Page 61 - They Also Served

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Winston Churchill 1895.
The son of a Conservative politician
and an American mother, Winston
Leonard Spencer Churchill was born
at the family seat, Blenheim Palace, on
30th November 1874. Not apparently
academically gifted, he scraped through
the entrance exam and was educated
at Harrow School before passing the
Sandhurst entrance exam at the third
attempt and joining E Company in
September 1894. Alas, little is known of
his performance at Sandhurst other than
that he passed out 20th of 130 cadets in his intake. Tragically, generations of cadet files were destroyed in the Second World War, to create additional space for clerks to work in. Nevertheless, on 20th February 1895, Churchill was commissioned into the 4th Hussars, based in Aldershot.
Peacetime soldiering was not for the young subaltern, so he managed to take some leave and travelled to Cuba where he became involved with skirmishes during the civil war, supplementing his income by writing reports for the Daily Graphic. He was also awarded two medals by the Spanish government. The 4th Hussars were then posted to India, and the peaceful backwater of Bangalore. However, on the basis of his reporting in Cuba, he managed an attachment to the Malakand campaign as a reporter, eventually being awarded the India General Service Medal and seeing some low-level combat. He also published his first book, The Story of the Malakand Field Force, which was well received.
By now bored with garrison life and rapidly gaining a reputation as a ‘gong hunter’, Churchill used his family contacts to organise an attachment to the 21st Lancers during General Kitchener’s Sudan campaign, with extra duties as a reporter for The Morning Post. At the Battle of Omdurman on 2nd September 1898, the Dervish Army fought to a standstill in suicidal charges against the well-defended British position before Kitchener ordered the cavalry to destroy the fleeing remnants of the enemy. The 21st, with Churchill attached to A Squadron, charged a force of around 1,500 Dervishes. Churchill shot one man with his pistol in an action that resulted in dozens of British
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