When the war began, Britain was led by Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain, but his policies of appeasement towards Germany and the failure of his military intervention in German-occupied Norway led to a parliamentary revolt, leaving Chamberlain no choice other than to resign, and name Winston Churchill as his successor.
Immediately, Churchill was faced with some difficult challenges. Germany invaded Holland and Belgium on his first day in office. Churchill was a man of great courage who relished the opportunity to lead his country to victory, but he was also a man of great circumspection. He realized that the people he surrounded himself with, and the alliances he made, would be the difference between victory and defeat. He assembled a Cabinet of advisors that included Lord Beaverbrook and Lord Halifax to handle every aspect of the war, from diplomacy to weapons production.
Churchill also brought President Roosevelt into the war, persuading him that Britain would be a loyal ally and a valuable one, were America to form an alliance.
France surrendered to Germany in 1940 which deprived Britain of its last line of defense, and made the threat of a German invasion of the south of England by sea a far more real and imminent threat. France's crumbling confirmed Churchill's belief that the Germans could only be beaten if America and Britain worked together. It was the only course of action that would restore freedom and protect the future of civilization.
Hitler's Luftwaffe began bombing London in September 1940, beginning the Battle of Britain. Churchill needed to find a way to keep home morale high while simultaneously devising a military plan to defend England's south from the brutal air attacks that were decimating London. He believed that sending Hitler a clear, unequivocal message that Britain would never surrender is one of the keys to actually winning the war.
At the same time, uncertainty and dissension are also rife in the Churchill household, as Churchill's wife and three grown children find the family order stabilized by their spouses. Even when Churchill spends time at his family home in the country, he is unable to find a place of harmony.
