Book Two
1
Mr. Chamberlain’s Invitation — The Pause of September 2 — War Declared, September 3 — The First Air Alarm — At the Admiralty Once More — Admiral Sir Dudley Pound — My Knowledge of Naval Matters — Contrast Between 1914 and 1939 — The Naval Strategic Situation — The Baltic — The Kiel Canal — The Attitude of Italy — Our Mediterranean Strategy — The Submarine Menace — The Air Menace — The Attitude of Japan — Singapore — The Security of Australia and New Zealand — Composition of the War Cabinet — Mr. Chamberlain’s First Selections — An Antediluvian — The Virtues of Siesta.
POLAND WAS ATTACKED by Germany at dawn on September 1. The mobilisation of all our forces was ordered during the morning. The Prime Minister asked me to visit him in the afternoon at Downing Street. He told me that he saw no hope of averting war with Germany and that he proposed to form a small War Cabinet of Ministers without departments to conduct it. He mentioned that the Labour Party were not, he understood, willing to share in a national coalition. He still had hopes that the Liberals would join him. He invited me to become a member of the War Cabinet. I agreed to his proposal without comment, and on this basis we had a long talk on men and measures.
After some reflection, I felt that the average age of the Ministers who were to form the supreme executive of war direction would be thought too high, and I wrote to Mr. Chamberlain after midnight accordingly:
2.9.39.
Aren’t we a very old team? I make out that the six you mentioned to me yesterday aggregate 386 years or an average of over 64! Only one year short of the Old Age Pension! If, however, you added Sinclair (49) and Eden (42) the average comes down to fifty-seven and a half.
If the Daily Herald is right that Labour will not come in, we shall certainly have to face a constant stream of criticism, as well as the many disappointments and surprises of which war largely consists. Therefore, it seems to me all the more important to have the Liberal Opposition firmly incorporated in our ranks. Eden’s influence with the section of Conservatives who are associated with him, as well as with moderate Liberal elements, also seems to me to be a very necessary reinforcement.
The Poles have now been under heavy attack for thirty hours, and I am much concerned to hear that there is talk in Paris of a further note. I trust you will be able to announce our Joint Declaration of War at latest when Parliament meets this afternoon.
The Bremen will soon be out of the interception zone unless the Admiralty take special measures and the signal is given today. This is only a minor point, but it may well be vexatious.
I remain here at your disposal.1
I was surprised to hear nothing from Mr. Chamberlain during the whole of September 2, which was a day of intense crisis. I thought it probable that a last-minute effort was being made to preserve peace; and this proved true. However, when Parliament met in the afternoon, a short but very fierce debate occurred, in which the Prime Minister’s temporising statement was ill-received by the House. When Mr. Greenwood rose to speak on behalf of the Labour Opposition, Mr. Amery from the Conservative benches cried out to him, “Speak for England.” This was received with loud cheers. There was no doubt that the temper of the House was for war. I even deemed it more resolute and united than in the similar scene on August 2, 1914, in which I had also taken part. In the evening a number of gentlemen of importance in all parties called upon me at my flat opposite the Westminster Cathedral, and all expressed deep anxiety lest we should fail in our obligations to Poland. The House was to meet again at noon the next day. I wrote that night as follows to the Prime Minister:
2.9.39.
I have not heard anything from you since our talks on Friday, when I understood that I was to serve as your colleague, and when you told me that this would be announced speedily. I really do not know what has happened during the course of this agitated day; though it seems to me that entirely different ideas have ruled from those which you expressed to me when you said, “The die was cast.” I quite realise that in contact with this tremendous European situation changes of method may become necessary, but I feel entitled to ask you to let me know how we stand, both publicly and privately, before the debate opens at noon.
It seems to me that if the Labour Party, and as I gather the Liberal Party, are estranged, it will be difficult to form an effective War Government on the limited basis you mentioned. I consider that a further effort should be made to bring in the Liberals, and in addition that the composition and scope of the War Cabinet you discussed with me requires review. There was a feeling tonight in the House that injury had been done to the spirit of national unity by the apparent weakening of our resolve. I do not underrate the difficulties you have with the French; but I trust that we shall now take our decision independently, and thus give our French friends any lead that may be necessary. In order to do this, we shall need the strongest and most integral combination that can be formed. I therefore ask that there should be no announcement of the composition of the War Cabinet until we have had a further talk.
As I wrote to you yesterday morning, I hold myself entirely at your disposal, with every desire to aid you in your task.
I learnt later that a British ultimatum had been given to Germany at 9.30 P.M. on September 1, and that this had been followed by a second and final ultimatum at 9 A.M. on September 3. The early broadcast of the third announced that the Prime Minister would speak on the radio at 11.15 A.M. As it now seemed certain that war would be immediately declared by Great Britain and also by France, I prepared a short speech which I thought would be becoming to the solemn and awful moment in our lives and history.
The Prime Minister’s broadcast informed us that we were already at war, and he had scarcely ceased speaking when a strange, prolonged, wailing noise, afterwards to become familiar, broke upon the ear. My wife came into the room braced by the crisis and commented favourably upon German promptitude and precision, and we went up to the flat top of the house to see what was going on. Around us on every side, in the clear, cool September light, rose the roofs and spires of London. Above them were already slowly rising thirty or forty cylindrical balloons. We gave the Government a good mark for this evident sign of preparation, and as the quarter of an hour’s notice, which we had been led to expect we should receive, was now running out, we made our way to the shelter assigned to us, armed with a bottle of brandy and other appropriate medical comforts.
Our shelter was a hundred yards down the street and consisted merely of an open basement, not even sandbagged, in which the tenants of half a dozen flats were already assembled. Everyone was cheerful and jocular, as is the English manner when about to encounter the unknown. As I gazed from the doorway along the empty street and at the crowded room below, my imagination drew pictures of ruin and carnage and vast explosions shaking the ground; of buildings clattering down in dust and rubble, of fire brigades and ambulances scurrying through the smoke, beneath the drone of hostile aeroplanes. For had we not all been taught how terrible air raids would be? The Air Ministry had, in natural self-importance, greatly exaggerated their power. The pacifists had sought to play on public fears, and those of us who had so long pressed for preparation and a superior air force, while not accepting the most lurid forecasts, had been content they should act as a spur. I knew that the Government were prepared, in the first few days of the war, with over two hundred and fifty thousand beds for air-raid casualties. Here at least there had been no underestimation. Now we should see what were the facts.
After about ten minutes had passed, the wailing broke out again. I was myself not sure that this was not a reiteration of the previous warning, but a man came running along the street shouting “All Clear,” and we dispersed to our dwellings and went about our business. Mine was to go to the House of Commons, which duly met at noon with its unhurried procedure and brief, stately prayers. There I received a note from the Prime Minister asking me to come to his room as soon as the debate died down. As I sat in my place, listening to the speeches, a very strong sense of calm came over me, after the intense passions and excitements of the last few days. I felt a serenity of mind and was conscious of a kind of uplifted detachment from human and personal affairs. The glory of Old England, peace-loving and ill-prepared as she was, but instant and fearless at the call of honour, thrilled my being and seemed to lift our fate to those spheres far removed from earthly facts and physical sensation. I tried to convey some of this mood to the House when I spoke, not without acceptance.
Mr. Chamberlain told me that he had considered my letters, that the Liberals would not join the Government, that he was able to meet my views about the average age to some extent by bringing the three Service Ministers into the War Cabinet in spite of their executive functions, and that this would reduce the average age to less than sixty. This, he said, made it possible for him to offer me the Admiralty as well as a seat in the War Cabinet. I was very glad of this because, though I had not raised the point, I naturally preferred a definite task to that exalted brooding over the work done by others which may well be the lot of a Minister, however influential, who has no department. It is easier to give directions than advice, and more agreeable to have the right to act, even in a limited sphere, than the privilege to talk at large. Had the Prime Minister in the first instance given me the choice between the War Cabinet and the Admiralty, I should, of course, have chosen the Admiralty. Now I was to have both.
Nothing had been said about when I should formally receive my office from the King, and in fact I did not kiss hands till the fifth. But the opening hours of war may be vital with navies. I therefore sent word to the Admiralty that I would take charge forthwith and arrive at six o’clock. On this the Board were kind enough to signal to the Fleet, “Winston is back.” So it was that I came again to the room I had quitted in pain and sorrow almost exactly a quarter of a century before, when Lord Fisher’s resignation had led to my removal from my post as First Lord and ruined irretrievably, as it proved, the important conception of forcing the Dardanelles. A few feet behind me, as I sat in my old chair, was the wooden map-case I had had fixed in 1911, and inside it still remained the chart of the North Sea on which each day, in order to focus attention on the supreme objective, I had made the Naval Intelligence Branch record the movements and dispositions of the German High Seas Fleet. Since 1911 much more than a quarter of a century had passed, and still mortal peril threatened us at the hands of the same nation. Once again defence of the rights of a weak state, outraged and invaded by unprovoked aggression, forced us to draw the sword. Once again we must fight for life and honour against all the might and fury of the valiant, disciplined, and ruthless German race. Once again! So be it.
* * * * *
Presently the First Sea Lord came to see me. I had known Dudley Pound slightly in my previous tenure of the Admiralty as one of Lord Fisher’s trusted staff officers. I had strongly condemned in Parliament the dispositions of the Mediterranean Fleet when he commanded it in 1938, at the moment of the Italian descent upon Albania. Now we met as colleagues upon whose intimate relations and fundamental agreement the smooth working of the vast Admiralty machine would depend. We eyed each other amicably if doubtfully. But from the earliest days our friendship and mutual confidence grew and ripened. I measured and respected the great professional and personal qualities of Admiral Pound. As the war, with all its shifts and fortunes, beat upon us with clanging blows, we became ever truer comrades and friends. And when, four years later, he died at the moment of the general victory over Italy, I mourned with a personal pang for all the Navy and the nation had lost.
I spent a good part of the night of the third, meeting the Sea Lords and heads of the various departments, and from the morning of the fourth I laid my hands upon the naval affairs. As in 1914, precautionary measures against surprise had been taken in advance of general mobilisation. As early as June 15, large numbers of officers and men of the reserves had been called up. The reserve fleet, fully manned for exercises, had been inspected by the King on August 9, and on the twenty-second various additional classes of reservists had been summoned. On the twenty-fourth an Emergency Powers Defence Bill was passed through Parliament, and at the same time the Fleet was ordered to its war stations; in fact our main forces had been at Scapa Flow for some weeks. After the general mobilisation of the Fleet had been authorised, the Admiralty war plan had unfolded smoothly, and in spite of certain serious deficiencies, notably in cruisers and anti-submarine vessels, the challenge, as in 1914, found the Fleet equal to the immense tasks before it.
* * * * *
I had, as the reader may be aware, a considerable knowledge of the Admiralty and of the Royal Navy. The four years from 1911 to 1915, when I had the duty of preparing the Fleet for war and the task of directing the Admiralty during the first ten critical months, had been the most vivid of my life. I had amassed an immense amount of detailed information and had learned many lessons about the Fleet and war at sea. In the interval I had studied and written much about naval affairs. I had spoken repeatedly upon them in the House of Commons. I had always preserved a close contact with the Admiralty and, although their foremost critic in these years, I had been made privy to many of their secrets. My four years’ work on the Air Defence Research Committee had given me access to all the most modern developments of radar which now vitally affected the naval service. I have mentioned how in June, 1938, Lord Chatfield, the First Sea Lord, had himself shown me over the anti-submarine school at Portland, and how we had gone to sea in destroyers on an exercise in submarine-detection by the use of the Asdic apparatus. My intimacy with the late Admiral Henderson, Controller of the Navy till 1938, and the discussions which the First Lord of those days had encouraged me to have with Lord Chatfield upon the design of new battleships and cruisers, gave me a full view over the sphere of new construction. I was, of course, familiar from the published records with the strength, composition, and structure of our Fleet, actual and prospective, and with those of the German, Italian, and Japanese Navies.
As a critic and a spur, my public speeches had naturally dwelt upon weaknesses and shortcomings and, taken by themselves, had by no means portrayed either the vast strength of the Royal Navy or my own confidence in it. It would be unjust to the Chamberlain Administration and their service advisers to suggest that the Navy had not been adequately prepared for a war with Germany, or with Germany and Italy. The effective defence of Australasia and India in the face of a simultaneous attack by Japan raised more serious difficulties: but in this case – which was at the moment unlikely – such an assault might well have involved the United States. I therefore felt, when I entered upon my duties, that I had at my disposal what was undoubtedly the finest-tempered instrument of naval war in the world, and I was sure that time would be granted to make good the oversights of peace and to cope with the equally certain unpleasant surprises of war.
* * * * *
The tremendous naval situation of 1914 in no way repeated itself. Then we had entered the war with a ratio of sixteen to ten in capital ships and two to one in cruisers. In those days we had mobilised eight battle squadrons of eight battleships with a cruiser squadron and a flotilla assigned to each, together with important detached cruiser forces, and I looked forward to a general action with a weaker but still formidable fleet. Now, the German Navy had only begun their rebuilding and had no power even to form a line of battle. Their two great battleships, Bismarck and Tirpitz, both of which, it must be assumed, had transgressed the agreed Treaty limits in tonnage, were at least a year from completion. The light battle cruisers, Scharnhorst and Gneisenau, which had been fraudulently increased by the Germans from ten thousand tons to twenty-six thousand tons, had been completed in 1938. Besides this, Germany had available the three “pocket battleships” of ten thousand tons, Admiral Graf Spee, Admiral Scheer, and Deutschland, together with two fast eight-inch-gun cruisers of ten thousand tons, six light cruisers, and sixty destroyers and smaller vessels. Thus there was no challenge in surface craft to our command of the seas. There was no doubt that the British Navy was overwhelmingly superior to the German in strength and in numbers, and no reason to assume that its science training or skill was in any way defective. Apart from the shortage of cruisers and destroyers, the Fleet had been maintained at its customary high standard. It had to face enormous and innumerable duties, rather than an antagonist.
* * * * *
My views on the naval strategic situation were already largely formed when I went to the Admiralty. The command of the Baltic was vital to the enemy. Scandinavian supplies, Swedish ore, and above all protection against Russian descents on the long undefended northern coastline of Germany – in one place little more than a hundred miles from Berlin – made it imperative for the German Navy to dominate the Baltic. I was therefore sure that in this opening phase Germany would not compromise her command of that sea. Thus, while submarines and raiding cruisers, or perhaps one pocket battleship, might be sent out to disturb our traffic, no ships would be risked which were necessary to the Baltic control. The German Fleet, as at this moment developed, must aim at this as its prime and almost its sole objective. For the main purposes of sea power and for the enforcement of our principal naval offensive measure, the blockade, we must of course maintain a superior fleet in our northern waters; but no very large British naval forces were, it seemed, needed to watch the debouches from the Baltic or from the Heligoland Bight.
British security would be markedly increased if an air attack upon the Kiel Canal rendered that side-door from the Baltic useless, even if only at intervals.
A year before, I had sent a note upon this special operation to Sir Thomas Inskip:
October 29, 1938.
In a war with Germany the severance of the Kiel Canal would be an achievement of the first importance. I do not elaborate this, as I assume it to be admitted. Plans should be made to do this and, if need be, all the details should be worked out in their variants by a special technical committee. Owing to there being few locks, and no marked difference of sea-level at the two ends of the Canal, its interruption by H.E. bombs, even of the heaviest type, could swiftly be repaired. If, however, many bombs of medium size fitted with time fuses, some set for a day, others for a week, and others for a month, etc., could be dropped in the Canal, their explosions at uncertain intervals and in uncertain places would close the Canal to the movement of warships or valuable vessels until the whole bottom had been deeply dredged. Alternatively, special fuses with magnetic actuation should be considered.
The phrase about magnetic mines is interesting in view of what was soon to come upon us. No special action had, however, been taken.
* * * * *
The British merchant fleet on the outbreak of war was about the same size as in 1914. It was over twenty-one million tons. The average size of the ships had increased, and thus there were fewer. This tonnage was not, however, all available for trade. The Navy required auxiliary warships of various types which must be drawn chiefly from the highest class of liners. All the defence services needed ships for special purposes: the Army and R.A.F. for the movement of troops and equipment overseas, and the Navy for all the work at fleet bases and elsewhere, and particularly for providing oil fuel at strategic points all over the world. Demands for tonnage for all these objects amounted to nearly three million tons, and to these must be added the shipping requirements of the Empire overseas. At the end of 1939, after balancing gains and losses, the total British tonnage available for commercial use was about fifteen and a half million tons.
* * * * *
Italy had not declared war, and it was already clear that Mussolini was waiting upon events. In this uncertainty and as a measure of precaution till all our arrangements were complete, we thought it best to divert our shipping round the Cape. We had, however, already on our side, in addition to our own preponderance over Germany and Italy combined, the powerful fleet of France, which by the remarkable capacity and long administration of Admiral Darlan had been brought to the highest strength and degree of efficiency ever attained by the French Navy since the days of the monarchy. Should Italy become hostile, our first battlefield must be the Mediterranean. I was entirely opposed, except as a temporary convenience, to all plans for quitting the centre and merely sealing up the ends of the great inland sea. Our forces alone, even without the aid of the French Navy and its fortified harbours, were sufficient to drive the Italian ships from the sea, and should secure complete naval command of the Mediterranean within two months and possibly sooner.
The British domination of the Mediterranean would inflict injuries upon an enemy Italy which might be fatal to her power of continuing the war. All her troops in Libya and in Abyssinia would be cut flowers in a vase. The French and our own people in Egypt could be reinforced to any extent desired, while theirs would be overweighted if not starved. Not to hold the Central Mediterranean would be to expose Egypt and the Canal, as well as the French possessions, to invasion by Italian troops with German leadership. Moreover, a series of swift and striking victories in this theatre, which might be obtainable in the early weeks of a war, would have a most healthy and helpful bearing upon the main struggle with Germany. Nothing should stand between us and these results, both naval and military.
* * * * *
I had accepted too readily when out of office the Admiralty view of the extent to which the submarine had been mastered. Whilst the technical efficiency of the Asdic apparatus was proved in many early encounters with U-boats, our anti-U-boat resources were far too limited to prevent our suffering serious losses. My opinion recorded at the time, “The submarine should be quite controllable in the outer seas and certainly in the Mediterranean. There will be losses, but nothing to affect the scale of events,” was not incorrect. Nothing of major importance occurred in the first year of the U-boat warfare. The Battle of the Atlantic was reserved for 1941 and 1942.
In common with prevailing Admiralty belief before the war, I did not sufficiently measure the danger to, or the consequent deterrent upon, British warships from air attack. “In my opinion,” I had written a few months before the war, “given with great humility (because these things are very difficult to judge), an air attack upon British warships, armed and protected as they now are, will not prevent full exercise of their superior sea power.” However, the deterrents – albeit exaggerated – upon our mobility soon became grave. The air almost immediately proved itself a formidable menace, especially in the Mediterranean. Malta, with its almost negligible air defences, presented a problem for which there was no immediate solution. On the other hand, in the first year no British capital ship was sunk by air attack.
* * * * *
There was no sign at this moment of any hostile action or intent upon the part of Japan. The main preoccupation of Japan was naturally America. It did not seem possible to me that the United States could sit passive and watch a general assault by Japan upon all European establishments in the Far East, even if they themselves were not for the moment involved. In this case we should gain far more from the entry of the United States, perhaps only against Japan, if that were possible, than we should suffer from the hostility of Japan, vexatious though that would be. On no account must anything which threatened in the Far East divert us from our prime objectives in Europe. We could not protect our interests and possessions in the Yellow Sea from Japanese attack. The farthest point we could defend if Japan came in would be the fortress of Singapore. Singapore must hold out until the Mediterranean was safe and the Italian Fleet liquidated.
I did not fear at the moment of the outbreak that Japan would send a fleet and army to conquer Singapore, provided that fortress were adequately garrisoned and supplied with food and ammunition for at least six months. Singapore was as far from Japan as Southampton from New York. Over these three thousand miles of salt water Japan would have to send the bulk of her Fleet, escort at least sixty thousand men in transports in order to effect a landing, and begin a siege which would end only in disaster if the Japanese sea communications were cut at any stage. These views, of course, ceased to apply once the Japanese had occupied Indo-China and Siam and had built up a powerful army and very heavy air forces only three hundred miles away across the Gulf of Siam. This, however, did not occur for more than a year and a half.
As long as the British Navy was undefeated, and as long as we held Singapore, no invasion of Australia or New Zealand by Japan was deemed possible. We could give Australasia a good guarantee to protect them from this danger, but we must do it in our own way, and in the proper sequence of operations. It seemed unlikely that a hostile Japan exulting in the mastery of the Yellow Sea would send afloat a conquering and colonising expedition to Australia. A large and well-equipped army would be needed for a long time to make any impression upon Australian manhood. Such an undertaking would require the improvident diversion of the Japanese Fleet, and its engagement in a long, desultory struggle in Australia. At any moment a decision in the Mediterranean would liberate very powerful naval forces to cut invaders from their base. It would be easy for the United States to tell Japan that they would regard the sending of Japanese fleets and transports south of the Equator as an act of war. They might well be disposed to make such a declaration, and there would be no harm in sounding them upon this very remote contingency.
The actual strength of the British and German Fleets, built and building, on the night of September 3, 1939, and that of the American, French, Italian, and Japanese Fleets on the same basis, is set forth in Appendix A, Book II. It was my recorded conviction that in the first year of a world war Australia and New Zealand would be in no danger whatever in their homeland, and by the end of the first year we might hope to have cleaned up the seas and oceans. As a forecast of the first year of the naval war these thoughts proved true. We shall in their proper place recount the tremendous events which occurred in 1941 and 1942 in the Far East.
* * * * *
Newspaper opinion, headed by The Times, favoured the principle of a War Cabinet of not more than five or six Ministers, all of whom should be free from departmental duties. Thus alone, it was argued, could a broad and concerted view be taken upon war policy, especially in its larger aspects. Put shortly, “Five men with nothing to do but to run the war” was deemed the ideal. There are, however, many practical objections to such a course. A group of detached statesmen, however high their nominal authority, are at a serious disadvantage in dealing with the Ministers at the head of the great departments vitally concerned. This is especially true of the service departments. The War Cabinet personages can have no direct responsibility for day-to-day events. They may take major decisions, they may advise in general terms beforehand or criticise afterwards, but they are no match, for instance, for a First Lord of the Admiralty or a Secretary of State for War or Air who, knowing every detail of the subject and supported by his professional colleagues, bears the burden of action. United, there is little they cannot settle, but usually there are several opinions among them. Words and arguments are interminable, and meanwhile the torrent of war takes its headlong course. The War Cabinet Ministers themselves would naturally be diffident of challenging the responsible Minister, armed with all his facts and figures. They feel a natural compunction in adding to the strain upon those actually in executive control. They tend, therefore, to become more and more theoretical supervisors and commentators, reading an immense amount of material every day, but doubtful how to use their knowledge without doing more harm than good. Often they can do little more than arbitrate or find a compromise in interdepartmental disputes. It is therefore necessary that the Ministers in charge of the Foreign Office and the fighting departments should be integral members of the supreme body. Usually some at least of the “Big Five” are chosen for their political influence, rather than for their knowledge of, and aptitude for, warlike operations. The numbers, therefore, begin to grow far beyond the limited circle originally conceived. Of course, where the Prime Minister himself becomes Minister of Defence, a strong compression is obtained. Personally, when I was placed in charge I did not like having unharnessed Ministers around me. I preferred to deal with chiefs of organisations rather than counsellors. Everyone should do a good day’s work and be accountable for some definite task, and then they do not make trouble for trouble’s sake or to cut a figure.
Mr. Chamberlain’s original War Cabinet plan was almost immediately expanded, by the force of circumstances, to include Lord Halifax, Foreign Secretary; Sir Samuel Hoare, Lord Privy Seal; Sir John Simon, Chancellor of the Exchequer; Lord Chatfield, Minister for the Co-ordination of Defence; Lord Hankey, Minister without Portfolio; Mr. Hore-Belisha, Secretary of State for War; and Sir Kingsley Wood, Secretary of State for Air. To these were added the Service Ministers, of whom I was now one. In addition it was necessary that the Dominions Secretary, Mr. Eden, and Sir John Anderson as Home Secretary and Minister of Home Security, though not actual members of the War Cabinet, should be present on all occasions. Thus our total was eleven. The decision to bring in the three Service Ministers profoundly affected Lord Chatfield’s authority as Minister for the Co-ordination of Defence. He accepted the position with his customary good nature.
Apart from myself, all the other Ministers had directed our affairs for a good many recent years or were involved in the situation we now had to face both in diplomacy and war. Mr. Eden had resigned on foreign policy in February, 1938. I had not held public office for eleven years. I had, therefore, no responsibility for the past or for any want of preparation now apparent. On the contrary, I had for the last six or seven years been a continual prophet of evils which had now in large measure come to pass. Thus, armed as I now was with the mighty machine of the Navy, on which fell in this phase the sole burden of active fighting, I did not feel myself at any disadvantage; and had I done so, it would have been removed by the courtesy and loyalty of the Prime Minister and his colleagues. All these men I knew very well. Most of us had served together for five years in Mr. Baldwin’s Cabinet, and we had, of course, been constantly in contact, friendly or controversial, through the changing scenes of parliamentary life. Sir John Simon and I, however, represented an older political generation. I had served, off and on, in British Governments for fifteen years, and he for almost as long, before any of the others had gained public office. I had been at the head of the Admiralty or Ministry of Munitions through the stresses of the First World War. Although the Prime Minister was my senior by some years in age, I was almost the only antediluvian. This might well have been a matter of reproach in a time of crisis, when it was natural and popular to demand the force of young men and new ideas. I saw, therefore, that I should have to strive my utmost to keep pace with the generation now in power and with fresh young giants who might at any time appear. In this I relied upon knowledge as well as upon all possible zeal and mental energy.
For this purpose I had recourse to a method of life which had been forced upon me at the Admiralty in 1914 and 1915, and which I found greatly extended my daily capacity for work. I always went to bed at least for one hour as early as possible in the afternoon and exploited to the full my happy gift of falling almost immediately into deep sleep. By this means I was able to press a day and a half’s work into one. Nature had not intended mankind to work from eight in the morning until midnight without that refreshment of blessed oblivion which, even if it only lasts twenty minutes, is sufficient to renew all the vital forces. I regretted having to send myself to bed like a child every afternoon, but I was rewarded by being able to work through the night until two or even later – sometimes much later – in the morning, and begin the new day between eight and nine o’clock. This routine I observed throughout the war, and I commend it to others if and when they find it necessary for a long spell to get the last scrap out of the human structure. The First Sea Lord, Admiral Pound, as soon as he had realised my technique, adopted it himself, except that he did not actually go to bed but dozed off in his armchair. He even carried the policy so far as often to go to sleep during the Cabinet meetings. One word about the Navy was, however, sufficient to awaken him to the fullest activity. Nothing slipped past his vigilant ear, or his comprehending mind.