CHURCHILL 



1374 



CHURCH OF ENGLAND 



elected to the state legislature, and in 1912 

 was the unsuccessful candidate of the Progres- 

 sive party for governor. 



CHURCHILL, WINSTON LEONARD SPENCER 

 (1874- * ), one of the best-known of the mod- 

 ern group of English statesmen, who though he 

 began his Parliamentary career as a Conserva- 

 tive, rose to distinction in the House of Com- 

 mons as a Liberal. He entered the army in 

 1895, saw service in India and in Egypt, win- 

 ning a medal for gallant conduct in the Battle 

 of Khartum, and during the South African War 

 was correspondent for a London paper. Elected 

 to Parliament in 1900, he soon cast in his lot 

 with the Liberals, and in 1905, during the 

 Campbell-Bannerman Ministry, became Parlia- 

 mentary Secretary for the Colonies. From 

 1908 to 1910 he was President of the Board of 

 Trade, in 1910 became Home Secretary, and in 

 1911 was appointed First Lord of the Admiralty 

 in the Asquith Ministry, being one of the 

 youngest men who ever held this office. 



Though Churchill was an advocate of a 

 strong navy, in 1913 he suggested to Germany 

 the plan of a "naval holiday," each nation to 

 cease adding to its navy for one year. The 

 next year saw nearly all Europe involved in 

 the greatest con- 

 flict of modern 

 times, the War 

 of the Nations. 

 Churchill's con- 

 duct of naval af- 

 fairs in the war, 

 especially in con- 

 nection with the 

 campaign in the 

 Dardanelles, 

 caused much dis- 

 satisfaction, and 

 when the Cabinet WINSTON CHURCHILL 

 was reorganized English author, soldier and 

 in 1915 he was statesman - 

 relieved of the navy portfolio. But that his 

 great ability might not be lost to the Cabinet, 

 he was appointed to the office of Chancellor of 

 the Duchy of Lancaster. In November of the 

 same year he resigned his Cabinet position and 

 joined the army in France, but he retained his 

 seat in Parliament. His writings include The 

 River War, My African Journey and a biog- 

 raphy of his father, Lord Randolph Churchill, 

 who died in 1895. B.M.W. 



CHURCHILL RIVER, in Western Canada, 

 with the exception of the Nelson River and 

 its tributaries 'the greatest of the rivers which 



flow eastward into Hudson Bay. It is nearly 

 1,000 miles long, and its drainage basin, which 

 is not sharply defined, includes about 115,000 

 square miles. Its source and the upper half 

 of its course are very close to the low water- 

 shed which divides the Arctic rivers from those 

 which flow into Hudson Bay. One of its 

 northern branches rises in Lake La Loche, in 

 Saskatchewan, about ten miles from the. Al- 

 berta boundary. From this lake a portage of 

 only twelve and one-half miles brings the 

 traveler to the banks of the Clearwater River, 

 whose waters find their way through the 

 Mackenzie system into the Arctic Ocean. 

 About 300 miles eastward on its course the 

 Churchill seems to be in direct connection with 

 the Mackenzie system, for it receives Reindeer 

 River, issuing from Wollaston Lake, another 

 part of whose surplus waters flow north and 

 west, into Athabaska Lake. 



Throughout its course the Churchill flows 

 through many large and small lakes; in fact, it 

 may be called a chain of lakes connected by 

 narrow, rapid channels. For the most part the 

 lakes and rivers are navigable for canoes, but 

 there are many places where rapids and water- 

 falls make short portages necessary. In the 

 early days of the Northwest, long before the 

 coming of a railway, the Churchill was an 

 important trade route. Its upper course, for a 

 distance of 450 miles below Lake La Loche, was 

 on the direct route of the trappers and voy- 

 ageurs to the valleys of the Peace River and 

 the Mackenzie. Along its banks the mink, 

 otter, marten, fox and other fur-bearing ani- 

 mals are still trapped in large numbers, and its 

 waters abound in fish. Fort Churchill, at the 

 mouth of the river, is the best natural harbor 

 on Hudson Bay. The river was named for 

 John Churchill, first Duke of Marlborough, 

 who was the third governor of the Hudson's 

 Bay Company (see MARLBOROUGH, JOHN 

 CHURCHILL). 



CHURCH OF ENGLAND,. the Church estab- 

 lished by law to be the State or national 

 Church of the English people. Its history 

 properly begins in the sixth century, when Saint 

 Augustine was sent to England by Pope Greg- 

 ory the Great to convert the inhabitants to 

 Christianity, and was appointed to be the first 

 Archbishop of Canterbury. 



Until the reign of Henry VIII the English 

 Church was one of the branches of the great 

 Roman Catholic organization, and the English 

 sovereigns acknowledged the authority of the 

 Pope. Henry VIII, though a believer in 



