National Churchill Museum

501 Westminster Avenue
Fulton, Missouri
573-592-5369

Admission is $10, or $9 for Seniors and $6.50 for teens and college students.  Free parking in lots or on street. 

https://www.nationalchurchillmuseum.org/

Opened in 1969. 

The museum lies in the basement of this beautiful English church, the Church of St. Mary Aldermanbury, originally built in the 12th century, rebuilt after fire in 1660's and destroyed by German bombs again in 1940. It was brought to Fulton in 1966.

The Winston Churchill Memorial and Library opened in 1969.  Later it was renamed the National Churchill Museum. 

In 1946, Winston Churchill gave his famous Iron Curtain speech at Westminster College, and thus the eventual museum on campus in honor of Churchill. 

In the lobby, other leaders who have spoken at Westminster are recognized. 

The timeline in the lobby begins in 1600. 

This 17th Century Bible belonged to the church. 

The first permanent gallery is dedicated to his childhood and early years. 

In 1895 Churchill began his long career in the service for Great Britain.

What a fascinating story! 

This interactive display allows you to understand how many places he lived in his early adult years. 

Everywhere you look in the museum the displays are filled with Churchill quotes.

Everything in quotes and/or script are quotes by Churchill. 

By 1911, he had served in Parliament and as Under-Secretary of State for the colonies, President of the Board of Trade, and Home Secretary, his position at the time of the Siege of Sydney Street. 

In 1911 he became the First Lord of the Admiralty, putting him in a important position for the beginning of World War I. He was instrumental in adding planes and tanks to the navy as this video shows.  

For seven months he held positions in fighting battalions. 

After the war he served as Secretary of State for the War and Air and then Secretary of State for the Colonies. From 1922-24 he was out of the government but in 1924 he was re-elected to Parliament and became the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

Throughout the galleries are replicas of letters written by Clementine Hozier who became his wife in 1908.  This one was written in 1924. 

Churchill was a prolific writer producing a five-volume set about World War I , the first volume completed in 1923.  Later he wrote a novel, two biographies, three volumes of memoirs, and other histories.   He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1953.

A section of the museum is devoted to Hitler. 

These films about the Nazi movement run five pictures together and are very impressive. 



As Prime Minister, Churchill signed the Munich Agreement with Hitler in 1939. 

Churchill as Prime Minister was instrumental in the use of the Eagles to defend Great Britain in World War II. 

This display allows museum visitors to crack the Nazi ciphers. 

These are a representative sample of the souvenirs that Americans brought home from the battlefields.  

London dealt with nighttime bombing for a long period. 

This is another interactive display.  Can you study this poster and then name the planes flying on the ceiling? 

Churchill walked among his people encouraging them during the war. 

After the World War II gallery there is a small room dedicated to Churchill's 1946 visit with President Truman to Westminster.  There is a film of his speech to watch. 



Churchill used this lectern and this chair during his '46 "Sinews of Peace" lecture at Westminster. 

Churchill was Prime Minister during the Cold War. 

Part of the Cold War display. 

The last permanent gallery is about Truman's personal life. He was an avid painter. 

This display is about his family. 

This is a replica of the desk he had in his home. 

This room is filled with Churchill memorabilia. 

At the tables in that room one can pull up on computer screens different quotes by Churchill on different subjects. 

Upon approaching the museum one is greeted by the first of many sculptures of Winston.  This one is titled "Iron Curtain" and was sculptured in 2011 by St. Louis native Don Wiegand.

Inside the museum one can see the molds that were used. 

There are sculptures throughout the museum. The Woman Behind the Man, c. 1965.  Churchill asked Croatian Oscar Nemon to create this. 

Winston S. Churchill, 1947, created by British sculptor Sir Jacob Epstein

Other sculptures

The church above the museum is open to the public when the museum is open. It is truly beautiful. 

The pulpit was designed by Christopher Wren. 

Every pew has beautiful needle-pointed kneeling pads. 

The organ in the back is also beautiful. 

One gallery in the museum is dedicated to the church.  This model shows the different stages of the church from the 12th century to when Wren rebuilt it in 1666 after a fire destroyed it. 

The church was bombed by the Germans in 1940 and again destroyed. These remnants are from the church.  

7000 stones of the original church that were used later in the rebuilding of it were brought from London to Fulton to reconstruct the church. 

This film shows how it was done. 

The stone mason on the reconstruction project donated these stones to the museum. 

The final gallery is covered wall to wall with over 4000 tiles that were painted by students K-12 in mid-Missouri to express a special relationship they have. In his speech Churchill spoke of the special relationship Great Britain has with the United States.  These were painted this year for the 50th anniversary of the museum and will be removed September 22, 2019.  

There is a nice gift shop off the lobby. 

In it one can buy a piece of the Berlin Wall. 

And of course one can buy lots of t-shirts! 

The library is off the gift shop. 

After visiting the museum we went to the Fulton Cafe for lunch. This award-wining restaurant specializes in Cuban food (as well as American).  The sandwich here is a classic Cubano with ham, Swiss, pork and pickles on Cuban bread. The salad included 4 fresh fruits and 4 fresh vegetables. 

Comments: This is a wonderful museum. It is attractive, well laid out, and has informative and diverse displays.  It is all very professionally planned and completed.  There are a number of films and interactive displays and some artifacts.

The museum includes a tremendous amount of information about Churchill and the times of his life.  We spent two hours there and could have stayed much longer if we had read everything.  We highly recommend this museum to others. It was definitely worth the 90-minute drive from St. Louis. 

And let us not forget how interesting a man Churchill was! 

The church is beautiful - so well restored. It is actually available for weddings!  

My big disappointment is that somehow I missed that there is an outside area that includes part of the Berlin Wall.  One year after the 1989 fall of the Berlin Wall, President Ronald Reagan dedicated Breakthrough, an 11-foot-high by 32-foot-long structure sculpted from 8 sections of the Berlin Wall by artist Edwina Sandys, granddaughter of Winston Churchill, as the centerpiece of the Cold War Memorial on the Westminster campus. We totally failed to see it and the special landscaped area around it that sit right outside the church.  

The Fulton Cafe had great food and all enjoyed the Cuban sandwich.  There are gift shops at the front of the restaurant.