To the world Churchill was the epitome of the British bulldog - tough, defiant, irrepressible.

But a soon to-be-published collection of letters penned by Sir Winston Churchill reveal just what an old romantic the great war leader really was.

Intimate letters, including many written at Blenheim Palace, are being published in a new book edited by Churchill's daughter, Mary Soames.

They were sent to her mother, Clementine, and show that underneath those wing-collared shirts and waistcoats beat the heart of a tender, sentimental and occasionally obsessive lover.

Clementine was his "sweet cat", while the great man became her "pug". And if Churchill's gift for words helped win a world war and a Nobel Prize for Literature, it also certainly extended to winning the woman he wanted for his wife. The letters show Churchill at his most love-struck, some being written in the days following his proposal to Clementine at Blenheim in August 1908. He famously popped the question when they were caught in a downpour and took refuge in the Temple of Diana overlooking the Palace's Great Lake.

The following morning he was writing: "How are you? I send you my best love to salute you: & I am getting up at once in order if you like to walk to the rose garden after breakfast & pick a bunch before you start."

His one problem at Blenheim seems to have been escaping from his cousin Sunny, the then Duke. "I did not get to bed till 1 o'clock," he complains, "for Sunny kept me long in discussion about his affairs which go less prosperously than ours." But he insists: "The purpose of this letter is also to send you heaps of love and four kisses."

Love, however, like Hitler's Panzer divisions, was unable to rob the old boy of a good night's sleep. The letters are full of references to how well he slept at Blenheim - doubtless after a few stiff nightcaps with his host.

Blenheim continued to play a central part in Winston and Clementine's lives, long after their marriage in 1908.

With the war clouds gathering in 1912, she tenderly warned her husband not to overdo it. "Do my Dearest Darling take great care of yourself & arrive tomorrow not an exhausted wearing pug, but sleek with your tail curled well over your head."

We can only wonder whether Bill and Hillary's letters will show such affection if Chelsea Clinton ever gets round to having them published.

*Speaking for Themselves: The Personal Letters of Winston and Clementine Churchill is published by Doubleday on October 1, priced £25.

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