Churchill's Black Dog at the Home Office, 1910-1911: The Evidential Reliability of Psychiatric Inference

Abstract

This is a case study of what passes for the evidential basis of psychological and psychiatric generalizations within popular historical accounts of, and widely publicized conceptions of, Winston Churchill. There are two objectives. First, to sift and evaluate textual evidence concerning Black Dog's actual manifestations and impact during Churchill's term at the Home Office – a period often suggested as one in which he experienced significant mental ill-health – utilizing, wherever possible, information and clues Churchill himself left behind. The second objective, interwoven with the first, is to subject to test and challenge the evidence relied on for diagnostic pronouncements from the dominant Storr/Ghaemi perspective, while being alert for indications of the alternative apprehension perspective identified, though not consistently adhered to, by Lord Moran. The overall conclusion is that, although clinical precision is unobtainable, the likelihood is that Black Dog at the Home Office manifested as, not melancholia, but worry and other forms of anxiety disorder.