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The Kennedys Amidst the Gathering Storm
A Thousand Days in London, 1938-1940
Chapter One
Into the Lion's Mouth
It was pouring rain as Joseph Kennedy boarded the U.S.S. Manhattan in New York harbor on Monday, February 23. Joe was completely exhausted. It had been an intense five days since he had been sworn in, in Washington, D.C., as ambassador to Great Britain. Just hours before boarding, Joe had dashed up to Hyde Park, New York, for a secret conference with the president. Now, on this stormy day, he was nearly "suffocated" by the press of "newspaper men, casual well-wishers, old friends and strangers by the thousand," who had essentially cornered him in his cabin, all of them determined to bask in his great success and learn the latest news about Anglo-American relations. Joe could not wriggle through them to reach eight of his children waiting on the top deck to say good-bye.
Jimmy Roosevelt squeezed his way into Joe's cabin and pulled him into the suite's bedroom, but even as they spoke, photographers snapped pictures of the two men sitting together on the bed.
In a brief interview, interrupted by his many friends and associates, Kennedy denied that President Roosevelt had given him any instructions the previous day about how to conduct himself in his new position. Protecting himself and subtly criticizing the president and the State Department, he told the press: "I'm just a babe being thrown into . . ."
"The lion's mouth?" one reporter suggested. Kennedy's vague smile left reporters wondering how he felt about his prospects. For Joe, such an uncontrolled and undignified leave-taking was "a nightmare" andan inauspicious beginning for a man realizing his dream of playing a vital role on the world stage and being, as he told the press, "a staunch believer in peace. . . ."
Finally, Joe managed to wend his way up to an upper deck where his sons Joe Jr., Bobby, and Teddy and his daughters Rosemary, Kick, Eunice, Patricia, and Jean had gathered. Joe's second son, Jack, often sickly, had caught a cold training for the swim team at Harvard; it was too risky to his health to see his father off in such inclement weather. Even here, photographers and fellow passengers with cameras intruded on their good-byes. As the ship prepared to depart, Joe's close friend Eddie Moore managed to herd the children off the ship and onto the dock at a place where they could stand, albeit unprotected from the pouring rain, to wave and throw kisses to their father.
Absent from the scene, much to Joe's dismay, was Rose. A month earlier in Palm Beach, while packing for the move to London, she had developed abdominal pains, ignoring them with a characteristic stoicism. When she could no longer tolerate the pain, Joe had her flown by private plane to Boston's Peter Bent Brigham Hospital, where her physician, Dr. Frederick Good, successfully performed an appendectomy. There was reason for such urgency. Rose Kennedy's biographer Charles Higham points out, "In those days before antibiotics came into general use, there was the dread of peritonitis, which killed, among other celebrities, Rudolph Valentino."
On New Year's Day, Roosevelt had written Britain's King George VI that he had chosen a "distinguished citizen" "to reside near the Government of Your Majesty in the quality of Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the United States of America." With an assurance he would later come to question, FDR told the king, "My knowledge of his high character and ability gives me entire confidence that he will constantly endeavor to advance the interests and prosperity of both governments. . . ." A few days later, the king's representatives informed the president that Kennedy would be "entirely agreeable to His Majesty the King." The inevitable consternation at court about the ambassadorial appointment of a maverick American business mogul who embodied two related issues that remained unresolved in the British psyche—its relation to Ireland and its history of anti-Catholicism—went officially unspoken.
Always clannish, Kennedy would surround himself with a cadre of loyal employees. His handsome and elegant friend Arthur Houghton, a former theatrical manager and an inveterate storyteller, kept Joe amused. The "rough-hewn" Harvey Klemmer, Joe's speechwriter from the Maritime Commission, would provide the ambassador with support on the job, as would Harold B. Hinton, a very sophisticated former New York Times reporter Joe had hired to do public relations—a job he anticipated would be extremely important to advance the agenda of both his ambassadorship and his family. Jimmy Roosevelt's friend Page Huidekoper, a very competent nineteen-year-old personal assistant, would serve as Hinton's clerk. Page found Joe to be charming, bright, and self-centered, with "an aberrant sense of humor." She quickly learned that Joe didn't "do nuances."
Kennedy had few close friends, but he could be kind to people in his inner circle. Joseph Kingsbury-Smith, a reporter for the International News Service of the United Press, remembered Joe as a friend who was "warm, kindly, considerate." When Kingsbury-Smith was hospitalized with broken legs, Joe secured for him the services of the royal household's surgeons and specialists, and visited him frequently.
Also accompanying Kennedy were Anthony (Tony) Drexel Biddle and his wife, Margaret. Biddle was the sartorially splendid scion of the banking family that had founded Philadelphia's Drexel University. FDR had made him ambassador to Poland the year before, and he was returning via London to his post. In a curious indication of the power and social proximity of America's most prominent families, Roosevelt's three key ambassadors—Joe Kennedy, Tony Biddle, and William Bullitt, the ambassador to France—would eventually become related by marriage. Tony was a relative of Jack Kennedy's future wife, Jacqueline, and Bill Bullitt's daughter would wed Tony Biddle's son.
As the U.S.S. Manhattan sailed toward Britain, Joe finally had time to focus on his mission as ambassador, a job that had taken on increased urgency in recent months as the turmoil in Europe threatened the restless and resentful peace Europe experienced in the nineteen years since . . .
The Kennedys Amidst the Gathering Storm
A Thousand Days in London, 1938-1940. Copyright © by Will Swift. Reprinted by permission of HarperCollins Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved. Available now wherever books are sold.
