John Lennon didn't just wake up one day and decide he wanted a new identity. But he did hate his middle name. Passionately.
Most people know him as the creative force behind the Beatles, the man who sang about peace, and the guy who wore those iconic round glasses. Yet, if you look at his birth certificate, there’s a name that feels completely out of place for a counter-culture rebel: Winston.
John Winston Lennon.
It sounds stuffy. It sounds like a British boarding school headmaster or a politician from a bygone era. For John, it was a constant reminder of a past he wanted to leave behind and a brand of patriotism he no longer subscribed to. In 1969, he tried to scrub it from his existence entirely.
The Birth of John Winston Lennon
To understand why he hated it, you have to go back to October 9, 1940. Liverpool was being hammered by German air raids. John was literally born into a war zone. His mother, Julia Lennon, chose the name Winston as a tribute to Winston Churchill, the Prime Minister leading Britain through its "finest hour."
It was a patriotic gesture common for the time. People were scared, and Churchill was the symbol of defiance.
But John wasn't a "Winston." He was a rocker. He was a provocateur. By the time the late sixties rolled around, that middle name felt like an anchor. It was a relic of the establishment.
💡 You might also like: How to Watch The Wolf and the Lion Without Getting Lost in the Wild
The Savile Row Ceremony: Trading Winston for Ono
On April 22, 1969, John decided to fix what he saw as a clerical error by his parents. He didn't just want to add a name; he wanted to replace one.
He climbed up to the roof of the Apple building at 3 Savile Row in London. This was the same spot where the Beatles had performed their legendary rooftop concert just months earlier. This time, the vibe was different. It wasn't about the music; it was about his marriage to Yoko Ono.
He stood before a Commissioner for Oaths named Bueno de Mesquita. In a brief, legalistic ceremony, he officially changed his name by deed poll.
"Yoko changed her name for me. I've changed mine for her," John said at the time. He wanted to be John Ono Lennon. He loved the idea of the "O"s. He once joked that between him and Yoko, they had nine "O"s in their names, which he considered good luck.
He was done with Winston. Or so he thought.
The Legal Catch-22
Here is the part where British law gets annoying.
📖 Related: Is Lincoln Lawyer Coming Back? Mickey Haller's Next Move Explained
John found out the hard way that you can't actually "delete" a name given at birth under the statutes of the time. You can add a name, and you can choose to go by a new name, but that original birth name stays on the books.
Because of this, his official legal name became John Winston Ono Lennon.
Talk about backfiring. He wanted to get rid of one name and ended up with four.
He was reportedly annoyed by this. To the public and his friends, he was John Ono Lennon. He signed his letters that way. He used it for his art. But every time he had to pull out a passport to enter the United States or sign a serious legal document, there was "Winston" staring back at him.
Why the change mattered to him
- Symbolism: It was a way to fully integrate his life with Yoko.
- Rebellion: It was a middle finger to the traditional British upbringing his Aunt Mimi had enforced.
- Brand: John was reinventing himself as a solo artist and a peace activist. "Winston" didn't fit the aesthetic.
Like Father, Like Son: The Julian Lennon Connection
Interestingly, the struggle with names didn't stop with John. His eldest son, Julian, went through a similar identity crisis decades later.
Julian was born John Charles Julian Lennon.
👉 See also: Tim Dillon: I'm Your Mother Explained (Simply)
For years, Julian dealt with the shadow of his father's name. Imagine standing in an airport security line and having to hand over a passport that says "John Lennon." The jokes, the double-takes, and the constant comparisons became a source of deep anxiety for him.
In 2020, Julian finally went through the legal process to swap his names around. He is now officially Julian Charles John Lennon. He didn't want to erase his father, but he wanted to be himself first.
The Legacy of a Name
John’s middle name is a tiny detail that tells a much larger story about his life. It’s a story of a man caught between his roots in wartime Liverpool and his aspirations to be a global citizen of a world without borders.
If you look at his 1976 U.S. Green Card, the name is there: John Winston Ono Lennon. Even when he finally achieved his dream of living in New York City, he couldn't escape the "Winston" his mother gave him during the Blitz.
It’s kind of ironic, really. The man who wrote "Imagine" and dreamed of a world with "no possessions" and "no countries" was legally tied to one of the biggest symbols of British nationalism until the day he died.
Next Steps for Fans and Researchers:
If you are looking to dig deeper into the legalities of the Lennon estate or his life in the late 60s, you should check out the National Archives in the UK for deed poll records from 1969. Additionally, reading John by Cynthia Lennon provides a great deal of context on how much his early family life—and those "respectable" names—clashed with the man he became. You can also view digital copies of his FBI files via the FOIA Reading Room, where his full legal name is used extensively during their surveillance of his anti-war activities.