Churchill Britain's Greatest Ever Orator?

Sixty-eight years ago today the last of the British troops evacuated from the beaches of Dunkirk stepped onto British soil. In the region of 338,000 British and French troops were successfully rescued by the Royal Navy and a flotilla of merchant vessels. Winston Churchill, Britain's wartime leader, recognised the scale of the disaster facing his country. He acknowledged that Britain and her allies had suffered a "colosssal military disaster."

As so often, he rallied the British people with a defiant message issued to the House of Commons. "We shall defend our island whatever the cost may be. We shall fight on the beaches, we shall find on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields in the streets, we shall fight in the hills. We shall never surrender."

Thankfully, we are no longer at war with our European neighbours. Churchill is commemorated with a statue in Parliament Square as visitors to London listening to the Palace Trail, London travel guide will see. Independent travellers can discover how arguably the greatest living statesman, Nelson Mandela, ended up having a statue erected to him in Parliament Square.

Affection for Sir Winston Churchill remains strong. Churchill was knighted in April, 1953. He was voted greatest ever Briton in a BBC poll a few years ago. Understandably, Churchill is remembered for his rousing oratory during World War Two and his recognition of the danger posed to the West by Communist dominated Europe. He famously coined the term 'iron curtain' in a speech made in Missouri, in March 1946. "From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic an iron curtain has descended across the Continent. Behind that line lie all the capitals of the ancient states of Central and Eastern Europe."

Churchill had a lighter side, too, as listeners to the Palace Trail audio walking tour will discover. To hear an audio sample from the Palace Trail mp3 guided tour featuring Churchill please click here.

There are five Walk Talk Tour iPod travel guides of London which are available in English, French, German and Spanish. Each Walk Talk Tour is divided into commentary points. Tour users receive instructions as to how to get from one commentary point to the next after they have heard about that particular landmark. Walk Talk Tourists are then asked to press pause. They are advised to press play when they reach their next destination. The Walk Talk Tour London city guides come complete with a downloadable map, so visitors won't miss a thing.