It would be difficult – not to mention foolish - to write a book about Winston Churchill without including the most relevant quotes from the most quotable man of the past century. One of the joys of a project like mine is that it’s so easy to find a Winston Churchill quote to enrich just about any subject.

There is one significant risk, however. A good number of the most popular “Winston Churchill quotes” were never actually said or written by Churchill.

Just last week a dormant American politician who had been touched by scandal announced his return to the fray by wrapping himself in this presumptive Churchill quote. “You have enemies? Good.That means you’ve stood for something sometime in your life.”

Within hours of the appearance of this quote on social media, the PolitiFact website jumped into fact checking mode and issued this verdict: “This quote does not belong to Churchill. It could not be found on the International Churchill Society’s website or in the Churchill Archive, which contains more than 800,000 pages of original documents. It is also included in the running list of "All the ‘Quotes’ Winston Churchill Never Said" by Richard Langworth, senior fellow at the Hillsdale College Churchill Project”.

So where did this quote originate? According to PolitiFact, it was taken from "Villemain," an essay written by French author Victor Hugo in 1845, 29 years before Winston Churchill was born. Hugo, who is best known for writing Les Miserables and The Hunchback of Notre Dame, wrote: "You have enemies? Why, it is the story of every man who has done a great deed or created a new idea. It is the cloud which thunders around everything that shines. Fame must have enemies, as light must have gnats. Do not bother yourself about it; disdain. Keep your mind serene as you keep your life clear."

Richard Langworth, whose vast body of published research provided the basis for Politifact's debunking, is one of the guiding lights of the International Churchill Society, and the most reliable resource for the veracity of any Churchill quote. His website – www.richardlangworth.com – is an incredibly informative and entertaining source of truth about Churchill. If you visit his site – an experience I highly recommend – please be sure to subscribe to his newsletter as well. As PolitiFact noted, Mr. Langworth's site even includes a page of "All the "Quotes" Churchill Never Said."

Just this past month, Mr. Langworth shared a Churchill story that surprised me in a strange way. It was about a Churchill quote that is so widely circulated that I was convinced it had to be fake. Also it did not fit with the general perception of Churchill as courteous and polite to women. As the story is generally told, when Nancy Astor confronted Churchill about being drunk, Churchill replied that she was ugly and that he would be sober in the morning.

According to the story in Richard Langworth’s newsletter, Churchill’s barb was aimed not at Nancy Astor, but another Member of Parliament, Bessie Braddock. Ronald Golding, a Scotland Yard detective, witnessed this exchange in 1946:

Bessie Braddock: “Winston, you are drunk, and what’s more you are disgustingly drunk”

Winston Churchill: Bessie, my dear, you are ugly, and what’s more, you are disgustingly ugly. But tomorrow I shall be sober and you will still be disgustingly ugly.”

One of the added joys of reading Richard Langworth is that in addition to his reliable rulings on the veracity of Churchill quotes and "quotes," he provides additional detail and perspective. In contrast to common understanding, Churchill was not drunk on this occasion. Rather, he was “just tired and wobbly” after a long day of debate that ran late into the night.

And here’s the best part … Churchill was a movie buff. His reply to Bessie Braddock might well have been inspired by a very similar line from the 1934 W.C. Fields film “It’s a Gift.’

Thanks for reading. Please don't forget Victor Hugo's advice to “Keep your mind serene as you keep your life clear,”

Bill