Who really said it

We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets

Q: Did Winston Churchill say "We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets"?

Yes. House of Commons, 4 June 1940, in the 'War Situation' debate as the Dunkirk evacuation ended — Hansard, vol 361, cols 795–96. Two things almost everyone gets wrong: the word 'them' is not in it ("we shall fight them on the beaches" is a misquotation), and the recording you have heard is not from 1940 — he re-recorded the speech in a studio in 1949.

Spoken by Winston Churchill 1874–1965 · British prime minister and Nobel laureate

Verified In copyright

House of Commons, 4 June 1940, in the ‘War Situation’ debate as the Dunkirk evacuation ended — Hansard, vol 361, cols 795–96. Two things almost everyone gets wrong: the word ‘them’ is not in it (“we shall fight them on the beaches” is a misquotation), and the recording you have heard is not from 1940 — he re-recorded the speech in a studio in 1949.

Last verified 20 Jul 2026 · how we verify · spot an error?

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Verified quote & credit

“We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets” We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender. —Winston Churchill, House of Commons, 4 June 1940. In copyright — clear extended reproduction with the estate.

Can you use it?

Still under copyright (rights held by The Churchill Literary Estate (permissions via Curtis Brown)). A short, credited quote is generally fine for talks, teaching, and internal decks; for commercial, published, or large-scale reuse, get permission.

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In context

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Provenance

The source

Speech: “War Situation,” House of Commons
Dated: 4 June 1940, as the Dunkirk evacuation ended
Citation: HC Deb 4 Jun 1940, vol 361, cc795–96
Familiar recording: A 1949 studio re-recording, not the 1940 delivery

We shall go on to the end. We shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be. We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender. Hansard, 4 Jun 1940

The peroration as Hansard records it. Note the full sequence — reproductions routinely drop ‘in the fields and in the streets’ or reorder the hills and streets.

Hansard — HC Deb 4 Jun 1940, War Situation

How we traced it

Hansard records the peroration in the ‘War Situation’ debate of 4 June 1940, in the sequence France → seas and oceans → air → island → beaches → landing grounds → fields and streets → hills → never surrender Hansard, HC Deb 4 Jun 1940 ↗.
There is no ‘them’ anywhere in it. The ubiquitous ‘we shall fight them on the beaches’ — common in films and advertising — inserts a word Churchill did not use, and slightly changes the sense from defending ground to engaging an enemy.
The audio everyone knows is a 1949 studio re-recording. Churchill did not broadcast this speech live on 4 June 1940, so clips captioned as 1940 recordings are mis-dated — a useful check when a ‘contemporary recording’ is offered as evidence.

In copyright

In copyright until the end of 2035 in the UK and EU (Churchill died 24 January 1965; life plus 70), with the US term for 1940s works running to broadly the same period. Permissions are administered by Curtis Brown for the Churchill Literary Estate. Quoting a sentence with attribution in a talk, article or book is ordinary practice. Reproducing the peroration at length — which is what people usually want to do with this one — is a substantial part of the work and is routinely cleared with the estate, and merchandise use is licensed and enforced. This is not legal advice.

Fact-check

Correctly credited — but routinely misquoted

Nobody doubts who said this. It is nonetheless one of the most consistently misquoted passages in English, and the most common error changes the meaning.

‘we shall fight them on the beaches’ misquoted

‘Them’ appears nowhere in the speech. Churchill names places, not an enemy — the force of the passage is the list of ground to be defended. The inserted word is extremely common in films and advertising Hansard ↗.

‘in the fields and in the streets’ truncated

Frequently omitted, and the hills and streets are often swapped. ‘Landing grounds’ is regularly rendered ‘landing fields,’ and ‘on the seas and oceans’ as ‘in the oceans.’

Dated to 1940 wrong date

The familiar audio is a 1949 studio re-recording; the speech was not broadcast live on 4 June 1940. Clips captioned as contemporaneous 1940 audio are mis-dated.

‘…butt ends of broken beer bottles’ unverified anecdote

The much-loved story that he muttered a coda about fighting with broken bottles ‘because that’s bloody well all we’ve got’ is not in Hansard and rests on anecdote. Treat it as unverified.

Genuinely Churchill, House of Commons, 4 June 1940, recorded in Hansard — without the word ‘them,’ and still in copyright until 2035 official record ↗.

Context

Why it resonates

He was reporting a defeat. Dunkirk had just evacuated over 300,000 men who had left their equipment behind, and the peroration answers the obvious question — what happens when they come — by naming, in order, every kind of ground on which Britain would be fought over.

The repetition is doing the work: each ‘we shall fight’ moves the imagined battle further inland, from the seas to the beaches to the streets to the hills, and the sentence only stops at ‘we shall never surrender.’

There is no "them" in it. He named places, not an enemy.

The peroration in order

‘We shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans…’

‘…we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be.’

‘We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills…’

‘…we shall never surrender.’

Explore

Filed under

More provenance-checked quotes on the same theme, each with its reuse status.

Courage Resilience

Go further

Dig deeper

Trusted places to keep pulling the thread — primary archives, fact-checks, and scholarship. We show how we used each one before you leave.

Hansard — HC Deb 4 Jun 1940 (War Situation)api.parliament.uk

The official parliamentary record of the speech, with the peroration in its exact order.

Curtis Brown — permissionspermissions.curtisbrown.co.uk

Where reproduction permissions for the Churchill Literary Estate are administered.

Churchill Archive — copyright positionwww.churchillarchive.com

The archive’s statement of the copyright position on Churchill material.

The speaker

About Winston Churchill

Winston Churchill

1874–1965 · British prime minister, statesman & Nobel laureate in Literature

Sir Winston Churchill led Britain through the Second World War and won the 1953 Nobel Prize in Literature for his historical writing and oratory. He delivered this three weeks into his premiership, as the last troops came off the Dunkirk beaches and invasion looked imminent. It is among the most quoted passages in the language — and, unlike much of what is pinned on him, entirely and verifiably his.

For writers & researchers

Cite this

Primary source — Chicago

Churchill, Winston. “War Situation.” Speech in the House of Commons, 4 June 1940. Hansard, HC Deb 4 June 1940, vol 361, cols 795–96.

MLA (9th ed.)

Churchill, Winston. “War Situation.” House of Commons, 4 June 1940. Hansard, vol. 361, cols. 795–96.

APA (7th ed.)

Churchill, W. (1940, June 4). War situation [Speech]. Hansard, 361, cols. 795–796.

This verification page

Quotle.info. “Who really said ‘We shall fight on the beaches’?” Last verified 20 Jul 2026. https://quotle.info/who-said/we-shall-fight-on-the-beaches