One More Appeal

 

On June 2, 1944 King George V wrote a final appeal to his Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, asking him not to take ship in order to observe the D-Day landings in Normandy which were to take place four days later.

Full text:

Buckingham Palace
GR- Royal crest/stamp June 2nd 1944

My Dear Winston,
I want to make one more appeal to you not to go to sea on D day. Please consider my own position. I am a younger man than you, I am a sailor, & as king I am the head of all three services. There is nothing I would like better than to go to sea but I have agreed to stay at home; is it fair that you should then do exactly what I should have liked to do myself?

You said yesterday afternoon that it would be a fine thing for the King to lead his troops into battle, as in old days; if the King cannot do this, it does not seem to me right that his Prime Minister should take his place.

Then there is your own position. You will see very little, you will seem a considerable risk, you will be inaccessible at a critical time when vital decisions might have to be taken, & however unobtrusive you may be, your very presence on board is bound to be a very heavy additional responsibility to the Admiral & Captain.

As I said in my previous letter, your being there would add immeasurably to my anxieties, & your going without consulting your colleagues in the Cabinet would put them in a very difficult position which they would justifiably resent.

I ask you most earnestly to consider the whole question again, & not let your personal wishes which I very well understand lead you to depart from your own high standard of duty to the State.

Believe me,

Your very sincere friend,

George R. I. (signed by hand)

Churchill's determination to personally observe the landing induced angst across the Allied leadership, with General Dwight Eisenhower also adding his strong objections. 

For the Prime Minister his desire was merely a continuation of his life long adventurous streak which saw him put his life at risk many times; on the Northwest Frontier of India; as a participant in the famed (and unnecessary) cavalry charge against the Dervishes at the Battle of Omdurman in the Sudan; as a reporter taken prisoner and then making his escape during the Boer War, all at the turn of the century; as a battalion commander in the trenches of the Western Front during WWI, an assignment he volunteered for after resigning his ministerial position in the wake of the Dardanelles debacle.

A reluctant Churchill finally agreed to remain home during the invasion.  The Prime Minister finally made it to Normandy six days after the landings.

On the other hand, Yogi Berra was present on D-Day as a gunner's mate on a fire support ship off Utah Beach!