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CHURCHILL, Winston S.
Irish Home Rule.
A Speech delivered by … First Lord of the Admiralty, at Belfast on February 8th, 1912.
Publisher: The Liberal Publication Department, 1912
Stock code: 73430
Price: £250 Currency Conversion
First edition, this copy "rubber hand-stamped '14' in the upper right-hand corner of the cover," and therefore one of those disbound from the collections bound up as Pamphlets and Leaflets for 1912 (Cohen). Churchill's stance on Home Rule was diametrically opposed to that famously adopted by his father; "Lord Randolph Churchill had famously declared: 'Ulster will fight, and Ulster will be right'. His son took the opposite line, denouncing Bonar Law and the Conservatives for inciting rebellion. In February 1912 he attempted to confront a Unionist audience in Belfast in the very same hall in which his father had spoken in 1886, but so great was the threat to his safety that the meeting had to be moved at the last minute to the Celtic Road football stadium" (ODNB). Churchill and his wife were greeted by a hostile crowd of 10,000 outside their hotel, and, as reported in the Times, their journey to the stadium was no less threatening; "As each car made its way through, men thrust their heads in and uttered fearful menaces and imprecations. It seemed to me that Mr. Churchill was taking a greater risk then ever he expected … Yet he never flinched and took hostility visualised as well as vocalised calmly and no harm befell him" (quoted in Churchill, WSC II).
Octavo. Later red half calf on marbled boards, title gilt to the spine, original self-wraps bound in, bulked with blanks. Very good.
