In the middle of a transatlantic flight this weekend, I stumbled across a review by former New Yorker editor Tina Brown—of the new(ish) biography all her friends on both sides of the Atlantic seem to be reading. It’s about the wild life of Pamela Harriman, the daughter-in-law of Winston Churchill, who fed the White House’s secrets to the British prime minister by sleeping with visiting American emissaries. Later in life, Harriman elevated the young Bill Clinton, who rewarded her with her first proper job: U.S. ambassador to France. At a dinner in the ’90s, she happened to sit opposite Tina, whose husband, Tina reports, found Harriman annoyingly charming.
This is a story of how power was brokered, broken, and remade in the 20th century—and a woman whose life touched many of the people who have most shaped the West in the last century. I think you’ll find it as fascinating as I did, so we’re delighted to reprint it—in case you need help deciding what book to take on vacation this summer. — Bari
For some reason, everyone I know on both sides of the Atlantic seems to be devouring Kingmaker: Pamela Harriman’s Astonishing Life of Power, Seduction, and Intrigue by Sonia Purnell, the biography of the famed political horizontale Pamela Harriman. Perhaps it’s because, with Donald Trump cosplaying master and commander, we all want to be bunkered in those storied war rooms beneath the streets of Westminster, wreathed in her father-in-law Winston Churchill’s cigar smoke.
Born in 1920, Pamela Digby Churchill Hayward Harriman was the luscious, wellborn redhead who, at the age of 19, and just two weeks after meeting him, married Winston’s appalling only son, Randolph, an abusive and misogynistic drunk, and soon gave birth to Winston Jr.
While the great man was consumed with winning World War II, Randolph was the Hunter Biden figure of Downing Street, whom the whole family—his three sisters and his ethereal mother, Clementine—tried to keep out of Winston’s way to avoid the inevitable scenes of rage and retribution. The marriage to Randolph collapsed after two years, leaving Pamela with nothing but her husband’s gambling debts, which forced her to flog off her jewelry and wedding presents.
But in the first indication of her remarkable social skills, Pamela captivated the senior Churchills, who, in Purnell’s words, told Randolph nothing but Pamela everything. She became a fixture at their Kent country retreat, Chartwell, often staying up with Winston playing Bezique till 5 a.m. to help relieve his wartime stress. Strangely unthreatened, Clemmie found it a relief to have Pamela around to provide her husband the gossip and laughter he loved, and she matched Winston in nocturnal energy.
