Martin Gilbert, April 26, 1981
President Saunders, ladies and gentlemen, I am deeply honoured to be invited here to Westminster College to talk at the site of Churchill’s famous ‘Iron Curtain Speech,’ and to do so about the origins of that speech itself.
Since receiving your invitation for this inaugural Crosby Kemper lecture, I have tried to piece together the story of Churchill's experience of Soviet communism – and of his reactions to that experience – in the 30 years leading up to his speech here at Westminster College; and I thank you most warmly for having asked me to present the fruits of my researches to you on this beautiful Missouri afternoon.
Many thousands of miles to the east: across the Atlantic Ocean and across the wide democratic zone of Western Europe, the Iron Curtain is still there. I crossed it myself, only three weeks ago, on the Austria-Czechoslovak border, just halfway between Stettin and Trieste.
For 20 minutes the train, with its one-through carriage from Rome to Moscow, stopped astride the Iron Curtain: it is a fierce curtain of tall fences, vigilant watchtowers, barbed wire, and electronic eyes.
Last night, here in Fulton Missouri, during an extremely pleasant reception, I was told two things about Churchill: first that he was spoilt and selfish, and second that he was cantankerous and quarrelsome.
But surely here, of all places, here on this delightful campus, where you have built, and are still building such a superb and living memorial to Churchill, something should also be known of the superb and living quality of his thoughts and understanding of world affairs. His quarrel was with tyranny.