October 14, 2025

Oddments from Life at Chartwell

In the current issue of Finest Hour, Bill Murray, the son of Winston Churchill’s bodyguard Edmund Murray, describes what it was like growing up in the shadow of the legendary prime minister. One benefit that Bill and his sisters Aileen and Yvonne enjoyed was being the recipients of various odds and ends discarded by Churchill.

“Dad was instructed to retain all of the bands from the cigars that Churchill smoked,” Bill writes. “He would slip them into his pocket, and as a result we had cigar bands from Churchill’s cigars in every drawer in our house….The same could be said of the playing cards that had Winston Churchill’s signature as the back design. If a deck was damaged or simply well used, it would often end up in our house for the children to play with.”

Especially appreciated by the children of the Murray household was a somewhat unusual relic: “I have distant memories of a rubber dinghy in our garden, a throwout from Chartwell, that was filled with water and used as a paddling pool.” Recently, a photograph of the dinghy was discovered in a Murray family album. With any luck, an intrepid researcher will one day find a photograph of Churchill himself in the inflatable watercraft!

Read more of Bill Murray’s recollections about growing up as the son of Churchill’s bodyguard in the current issue of Finest Hour by becoming a member of the International Churchill Society. Rates start as low as $29 / year. CLICK HERE to join.