William Sitwell

I liked this book about :Lord Woolton and his role at the Minstry of Food during WW2. It's an easy read and full of (to my mind) the personal side of his life which brings to life the person rather than his political role. Its easy to see that he and Churchill did not hit it off but I suspect by the time the war was all but won,Churchill had realised what he had on his hands and so promoted Woolton to be the Minister of Post War Reconstruction, in an attempt to utilise his strong business skills. I would have liked more on this latter role but perhaps that is better kept for a further biography.… (mer)

This book is useful in that it contains a lot of information about Lord Woolton's role as Minister of Food for most of WW2 in Britain. Perhaps rather less about his ministry, but that is fair enough. It is unfortunate that the text is written in a rather dull and repetitious way. The author boasts that it would be too tiresome to include references to documentary sources; consequently there are no citations. There are also some glaring factual errors. In addition, the author's social prejudices (this is the man who recently had to leave an editorial post after a perhaps facetious call to kill vegans) imbue the text throughout.… (mer)