Neville Chamberlain’s Umbrella: ‘Object’ Lessons in the ... · the concern here is with...

Julie V Gottlieb University of Sheffield

Neville ChamberlainrsquosUmbrella lsquoObjectrsquo Lessons inthe History of Appeasement

AbstractNeville Chamberlainrsquos umbrella was ubiquitous during the Munich Crisis and inits aftermath as material object as commodity and as political emblem that cameto represent the temperament and character of the lsquoMan of Peacersquo who hadbrought relief to the world by striking a lsquogentlemanrsquos peacersquo with Hitler on 30September 1938 This culminated in the damning portrayal of the Prime Ministeras the lsquoUmbrella Manrsquo in lsquoCatorsquosrsquo Guilty Men (1940) Throwing the spotlight onthe material object of the umbrella can illuminate the popular dimension of thesehighly charged diplomatic events and offer some insight into how foreign policywas lived across the social spectrum and across borders We can chart dramaticfluctuations in both mediated and visceral public opinion in the changingsymbolic uses of the umbrella by politicians by journalists by cartoonists andby consumers themselves The study of appeasement has been stuck in certainmethodological ruts and has not hitherto taken the cultural turn nor paid muchattention to popular responses to the prelude to the Peoplersquos War By blowing thedust off Chamberlainrsquos old umbrella this article suggests an alternativeperspective on the politics and culture of appeasement evoking the sightssounds textures feelings and tastes of a crisis that was played out at the level ofdiplomacy but also very much as a lsquoPeoplersquos Crisisrsquo

The history of appeasement has traditionally been told from thevantage point of international relations high politics or in biographicalmode animated by dramatic scenes of suspense and intrigue involvingensembles of great men1 Over the past 75 years the bountiful

E-mail juliegottliebsheffieldacukI am grateful to Richard Toye and Clarisse Berthezene for reading earlier drafts Marc-Olivier Baruch Miklos Lojko and others who heard this as a paper for directing me to yetmore representations of Chamberlainrsquos umbrella and to the journalrsquos anonymous readersfor their constructive feedback

1 The scholarship on appeasement is vast but a few illuminating synopses of the long-running historiographical debates are available See Sidney Aster lsquoAppeasement Beforeand After Revisionismrsquo Diplomacy and Statecraft 19 (2008) 443ndash80 Daniel Hucker lsquoThe

Twentieth Century British History Vol 27 No 3 2016 pp 357ndash388 doi101093tcbhhww030

Advance Access publication 30 June 2016 The Author [2016] Published by Oxford University Press All rights reserved For Permissionsplease email journalspermissionsoupcom

scholarship on appeasement has passed through various stages froman indictment of the lsquoMen of Munichrsquo countered by revisionists andcontested in turn by counter-revisionists and post-revisionists Of thesegreat and guilty men the leading man has inevitably been the BritishPrime Minister Neville Chamberlain a figure whose reputation haslurched from hero to villain from self-styled lsquoMan of Peacersquo to Hitlerrsquosgullible dupe2 At the zenith of his popularity Chamberlain wasencouragingly informed by Bill Astor that his lsquoprestige abroad isenormous His name is almost a synonym for peacersquo3 Portrayal ofChamberlainrsquos saintliness was constantly reinforced with the visualhook of the umbrella and PPS to Rab Butler at the Foreign OfficelsquoChipsrsquo Channon one of the Prime Ministerrsquos most infatuatedsupporters observed how on his way to Munich the lsquoSaviour ofPeace got quietly into his car umbrella and allrsquo4 However it did nottake long for Chamberlainrsquos detractors and satirists to rain on hisparade and the Premier was demeaned and damned through a processof objectification In lsquoCatorsquosrsquo stinging denunciation of 1940 Guilty MenChamberlain was given a starring role among the band of fumbling andbumbling appeasers but more specifically he was cast as themetonymous lsquoUmbrella Manrsquo becoming one with the quintessentiallyutilitarian English accoutrement that so often supported his elongatedbut curling septuagenarian framemdashhe would turn 70 on 18 March19395 The Star predicted that the umbrella lsquostiff straight rigid tightlyrolled up rather like its owner may take its place in historyrsquo6

In fact umbrellas and Chamberlainrsquos umbrella in particular wereomnipresent in the visual and material culture and in the rhetoricalconstructions of the Munich Crisis and in its aftermath7 Chamberlainrsquosumbrella was easily the most produced and reproduced politicalemblem of late 1938ndash9 represented in a wide range of textual and

Unending Debate Appeasement Chamberlain and the Origins of the Second World WarrsquoIntelligence and National Security 23 (2008) 536ndash51 and R Gerald Hughes The PostwarLegacy of Appeasement British Foreign Policy since 1945 (London 2014)

2 See Robert Self lsquoNeville Chamberlainrsquos ReputationmdashTime for ReassessmentrsquoHistorically Speaking 8 (2007) 18ndash20

3 Letter from Neville Chamberlain to Ida 13 November 1938 in Robert Self ed TheNeville Chamberlain Diary Letters Volume 4 The Downing Street Years 1934-1940 (Aldershot2005) 362

4 28 September 1938 Robert Rhodes James ed lsquoChipsrsquo The Diaries of Sir HenryChannon (London 2003) 172

5 Comedy singing team Flanagan and Allen also had a hit with lsquoThe Umbrella Manrsquo in1938 which did not make direct reference to the PM but was about an umbrella maker

6 Quoted in David Reynolds Summits Six Meetings that Shaped the Twentieth Century(London 2007) 54

7 Any interest that there has been in the material culture of appeasement has beenpopular rather than academic See Nigel Rodgers The Umbrella Unfurled Its RemarkableLife and Times (London 2013) and Max Everest-Phillips Neville Chamberlain The Art ofAppeasement (London 2013)

358 JULIE V GOTTLIEB

visual forms in the media and in consumable forms as accessoriesadornments novelties souvenirs and edible delicacies In Britain andabroad and especially in France the umbrella came to stand for adistinctly British form of diplomatic engagement The Yorkshire Postasked lsquoIs there any other single object that could be turned to so muchpolitical symbolism Perhaps it was the association of ideas between MrChamberlainrsquos mission and the purpose of the umbrella that struckforeign imagination the umbrella has no bellicose connotations It isshelter protection (originally against sun as well as rain)rsquo8

New directions in political history scholarshipmdashtaking into accountlinguistic visual affective material rhetorical and consumption turnsand a spate of biographies of individual objectsmdashmake the study of theumbrella as political symbol and as material entity especially apropos9

As Frank Trentmann has declared lsquothings are backrsquo and lsquothe materialworld has too much history in it to leave it to the social sciencesrsquo10 Inher recent object biography of the gas mask Susan Grayzel hasdemonstrated how it functions as lsquoa device with which to explore thewar within and beyond its seemingly natural borders of time andspacersquo11 Symbolizing the diametrical opposite of the gas maskChamberlainrsquos umbrella was indubitably the other pervasive emblem-atic object of the crisis By searching for the meanings of the gamp12

this essay therefore offers an evocation of the Czechoslovakian CrisisMunich Crisis as it was seen tasted and felt both in terms of sentienceand sentiment If the approach taken here includes some elements of ajeu drsquoesprit it is because this echoes the whimsical ways in whichChamberlain and his umbrella were represented in the sources Intracing how the umbrella was initially used to fete but very soondiscredit its owner we can unmask neglected discourses and levels ofexperience in the prelude to the Peoplersquos War

The multiple and malleable meanings of Chamberlainrsquos umbrella canbe deduced by reflecting on its symbolic discursive performative andvery material embodiments These meanings can be uncovered by first

8 lsquoUmbrellasrsquo Yorkshire Evening Post 24 October 19389 See Tony Bennett and Patrick Joyce eds Material Powers Cultural Studies History and

the Material Turn (London 2013) Lyn Pykett lsquoThe Material Turn in Victorian StudiesrsquoLiterature Compass I (January 2003-December 2004) Erika Rappaport lsquoImperialPossessions Cultural Histories and the Material Turn Responsersquo Victorian Studies 50(2008) 289ndash96 for the lsquorhetorical turnrsquo in modern British history see Richard ToyeRhetoric A Very Short Introduction (Oxford 2013)

10 Frank Trentmann lsquoMateriality in the Future of History Things Practices andPoliticsrsquo Journal of British Studies 48 (2009) 283ndash307

11 Susan R Grayzel lsquoDefence against the Indefensible The Gas Mask the State andBritish Culture during and after the First World Warrsquo Twentieth Century British History 25(2014) 418ndash34

12 The etymology of the gamp is from Charles Dickensrsquo Martin Chuzzlewit (1843-1844)and named after the character Mrs Gamp the drunken nurse who always carried anumbrella

NEVILLE CHAMBERLAINrsquoS UMBRELLA 359

charting the textual construction of Chamberlainrsquos umbrella in thepress providing insight into the spectrum of and shifts in publicopinion on the appeasement policy in Britain and abroad Secondly itwill consider how the changing representations of the umbrella relate tothe re-construction of Neville Chamberlainrsquos political persona by themedia the Conservative Party the public and himself13 Thirdly it willexamine the marketing and the commercialization of the crisis and theways in which certain hallmarks of national identity were diffusedthrough popular cultural forms in these tense months that proved to bethe countdown to the Second World War Fourthly it will reflect on thequasi-religious significance accorded the umbrellamdashimmediately afterthe Four Powers Conference Chamberlainrsquos umbrella was instantlyrecognized as an artefact of deep historical significance a museumpiece and even a relic Fifthly and perhaps most obviously theumbrella became the metaphoric stick with which to beat Chamberlainand in textual visual or theatrical form the umbrella was evoked todenote a misguided and bankrupt foreign policy

Due to the irrefutable diplomatic failure of the Munich Agreementsigned on 30 September 1938 at each juncture in the reassessment ofappeasement historians political scientists and generations of polit-icians too have tried to identify the underlying lesson to be learnedwhether strategic ethical or psychological Munich has consistentlybeen conjured as an object lesson in international relations an exampleof a how negotiations with dictators should not be conducted and usedto serve as a practical example of a principle or an abstract idea14 Butthe concern here is with another type of object lesson namely the lessonswe can learn from the main object the artefact of appeasement Indeedobjects can act as lsquopolitical symbols vehicles of community ingredientsof the public sphere and instruments of political communicationrsquo15

Unlocking Secrets of Signification by Unwinding ChamberlainrsquosUmbrella

Modern political history is replete with examples of leaders who areidentified with and as their signature pieces whether it is StanleyBaldwinrsquos pipe Hitlerrsquos moustache Neville Chamberlainrsquos umbrella

13 Nicholas Pronay lsquoRearmament and the British Public Policy and Propagandarsquo inJames Curran et al eds Impacts and Influences Essays on Media Power in the TwentiethCentury (London 1987) 53ndash96 and T J Hollis lsquoThe Conservative Party and FilmPropaganda between the Warsrsquo English Historical Review 96 (1981) 359ndash69

14 M Vedby Rasmussen lsquoThe History of a Lesson Versailles Munich and the SocialConstruction of the Pastrsquo Review of International Studies 29 (2003) 499ndash519



first Winston Churchillrsquos hats16 and then his cigar Margaret Thatcherrsquoshandbag or John Majorrsquos cricket bat or his y-front underwear (seeFigure 1) Charting the deliberate cultivation alongside the changingmeanings and charges of these personal symbols allows us to assessfluctuations in the popular appeal and the reputations of these politicalleaders17 In fact Churchill as Chamberlainrsquos chief rival in theappeasement polemic was understood to be losing the argument andthe popularity contest because he had yet to develop his autographbrand lsquoSartoriallyrsquo Churchill lsquohas been a chameleon and suspectamong his countrymenrsquo It was pointed out that lsquoa statesmen should beknown by one or two features not for varietyrsquo In the Edwardian periodChurchill had acquired a reputation for wearing distinctive hats but his

Figure 1lsquoNeville Chamberlainrsquo ceramic toby jug by Gibsons Parliamentary Art CollectionWOA S552

16 The author is grateful to Richard Toye for allowing me to preview his work onlsquoWinston Churchill and the Golden Age of Journalismrsquo an essay where he discusses howChurchill acquired a reputation for wearing distinctive hats which he used to hisadvantage in building his reputation and distinctive brand

17 For the politics of reputation in modern Britain see Philip Williamson StanleyBaldwin Conservative Leadership and National Values (New York 1999) and Richard Toyeand Julie V Gottlieb eds Making Reputations Power Persuasion and the Individual inModern British Politics (London 2005)


trademark cigar chomping had not yet permeated public consciousnessby 1938 whereas lsquomonocle and orchid were priceless assets to JosephChamberlain Everyone thought of Gladstone in terms of collarsStanley Baldwinrsquos homely pipe caught the popular fancy suggestinggaiters muddy boots and pigs Lloyd Georgersquos purple smoking jacketand patriarchal cloaks created a diverse character NevilleChamberlainrsquos umbrella is as notorious as Sairey Gamprsquosrsquo18 Politicalemblems are important both for crystallizing image and message in theheat of political competition and they also serve as a vital mnemonicdevice in securing legacies in the longer term For example the designfor the Chamberlain toby jug is made up of his head as cup and hisumbrella as handle

In addition Chamberlainrsquos umbrella has not been the onlysymbolically resonant brolly and he competes for exclusive rights tothe umbrella as metonym of English national identity with theHollywood version of Mary Poppins (1964) and the Avengersrsquo (1961ndash9)umbrella-carrying bowler-hat topped unflappable Cold Warrior JohnSteed (played by Patrick Macnee) Experts on the John F Kennedyassassination will also be familiar with the mysterious lsquoumbrella manrsquowho stood along the route of the Dallas motorcade and conspiracytheorists believe he was either signalling to the assassin or that he mayhave shot a poison dart at the President from the tip of his gamp19

Much more recently the umbrella has emerged as a powerful politicaltrope again outstripping it quotidian utility when in the autumn andwinter of 2014 the Occupy Central protestors in Hong Kong found thatumbrellas were the only effective defence against the armed policersquospepper spray and the harsh midday sun This popular movement fordemocracy has been dubbed the lsquoUmbrella Revolutionrsquo

What is the meaning of the umbrella and what does it stand for inthe specific context of Britain in the 1930s It is first and foremost afunctional object providing protection mainly against foul weather Itelicits English virtues of pragmatism the boy-scout wisdom aboutalways being prepared and that rather uninspiring Baldwiniancatchphrase lsquosafety firstrsquo Further the brolly alludes to a national

18 lsquoMr Churchillrsquos Dressrsquo Yorkshire Evening Post 24 November 193819 lsquoThen along came Chamberlain and it immediately became associated with losers

who trusted Hitler so much so that Joseph Kennedy the American Ambassador to theCourt of St Jamesrsquos and in his time a fervent supporter of appeasement came to loatheany mention of umbrellas His son the future President John F Kennedy is said to haveinherited his fatherrsquos umbrellaphobia This prompted a man called Louis Steven Witt totake an umbrella to Dealey Plaza on November 22 1963 with the intention of opening itas the Presidentrsquos car passed and thereby poking fun at himrsquo Craig Brown lsquoGood gollythe Brolly has been Jolly Significantrsquo Daily Mail 8 October 2009 For a review of thepejorative meaning attached to the umbrella in American politics due the Chamberlainconnection see Edward H Miller lsquoUmbrella Manrsquo lthttphistsocietyblogspotcouk201311umbrella-manhtmlgt


obsession with the weather with meteorologically oriented subjects themost acceptable in polite company across the social spectrum lsquoInEngland this [the weather] is an ever-interesting even thrilling topicand you must be good at discussing the weatherrsquo20 The English virtueof always being prepared for a rainy day was captured in a spot oflsquomass observationrsquo conducted by Daily Mail reporter Charles Gravesfrom a front table at Oddyrsquos Piccadilly in the spring of 1938 Herecorded the lsquoratio of umbrellas to walking sticks was about 8 to 1 Fivepessimists carried mackintoshes twenty or thirty wore overcoatsdespite the warmthrsquo21 An actual Mass-Observer identified as a ladysocial worker (age 40 London) felt it lsquoso undignified to send that oldman over there [to Germany] with his umbrella Baldwin may not havebeen much use but at least he had some presence and personalityrsquo22 InGeorge Orwellrsquos famous exploration of British national identity lsquoTheLion and the Unicornrsquo the umbrella completes the outfit of his muchdisdained Whitehall-based colonial administrator lsquoWell-meaning over-civilized men in dark suits and black felt hats with neatly rolledumbrellas crooked over the left forearm were imposing theirconstipated view of life on Malaya and Nigeria Mombasa andMandalayrsquo23 In social terms this piece of attire supports middle- andupper-class standing In terms of gender the long black umbrella tendsto be male-identified by the 1930s whereas it had been female-identified when weaponized by the suffragettes a generation earlier24

According to George Mossersquos taxonomy of the image of modern manthe clean-cut Englishman is the ideal masculine type in Britain pittedagainst the emergent virile Continental figure of the New Fascist Man25

Peter Mandler has argued that the conflation of Englishness withgentlemanliness was an inter-war development as a conservativeminority sought to adopt the hitherto liberal notion of nationalcharacter for their exclusive anti-modern ends Mandler has identifiedcartoonist George Strubersquos lsquoLittle Manrsquo as lsquothe exemplar of the newtype an imaginative compound of the City gent and the lsquolsquoman in the

20 George Mikes How to be an Alien (London 1946) 1621 Charles Graves lsquoPersonality Page I See Lifersquo Daily Mail 24 May 193822 Day Survey Respondent 638 April 1938-September 1938 Mass Observation Archive

University of Sussex Special Collection23 George Orwell lsquoThe Lion and the Unicornrsquo in Sonia Orwell and Ian Angus eds The

Collected Essays Journalism and Letters Vol2 My Country Right or Left 1940-1943(Harmondsworth 1968) 93

24 A generation earlier the umbrella had been female or female fanatic-identified inanti-suffragette propaganda See Maria Grever lsquoThe Pantheon of Feminist CultureWomenrsquos Movements and the Organization of Memoryrsquo Gender and History 9 (1997)364ndash74

25 George L Mosse The Image of Man The Creation of Modern Masculinity (New York1996) See also Julie V Gottlieb lsquoBody Fascism in Britain Building the Blackshirt in theInter-war Periodrsquo Contemporary European History 20 (2011) 111ndash36


streetrsquorsquo dressed in bow tie and bowler hat and armed with tightlyfurled umbrellarsquo while also small modest and endearing26 Thereforedominant codes of gentlemanliness are inscribed on the umbrella as it isthe stereotypical Englishmanrsquos accessory of choice As Susan KingsleyKent argues lsquothe figure of Neville Chamberlain impeccably tailoredwith his bowler hat and umbrella returning from Munich with lsquolsquopeacein our timersquorsquo seemed to exemplify those qualities of [Little Englandist]masculinity that would help keep Britain out of warrsquo27 In MartinFrancisrsquos assessment Chamberlain possessed lsquoa celebrated aloofnessrooted in deep loathing of displays of public emotion orsentimentalityrsquo28

But what happened to the English gentleman and by extension tothe popularity of his trademark umbrella when peacetime gave way towar Marcus Collins has suggested that with the outbreak of warthe gentleman was relegated to a bygone age he was feminized and hewas identified as the exemplar of a corrupt gerontocracy While theTory lsquoChipsrsquo Channon confided in his diary upon hearing aboutthe Munich terms that it was lsquoa Chamberlain respectable gentlemanrsquospeacersquo and he joined in as the lsquowhole world rejoice[d]rsquo the verygentlemanliness of the agreement helped to undermine the PrimeMinisterrsquos position only a few months later29 The form and design ofthe umbrella therefore expresses an intrinsically gentlemanly aestheticreferencing a tightly wound and self-retrained etiquette stiffness (of theupper lip variety) and aspirational middle-class and patrician taste fora well-cut suit and a top hat while eschewing anything overtly martial

The relative infrequency of the umbrella-carrying habit among thelabouring classes is in itself significant as the gamp is very much amarker of upwardly mobile class aspirations It was partly for thisreason that the umbrella also became a subversive symbol and theNational Unemployed Workersrsquo Movement staged a number ofdemonstrations in early 1939 in which protestors carried a blackcoffin inscribed with the words lsquoHe did not get his winter reliefrsquo andenclosing an umbrella30 The burial of Chamberlainrsquos umbrella (labelledlsquoappeasementrsquo) also featured in Cummingsrsquo cartoon in the UnitedFrontrsquos Tribune31 In shortmdashbut especially in its elongated design thatallows it to double as a walking-stickmdashthe umbrella is an emblem of

26 Peter Mandler The English National Character The History of an Idea from EdmundBurke to Tony Blair (London 2006) 165

27 Susan Kingsley Kent Gender and Power in Britain 1640-1990 (London 1999) 30928 Martin Francis lsquoTears Tantrums and Bared Teeth The Emotional Economy of Three

Conservative Prime Ministers 1951-1963rsquo Journal of British Studies 41 (2002) 354ndash8729 30 September 1938 Robert Rhodes James ed lsquoChipsrsquo 17230 lsquoCoffin Parade in Middlesbroughrsquo Manchester Guardian 14 January 1939 See also lsquoA

Procession with Umbrellasrsquo Manchester Guardian 23 February 193931 lsquoAppeasement is Dead Long Live Appeasementrsquo Tribune 24 March 1939


Englishness reifying national tastes for all things rainproof andrespectable civil and civilian urban and urbane and practical andprotective It is no accident that the umbrella is often used inadvertisements and as a logo for insurance companies In factlsquoumbrella insurancersquo is the term given to extra liability insurance

Chamberlainrsquos Styling and Self-Styling as the lsquoUmbrella Manrsquo

The umbrella has a longer history in British fashion as part of thedominant sartorial code and as it just so happens the story of itsprovenance and integration into British menrsquos fashion was newsworthyin July 1938 when the umbrella carried by Jonas Hanway through thestreets of London in 1750 was being sold at auction in Tavistock Thephilanthropist Hanway brought umbrellas from Persia and made thempopular in England when it had lsquoneeded moral courage for a man touse a luxury article that was regarded by men as something thoroughlyeffeminatersquo Then it was a lsquogreat soldier James Wolfe who writing as acivilian from Paris in 1752 lamented that Englishmen should be so slowto recognise the lsquolsquoamicable advantagesrsquorsquo of the umbrellarsquo However 60years later lsquothe Duke of Wellington disparaged the umbrella as anlsquolsquounmilitaryrsquorsquo weapon At Bayonne in 1813 he noticed some youngGuardsrsquo officers protecting themselves from Biscayan squalls beneathumbrellas and he wrote this scathing reprimand Lord Wellington doesnot approve of the use of umbrellas under fire and will not allow thesons of gentlemen to make themselves ridiculous in the eyes of theenemyrsquo32 Over a century later the umbrella would again provokecontroversy and again on the basis that it sent the wrong message to anenemy bent on European domination It was no match for the swordPredicting the proliferation of umbrella imagery already in August1938 anti-appeaser and National Labour MP Harold Nicolsonremarked lsquoBritannia for several years has discarded her trident foran umbrellarsquo33 A more light-hearted solution to the military impotenceof the umbrella was the invention presented at an Institute of Patenteesexhibition in Manchester in May 1939 of an umbrella with a shooting-stick attachment which would lsquohave interest for Mr Chamberlain whenhe next goes to Munichrsquo34

In the specific context of Chamberlainrsquos premiership from 1937 to1940 no other public personage challenged him to be distinguished asthe umbrella man lsquoMr Chamberlain is the man behind the newEuropean boom in the old umbrella Our Mr Chamberlainmdashfar from a

32 lsquoMiscellany The Early Gamprsquo Manchester Guardian 6 July 193833 lsquoSayings of the Weekrsquo Manchester Guardian 21 August 193834 lsquoIn Manchesterrsquo Manchester Guardian 25 May 1939


fashion-plate Irsquom sure yoursquoll agreemdashhas done for the umbrella what theDuke of Windsor once did for the straw hat what Anthony Eden hasdone for the Homburg Lord Baldwin for the pipe Mr Gladstone for thebagrsquo35 Chamberlainrsquos umbrella emerged as one of the most repeatedsynecdoches in the lsquodiscursive profusionrsquo unleashed by the MunichCrisis36

The study of Chamberlainrsquos umbrella fits under the wider conceptualframework of a relational history of politics and fashion and thefashioning of politics In the age of cinema newsreels and pictorialnewspapers politicians made deliberate fashion statements and theirdramatic posturing and the very visual performativity of diplomacysuggest an acute awareness of the camera The newsreels that werewatched by as many of 19 million per week lost no filmic or photoopportunity during the Crisis lsquoThe greatest triumph for propagandawas the extraordinary coverage given by the newsreels to the Munichagreement Gaumont British offering an almost hysterical endorsementboth of the agreement and of Chamberlain personallyrsquo37 Of course theConservative Party was particularly successful at harnessing cutting-edge political technologies before and between the wars and theConservative Party Film Association had taken advice from film mogulsAlexander Korda and Michael Balcon on how to craft the PMrsquos publicimage38 This was brilliantly satirized by cartoonist David Low in hislsquoLowrsquos Topical Budgetrsquo where Chamberlain was being made ready forhis close-up by Korda and under the heading lsquoA Star is Bornrsquo39

Correspondingly the pictorial news market was only expanding andsignificantly Edward Hulton launched The Picture Post on 1 October1938 The Illustrated London News published a lsquoRecord Number TheCrisis and the Agreementrsquo narrating the momentous week with moreimages than text including an article lsquoPersonalities in Crisisrsquo It wasnoteworthy that of the eleven personalities here featured those notcarrying an umbrella were American Ambassador Joseph KennedyHalifax Attlee and Sir Robert Vansittart while all the other Tories andcabinet ministers were pictured in stride with their umbrellasmdashAnthony Eden Sir John Simon Churchill Duff Cooper Samuel HoareHore-Belisha and Chamberlain40 This was a crisis as photo montage

35 Graham Stanford lsquoThe Chamberlain Gamp is A La Mode Nowrsquo Daily Mail 25October 1938

36 Kate McLouglin lsquoVoices of the Munich Pactrsquo Critical Inquiry 34 (2008) 543ndash6237 Malcolm Smith Britain and 1940 History Myth and Popular Memory (London 2000)

2238 See Jeffrey Richards The Age of the Dream Palace Cinema and Society in 1930s Britain

(London 2010)39 David Low lsquoLowrsquos Topical Budgetrsquo Evening Standard 9 October 193740 lsquoPersonalities in Crisisrsquo Illustrated London News 8 October 1939


carrying a message that these powerful men were using their fingers togrip umbrellas rather than poising them on the trigger

The Sudeten Crisis and the Battle of Dress

That the crisis was both recorded by and inevitably given addedemotional charge by two dimensional and moving pictorials meant thatat a certain level too deteriorating Anglo-German relations wereexplained as what I would term a battle of dress (Figure 2) Shortlypreceding the Sudeten Crisis another kind of sartorial contest hadplayed itself out on the British domestic front as the lsquobattle of theshirtsrsquo and involving Mosleyrsquos Blackshirts and the lsquoRedsrsquo and to alesser extent the Greenshirts All were disrobed and thereby disarmedof this powerful form of spectacular propaganda with the banning ofpolitical uniforms under the Public Order Act (1936) or so the NationalGovernment had intended41 Certainly there was a correlation betweenthe divestment of the British Union of Fascistsrsquo blackshirt trademarkand its terminal decline The fear of private armies and their standingin British law had been reignited by Mosleyrsquos Blackshirt movement in193442 and this may well provide some of the context for the negativecoverage of the dictatorsrsquo martial fashion choices at Munich It waswidely noted that Hitlerrsquos and Mussolinirsquos military uniforms were aclear projection of their bellicose intentions and embodied the essenceof dictatorships whereas Chamberlainrsquos well-tailored civilian costumewith the inevitable accompaniment of his umbrella conveyed his pacificaspirations and identified him as a representative of bourgeoisdemocracy As Mr Leslie Burgin (Minister of Transport) told theHouse in the post-Munich debate lsquoStudents of history would rememberthat the Premier was in morning dress and travelled in a civilianpassenger planemdash(Opposition laughter)mdashand this unarmed individualwent to the commander of the other side at his headquarterssurrounded by soldiers That was a factor of enormous potentialconsequencersquo43 Even the anti-appeaser journalist and newly electedIndependent member for Bridgewater Vernon Bartlett could lsquoadmirethe courage with which the Prime Minister armed only with his nowfamous umbrella went to Germany and reviewed those terrifying

41 See Philip Coupland lsquoThe Blackshirt in Britain Meanings and Functions of PoliticalUniformrsquo in Julie V Gottlieb and Thomas P Linehan eds The Culture of Fascism Visions ofthe Far Right in Britain (London 2004) 100ndash15

42 See Herbert Morrison lsquoHow I Would Procure Peacersquo Daily Mail 5 July 1934 wherehe suggests that the Blackshirts threaten to return Britain to a state before law and orderwhen lsquophysical combat between individuals mobs and even private armies wascommonrsquo See also lsquoFascists and the Law No Offence in Drilling or in Black ShirtsrsquoManchester Guardian 19 May 1934

43 lsquolsquolsquoMan in the Streetsrsquorsquo Viewsrsquo Manchester Guardian 5 October 1938


guards of honour in their black steel helmets and their big black bootsrsquoalthough for Bartlett that did not mean that it could be ruled out thatlsquothe Prime Ministerrsquos policy may be mistakenrsquo44 Only a couple ofmonths later when Chamberlain paid his state visit to Italy in January1939 there was a sense of relief among the South-west LancashireWomen Conservatives that for that occasion Mussolini had worn lsquoawell-cut Bradford suitrsquo and the MP who addressed these Tory womendiagnosed that lsquo[o]ur problem seems to be how quickly can we get HerrHitler and Signor Mussolini into a bowler hat and carrying anumbrellarsquo45

Britainrsquos suave bachelor Ambassador to Berlin Nevile Hendersonwas himself something of lsquothe fashion-plate diplomatrsquo He had alsquoperfect tailorrsquos figurersquo he was a trend-setter for lsquowearing woollenpullovers except on the most formal occasionsrsquo and his signature redcarnation button-hole was lsquoalmost as well known to Berlin politicians asMr Chamberlainrsquos umbrella is to the worldrsquos cartoonistsrsquo46 Accordingto this Daily Mail write-up the imperturbability of this old Etonianarch-appeaser and prototypical clean-cut Englishman was clearlyconveyed through his deliberate choice of attire We should not

Figure 2Sidney lsquoGeorgersquo Strube [no caption] Daily Express 3 October 1938 StrubeExpressNewspapersNampS Syndication and British Cartoon Archive Ref No GS0496

44 19 December 1938 Hansard 257345 lsquoThe Bowler Hat Dictators and British Friendshiprsquo Manchester Guardian 20 February

193946 lsquoThe Man we Sent to Hitlerrsquo Daily Mail 24 August 1939


underestimate the importance of lsquopower dressingrsquo in the culture ofdiplomacy

Of course Hitler had no intension of lsquodressing downrsquo for thesatisfaction of the British Prime Minister He was reported to have saidafter Chamberlainrsquos departure from Munich lsquoIf ever that silly old mancomes interfering here again with his umbrella Irsquoll kick him downstairsand jump on his stomach in front of photographersrsquo47 As if right oncue already on 6 November 1938 in a very public display Hitlerturned against Chamberlain by taking a swing at the PMrsquos umbrellaSpeaking at the Gautag of the Thuringian National Socialists in WeimarHitler decried lsquothose umbrella-carrying prototypes from the heyday ofour bourgeois party worldrsquo who lsquohave been eradicated and shall returnno morersquo48 His audience greeted this allusion to Chamberlain withroars of laughter and frantic applause49 Lloyd George did not takeHitlerrsquos umbrella-inflected insult of the PM kindly telling Parliamentthat he had been

amazed to see in a speech of Herr Hitlerrsquos a reference to Umbrella-carrying statesmen of the past who thank God are extinct inGermany I think it is rather insulting from a man who has treatedyou as a friend and whom you have treated in the same waymdashwhomyou trusted in a perfectly candid straightforward and courteousmanner going out of your way to meet him (Interruption) I think itwas It was mean anyway But it is not merely that The generalattitude of the whole of the Press there is hostile and in a countrylike that the Press means the Government It is really officialmdashessentially so50

By the winter of 1945 when it was clear that Germany would lose thewar according to Hugh Trevor-Roper Hitler believed that the outcomewould have been different had Germany gone to war in September1938 and that it was the fault of the lsquoarch capitalist bourgeoisChamberlain with his deceptive umbrella in his handrsquo51 On the onehand Hitler came to see the umbrella as a modern-day Trojan horse

On the other hand Chamberlainrsquos umbrella was laden withreferences to his personal history and it identified him as a second-

47 Quoted in Richard Overy War and the Economy in the Third Reich (Oxford 2002) 22848 Max Domarus The Complete Hitler A Digital Desktop Reference to His Speeches and

Proclamations 1932-1945 123249 Dr Wilhelm von Kries London correspondent for the Lokal Anzeiger was similarly

umbrella-fixated but far less critical of the British position when he said thatlsquoChamberlainrsquos badge of office the essence of his dignity and the expression of hispersonality is the umbrellarsquo lsquoSayings of the Weekrsquo Manchester Guardian 22 January 1939

50 Mr Lloyd George Hansard HC Deb 19 December 1938 vol 342 col 255051 Hugh R Trevor-Roper ed The Testament of Adolf Hitler The Hitler-Bormann

Documents February-April 1945 (London 1961) 84


generation Victorian entrepreneur in business as in politics Beforeboarding the commercial airliner for Munich on 29 September hiscarefully crafted short prologue to his peace mission referenced hisVictorian childhood and the ethos of Samuel Smiles-variety self-helpHe began with lsquoif at once you do not succeed try try try againrsquo andthen quoted Hotspur in Shakespearersquos Henry V lsquoout of this nettledanger we pluck this flower safetyrsquo Reflecting on the theatrical qualityof these political scenes Chamberlain told his sister lsquoThat the news ofthe deliverance should come to me in the act of closing my speech inthe House was a piece of drama that no work of fiction eversurpassedrsquo52 And yet his political rise was much more prosaic andprovincial It is important to bear in mind that Chamberlain had hisstart as Lord Mayor of Birmingham and then already in late middle-age he rose through the ranks of the Conservative Party viaappointments as Minister of Health and then Chancellor of theExchequer (He was not an aristocrat he had no experience in foreignpolicy and it was his half-brother Austen who had served as ForeignSecretary and he had been too old to serve in the war and had nomilitary record distinguished or otherwise) His political trajectoryfrom the world of business to municipal politics and then back to thebusiness of government on the national scale combined with hispreference for an old-fashioned black tailcoat stiff winged collar andfull tie explains why his critics provided him with other alter egossuch as the lsquoprovincial undertakerrsquo53 or lsquoa tough old businessmanrsquorepresenting the lsquohardware of Birminghamrsquo54 Lloyd George called himlsquoa good mayor of Birmingham in a lean yearrsquo while Tribune defined hismind set as lsquosordid provincialismrsquo55 Incidentally it was his fatherJoseph Chamberlain whom a young Winston Churchill said was lsquotheone who made the weatherrsquo56 in recognition of his bold policies at theheight of Britainrsquos imperial power Indeed Joseph Chamberlain was adapper dresser always seen in public in silk hat frock coat with a freshorchid in his button hole and a gold-rimmed monocle While it was hisfirst son Austen who showed filial devotion by donning the exact samegarments even when they were a generation out of style57 Neville toomust have learned important lessons in cultivating his personalimagery and political showmanship from his father The umbrella wasan essential prop of his theatre as inextricable from his public persona

52 Letter to Hilda 2 October 1938 in Robert Self ed The Neville Chamberlain DiaryLetters Volume 4 The Downing Street Years 1934ndash1940 (Aldershot 2005) 349

53 See Robert Self Neville Chamberlain A Biography (Aldershot 2006) 754 lsquoCatorsquo Guilty Men (New York 1940) 68 and 46 respectively55 Quoted in lsquoOpen Letter to No10 Downing Streetrsquo Tribune 26 August 193856 Quoted in Peter T March Joseph Chamberlain Entrepreneur in Politics (New Haven

1994) 40857 Robert Self ed The Austen Chamberlain Diary Letters (Cambridge 1995) 5


as Charlie Chaplinrsquos Little Tramprsquos signature bowler hat and canemdashnorwill it come as a surprise that the two iconic figures Chamberlain andChaplin were often blended in caricatures As such the umbrella wasnot merely an inanimate object but served as a cast member in theunfolding drama of the crisis and it had almost been lost in the scenesof jubilation in Downing Street on the night of 30 September only to befound the next morning with considerable relief by the Premierrsquoschauffeur under the rug of the car in which Chamberlain had travelledfrom Heston58 This tale of lost and found was widely reported in thepress and a similar fictive incident was the subject for the cartoonlsquoLondon Laughsrsquo in which a police officer on horseback chargesthrough the crowds around 10 Downing Street umbrella in hand toreunite the Prime Minister with his mislaid item59

The umbrella-cum-walking stick was very much part ofChamberlainrsquos style of performance He clung as tightly to his identityas the umbrella man as to the gamp itself even when this piece ofapparel became the butt of so many jokes at his expense He wasdelighted that letters and gifts lsquorain[ed] inrsquo60 to Number 10 in the weeksafter Munich telling his sister about lsquofive fishing rods and innumerableflies two gold watches two clocks an umbrella and quantities ofrubbishrsquo61 His Foreign Secretary Lord Halifax used the language of theumbrella to fortify his Prime Ministerrsquos position and provide a populistexplanation for why appeasement had to be accompanied by the build-up armaments lsquothe right conclusion to my mind in this matter ofarmament for national defence is that there is a good deal of sense inthe old-fashioned idea that an umbrella often helps keep the rainawayrsquo62 Chamberlain himself confessed to an audience in Blackburn inFebruary 1939 that lsquoWhen one has to pass through as I have oftenmany hours of anxiety it is the greatest possible encouragement andsupport to me to think that I have under the old umbrella so many ofmy own fellow countrymen and countrywomen who believe with methat peace is the greatest blessing that any country can enjoyrsquo63 Supportfor the PM at the grassroots was expressed by Alderman W H Hoareat the East and West Midlands Areas of Association of Conservative

58 lsquoClouds Had Gone So rsquo Hull Daily Mail 1 October 193859 Joseph Lee lsquoLondon Laughs 10 Downing Street The Day He Left Without Itrsquo

Evening News 7 December 193860 lsquoOur rooms are a bower of flowers amp gifts rain in even a gold watch from a Dutch

admirer and fishing rods from a tackle makerrsquo Letter to Ida 19 September 1938 in RobertSelf ed The Neville Chamberlain Diary Letters Volume 4 The Downing Street Years 1934-1940 (Aldershot 2005) 348

61 Letter to Ida 24 October 1938 in Robert Self ed The Neville Chamberlain DiaryLetters Volume 4 The Downing Street Years 1934-1940 (Aldershot 2005) 358

62 lsquoNationrsquos Defence Calls for Service from All Lord Halifax and lsquolsquoWave of FeelingrsquorsquorsquoDaily Mail 25 October 1938

63 lsquoPeace under My Old Umbrellarsquo Daily Mail 23 February 1939


Clubs Birmingham with the opinion lsquothat it is better to have anumbrella in the hand of a righteous imperialist than a sword in thehand of a blustering Nazirsquo64 Chamberlainrsquos most fawning constituencywas the Conservative Womenrsquos Association65 and he told its assemblyon 11 May 1939

I seem in these days to be the target for a lot of rotten eggs but I canassure you that does not keep me awake because I believe that Ihave the support of the women of the country and that they have aclearer vision than some of those whose sight is obscured by partyand personal prejudice For that reason you have as I know frommy correspondence followed the events of the last 12 months withthe closest attention You have watched the old umbrella goingaround you have I believe approved our efforts strenuous and upto now successful to keep Europe out of the war66

It probably would have caused him little offence that in the PicturePostrsquos crossword of 20 May 1939 the solution to 27 (across) lsquoTheumbrella manrsquo was of course PM Chamberlain67 Meanwhile thePensions for Spinsters Movement offered the Prime Minister a 70thbirthday present of a pound3 15 s umbrella hoping it may jog his memory tointroduce the legislation they were pleading for and enclosing a notelsquoasking for protection under his umbrella for middle-aged spinstersrsquo68

Tributes continued to be expressed through umbrella imagery duringthe war and when Mrs Annie Chamberlain inspected three companiesof the Auxiliary Territorial Service in Hull lsquoafter watching a march pastin columns of three she viewed the kitchens and at once began tolaugh One of the ovens bore the name Neville and had an umbrellapainted on itrsquo69 Indeed many biographers have alluded toChamberlainrsquos domineering manner his autocratic style and hisdeluded self-belief and his apparent willing participation in thistransformation of his figure into the loveable umbrella man providesfurther explanation for his persistent pursuit of appeasement70

64 lsquoUmbrella is Better than Nazi Swordrsquo Derby Daily Telegraph 27 March 193965 See Julie V Gottlieb lsquoGuilty Womenrsquo Foreign Policy and Appeasement in Inter-war

Britain (Basingstoke 2015)66 19397 The Prime Ministerrsquos Great Speech Peace through Strength Mr

Chamberlainrsquos Great Speech delivered at the mass meeting of women Conservatives atthe Royal Albert Hall London on Thursday 11 May 1939 Oxford Bodleian LibraryConservative Party Archive

67 lsquoCrosswordrsquo Picture Post 20 May 193968 lsquoThey Seek pound4500000 for pound3 15s Umbrellarsquo Daily Mail 13 March 193969 lsquoMrs Chamberlain Sees Sign of the Umbrellarsquo Hull Daily Mail 24 November 193970 See Graham Macklin Chamberlain (London 2006) and Nick Smart Neville

Chamberlain (London 2009)


Production and Consumption of Chamberlainrsquos Umbrella

The success or happy accident of Chamberlainrsquos self-branding as theumbrella man was evidenced by the surge in popularity of all thingsumbrella-form The Munich Crisis was packaged for sale in a numberof ways but for our purposes the most remarkable manifestation of thecollision of market forces with public support for lsquopeace at any pricersquowas the branding (the product placement) and the conspicuousconsumption of Chamberlainrsquos umbrella Appeasement trinkets weretargeted at a mainly female market and even more specifically atgrateful mothers suggesting the subtle ways in which appeasementwas gendered and woman-identified and foreign policy domesticatedFrank Trentmann has identified the rise of the citizen-consumers a newidentity forged in and for the Free Trade nation These citizen-consumers possess agency and are lsquopart of civic lifemdashnot justcustomers in a shop Instead of a retreat from public life consumptionwould foster civic participation and over time raise the quality ofproductionrsquo71 By the late 1930s as women invested in the lsquoaccessoriesof appeasementrsquo and adorned themselves with the Chamberlain brandby extension they became the accessories to appeasement exercisingpolitical control through consumer choice

The story of the commodification of Chamberlainrsquos umbrella is amulti-national one with a spike in the sale of actual umbrellas as wellas myriad homages to Chamberlainrsquos umbrella in the spheres offashion commercial design haute cuisine and cocktail mixology Theumbrella was even more unambiguously an emblem of British nationalidentity abroad than it was at home lsquoIndeed in the Continental mindthe Premierrsquos umbrella has eclipsed Lord Baldwinrsquos pipe as anexpression of all that is most Britishrsquo72 Across Europe after Munich thefurled black umbrella became known as a lsquochamberlainrsquo the veryepitome of Englishness Indeed as one reporter noted lsquoso closely hasthe umbrella now become identified with the British Prime Minister that a friend of mine who left his in a Paris cinema was recalled withthe words lsquolsquoEh Monsieur vous avez oublier votre Chamberlainrsquorsquorsquo73

The umbrella effect was tangible In the wake of the Munich crisisthere was a reported increase in the sale of umbrellas in the Europeanmarket lsquoThe men who make money out of umbrellas are wild withdelight There was a slump in the lsquolsquogamprsquorsquo And even the rain wouldnrsquotshift it But now that should changersquo74 Apparently the Chamberlainumbrella boom began in Belgium lsquowhere rain is a ritualrsquo and then

71 Frank Trentmann Free Trade Nation (Oxford 2008) 1772 lsquoMr Chamberlainrsquos Umbrellarsquo Yorkshire Post and Leeds Intelligencer 14 October 193873 lsquoThe lsquolsquoChamberlainrsquorsquorsquo Yorkshire Evening Post 11 October 193874 Graham Stanford lsquoThe Chamberlain Gamp is A La Mode Nowrsquo Daily Mail 25

October 1938


spread to France and was just expected to break in Britain where anumbrella seller told a reporter that lsquoThere has been a wan in theumbrella-carrying fashion Along comes Mr Chamberlain Wheneveryou see him you see AN UMBRELLA It should be good for businessrsquo75

In London the umbrella shop in St Jamesrsquos Street Piccadilly placed aplacard in the window reading lsquoThis is where the ChamberlainUmbrella was boughtrsquo76 It was even suggested that lsquoMr Chamberlainrsquosumbrella has had an encouraging effect on the umbrella market inBombayrsquo and in anticipation of the monsoon season there was an evenbrisker than usual trade in umbrellas because from Chamberlainrsquosexample lsquopeople had acquired lsquolsquoumbrella sensersquorsquorsquo77

The French connection is the most illuminating and it was in Paristhat the consumption of Chamberlainrsquos umbrella was the mostapparent78 Chamberlain was deeply moved by the outpouring ofFrench support for his policy and as he told his sister Hilda he evenorganized the visit for himself Halifax and their wives on

my own initiative I felt it to be the right thing for many reasonsmdashto give the French people an opportunity of pouring out their pentup feeling of gratitude and affectionndash to strengthen Daladier andencourage him to do something at last to put his countryrsquos defencesin order and to pull his people into greater unitymdashto show Franceand Europe too that if we were anxious to make friends withGermany amp Italy we were not on that account going to forget our oldalliesmdashand finally to make it possible for me to go to Rome inJanuary which is what I am trying to arrange79

In anticipation of the visit it was predicated that the Paris lsquocrowd thatwelcomes them will be keenly disappointed if they arrive withoutumbrellasrsquo and during the crisis itself the papers in Paris published abig picture of his umbrella This was a tribute both to the man and hispacific policy as well as reflecting a more widespread French

75 Graham Stanford Daily Mail 25 October 193876 lsquoMein Gamprsquo Yorkshire Evening Post 19 December 193877 lsquoUmbrella Sensersquo Derby Daily Telegraph 23 June 193978 See Daniel Hucker Public Opinion and the End of Appeasement in Britain and France

(Farnham 2011) D Hucker rsquoFrench Public Attitudes Towards the Prospect of War in 1938-1939 lsquolsquoPacifismrsquorsquo or lsquolsquoWar Anxietyrsquorsquorsquo French History 21 (2007) 431ndash49 and Mona SiegellsquolsquolsquoTo the Unknown Mother of the Unknown Soldierrsquorsquo Pacifism Feminism and the Politicsof Sexual Difference among French Institutrices between the warsrsquo French Historical Studies22 (1999) 421ndash51 See also Christine Bard lsquoLe dilemme des feministes francaises face aunazisme et a la menace de guerre 1933-1939rsquo Liliane Kandel dir Feminismes et nazismesParis Publications de lrsquoUniversite de Paris 7-Denis Diderot 1997 pp 148-161

79 Letter to Hilda 6 November 1938 in Robert Self ed The Neville Chamberlain DiaryLetters Volume 4 The Downing Street Years 1934-1940 (Aldershot 2005) 360ndash1


appreciation for the lsquoperfectly dressedrsquo Englishman80 In contrastlsquoFrench dress designers consider that Englishwomen have poor tastewhere clothes are concernedrsquo81 The Paris visit on 23 Novemberhappened to coincide with the fete of St Catherine (old maids day)and Paris shops were already full of lsquobonnetsrsquo with which lsquoworkgirlsrsquocelebrated the festival As a result lsquothe emblem of some of the caps is anumbrella no less The Catherinettes are now putting the final seal uponthe sheltering Chamberlain umbrella which it is hoped is a protectionrather than merely blinkersrsquo82 The Premierrsquos profile silhouetted on agold medallion hung lsquofrom the coats or suit lapels of many smartFrenchwomenrsquo83 That season the umbrella motif was everywhere to beseen and a well-known (but unnamed) Paris couturier remarked howtwo Britons had influenced fashion more than anyone else the newQueen Elizabeth and Mr Chamberlain In the detail of dressChamberlainrsquos influence was plain to see from neat little day frockswith pockets shaped like umbrellas Chamberlain hats actual umbrellasand all kinds of jewellery like lsquotiny gold umbrellas to pin to the lapelof your coat medals of Chamberlain made up into brooches andChamberlain medals dangling from key-holders fobs and all kinds ofornaments to womenrsquos dressrsquo84 The culmination of Anglo-Frenchunderstanding through and under the umbrella was the design oflsquoFranco-British umbrellasrsquo that lsquoappeared in Paris shop windowsrsquo duringtorrential downpours in July 1939 seen to be the lsquolatest expression ofthe lsquolsquoEntente Cordialersquorsquo Made of oilskin or silk cloth the sections of theumbrellas form a circular Union Jack or a combination of the TricolourThe handles are small wooden figures representing Mr Chamberlain orMr Daladierrsquo85 The disembodiment and fetishization of Chamberlainas umbrella had a surrealist quality about it Umbrella pins buttonscoins dolls sweets and sugar umbrellas (instead of the usual mice) wereon-trend with the designs of the surrealist Elsa Schiaparelli a favouriteof Wallis Simpsonrsquos although it does not appear to be the casethat Schiaparelli used the umbrella motif in her 1938ndash9 collection

80 lsquorsquorsquoUn Gentleman Tres Piccadillyrsquorsquo was the title given last night by Paris Soir to EarlDe la Warr President of the Board of Education [visiting Paris with his wife] Paris Soirsees him as a supreme example of the well-dressed Englishman lsquoWith an aristocraticelegance he wears his Eden hat his Chamberlain umbrella and an impeccable English-made suitrsquo declares the newspaperrsquo Daily Mail 2 February 1939

81 Walter G Farr lsquoAnd Theyrsquore Still the Rage of Parisrsquo Daily Mail 12 November 193882 lsquoThe St Catherine Mr Chamberlainrsquos Umbrellarsquo Manchester Guardian 24 November

1938 Photographs of some of these hats in the shape of the umbrella can be seen inlsquoChamberlain Umbrella Hat for lsquolsquoOld Maidsrsquorsquo Day in Parisrsquo Hartlepool Mail 23 November1938

83 lsquolsquoGadfly Finds that You Might Wear NevillemdashIn your buttonholersquo Tribune 11November 1938

84 lsquoWhat Smart Women are Wearingrsquo Aberdeen Journal 11 February 193985 lsquoUmbrella Tokenrsquo Derby Daily Telegraph 29 July 1939


Sometimes an Umbrella is Just an Umbrella

Chamberlain reproductions functioned to celebrate him as the lsquoMan ofPeacersquo From the very top level of the British establishment the Houseof Windsor gave its royal seal of approval by purchasing Chamberlainmerchandise Royal endorsement of Chamberlain was abundant and itwas at once symbolically important and highly controversial that uponhis return to London from the Four Powers Conference as his first portof call he was invited to Buckingham Palace He was met there by hiswife and they with the King and the Queen greeted the cheeringcrowds from the balcony of the palace The image still of thismomentous photo opportunity capturing the nation rejoicing togetherwith the constitutional monarch was then sold as Christmas cards inDecember 1938 bearing the motto lsquoPeace on earth and goodwill tomenrsquo and available from The Timesrsquo shop in Queen Victorian StreetLondon

Early in the new year in February when Queen Mary visited theBritish Industries Fair at Olympia she was equally taken by childrenrsquostableware decorated with Walt Disney characters from Snow White(buying a childrsquos table set in pewter ware) as by the lsquoChamberlainclockrsquo with umbrella figuring and hands in the shape of umbrellaslsquoQueen Mary said she wanted to see the clock because she had read allabout it in the newspapersrsquo In the fancy section lsquoQueen Mary and herdaughter were amused at some combs made in the shape of MrChamberlainrsquos umbrella and called lsquolsquoMein Gampfrsquorsquorsquo and they orderedthree dozen of these86 The purchase of this royal purchasing powerwas significant on two levels First it made a very public point aboutthe monarchyrsquos continued enthusiastic support for Chamberlainrsquosforeign policy which would have been reassuring to certainconstituencies of the British public and represented a savvy strategyof what in the present would be called cross-promotion Secondly therapid production of this Chamberlainumbrella-form paraphernaliamust have been facilitated by a pre-existing production chain thatmanufactured royal-themed novelties for the mass market In factQueen Mary was evidently much amused as she came back to theIndustries Fair for a third day in succession and this time lsquobought oneof the Chamberlain dolls with the umbrella and suggested that it mightbe a good idea to make a similar doll of the King for sale in Americaduring the royal visitrsquo87

The Chamberlain doll craze had actually started earlier and in timefor the Christmas rush These Chamberlain mannequins were regarded

86 lsquoQueen Mary at Olympiarsquo Manchester Guardian 22 February 193987 lsquoCourt and Personal Queen Mary Again at the Industries Fairrsquo Manchester Guardian

24 February 1939


with some curiosity at the time and one reporter wondered how RipVan Winkle would have reacted had he woken from his long slumber inLondon in the autumnwinter of 1938 lsquoHe would be surprised to seeMr Chamberlain masquerading as a doll (complete with umbrella) anddelighted by other dolls sweetly like the Princesses He would beintrigued by Snow White and his attendant Seven Dwarfs and bebaffled by the model Lambeth Walkersrsquo88 The appeasement docudramaand Disneyrsquos animated Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs wereconcurrent box office hits in 1938 and it therefore makes perfectsense that they should have both been the inspiration for a variety ofknickknacks that they were both merchandized and side-by-side toappeal to the female-dominated marketplace and catering to childrenrsquostastes and that satirists should enjoy shape-shifting the Prime Ministerwhose gullibility was symbolized by his umbrella with the pale-facedprincess a modern Eve who herself was credulous enough to bite intothe poisoned apple

As promised on the menu is an alternative sensory history ofappeasement a re-enactment of how the Munich crisis was seen feltand even tasted The nationrsquos sweet tooth was satisfied by sugar pasteand chocolate Chamberlains In chocolate form lsquohe held an important-looking document also in chocolate and on his arm was a porcelainwhite doversquo Such a delicacy lsquocost daddy 1s 3drsquo89 The celebrated MaıtreChef at the grill-room at the Dorchester Hotel Park Lane invented anew dish called lsquoCoeur de Filet Neville Chamberlainrsquo consisting of afillet of English beef in port wine sauce garnished with marrow ontoast and surrounded by croquettes of potatoes and almondsasparagus points fried in the Italian way and croustade of cherriesdone in the German fashion lsquoCreated by a French chef and namedafter the British Premier the dish is fully representative of the newlsquolsquoconcert of Europersquorsquorsquo90 To wash down this bit of nouvelle cuisine a newcocktail named for Chamberlain was launched for the House ofCommons Cocktail party called lsquothe umbrellarsquo91 while at lsquoParisiancocktail parties they have Chamberlain straws in their cherries likethe little umbrellas they arersquo92

Chamberlainrsquos umbrella was also all the rage during the pantomimeseason and in various forms of popular entertainment Not all Frenchallusions to Chamberlainrsquos umbrella were favourable and already in

88 lsquoChamberlain Doll Here for Christmasrsquo Daily Mail 30 November 193889 Christopher Saltmarshe lsquoTake it from Mersquo Daily Mail 16 December 193890 lsquoReflexions by Reflexrsquo Essex Newsman 8 October 193891 lsquolsquolsquoUmbrellarsquorsquo Cocktail Attacked by Broughty Ladyrsquo Dundee Courier 29 March 193992 Graham Stanford lsquoThe Chamberlain Gamp is A La Mode Nowrsquo Daily Mail 25

October 1938


mid-October one of the most popular intimate revues Vive la Francewith Dorin as author and chief actor included a skit on lsquoSnow Whitewith Hitler Benes Mussolini Daladier Bonnet Goebbels andChamberlain as the Seven Dwarfs The last named is represented bya marionette umbrella and allrsquo93 It was also in Paris that the UmbrellaDance or the lsquoChamberlainersquo was the latest mania involving hookingyour chosen partner with an umbrella94 In Patrick Modianorsquos semi-autographical Liver de famille he recalled that his actress mother waspart of a revue lsquodrsquoaccualitersquo called Demain tout ira mieux in early 1940lsquoElle etait au centre du tableau final Tandis que les girls dansaient avecles parapluies lsquolsquoChamberlainrsquorsquo on voyait ma mere srsquoelever sur unenacelle la tete entouree de rayone drsquoorrsquo95 A more salacious version ofthis dance was performed in Philadelphia USA in 1940 by a femaledancer who was arrested for indecent entertainment for doing thelsquoChamberlain Dancersquo as the only thing covering her modesty policesaid was a raised umbrella96

Back in Britain at an annual school pantomime an architecturalstudent lsquowas a perfect stand-in for the Premier and sartorially correctfrom the waist up Below that he wore a black crinoline which wentremarkably well with his historic umbrellarsquo97 The rumour in circulationwas that the pantomime joke of the 1938 season and hot favouritewould be Mr Chamberlainrsquos umbrella and if used lsquothe catchword willprobably be lsquolsquoMein Gamprsquorsquorsquo98 And then it was a farce within a farcewhen thieves broke into the Communist-run Unity Theatre St Pancrasand lsquostole the costumemdashincluding an umbrellamdashof lsquolsquoMr Chamberlainrsquorsquowho is one of the principal characters of the political pantomimelsquolsquoBabes in the Woodrsquorsquo lsquolsquoMussolinirsquosrsquorsquo uniform was also stolen andlsquolsquoHitlerrsquosrsquorsquo was damaged A sum of pound5 collected for the St PancrasChildrenrsquos Outing Fund was stolenrsquo99 That same season womencabaret dancers staged a sketch donning the now signatureChamberlain apparel top hat moustache and black umbrella lsquoWhorsquosTalking Libertyrsquo which was a big draw in the panto season one year

93 lsquoMr Chamberlainrsquos Umbrellarsquo Yorkshire Post and Leeds Intelligencer 14 October 1938There was plenty of uses of the umbrella for anti-British propaganda in Russia lsquoAll anti-British and especially anti-Chamberlain tendencies have disappeared from the Sovietnewspapers following the conference between Sir William Seeds British Ambassadorand M Litvinov Soviet Foreign Commissar regarding the proposed Anglo-Russian pactThe Soviet humorous weekly Krokodil which is usually replete with anti-Chamberlaincartoons omitted them from to-dayrsquos issue So did the French-language Moscownewspaper Journal de Moscou a weekly which has frequently made the famous umbrella abutt of humourrsquo (lsquoMoscow Cuts Out Umbrella Jokesrsquo Daily Mail 25 April 1939)

94 lsquoWomen and their Ways Letter from Parisrsquo Nottingham Evening Post 30 March 193995 Patrick Modiano Livet de Famille (Paris 1977) 4796 lsquoThe Chamberlain Dancersquo Sunderland Daily Echo and Shipping Gazette 15 March 194097 Christopher Saltmarshe lsquoTake it from Mersquo Daily Mail 16 December 193898 lsquoLondonrsquos Pantomimesrsquo Manchester Guardian 9 December 193899 lsquolsquolsquoChamberlainrsquorsquo Dress Taken from Theatrersquo Daily Mail 3 April 1939


later at the Whitehall Theatre had as one of its principals lsquoPrime []Charmingrsquos lsquolsquoDandinirsquorsquo the Lord High Chamberlainrsquo and he lsquowas madeto make remarks about going to Munich for appeasement using anaeroplane for the purpose about fishing in Scotland about wearing atop hat and umbrellarsquo100

The Umbrella as Relic and Icon of Appeasement

On the one hand the materiality of Chamberlainrsquos umbrella belongs tothe realm of the profane and the disposable The umbrella was an easilybreakable prop a temporary novelty and a consumable with a shortshelf-life On the other hand however Chamberlainrsquos one-of-a-kindumbrella was immediately identified as a curio an antique or even as asacred object or talisman Chamberlain was profoundly uplifted by thisstory as related to him by Bill Astor son of Cliveden Set-hostess Nancy

Just before he left Greece he [Bill Astor] met an old peasant womanwho asked whether he would be seeing Mr Chamberlain On beingtold that this was possible she showed him a cross which like mostGreek peasants she was wearing round her neck In the cross was atiny hole for the reception of a relic of the true cross (of which thereis apparently an unlimited supply to be obtained) You see she saidI havenrsquot filled up my hole Now when you go to London I want youto get for me a little bit of Mr Chamberlainrsquos umbrella to put in mycross101

Clearly the Prime Minister savoured his iconic status as saviour and hewas guided in his policy-making by these sentimental spiritual andmaterial signs of approval For this brief moment in history theumbrella became a religious symbol and the Rev James Duncandescribed it this way in his sermon

The people gaped wondered laughed and then cheered Its appealwas irresistible it ceased to be just an umbrella and wastransformed into a portent Here before their eyes was a modernDon Quixote War clouds were heavy in the sky At any momentmight fall a great rain of bombs and bullets Yet this Strange Fellowstalking like a fairy with a magic wand went aloft holding anumbrella smiling with an innocence born of faith While I am notprepared to assert it I hazard the guess that when Britainrsquos Man of

100 Pantomime (LE) March 1940 Mass Observation Archive University of SussexSpecial Collections

101 Letter from Neville to Hilda 13 November 1938 in Robert Self ed 362ndash3


Faith sat in solemn conclave cheek by jowl with three Chieftains ofEurope there was an umbrella by his side I picture him feeling iteven as Aladdin rubbed the magic lamp and finding in the touchsecurity and the quiet confidence of an ultimate happy ending102

That this iconization of the umbrella was extended beyond ChristianOrthodox lands was suggested by David Lowrsquos cartoon noting thatlsquoForeign museums are applying for the loan of the Chamberlainumbrella Soon shady characters are going to start hawking genuineportions of the original sacred relic to touristsrsquo103

His umbrella was also considered an object of intrinsic antique andhistorical value Indeed Chamberlain became a museum piece whilestill in office when his waxwork model was displayed at MadameTussaudrsquos in London He was part of a wax tableaux sitting around theCabinet table with other life-like members of his Cabinet and as suchin this indoor scene he was depicted umbrella-less However one daylsquomembers of the staff found that somebody had placed an antiquatedlsquolsquogamprsquorsquo in the table in front of the Premierrsquo104mdashas Chamberlain and theumbrella had become inseparable in the popular imagination His waxeffigy complete with umbrella was also displayed at the GrevinWaxworks Museum in Paris and significantly removed together withthose of Daladier Herriot and Blum at German bidding in 1941105

The array of reproductions of the umbrella and the preoccupationwith its material form were mainly though not exclusively means bywhich the policy of appeasement and Chamberlainrsquos putative achieve-ments at Munich could be validated and lionized by the public Therewas some frivolous press banter about the provenance of Chamberlainrsquosumbrella and Mrs Chamberlain had been interviewed about itexplaining that she had bought it for her husband as a present 14years earlier and it had since been recovered four times106 But curatorswere taking the acquisition of his umbrella seriously Chamberlain wasinvited to present his umbrella to an umbrella museum being organizedat Gignese near Stresa lsquoThe organisers had written asking for the onehe took to Munich But Mr Chamberlain replied that it was lsquolsquotooordinary and too worn to figure in a museum of Italian umbrellasrsquorsquo It isbelieved Mr Chamberlain indicated he still has further use for itrsquo107 Afew months later he must have relented on this point as lsquoMrChamberlainrsquos umbrellamdashthe one he took to Munichmdashis exhibited with

102 lsquoRemember that Man of Faithrsquo by the Rev James Duncan Vicar of DowdonSunderland Daily Echo and Shipping Gazette 23 December 1938

103 David Low lsquoTopical Budgetrsquo Evening Standard 14 January 1939104 lsquoThe Premierrsquos Umbrellarsquo Derby Daily Telegraph 12 January 1939105 lsquoThe lsquolsquoFamousrsquorsquorsquo Yorkshire Evening Post 7 April 1941106 lsquoMr Chamberlainrsquos Umbrellarsquo Dundee Evening Telegraph 13 March 1939107 lsquoHe Still Needs His Umbrellarsquo Daily Mail 11 January 1939


a number of other umbrellas and walking-sticks interesting inthemselves or the property of interesting people at Foyle Art Gallery113-125 Charing Cross-road WC 2rsquo108 He was also in on the joke whenhe donated an autographed umbrella to be auctioned during theDunfermline Studentsrsquo Charities Week in June 1939109 Readers of theManchester Guardian were asked to write in with suggestions aboutwhat material objects should be interred as memorials in WaterlooBridge Of the lsquotopicalrsquo articles selected for this time capsule a gas maskor babyrsquos gas mask came first Mr Chamberlainrsquos umbrella secondwhile lsquoa torn treatyrsquo came third110 In 1940 when the English frigateCrescent which had sank off Leonstrup in 1808 was salvaged bySiguard Damsgaard found in the officersrsquo cabin was an umbrella andthe intention was to present this find as a gift to Mr Chamberlain111

While there was clearly a public fascination with and fetishization ofChamberlainrsquos umbrella as artefact my research has not so far beenable to ascertain what became in the end of the actual umbrella thatChamberlain carried with him in those anxious months and it mightyet become the holy grail of appeasement mythology

Chamberlainrsquos Umbrella as Lightning Rod forCritiques of Appeasement

Finally fittingly enough Chamberlainrsquos umbrella also served as alightning rod absorbing powerful and especially negative and hostilecriticism In addition the worsening and ever more pessimistic nationalmood was commonly conveyed through climatic imagerymdashthe profusionof meteorologically informed language reinforcing the national obsessionwith the weather In representational terms the ever-furled umbrella leftthe Prime Minster fully exposed to antagonistic political elements and toa torrent of parodies as the metamorphosing depiction of the umbrellafunctions as barometer of sea changes in mediated public opinion andpress commentary The Rev E Aldington Hunt of the Newington ParishChurch said in his sermon in February 1939 that lsquowe could thank Godthat we lived in England where we could crack jokes about the Motherof Parliaments and Mr Chamberlainrsquos umbrella which was fastdisplacing the olive branch as the symbol of peacersquo112 The much exaltedEnglish sense of humour and a rich tradition of political allegory andcartooning had extra resonance in the 1930s and against the backdrop of

108 lsquoIt Happens To-day Thatndashrsquo Daily Mail 23 August 1939109 Aberdeen Journal 13 May 1939 See also lsquoPremier Signs for Charity Umbrellarsquo Dundee

Courier 8 April 1939110 lsquoCuriosities of the Futurersquo Manchester Guardian 29 May 1939111 lsquoUmbrellasrsquo Western Daily Press 3 January 1940112 lsquoUmbrella the New Symbol of Peacersquo Hull Daily Mail 6 February 1939


the violent muzzling of freedom of speech and the crushing of politicalpluralism under dictatorships on the Continent As Nicolson wouldclaim lsquoa sense of humour cannot prosper either in a totalitarian andclassless society or in a society in the process of revolution A specialfortuitous and therefore transitory balance between acceptance andrevolt between conformity and non-conformity between the conven-tional and the eccentric is needed before a sense of humour can pervadea whole societyrsquo113 Further what made the English sense of humourdistinctive and a lsquonational quality possessed by all classes alikersquo was thecombination of the sardonic humour of the proletariat and the gentle andindulged mode more typical of the bourgeoisie114

Humour according to Nicolson and via Freud functioned as adefence mechanism especially so lsquoto reduce the menacing to a level ofthe comic as when Hitler was represented not as some demonic forceintent upon destruction but as a talkative man with a moustachersquo(Figure 3)115 Arguably the most accomplished agent of this British lineof defence and psychological warfare was the fierce anti-fascist andanti-appeasement cartoonist for Beaverbrookrsquos otherwise pro-appease-ment Evening Standard David Low Virtually without fail Low depictedChamberlain with or as the umbrella The ideographic picture-writingpotential of the umbrella came to Low as a real boon From time totime he had espied Chamberlain taking his regular walks in St JamesrsquosPark lsquolooking rather like a bird himself with his small head on a longneck and unlidded eye (the glare but without the cruelty) and theinevitable umbrella tucked under his arm poking out behind a kind oftailrsquo It followed naturally that lsquothe umbrella stuck in my mindChamberlain was the sort of Englishman who carried his umbrellaeverywhere I was struck by its symbolic possibilitiesrsquo116 In theumbrella Low saw myriad symbolic prospects and it served as apowerful and pliable symbol on par with the palm of Peace orthe clenched fist for force Low deemed it the lsquoPerfectrsquo symbol for thecartoonist for as he explained it lsquo[k]eeps the rain off shelters from theblast can lean on it poke with it may be blown inside-out mightattract lightening After that I used the umbrella regularly as thesymbol for Chamberlain Appeasement Sometime he carried itsometimes it carried himrsquo117 Low also inter-textualized the Munichdocudrama and Snow White casting Chamberlain as lsquoSno-Usersquo and theSeven Dwarfs his tattered umbrella now serving as a broom118

113 Harold Nicolson The English Sense of Humour and other Essays (London 1956) 35114 Nicolson The English Sense of Humour 23115 Nicolson The English Sense of Humour 41ndash2116 David Low Lowrsquos Autobiography (London 1956) 308117 Low Lowrsquos Autobiography 309118 See David Low cartoons lsquoTwo Meetingsrsquo Evening Standard 13 May 1938 lsquoSi vis

pacem pare umbrellumrsquo Evening Standard 12 November 1938 lsquoLowrsquos Topical Budgetrsquo


Nor did Low hold a monopoly on the umbrella as a symbol ofpolitical failure rather than gentlemanly restraint Time and Tide remarkedon the fact that lsquoMr Chamberlain never opens his umbrella Isnrsquot there anallegory here All the little States in North and Central Europe are

Figure 3David Low lsquoLowrsquos Topical Budgetrsquo Evening Standard 12 November 1938 SoloSyndication and British Cartoon Archive Ref No DL1385

Evening Standard 19 November 1938 lsquoLowrsquos Topical Budgetrsquo Evening Standard 26November 1938 lsquoLowrsquos Christmas Dreamrsquo Evening Standard 24 December 1938 lsquoThe SetUp for 1939rsquo Daily Express 2 January 1939 lsquoLowrsquos Topical Budgetrsquo Evening Standard 25March 1939 and lsquoInspection of Correspondence Columnrsquo Evening Standard 17 July 1939


looking around for cover Hungary is the latest to run to totalitarianshelter As umbrellas go the democratic pattern is more attractivemdashbut itwonrsquot do uprsquo119 The passionately anti-Chamberlain Peace and Plentydirected by Communist filmmaker Ivor Montagu showed an image stillof a diagonally poised umbrella in the frame just before a series ofunflattering portrait shots of the PM and his key Cabinet members whilelater in the film a Chamberlain marionette complete with umbrella hashis strings pulled as he is merely the puppet of capitalism and thetraditional landed elite120 By April 1939 Eleanor Roosevelt too amplifiedthe changing charge of the Premierrsquos umbrella with the quip lsquoThegentleman with the umbrella finding that appeasement does not workwhere ethics do not exist has gone the whole way in the oppositedirectionrsquo121 All this had a trickle-down effect and when the ManchesterGuardian offered a first prize of two guineas and a second prize of oneguinea for a triolet on any topic of the moment a prevalent theme waslsquoour Mr Chamberlain and his umbrella which ranged from the gentlysympathetic to the almost libellousrsquo122 This entry demonstrated wellhow Chamberlainrsquos umbrella had become a terrible liability

He has always loved PeaceSo he took his umbrellaTo attend to the deceaseHe has always loved Peace(Knowing voters are geese)Hersquos an honourable fellaHe has always loved PeaceSo he took his umbrella123

On the other side of the political spectrum the Tory photojournalist andanti-appeaser Edward Hulton used the Picture Post as a platform fromwhich to call Chamberlain to arms trumpeting in April 1939

Down Umbrellas The call now is lsquoTo Arms Citizensrsquo lsquoStatutoryCitizen Servicersquo may provide our rulers with large bodies of menwhom they cannot at once organise still less find machineguns forBut it will put the slacker on a basis of equality with the patriot andshow the Germans that we are willing to do for freedom what theyare doing for tyranny However it is Mr Chamberlain who mustseize the shield and drop the umbrella124

119 lsquoTime-Tide Diaryrsquo Time and Tide 21 January 1939120 Ivor Montagu Peace and Plenty (1939) httpplayerbfiorgukfilmwatch-peace-

and-plenty-1939121 lsquoSayings of the Weekrsquo Manchester Guardian 9 April 1939122 lsquoA Refrain for the Timesrsquo Manchester Guardian 1 March 1939123 lsquoA Refrain for the Timesrsquo Manchester Guardian 1 March 1939124 Edward Hulton lsquoCan we Let Hitler Dominate Europersquo Picture Post 15 April 1939


Hultonrsquos hostility towards Chamberlain was unabated after the manrsquosdeath again expressed by recourse to the umbrella lsquoWe went from badto worse when the late Neville Chamberlain took it into his head thathe could convert the devil by flourishing an umbrellarsquo125

There was a noticeable number of American women foreigncorrespondents who adopted a staunchly anti-appeasement positionmost prominent among them Dorothy Thompson Virginia CowlesMartha Gellhorn and Helen Kirkpatrick Kirkpatrick titled herindictment of the National Governmentrsquos foreign policy Under theBritish Umbrella What the English Are and How They Go to war (Jan 1939)During the Munich Crisis Kirkpatrick was temporarily diplomaticcorrespondent for the Sunday Times During her time in Londontogether with two other journalists Victor Gordon-Lennox and GrahamHutton she published a weekly newspaper The Whitehall News whichwas anti-appeasement and in opposition to Nazi Germany and FascistItaly Apparently among others Eden and Churchill were readers ofThe Whitehall News Czech-born former American Secretary of StateMadeleine Albright has noted that then as now people are inclined toexpress their views through their dress and after Munich New Yorkdepartment stores lsquowere selling a $1 pin in the shape of a whiteumbrellamdashthe symbol of Chamberlain in the color of surrenderrsquo126

Nicolson remarked that Hitler was lsquoimmune to any sense of humourrsquoand rather possessed a lsquosavage sense of farcersquo127 Indeed the maliciousNazi sense of humour was illustrated in this anecdote upon hearingfrom the BBC news that Chamberlain had flown without his umbrellato visit British troops stationed in France in December 1939 Germanairmen dropped an umbrella of British make over the lines bearing themessage lsquoGerman airmen regret that Chamberlain is forced to gowithout an umbrella in such bad weather and are sending him usefulprotectionrsquo128 By 1940 Mr Chamberlainrsquos umbrella had become lsquotheofficial lsquolsquohate emblemrsquorsquo of the Nazi fighting forcesrsquo and it appeared onthe Bridlington torpedo and as a badge on many German Air Forcesquadrons lsquoone such showing the umbrella tucked under the arm of atoucan-like bird and another depicting the PMrsquos gamp being clutchedby a cherubrsquo129

While the initial spontaneous representations of the umbrella werelargely harmlessly whimsical favourable and flattering to Chamberlainthe Prime Ministerrsquos critics lost little time to show how the shadow of a

125 lsquoAntony Eden in the Middle Eastrsquo Picture Post 20 November 1943126 Madeleine Albright Prague Winter A Personal Story of Remembrance and War 1937-

1948 (New York 2012) 107127 Nicolson The English Sense of Humour 47128 lsquoUmbrella for Mr Chamberlainrsquo Manchester Guardian 21 December 1939129 lsquoUmbrella as Emblemrsquo Yorkshire Evening Post 26 March 1940


halo cast by his ostensible umbrella of peace was actually a terriblespectre At first David Low came under harsh criticism for hisiconoclasm and his desecration of the umbrella as lsquoexpressions ofdoubt seemed almost indecentrsquo and because lsquoit was very difficult todiscuss the Chamberlain policy sensibly in those days To his friends hewas a saint to his critics rather less sorsquo130 But the analyticallsquodeconstructionrsquo of the umbrella was well under way by the timeHitlerrsquos troops marched into Prague Gwilym O Griffithsrsquo letter to theManchester Guardian critiqued the National Governmentrsquos betrayal ofthe League but he also drew an analogy between art and modernpolitical culture along the lines of Walter Benjaminrsquos paradigm of theaestheticization of politics131

Our statesmen have wished well to the League within the limits of apre-war mentality but they have been led by their nose for lsquorealismrsquoto concern themselves less with world reconstruction than withtemporary interests and more with capitalistic lsquoappeasementrsquo thanwith a well-founded peace Their policy had become lsquoobjectiversquo inthe sense that decadent modern art is objective dismembering anddisintegrating the human image and presenting only an eye a nosewith an aeroplane an umbrella or some such confusion of objectsThere is no longer any integral form no unitive conception but anaggregation of things immediately perceived 132

Indeed there is a strong element of the surreal in the emblems andartefacts of the Munich Crisis Fittingly Chamberlainrsquos ghost-likeumbrella dominates the right side of the canvass in Salvador Dalırsquosdreamscape lsquoThe Enigma of Hitlerrsquo (1939) As the artist explained thepainting consisted of lsquoa condensed reportage of a series of dreamsobviously occasioned by the events of Munich Chamberlainrsquosumbrella appeared in the painting in a sinister aspect identified withthe bat and affected me as extremely anguishing at the very time I waspainting itrsquo133

Remarkably umbrella-phobia was a condition that could bediagnosed after the war in politicians who had had to rescue theirreputations from the lsquoGuilty Menrsquo stigma Robert Armstrong LordArmstrong of Illminster shared these reminiscences of his former boss

130 David Low Lowrsquos Autobiography 309ndash10131 Walter Benjaminrsquos Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction (1936)132 lsquoMr Chamberlainrsquos Foreign Policyrsquo [letter to the editor from Gwilym O Griffiths]

Manchester Guardian 6 March 1939133 Salvador Dalı The Secret Life of Salvador Dalı trans HM Chevalier (New York 1993)

371 An earlier painting lsquoTelephone in a Dish with Three Grilled Sardines at the End ofSeptemberrsquo (1939) was another realization of the artistrsquos subconscious response to theCzech crisis


Rab Butler for whom he had served as Private Secretary when Butlerwas Chancellor of the Exchequer

once when we were walking together he was carrying a cane with asilver head He explained that in 1938 at the time of the events inMunich he had been a junior Minister at the Foreign Office He saidlsquoIt was very difficult for me I had no responsibility for formulatingthe policy or deciding what the policy should be I just had toexplain it in the House of Commons because my Secretary of Statewas in the House of Lords I had no share in saying what it shouldbersquo There was a pause and then Mr Butler waggled his cane at meand said lsquoSince that time I have never carried an umbrellarsquo134

Even in Tory circles the association of the umbrella with Chamberlainand his foreign policy marked the end of the umbrella-carrying habitJohn le Carrersquos Absolute Friends (2003) begins with the protagonistBavarian-based tour guide Ted Mundyrsquos reflection on the meaning andresonances of Chamberlainrsquos umbrella in the post-Cold War context lsquoinGerman eyes therefore Neville Chamberlainrsquos rolled-up umbrellaremains to this very day madam the shameful emblem of Britishappeasement of Our Dear Fuhrer his invariable name for Adolf Hitler lsquolsquoImean frankly in this country as an Englishman Irsquod rather stand in therain without onersquorsquorsquo135 The insinuation of Chamberlainrsquos umbrella if notumbrellas more generally136 is that they no longer project safety andprotection Rather reliance on an umbrella demeans and emasculates itsuser

Conclusion

Claims have often been made about popular enthusiasm forChamberlain in the weeks after Munich and starting in 1939 NormanAngell in For What Do We Fight lsquocalled for the British people to face thetruth about the international situation to recognize that the strategy ofappeasement had not been lsquolsquocompletely sound and fully vindicatedrsquorsquorsquoAngell charged the public with complicity and in his ultimateindictment he stressed that responsibility lay not only with MrChamberlain and his Government but lsquothe nation the electorate thepublic as a whole If it be true that Mr Chamberlain or his predecessors

134 Hansard HL 26 February 1996 col 1284ndash1285135 [italics in the original]John Le Carre Absolute Friends (London 2003) 8136 In 2007 the characterization of football manager Steve McClaren as the lsquowally with

the brollyrsquo is another example of the negative and emasculating signification of theumbrella


were leading us along a path the end of which was war then it was thenationrsquos job to get rid of himrsquo137 The culpability for appeasement had tobe more widely shared Indeed a history of the visual and materialculture of appeasement shines light on the once cloud-covered evidenceof popular support for Chamberlain offering a lsquopeoplersquos historyrsquo of theMunich Crisis as we are able to breathe new life into the sightssounds tastes and textures of the political climate in the autumn andwinter of 1938ndash9 By considering the universal presence ofChamberlainrsquos umbrella we reveal the social imaginary of Britain atthe anxious close of the antebellum at moments of relative calm beforethe storm One could even suggest that the brolly is the ideal lsquoumbrellatermrsquo for the Munich Crisis and especially for the very Britishexperience of and the putatively non-hysterical public response to thelsquowar of nervesrsquo 138

137 Quoted in Robert J Caputi Neville Chamberlain and Appeasement (Cranbury NJ 2000)22

138 A lsquoWar of Nervesrsquo was how the Daily Mail characterized the crisis cycle of September1938 and the expression was used repeatedly to describe the countdown to war in thesummer of 1939 lsquothe provocation the propaganda the movements of troops thestorming of the citadel from within But the British people are not easy targets for thesnipers of Dr Goebbels We should win in a war of guns We shall certainly not bedefeated in a war of nervesrsquo lsquoThe Voice of Britainrsquo Daily Mail 3 July 1939 See also GWard Price lsquoThe lsquolsquoWar of Nervesrsquorsquo goes onrsquo Daily Mail 31 August 1939


scholarship on appeasement has passed through various stages froman indictment of the lsquoMen of Munichrsquo countered by revisionists andcontested in turn by counter-revisionists and post-revisionists Of thesegreat and guilty men the leading man has inevitably been the BritishPrime Minister Neville Chamberlain a figure whose reputation haslurched from hero to villain from self-styled lsquoMan of Peacersquo to Hitlerrsquosgullible dupe2 At the zenith of his popularity Chamberlain wasencouragingly informed by Bill Astor that his lsquoprestige abroad isenormous His name is almost a synonym for peacersquo3 Portrayal ofChamberlainrsquos saintliness was constantly reinforced with the visualhook of the umbrella and PPS to Rab Butler at the Foreign OfficelsquoChipsrsquo Channon one of the Prime Ministerrsquos most infatuatedsupporters observed how on his way to Munich the lsquoSaviour ofPeace got quietly into his car umbrella and allrsquo4 However it did nottake long for Chamberlainrsquos detractors and satirists to rain on hisparade and the Premier was demeaned and damned through a processof objectification In lsquoCatorsquosrsquo stinging denunciation of 1940 Guilty MenChamberlain was given a starring role among the band of fumbling andbumbling appeasers but more specifically he was cast as themetonymous lsquoUmbrella Manrsquo becoming one with the quintessentiallyutilitarian English accoutrement that so often supported his elongatedbut curling septuagenarian framemdashhe would turn 70 on 18 March19395 The Star predicted that the umbrella lsquostiff straight rigid tightlyrolled up rather like its owner may take its place in historyrsquo6

In fact umbrellas and Chamberlainrsquos umbrella in particular wereomnipresent in the visual and material culture and in the rhetoricalconstructions of the Munich Crisis and in its aftermath7 Chamberlainrsquosumbrella was easily the most produced and reproduced politicalemblem of late 1938ndash9 represented in a wide range of textual and

Unending Debate Appeasement Chamberlain and the Origins of the Second World WarrsquoIntelligence and National Security 23 (2008) 536ndash51 and R Gerald Hughes The PostwarLegacy of Appeasement British Foreign Policy since 1945 (London 2014)

2 See Robert Self lsquoNeville Chamberlainrsquos ReputationmdashTime for ReassessmentrsquoHistorically Speaking 8 (2007) 18ndash20

3 Letter from Neville Chamberlain to Ida 13 November 1938 in Robert Self ed TheNeville Chamberlain Diary Letters Volume 4 The Downing Street Years 1934-1940 (Aldershot2005) 362

4 28 September 1938 Robert Rhodes James ed lsquoChipsrsquo The Diaries of Sir HenryChannon (London 2003) 172

5 Comedy singing team Flanagan and Allen also had a hit with lsquoThe Umbrella Manrsquo in1938 which did not make direct reference to the PM but was about an umbrella maker

6 Quoted in David Reynolds Summits Six Meetings that Shaped the Twentieth Century(London 2007) 54

7 Any interest that there has been in the material culture of appeasement has beenpopular rather than academic See Nigel Rodgers The Umbrella Unfurled Its RemarkableLife and Times (London 2013) and Max Everest-Phillips Neville Chamberlain The Art ofAppeasement (London 2013)





















































































































October 1938























24 February 1939






October 1938
































































Conclusion




























































































































October 1938























24 February 1939






October 1938
































































Conclusion






























24 February 1939






October 1938
































































Conclusion













October 1938
































































Conclusion







































































Conclusion









Neville Chamberlain’s Umbrella: ‘Object’ Lessons in the ... · the concern here is with...

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Transcript of Neville Chamberlain’s Umbrella: ‘Object’ Lessons in the ... · the concern here is with...