Immigrant of the Day: Pamela Churchill Harriman (UK)

Pamela Churchill Harriman (1920–1997) was an English-born socialite who became a political activist for the Democratic Party and a diplomat. Her only child, Winston Churchill, is named after his famous grandfather.

Pamela Beryl Digby was born in Farnborough, Hampshire, England. In 1939, while working at the Foreign Office in London doing French to English translations, Pamela met Randolph Churchill, the son of Winston Churchill. They were married in 1939 and went to live with her in-laws at 10 Downing Street.

Pamela was married two other times. She married Averell Harriman, in September 1971. With this marriage, her social focus was moved to Washington, D.C., where he owned a townhouse in Georgetown from which they entertained the notables of the world. Harriman, a railroad tycoon, was wealthy. With Harriman’s involvement and links in the Democratic Party, Pamela’s political career got started.

Harriman became a U.S. citizen in 1971 and she became involved in the Democratic Party, creating a political action committee – named “Democrats for the 80s”, later “Democrats for the 90s”, and nicknamed “PamPAC.” In 1980, the National Women’s Democratic Club named her the Woman of the Year.

U.S. President Bill Clinton appointed her Ambassador to France in 1993.  She died in Paris in 1997. The morning after her death in Paris, President Jacques Chirac of France placed the Grand Cross of the Legion of Honor on Mrs. Harriman’s flag-draped coffin. She was the first female foreign diplomat to receive this honor. President Bill Clinton dispatched Air Force One to return her body to the USA and spoke movingly at her funeral at the National Cathedral of Saints Peter & Paul in Washington DC.

Pamela’s Harriman’s life story has been the subject of a documentary film and a 1998 television movie The Life of the Party: The Pamela Harriman Story with Ann-Margret in the title role.  Her life is recounted in Sally Bedel Smith, Reflected Glory: The Life of Pamela Churchill Harriman (1996) and Christopher Ogden, Life of the Party:the Biography of Pamela Digby Churchill Hayward Harriman (1994).

KJ