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The Darkest Hour

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For other uses, seeDarkest Hour (disambiguation).
The world situation at the beginning of 1941, with colour-coding:
Western Allies(independent countries)
Western Allies(colonies or occupied)
Comintern
Axis(countries)
Axis(colonies or occupied, includingVichy France)
neutral

"The Darkest Hour"is a phrase used to refer to an early period ofWorld War II,from approximately mid-1940 to mid-1941. While widely attributed toWinston Churchill,the origins of the phrase are unclear.

The phrase[edit]

The phrase "the darkest hour" for this period, drawing on the proverb that "the darkest hour is just before the dawn", is usually ascribed toWinston Churchill,though there is no evidence he coined the phrase.[1]

Churchillhadused a similar phrase at the time, though at the time he was referring specifically to the situation of France rather than to the United Kingdom. In his'finest hour' speech,on 16 June 1940, Churchill described the collapse of France following the German invasion as "the darkest hour in French history";[2]he had used similar terms when meeting with members of theSupreme War Councila week earlier.[3]Writing after the war, in 1949, he described the period just before Dunkirk as "the darkest moment", and the period 1940–41 generally as "the darkest hours".[4]

However, presumably due to the proverb, use of the phrase was widespread at the time. A little before Churchill's speech, it was being used to describe the current situation in sources as widely spread as the leader column of theBerwick Advertiser(30 May)[5]and the New Zealand parliament (13 June).[6]It is not clear when it became firmly associated with the United Kingdom specifically, or attributed to Churchill.

Historical context[edit]

Following theFall of Francein June 1940, and the evacuation of theBritish ArmyfromDunkirk,theBritish Empirewas the only major power fighting against theAxis Powersin Europe. Through much of 1940, until victory in theBattle of Britain,the United Kingdom appeared to be underdirect threat of invasion.

Although the British Empire was the only major power fighting the Germans and Italians during the period, it was not the only major power fighting the Axis as a whole.Chinahad been engagingImperial Japansince 1937, when the Japanese launched anall-out invasion.Some minor powers were also fighting the Germans and Italians: Greecefought the Axis powersfrom October 1940, when itdefeated the Italian troops,to June 1941, whenCretesurrenderedto the Germans. BothWinston Churchill[7]andCharles de Gaulle[8]praised Greece's exceptional heroism at a point that many peoples were subjugated and the Axis seemed unbeatable.

The United States did not formally become involved in the war on the Allied side until after theattack on Pearl Harborby the Japanese on 7 December 1941. However, PresidentFranklin D. Rooseveltclearly sympathized with Britain and other opponents of Germany, and he did what he could to quietly assist them within the confines of existing U.S. law, which mandated strict official neutrality, and in the face of strong isolationist sentiment, both among the public and Congress, which wanted the U.S. to stay out of the European and Asian conflicts. At Roosevelt's urging, a "cash-and-carry" provision allowed presidential approval of weapons sales to the belligerent nations, on the condition that the recipients both arranged for the transport and paid immediately with cash. The argument was that would not draw the U.S. into the conflict and so the provision was inserted into theNeutrality Act of 1937,which had been passed when war clouds were looming over Europe, and the Sino-Japanese conflict was already underway,[9]and after the provision officially lapsed in 1939, it was re-inserted into the follow-upNeutrality Act of 1939.[10]

Roosevelt believed that "cash-and-carry" would aid France and Great Britain in the event of a war with Germany since they were the only countries that controlled the seas and could take advantage of the provision.[11]The U.S. officially dropped its pretense of neutrality with the passage of theLend-Lease Actin March 1941 and openly allowed arms sales to Britain,Free France,China and later, the Soviet Union and other Allied states.[12]

The phrase "The Darkest Hour" was used for the title of the 2017 filmDarkest Hour,which starredGary Oldmanas Churchill and was set in May 1940.

References[edit]

Notes
  1. ^Martin, Gary."'The darkest hour' – the meaning and origin of this phrase ".Phrasefinder.
  2. ^Their Finest Hourat The Churchill Centre website
  3. ^Gilbert, Martin (1966).Winston S. Churchill: Finest hour, 1939–1941.Boston, Houghton Mifflin.
  4. ^Churchill, Winston (1949).The Second World War. Vol. II: Their Finest Hour.Dunkirk. pp. 79, 460.{{cite book}}:CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  5. ^"The Darkest Hour".Berwick Advertiser.30 May 1940.
  6. ^Parliamentary debates. v.257.1940. p. 168.
  7. ^Wikiquote:Winston Churchill
  8. ^"Symi News"(PDF).1 October 2009.Retrieved26 May2018.
  9. ^The Neutrality Acts, 1930s, US: State Department, retrieved 5 June 2008.
  10. ^Public Resolution 54, 76th Congress, 54 Stat. 4 4 November 1939
  11. ^The Neutrality Acts, 1930s, US: State Department, retrieved 5 June 2008.
  12. ^Ebbert, Jean, Marie-Beth Hall & Beach, Edward Latimer. Crossed Currents. p. 28.
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