Westminster College on Saturday will honor Winston Churchill on the 50th anniversary of his death

With a service fit for the man who led Britain through World War II, Westminster College on Saturday will remember Sir Winston Churchill on the 50th anniversary of his death.

It was at Westminster in Fulton, Mo., that Churchill on March 5, 1946, delivered his “Iron Curtain” speech condemning Soviet policies in Europe. Churchill had been invited to the college by President Harry Truman.

The British ambassador, Sir Peter Westmacott, will be joined on the campus for the 10:30 a.m. service of remembrance by Churchill’s granddaughter Edwina Sandys, great-grandson Duncan Sandys and Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon, along with other dignitaries.

The service is one of the first in a series of events around the world to honor Churchill’s life, work and achievements. Event organizers said the Westminster service will be the only U.S. commemoration on the day of Churchill’s death.

The service will be held in the Church of St. Mary the Virgin, Aldermanbury, on the Westminster campus. The Christopher Wren church, the site of the National Churchill Museum, was brought brick by brick from London and reconstructed on the college grounds in 1964.

The order of Saturday’s ceremony is taken from Churchill’s funeral service, which was held at St. Paul’s Cathedral in London. The event will be live-streamed at www.westminster-mo.edu.

This story was originally published January 23, 2015 at 1:41 PM with the headline "Westminster College on Saturday will honor Winston Churchill on the 50th anniversary of his death."