C O V E R S TO RY
PAINTACEOUS MADEIRA
I
was embarrassed. In the midst of presenting cruise he began. “That is Reid’s (Palace) Hotel, where ship lectures on Churchill’s life, one passenger’s Churchill stayed.” The mountain, Cabo Girão, 580 question left me humiliated: “Tomorrow we dock meters, forms the sixth largest cliff in Europe. “I can in Madeira. Can you tell me also take you to where he about Churchill’s visit there?” painted the scene of the small DAV I D D RU C K M A N Hesitating, I told the passenger I fishing harbor,” the driver would respond in my next lecure. added. Our ship duly pulled into Madeira, the chief island “In the 1950s the roads were cobblestone or dirt; in the Portuguese archipelago 400 km. north of transport was by donkeys pulling carts but someone Tenerife, Canary Islands, in the northeastern Atlantic. had an old Rolls-Royce which was reconditioned for The next morning my wife and I strolled the main harbor and capital, Funchal. On display was a boat that was reportedly designed by Lawrence of Arabia. As we were about to return to the ship we are accosted by a taxi driver who seemed quite knowledgeable about Churchill’s visit. So we hired him for the afternoon. “See that large building half way up the mountain?” David and Lynn Druckman are world travelers in quest of Churchill; David’s articles have appeared frequently in Finest Hour. For the historical account see “Churchill’s Madeira,” by Terry Reardon (FH 121:30-31).
Churchill.” Anyone who has chased Churchill sites can understand my growing excitement. At Reid’s Hotel we were graciously greeted by the manager who offered to show us the famous Churchill (or Presidential) Suite. The view from his living room window, over the bay and into the city, was glorious. The most elegant of Reid’s 163 rooms in 1950, it rents today for €2240 per night. There are framed photos of the Churchills and cartoons of WSC throughout the suite, even in the bathroom. Although there is a full kitchen, the suite is insufficient to house more than a half-dozen guests.
As Terry Reardon has recounted in Finest Hour 121, Churchill yearned for a relaxing 1949-50 winter holiday away from cold and dreary England. On November 19th, in a telegram to Bryce Nairn, British Consul in Madeira, Churchill wrote: “query warm, paintable, bathable, comfortable, flowery, hotels etc.” On 3 January 1950 Winston, Clementine, their daughter Diana, >>
C O V E R S TO RY PRECEDING PAGES: THE FISHING VILLAGE OF CAMARA DE LOBOS (CHAMBER OF THE WOLVES), PHOTOGRAHED BY THE AUTHOR FROM THE CLIFF BALCONY ATOP WHICH CHURCHILL HAD SET UP HIS EASEL IN JANUARY 1950. INSET: THE COVER PAINTING.
literary assistant Bill Deakin, two secretaries, and two Special Branch detectives arrived by ship in Funchal. Churchill had been there a half century earlier, on his way to South Africa as a war correspondent. This time he was looking forward to relaxing for a few weeks to paint and work on his war memoirs. Churchill’s idyll was foreshortened on January 12th when, notified that Prime Minister Attlee had suddenly scheduled a General Election for February 23rd, he departed by Flying Boat for London. His stay in Madeira had lasted only nine days and had produced only one oil painting. The taxi driver drove us to Churchill’s “paintaceous” site, in the small fishing village of Camara de Lobos (Chamber of the Wolves), about 10 km. from Reid’s Hotel, high on Cabo Girão overlooking a small bay and tiny harbor full of fishing boats. It looks much the same as it did when Churchill was there. On a balcony atop the cliff, the Leader of His Majesty’s Opposition created an oil painting entitled “Fishing Port of Madeira” (Coombs 294), a landscape of the bay and fishing village, which he later gave to his son Randolph. It has since passed to his grandson Winston and, most recently, to his great-grandson Randolph. Thirty meters away from this spot redolent with memories of the Great Man at his easel was a restaurant aptly named the “Churchill Restaurante.” We did not dine there, but purchased a bottle of Madeira wine to take home as a souvenir of our visit. The next day, on our cruise ship, I opened my lecture with nonchalant ease: “After my last presentation I was asked….”
ABOVE: CHURCHILL
SETS TO WORK ON A SMALL BALCONY OVER-
LOOKING THE HARBOR, WHERE
DAVID DRUCKMAN
PHOTOGRAPHED
THE SCENE ON PRECEDING PAGES. BELOW: DIANA ADMIRES THE VIEW WHILE A
Further Reading Martin Gilbert, Winston S. Churchill, vol. 8 “Never Despair” 1945-1965 (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1988), 498-501. Mary Soames, Winston Churchill: His Life as a Painter (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1990), 169-70. David Coombs and Minnie Churchill, Sir Winston Churchill: His Life Through His Paintings (Philadelphia: Pegasus, 2003), 225. FINEST HOUR 156 / 58
SCOTLAND YARD
CHURCHILL
DETECTIVE OBSERVES.
TOP: REID’S HOTEL IN FUNCHAL, OWNED BY THE BLANDY WINE FAMILY, REMAINS ONE OF THE GREAT HOTELS OF THE WORLD. THE CHURCHILL SUITE IS STILL ITS MOST PALATIAL OFFERING; THE DRUCKMANS ARE OLD HANDS AT CONVINCING HOTEL MANAGERS TO LET THEM IN FOR PHOTOGRAPHS ON
FINEST HOUR! CENTER: BARBUDA CAPTURED THE CAMARA DE LOBOS IN ONE OF ITS CHURCHILL CENTENARY STAMPS IN 1974. ABOVE: EVIDENTLY, AS CHURCHILL PAINTED, THE SUN ROSE TO A TRICKY ANGLE AND
BEHALF OF SCENE AT
THE ARTIST USED AN UMBRELLA TO AVOID GLARE AS HE WORKED. THE PAINTING IS NOW THE PROPERTY OF HIS GREAT-
RANDOLPH. LEFT: OUR KNOWLEDGEABLE LYNN DRUCKMAN AT “CHURCHLL RESTAURANTE,” WHICH MARKS THE SPOT WHERE THE STATESMAN PAINTED MORE THAN SIX DECADES AGO. GRANDSON
CABBIE-TOUR GUIDE WITH
FINEST HOUR 156 / 59