied grand strategy and, after the war, returned as prime minister from 1951 to 1955, overseeing a period in which the Conservative government broadly accepted the new welfare state.

 

Writings, honors, and death

• Churchill was a prolific writer and historian, producing multi‑volume works on World War II and the history of the English‑speaking peoples, and he received the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1953 for his historical and biographical writing and his oratory.

• Knighted and widely honored in his later years, he suffered declining health in the 1950s, resigned as prime minister in 1955, and died in London on 24 January 1965 at the age of 90, receiving a state funeral attended by world leaders

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