History's Secret Heroes - Series 4: Pamela Churchill’s Special Relationships

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I realize those two parachutes tied up together is what a dead man sees. I am not going to survive. Real survival stories. Listen wherever you get your podcasts. Arrived in Munich from England. She was 17 years old. She had startling blue eyes, milky white complexion. She burned immediately when she went in the sun. And there's very, very striking red, orban red hair. Her parents, Lord and Lady did be, had centered her the German city to get a bit of polish. She had parents who really just wanted her to prepare to get married, hopefully to a Duke, have lots of children, that kind of thing. Munich had plenty for a young woman to see, Gothic architecture, palaces, churches. But it was also a political center. The headquarters of the Nazi Party, now in control of Germany. Jewish people are being persecuted, their businesses are being attacked. It is a deeply distressing place to be, even if a lot of people close their eyes and look the other way. Pamela didn't look the other way. She wanted to understand more. How had this guy Hitler exerted such an eye and grip over his country? What was he like? Pamela's circle back in England included the midfielder sisters, an upper-class family whose politics ranged from communism to fascism. One sister, Unity Mittford, was particularly close to the Führer, at Old Hitler. So she asked Unity could she meet the Führer? Unity Mittford arranged for Pamela to take tea with Hitler in the English garden. It was a smart park in Munich. It was a beautiful spring day. The trees were wearing their nice spring, livery pale green. It would all be very gentle. Hitler arrived with a small entourage. The first thing that Pamela noticed was two very, very good looking offices. She always liked to spot a good looking man, shall we say. Pamela was disgusted by what she'd seen of Nazism, but she knew how powerful Hitler was and the support he had from many German people. She expected to meet a man who, despite his politics, would impress her. She thought in a way I'm going to meet someone super charismatic. She'd heard his speeches, his ranting speeches on the radio, which horrified her. So she assumed that in person there would be something that would absolutely kind of overwhelm you with charisma. But Pamela found him inconsequential. She's described him as a tin foil character. It's a bit 1D from that very, very brief meeting. She formed an opinion that this man was strangely unprepossessing in the flesh. So it was even more curious and awakened her, her determination to try and find out how these characters came to power and exerted it so dramatically. Pamela's parents might have imagined her settling down respectively with an aristocratic husband, but now she was on track for a very different life. She wanted to be at the centre of international politics and power, and she wanted to influence it. I'm Helena Bonham Carter and for BBC Radio 4. This is history's secret heroes. Two stories of deception, acts of resistance and courage from World War II. Pamela's special relationships. By March 1938 Pamela Digby was safely back in Britain, but the prospect of a clash with Germany was growing. Hitler annexed Austria and drew it into the German Reich. He wanted to take Czechoslovakia too. In Britain there was disagreement about how to respond. The Prime Minister, Neville Chamberlain, wanted at all costs to avoid another war. He'd already pursued a policy of appeasement towards Benito Mussolini, the fascist dictator of Italy, the foreign secretary Anthony Eden resigned in protest. Meanwhile, the conservative MP Winston Churchill was telling anyone who'd listen, that Hitler must be fought. Just around the corner from the turmoil of Whitehall, Pamela Digby pulled up to the gates of Buckingham Palace with her mother. "So you've got all these cars edging along the mall and you've got the mamas and their diamonds." Sonja Penel is the author of Kingmaker, a biography of Pamela Digby. There's a little bit of a sort of a Bridgerton-thigh pit. Pamela was a debutante, arriving to be presented to royalty for the first time. Her job for the next few months was to attend lunchens, teas and balls. "It was a bit of a potential marriage market." Chris James is Pamela Digby's nephew. "It baffles me as much as anyone else and I think it must be a fairly horrifying ordeal for most of the girls and probably not much better for the lands either." Pamela Digby grew up in Dorset. Girls of her class were not expected to have any ambition beyond making a good marriage. "She was not given any real formal education and I think she was always very conscious of that." She pleaded and pleaded to be sent to school eventually she was at the age of 15, but the other girls didn't take to her. And they were the picked on her. They laughed at the fact that she liked horses so much. They laughed at the fact that she was a bit overweight and had freckles and that she was sort of bouncy and interested and always kind of asking questions. By the time Pamela arrived at the palace three years later she still didn't quite fit in. Some of the comments that people made to her, I mean some one one Lord said, "Oh, I see the chestnut mares in full again." Oh absolutely a pulling slight at her slightly rounded figure. As a season drew to a close, Pamela was still unbetrothed. And next year, the next season, her sister will be coming out and she'll be old stock as they put it. But the marital prospects of the upper classes were overshadowed by a rather more significant concern. War. In September 1938, Chamberlain went to Munich to secure a peace agreement with Hitler, giving him the Sudetenland in the hope this would appease him. Chamberlain claimed this meant peace for our time. But Hitler was not appeased. He carved up Czechoslovakia and prepared to invade Poland. On the first of September 1939, he did. Two days later, Britain and France declared war on Germany. And she has to find a husband before all the men go off the war. Pamela had no offers, and it looked like she might have to go back to Dorset to work with her mother in the women's auxiliary. And then a phone call comes in, unexpected, totally out of bloom. It was Randolph Churchill. Randolph was the son of Winston Churchill, the MP who'd pushed for war. When war was declared, Chamberlain drew Churchill in, appointing him first Lord of the Admiralty. He was no longer out in the cold. Even so, the digby family weren't keen on the Churchill's. They consider them rackety political chances. They definitely don't want their daughters to go anywhere near the Churchill family. Randolph asked Pamela to dinner. She says, "You don't know me." He says, "Yes, but have dinner with me. What do you like?" And she says, "Well, I'm rather fat, but mommy says puppy fat disappears." And so he says, "Okay, I'll come and pick you up." The dinner went horribly. Randolph didn't even try to make conversation with Pamela. She's rather annoyed, obviously, who's being ignored in this way. Coffee, he swings around finally, looks at her intently, and says, "You look healthy enough to bear my child, will you marry me?" And she says, "Yes." He was convinced he was going to be killed in the war and he was determined to leave the sun and air and he was going around asking several girls a night if they would marry him and they all ran a mile except for Pam. He's had mistress after mistress, he's got involved in drunken brawl, he's racked up huge debts that his parents struggle to repay and he's a bit of a one. Pamela wanted a political life and she didn't want to go back to Dorset. She wanted excitement, she wanted to be in the room when and where it happened. A month later the two were married. It transpires pretty quickly that he's a bully and he's rough and aggressive. He makes no effort whatsoever. Nonetheless Pamela was soon pregnant. She gave birth to a son who they named after his grandfather, Winston Churchill. The night that she gives birth, the labour is long, it's hard, it's during a terrible, terrible air raid, bombs falling all around, absolutely terrifying. He's nowhere to be seen, he's in another woman's bed. The Pamela didn't get on with her husband, she did get on very well with her parents in law, Winston and Clementine Churchill. Winston and Clementine take a right in to the bosom of the family just as they're actually pushing Randolph further and further out. They see him as a liability, a security risk. Someone they simply cannot trust with anything. Whereas this young woman that he's married despite being of no formal qualifications whatsoever, they see something completely different, really quite a remarkable young person. The Churchill saw that Pamela was bright, inquisitive, intuitive and discreet. In May 1940, Neville Chamberlain resigned. Winston Churchill became Prime Minister, but he was still a controversial figure and wasn't guaranteed support in Parliament or in the country at large. But suddenly he was his daughter-in-law who, who's support for him, devotioned him, is 100%. I mean, she's absolutely and completely behind him. He very much enjoys that. Pamela often played cards with her father in law. And when they play cards, they chat about the war, the challenges, the threat. And quite soon, she is very well briefed, she's invited to dinners and meetings with senior ministers and military personnel. Churchill brought her into his inner circle. She was part of a small group of people called Padlock, privy to all secrets, basically. And they began to see her as almost like a secret weapon in their war campaign. Despite the pressures of war and her unhappy marriage, Pamela grew more confident. She's radiant. She's excited. Her life has purpose and thrill. She slims down extraordinarily. She looks like a different girl, woman, her eyes are sparkling. She seems to be thriving like never before. She became known as the Orban Alluring Pam Churchill. Anyone who cost the threshold was immediately entranced by her, because she had this magic cocktail, right? She was very sexy now. She was a Churchill, so she was obviously close to power. And she knew so much about what was going on in the war that she was great to talk to. Hey, it's Ryan C. Crest for Albertsons and Tom Thumb. Just look for participating item tags to earn on eligible items from Takis, Spam, Pop Secret, Thomas' International Delight, Stoke, Galbani, Lando Frost, Nerd, and Body Armor. Restrictions apply. So I just swam. By the beginning of 1941, Britain's prospects looked dire. Germany had invaded much of Europe. Everyone knew Britain could be next. The peril of Britain is almost beyond our imagination. We didn't have the money, the men, the military material to defend ourselves. The only hope was to get the United States to support the Allies. Even if we can't get them fighting alongside with us. But somehow can they help us with the hardware we need, but also food, vitamins, anything? Well, sure of everything. The President of the United States, Franklin D. Rosevalt, was reluctant to get involved. He sent over a special envoy to assess the situation. A tough former public administrator named Harry Hopkins. He arrived, actually, while the determined to dislike Britain and the British. But the Churchills, with Pamela, had planned a charm offensive. He would be shown bomb sites and the plucking curries of the ordinary British people when their streets and houses were bombed to smithereens, extraordinarily moving. During the week, and then at weekends, and they knew if they'd done their homework and he loved a bit of a glamorous life, they were taken to a state-by-home where he was introduced to Pamela. Pamela was beautiful, soft, and attentive. She lavished Hopkins with compliments. And he also realises that she is phenomenally clever, that she knows what's going on and that the Churchills trust her and that she's included in all their conversations with him. And so he realises that she's totally key. After six weeks in Britain, Harry Hopkins returned to the United States. Two important things happened. One is he goes back to the States and says, "We've got to save those people. They're amazing. They are really amazing. They deserve everything we can do to help them." The United States began the Lend-Lease programme, providing Britain with everything from ammunition and motor vehicles to powdered eggs. And the other thing that he decides is that Pamela is the most plugged in person in Britain after Churchill himself. Donald Roosevelt was still cautious. He needed someone to run the Lend-Lease programme in London, so he appointed another Anglo-Skeptic, businessman, Averall Harrowman. He was cold and aloof and difficult to really pin down and Roosevelt thought, therefore, that, "Oh, you know, those Brits were their charm. They might have charmed Harry Hopkins, but they're not going to charm this guy." After Churchill's and their ally, the newspaper Baron Lord Beaverbrock, hoped Pam would again be their secret weapon. Harrowman is very good looking, by the way. She didn't seduce Harry Hopkins, as she said, "He's a deer, but not a pin-up that Harrowman was, so she had different tactics." She began by doing her homework on Harrowman. Though he was cold and aloof, he actually was a very insecure man who'd had a very harsh disciplinary and father. He was always a wallflower, even at his own parties. No one laughed at his attempts at jokes, and so he was a bit socially awkward. Pamela went straight for him. A whole evening is arranged, a dinner party at the Dorchester Hotel. Beaverbrock pays for a skin-tight, gold-blammy, shoulderless dress, which looks phenomenal in it. The seating was meticulously planned, Pamela next to Harrowman. That quickly she goes into what her friend's laser-corded mating dance, and that was effectively stroking his forearm and then looking into his eyes with her beautiful sapphire eyes, laughing at his attempts at repartee, no one else normally does. And then pummeling him gently for little snippets of information about Roosevelt, flattering him in the process, him not realising that she's doing this with an ulterior motive. Suddenly, the evening was interrupted by an air raid. And they turn off the lights, they open the curtains, they see enemy planes flying towards them. They see self-ridges department still catching fire. Averbrock Harrowman invited Pamela to his suite to continue their conversation. As he said sometime later, there's nothing like the blitz to get things going. By the morning he's completely pro-Brit, he's completely in awe of her, he's taken on board everything she says at the Brit's most need and by the time he He goes back to Washington with a message from the president a few weeks later, everyone describes him as "unduely pro-brit". She did literally lie back and think of England, did her patriotic duty and it had a big impact. But Churchill still needed information, and Pamela was only getting started. Pillow talk was supremely important. What were the Americans thinking about this? Would this be possible with Roosevelt for or against it? How stuff going on in Congress? Who there should the Brits talk to to try and bring rounds? Pamela took it all to Churchill and fed strategic information back to Haramann. Whether or not the Churchill's were aware of Pamela's affair with Haramann, her husband Randolph was kept in the dark. He was sent to Cairo to keep him out of the way. But on one of his visits, he finds out what's happening, and goes berserk at his parents for the first time, but not the last time. And what he constantly accuses them of is privileging the national interest over his marriage. And actually, he was right. Lavoral Haramann, too, was married. To avoid a scandal, he was sent to Moscow. Pamela broadened her horizons. She held parties inviting well-connected men. Soon there were a whole load of others, so she had a whole roster of important lovers. Often at the same time, she was juggling, and these were men with big egos, as well as, you know, very, very heavy burdens of conducting the war, and she had to do it so tactfully and skillfully that they, A, didn't really know what was going on. B, went along there, and ceded everything she needed them to do. On the 7th of December, 1941, Pamela was with the Churchill listening to the wireless. The static was bad, but it sounded like there'd been an attack on the United States. And finally, yes, this is confirmed by a secretary rushing in with a cable. The Japanese Navy had launched a surprise assault on the American base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. And obviously, it was horrific, though, terrible casualties, the whole ship was sunk. But for Churchill, and that little group of Anglo-Americans there that night, this was the best news ever. The United States would have to join the war. This could change everything, but it also changed nothing initially, because America, A, were they going to attack the Japanese, which was less useful to the Brits than the Germans, but also, you know, they had so much to learn and to get ready for. Pamela had a relationship with an American journalist, CBS broadcaster Ed Marrow. He beams into millions and millions of American homes every day with his reports from the front line in London, but he fell for Pamela in such a dramatic way. Marrow told Americans about the reality of war for British people. They don't know what it's like to be bombed, and he makes it very, very clear and graphic to them what it's like to be bombed. And basically, just helps to bring American public opinion on side. She was very close to him, I think. You know, it's certainly, it's a relationship my mother mentioned, my mother thought Pam would have married Ed Marrow if she could have persuaded him to get divorced. Winston Churchill worked around the clock. Still, he summoned Pamela to play cards and help him relax. Even now that the Americans were on board, they didn't always agree with the British about military strategy or tactics. This brought up a new target for Pamela's attention. Major General Fred Anderson was a sort of wonder kind. He was at young, pretty late 30s, seen as this great military star. Anderson was in charge of 8th bomber command, leading up to a potential allied invasion of France. The British preferred to bomb at night. They'd lost so many air crews, this was safer for air crews, though of course there was a consequence and casualties on the ground, it wasn't as accurate. The Americans who had not lost as many air crews had a different view as that you should bomb during the day, reduce civilian casualties and just be careful somehow. Anderson was a key man whom Churchill hoped to influence. And so was the Peter Portal who was the head of the RAF. Pamela's slept with both of them. Ting has a covert go between between the two men, Pamela helped them reach a compromise. She was in her early 20s when she was doing this and she was playing a role in geopolitics at the very, very highest level with consequences for millions of lives. The 6th of June 1944, Pamela was woken early by the sound of the phone ringing, Anderson was on the line, he told her to turn on the wireless, then hung up. The light troops were landing on the beaches of Normandy. This was one of the most important days of the war, D-Day, it was also one of the loniest days in Pamela's life. After D-Day, her influence began to wane apart from anything else, so the Churchill's. So Churchill isn't as relevant as he was in those early years, so in a sense her role is not quite as important anymore. The war finally ended in 1945, Churchill was victorious, but he lost the election shortly afterwards. As Pamela's role diminished, she realised she had to deal with her husband Randolph Churchill. He was deeply offended as to what happened, even though they have agreed to divorce by now. Pamela was uninvited from the Churchill family's Christmas celebrations. I don't think she particularly found Britain very hospitable at that time either, anyone who's been in Pam's position, becomes a bit, you might say, "Mama, I'd love it or loathe it." Without the favour of the Churchill family and with the war over, Pamela was just a divorced woman of 25, with little money and a shocking reputation. She's got a young child, but now she finds herself in quite a difficult position, wasn't Earth as she's going to do. Her wartime role hardly prepared her for a conventional career in peacetime. Even though she had all that geopolitical experience, all those contacts, all that knowledge, you can't just rock up at NATO as a woman like her and say, "Can I have a job?" She might have gotten to the Secretaryal pull, except she couldn't type. She left Britain and pursued what she knew best, influential men. There are many of them, Ali Khan, who teaches a lot about what to do in the Belgium. And then Gianni Anielli, who I think was a great love for her life of the men, she never married. There were others that were early Rothschilds and so on. Eventually, she met Broadway producer Leland Hayward, who'd made a fortune with a sound of music. She moved to New York for him. And then, when he died, she met up with Avril again and they were married within a very short time, and that really was happy for both of them, I think. Decades after their wartime affair at the Dorchester Hotel, she reconnected with her first wartime lover, Avril Haramon, who was then nearly 80 and weirdoed. She was in her 50s, it was a marriage for love and politics. Because through her new husband, Pamela got involved with the Democratic Party. Where she uses everything that Churchill taught her, ultimately to help Bill Clinton get into the White House. And in fact, he made her American ambassador to France when she was 73, where she then sat about working on the peace process in Bosnia, using again everything she had learnt from the Second World War. In Paris, Pamela went every day to swim at the Ritz. In February 1997, she had a stroke while in the pool. The following day, Pamela Digby Churchill Hayward Haramon died. Clinton really pulled out the stops. He sent Air Force 1 to bring her body home and laid on a nearest-the-americans' have to a state funeral for a in-Motion in Cathedral, which was really quite a big event. There have been a few men who just dismiss her as a very rude word, and that's it. But if you look at who thanks her, it includes Nelson Mandela, it includes Joe Biden, Richard Nixon, Bill Clinton, Jack Shirak, her France. She's an unlikely hero, but she did what she had to do to help Britain win the war and to resist the Nazis. She really did make a difference in sureing up the Anglo-American alliance, which was the only way that we were going to win. Next time on history's secret heroes, in the aftermath of the Hiroshima bomb, a minister Russia's towards the end. devastation to save his people. Tanimoto at that point thought of the fact that his wife and baby were in the middle of the city, and he was also thinking about his congregation and his church. And so he began running. Kyoshi Tanimoto and the atomic bomb. Subscribe to History's Heroes on BBC Sounds and make sure you have push notifications turned on. We'll let you know as soon as new episodes are available. So Alice Lockstone, I'm here for the history. Well, Ben Henderson, I like the formality, and that's perfect because we have a lot of history to share. Why did T become such a British obsession? How did English turn into the language we speak today? And yes, why do women's clothes still not have pockets? Well in our new podcast here for the history, we're investigating how stories from the past shape everyday life today. Basically the things we've all noticed but never stopped to question. Listen on BBC Sounds or watch on YouTube. Just search for here for the history. Ever wondered what you would do if you found yourself lost in the wild? Real survival stories from the Noisepodcast Network brings you astonishing tales of ordinary people thrust into extraordinary situations. So I just swam. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.