CHURCHILL, Winston S.

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Autograph letter signed, soliciting Lord Salisbury for assistance with his biography of Lord Randolph. Winston Churchill writes to former prime minister Lord Salisbury, asking for letters relating to his father Lord Randolph, who served in Salisbury's Cabinet. Churchill was gathering material for his biography - Salisbury supplied correspondence which probably represented the most important source apart from the Churchill family papers.Churchill writes two months after Salisbury's exit from Downing Street, following three terms as prime minister: June 1885-January 1886, July 1886-August 1892, and June 1895-July 1902. Lord Randolph served Salisbury successively as Secretary of State for India, Leader of the House of Commons, and Chancellor of the Exchequer, until his resignation from the Cabinet on a point of principle stalled his political career. Winston's relationship with his father had been respectful rather than warm. However, "when Winston later reread his father's letters, he realized how much he had thought and cared for him... [and] was determined to vindicate his memory. In 1906 he published a two-volume biography of his father, which remains the most detailed written up to the end of the twentieth century. Winston believed that he owed everything to his father" (ODNB). Churchill writes to Salisbury in the early stages of gathering material for the book: "Dear Lord Salisbury, as perhaps you may not have seen the enclosed advertisement in The Times, I write personall

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