For years, Churchill warned the British government against the growing Nazi threat. For years he was ignored. Politically isolated in Parliament, sometimes jeered at and scorned, Churchill stood alone, a beacon of reality amid the gathering storm. This book tells of perhaps the Last Lion’s finest hour in the historical context not only of the 1930s, on which this volume focuses, but of the events that preceded the decade. In the Author’s notes Manchester writes:

“In the view of this writer, there can be no enlightening life which does not include an account of the man’s times. This need for context is even greater when the central figure is a towering statesman. It is impossible to understand Churchill and his adversaries in the 1930s, for example, without grasping the British revulsion against the horrors of World War I.”