When Neville Chamberlain returned home having forged the Munich Agreement with Hitler, he declared he had achieved 'peace for our time'.

A grateful public – who could not possibly know how drastically the Prime Minister had underestimated the Fuhrer's ambitions – showered him with 20,000 congratulatory letters and gifts.

But it has now emerged that the French were so delighted that they decided to buy him a gîte in the countryside.

Neville Chamberlain returned home having forged the Munich Agreement with Hitler, he declared he had achieved 'peace for our time'. It has now emerged that the French were so delighted that they decided to buy him a gîte in the countryside

On September 30, 1938, just a day after the conference ended, a public fund was set up to pay for the house. A week later, it had raised almost half a million francs – equivalent to about £500,000 today.

Tim Bouverie, author of Appeasing Hitler: Chamberlain, Churchill and the Road to War, said: 'The Foreign Office was worried. If the Prime Minister rejected the offer, he risked offending the French.

'If he accepted, he would be obliged to visit his property and ensure it was properly maintained. In the end, it was decided that it would be safest to decline.'

But the adulation for Chamberlain and his policy of appeasing Hitler by surrendering the Sudetenland was short lived – as Germany invaded Poland less than a year after the Munich Agreement was struck. 'However, if there hadn't been a war, then the Munich Agreement would have continued to be held up as a major success story,' Mr Bouverie said.

On September 30, 1938, just a day after the conference ended, a public fund was set up to pay for the house. A week later, it had raised almost half a million francs – equivalent to about £500,000 today. Pictured: Hitler with Chamberlain

The author will be discussing his book on Saturday at the Chalke Valley History Festival, which is sponsored by the Daily Mail. Also at the talk will be the tablecloth around which Hitler and Chamberlain sat at the Berghof, Hitler's residence in the Bavarian Alps, on September 15, 1938.

The covering was looted from the house in May 1945 and was acquired by a British collector, who will be bringing it to the festival, near Salisbury, Wiltshire.