January 1, 1970

His entry into Sandhurst in 1893 was delayed when he fell off a bridge near his aunt’s house into a tree, during a game of ‘chase’, and was laid up in bed for three months with a ruptured kidney.

His arrival at Sandhurst brought to an end his schooldays and he thrived at the elite military academy. ‘I had a new start’, he wrote in My Early Life: ‘I was no longer handicapped by past neglect of Latin, French or Mathematics.’ Here, Churchill developed the intense powers of concentration, particularly when studying the strategy of war, which were to serve him well in later life. He also prepared and delivered his first public speech for the Entertainments Protection League (opposing plans to to screen off the bar of the Empire Theatre, Leicester Square, where ‘undesirable ladies’ congregated). He completed his cadetship in 1894.