Patrick Kinna, MBE, confidential assistant to Winston Churchill,
1941-45, was born on September 5, 1913. He died on March 14, 2009,
aged 95.

While accompanying Winston Churchill as confidential assistant on
every foreign trip he made as Prime Minister during four years,
1941-45, of the Second World War, the shorthand writer Patrick Kinna
met most of the key Allied figures, from Franklin D. Roosevelt to
Joseph Stalin.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/obituaries/article5934076.ece?token=null&offset=0&page=1

In addition to Pitman shorthand speeds of 150 words per minute, Kinna
had a useful facility for taking dictation straight on to a manual
typewriter at 50 words per minute. In the rather cramped bathroom at
Chartwell Churchill would dictate to him from his bath, while Kinna
typed in the only other place there was to sit, on top of the lavatory
seat, with the typewriter on his knee. The typescript would be ready
for the Prime Minister by the time his valet had towelled him dry.

Patrick Francis Kinna was born in 1913, the eighth child of Captain
Thomnas Kinna, who as a boy had met Napoleon III when serving as an
acolyte in the Catholic Church at Eltham, and was subsequently
decorated for his part in the relief of Ladysmith.

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