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Winston Churchill biographer Sir Martin Gilbert dies | |
(35 minutes later) | |
Sir Martin Gilbert, biographer of Sir Winston Churchill and a member of the inquiry into the Iraq war has died, the panel's chairman has announced. | |
Sir Martin died "peacefully" on Tuesday after "a long and serious illness", the inquiry's Sir John Chilcot said. | Sir Martin died "peacefully" on Tuesday after "a long and serious illness", the inquiry's Sir John Chilcot said. |
He described Sir Martin, 78, as an "extraordinarily eminent historian" and said the Chilcot inquiry had benefited from his "wisdoms and insights". | |
Sir John told MPs of Sir Martin's death as he appeared at a Commons committee. | Sir John told MPs of Sir Martin's death as he appeared at a Commons committee. |
He had been called to the Foreign Affairs Committee to explain delays in publishing the inquiry's official report. | He had been called to the Foreign Affairs Committee to explain delays in publishing the inquiry's official report. |
Sir John said he wanted to pass on his "personal condolences" to Sir Martin's family. | Sir John said he wanted to pass on his "personal condolences" to Sir Martin's family. |
The Holocaust Education Trust said in a tweet: "Very sad to hear of the passing of Sir Martin Gilbert, leading Holocaust historian and our great friend. | |
"Our thoughts are with his family." | |
Leading historian | |
In addition to being the official biographer of Winston Churchill, Sir Martin wrote books on the Holocaust, the first and second world wars and Jewish history. | |
It was in 1962 as a research fellow at Oxford University that he began his work on the life of the war-time leader. | |
A year after being elected a junior research fellow at Merton College, Oxford, Churchill's son Randolph, who was working on the biography of his father, asked Sir Martin to join his research team. | |
Following Churchill's death in 1965, and with approval from Randolph, Sir Martin wrote his first book on the former prime minister, a single-volume entitled Winston Churchill that was released in 1966. | |
After Randolph Churchill died in 1968, Sir Martin was asked to take over his work to complete the Churchill biography, including the main and document volumes. | |
He would end up publishing numerous volumes of Churchill's biography over the next 20 years. | |
But it was his book The Holocaust, rather than his writings on Churchill, that generated "by far the most correspondence and contact with individuals whom I would never otherwise have met", Sir Martin said. | |
This gave him material and ideas he would incorporate into subsequent Holocaust-related books, he said. | |
Sir Martin was an honorary fellow of Merton College, Oxford, and a distinguished fellow of Hillsdale College, Michigan. |