I just finished reading "The Splendid and the Vile," by Erik Larson. It tells the story of The Blitz, the bombardment of Great Britain by the Nazis from September 1940 to May 1941.

There were 44,652 people killed, and 52,370 injured. "Of the dead," Larson writes, "5,626 were children."

A few things stood out:

• The incredible hardship and resilience of the British people, to lose life, home and safety for nearly an entire year of raids.
• The way that Churchill imbued them with the fortitude and courage to keep going in defiance of the Nazis, by reminding them of what they were fighting for.
• The stark contrast between the late night gatherings of Churchill and Hitler, as an insight into the essence of the two men, and a potential clue as to why Churchill was the right man for such a moment.

Larson's book has many scenes of Churchill's weekend gatherings, which took place at one of two country houses.

Churchill would gather almost every weekend with close friends, family, and top government officials, and their evenings would go very late, often well past midnight. There was lots of alcohol, singing, and sometimes dancing led by Churchill himself. It was a convivial, raucous atmosphere.

Larson’s description of Hitler’s gathering late one Friday night on May 9, 1941, however, is totally different: “A group of senior Nazi officials and the lesser lights with whom Hitler filled his innermost circle gathered at the Berghof, in the Bavarian Alps. Hitler could not sleep. He was, by this point, plagued with insomnia. And if he could not sleep, then no one would sleep. Hitler’s waiters — members of the SS, or Schutzstaffel, Hitler’s elite guard — served tea and coffee; tobacco and alcohol were forbidden. A fire roared in the hearth … As always, Hitler spoke in monologues, on topics that ranged from vegetarianism to the best way to train a dog. Time advanced slowly. His guests … listened with accustomed obedience, barely sensate in the warmth and flickering light, as a freshet of words flowed past them in which they were obliged to wade” (461).

Now here is Larson’s rendering of one late evening, on Saturday, June 15, 1940. The news out of France was bad. The government there was about to surrender to Hitler’s invading force. Churchill, when told this, became “very depressed.” “At once the atmosphere at Chequers grew funereal, Colville wrote … At length, the house staff served champagne, brandy, and cigars, and these did wonders to lighten the mood. This revitalization over drink and dinner was something of a pattern, as Lord Halifax’s wife, Dorothy, had noted in the past: Churchill would be ’silent, grumpy, and remote’ at the start of the meal, she wrote. ‘But mellowed by champaign and good food he became a different man, and a delightful and amusing companion.’ After Clementine once criticized his drinking, he told her, ‘Always remember Clemmie, that I have taken more out of alcohol than alcohol has taken out of me' (83)."

Churchill was far from a model husband of father, of course, but the point here is the difference in leadership styles. Churchill loved to hear himself talk as much as anyone, but he didn’t take himself so seriously that he demanded everyone listen all the time. And, it’s worth noting, he liked to have fun.

Churchill, one weekend, “suggested everyone present retire to the great hall for sandwiches.”

“He had the gramophone turned on,” wrote Alan Brooke, then the commander in chief of Home Forces. “And, in the many-colored dressing gown, with a sandwich in one hand and watercresses in the other, he trotted round and round the hall, giving occasional little skips to the tune of the gramophone" (109).