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CHURCHILL, Winston S. Marlborough. His Life and Times . London: George G. Harrap, 1933-38.
CHURCHILL, Winston S. Marlborough. His Life and Times . London: George G. Harrap, 1933-38. 4 volumes, 8° (231 x 154mm). Half-title and frontispiece in each volume. Plates, maps, plans and illustrations. (Frontispiece in vol.I almost detached.) Original plum cloth, spine titled in gilt, Marlborough arms in gilt on sides, top edges gilt (spines of vol.I-III sunfaded, a little rubbed or lightly scuffed). Provenance : by descent from Stanley Baldwin; Sotheby's, 19 July 1994, lot 302. FIRST EDITION, PRESENTATION COPIES, VOLUMES I-III INSCRIBED BY CHURCHILL TO STANLEY BALDWIN, VOLUME III AN ADVANCE PRESENTATION COPY, WITH AN ADDITIONAL AUTOGRAPH LETTER SIGNED BY CHURCHILL. All three volumes are inscribed to Baldwin in their months of publication. Volume III was inscribed a few weeks before publication, as the inserted letter to Baldwin, dated 5 October 1936, explains: "My dear S.B., At the worst this may be a cure for sleeplessness! It is not published till October 23. I hope your rest is doing you good in every way...". Woods A40(a). Only a month after his friendly letter, Churchill attacked Baldwin's resistance to rearmament in the Commons in ringing terms, as 'decided only to be undecided, resolved to be irresolute, adamant for drift, solid for fluidity, all-powerful to be impotent' (12 November 1936). Baldwin responded that the electorate would not have voted for a rearming government: Churchill's comment in a letter to a friend was 'I have never heard such a squalid confession'.