Mary, Princess Royal ref 1
Mashall, Elizabeth ref 1, ref 2, ref 3
Maynard, Kenneth ref 1, ref 2, ref 3
Medlock, Margery ref 1, ref 2
Menzies, Stewart ref 1
MI5 ref 1, ref 2, ref 3
MI6 ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6, ref 7, ref 8, ref 9, ref 10
MI8 ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6
MI9 ref 1
Millar, Rear Admiral ref 1
Miller, Betty ref 1
Miller, Bill ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5
Mitchell, Ted ref 1, ref 2, ref 3
Mitchell, Vi ref 1
Molotov/Ribbentrop pact ref 1
Mombasa ref 1, ref 2
Monte Cassino ref 1
Montgomery, Field Marshal ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6, ref 7, ref 8
morale, low ref 1, ref 2, ref 3
Moran, Peggie ref 1
Morse Code ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5
Morton, Rosemary ref 1
motorcycle couriers ref 1
Mountbatten, Lord Louis ref 1
Murmansk ref 1
Mussolini, Benito ref 1
NATO ref 1
Nazi invasion threat ref 1
Nehru, Jawaharlal ref 1
neutral countries, operations in ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4
New College, London ref 1
Newman, Victor ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6, ref 7
Newton, Arthur ref 1
Nicholls, Joan ref 1, ref 2
night shifts ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6
No. 1 Special Wireless Group ref 1
North African campaign ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6, ref 7, ref 8, ref 9
North Foreland ref 1
Norton, Rosemary ref 1
O’Connor, Gen ref 1
Official Secrets Act ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6, ref 7
older recruits ref 1, ref 2
Operation Barbarossa ref 1
Operation Market Garden ref 1
Operation Mincemeat ref 1
Operation Overlord ref 1, ref 2
Operation Torch ref 1, ref 2, ref 3
outbreak of war ref 1
partition of India ref 1
Patton, Gen ref 1, ref 2
pay ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4
Pearce, Ollie ref 1, ref 2
Pearl Harbor ref 1
Pearson, David ref 1, ref 2
Pederson, Rene ref 1
Pelan, Ray ref 1
Percival, Gen ref 1
Philco ref 1
Pidgeon, Geoffrey ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6, ref 7, ref 8, ref 9, ref 10, ref 11, ref 12, ref 13, ref 14, ref 15
Pincher, Chapman ref 1, ref 2
Plymouth ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5
Portland Bill ref 1, ref 2
Portsmouth ref 1
Portugal ref 1
postwar life ref 1
pranks ref 1, ref 2
pressures on operators ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6
prototype out-stations ref 1, ref 2
Putin, Vladimir ref 1
Quebec Agreement ref 1
quinsy ref 1
Radio Analysis Bureau ref 1, ref 2, ref 3
radio equipment, transportation to Europe ref 1
radio finger-printing ref 1
Radio Security Service ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6, ref 7, ref 8
Radio Society of Great Britain ref 1
Ranfurly, Hermione, Countess of ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6
Rastenburg ref 1
recruitment and training ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6, ref 7, ref 8, ref 9, ref 10, ref 11, ref 12, ref 13, ref 14, ref 15
romances ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6, ref 7, ref 8
Rommel, Field Marshal ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6, ref 7, ref 8, ref 9, ref 10, ref 11, ref 12, ref 13
Room 40 ref 1, ref 2
Roosevelt, Franklin D. ref 1
rotas ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5
Rothamstead Manor ref 1
Royal New Zealand Navy ref 1
Russell, Sheridan ref 1
Ryan, Imogen ref 1, ref 2
St Erth ref 1, ref 2
Sandhurst, Lord ref 1, ref 2
Sandover, Capt Mike ref 1
Sandwich, Lord ref 1
Sandy, Ted ref 1
Sardinia ref 1
Sayer, Lt-Col ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5
Scarborough ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5
scarlet fever ref 1
Scott, Lt-Col Walter ref 1, ref 2
Scott-Farnie, Rowley ref 1
Secret Intelligence Service (SIS) ref 1
Section VIII ref 1
security ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4
security, breaches of ref 1, ref 2
Shepherd, Group Capt John ref 1
Sheringham ref 1
Shirreff, 2nd Lt Donald ref 1
Sicilian campaign ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6
Sinclair, Sir Hugh ref 1, ref 2
Sinclair, Pat ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6, ref 7, ref 8, ref 9, ref 10, ref 11, ref 12
Sinclair, Peter ref 1, ref 2
Singapore ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6, ref 7, ref 8
Skegness ref 1
Skelton, Barbara ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4
Skillen, Capt Hugh ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6, ref 7, ref 8, ref 9, ref 10, ref 11, ref 12
Sleaton Sluice ref 1
Slim, Gen ref 1, ref 2
Smee, Margaret ref 1, ref 2
Smith, Logan Pearsall ref 1
Smith, Ursula ref 1
Somerville, Admiral ref 1
South Foreland ref 1
Southwold ref 1, ref 2, ref 3
Soviet Union ref 1, ref 2, ref 3
Soviet Y team ref 1
Spain ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4
Spanish Civil War ref 1, ref 2, ref 3
Special Liaison Units (SLUs) ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6, ref 7
Special Operations Executive ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4
sports ref 1, ref 2, ref 3
spy scares ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4
SS City of London ref 1
Stalin, Joseph ref 1
Station X ref 1
see also Bletchley Park
Stock, Vic ref 1
Strachey, Oliver ref 1
Stripp, Alan ref 1
Stuttford, Anne ref 1
Sugg, Iris ref 1, ref 2
suicides ref 1
Swindlehurst, Herbert ref 1, ref 2
swing music ref 1
Tangier ref 1, ref 2, ref 3
teleprinters ref 1, ref 2
Tiltman, Col John ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4
Tirpitz ref 1
Tobruk ref 1, ref 2
Topolski, Feliks ref 1
Tozer, Bill ref 1
trade unions ref 1
Travis, Cdr Edward ref 1, ref 2, ref 3
Trevor-Roper, Hugh (later, Lord Dacre) ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6, ref 7, ref 8, ref 9, ref 10, ref 11, ref 12, ref 13
Trowbridge ref 1
Truin, Dudley ref 1
Tunisia ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4
Turing, Alan ref 1, ref 2, ref 3
Turkestan ref 1
typhoid ref 1, ref 2
U-boats, tracking ref 1, ref 2
Ukraine ref 1
Ultra ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6
Underwood, Dennis ref 1
V1 missiles ref 1
Valentine, Jean ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6, ref 7, ref 8
VE Day ref 1, ref 2, ref 3
Vegehl ref 1
Venlo incident ref 1
Vivian, Valentine ref 1
VJ Day ref 1
voice-encryption ref 1
Voluntary Interceptors ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5
&n
bsp; Wallace, Maj ref 1, ref 2
War Office Radio Services ref 1
watchlists ref 1
Wavell, Gen ref 1, ref 2, ref 3
Webbe, Hazel ref 1
Welch, Sybil ref 1, ref 2
Welchman, Gordon ref 1
West, Nigel ref 1, ref 2
West, Peggy ref 1, ref 2, ref 3
Whaddon Hall ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5
White, Betty ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6, ref 7, ref 8, ref 9
White, Charles ref 1
White, Dick ref 1
Wick ref 1, ref 2
Wilder, Thornton ref 1
Wilkes, Lt Eric ref 1
Wilkinson, Patrick ref 1
Williams, Dafydd ref 1, ref 2
Willis, Vice Admiral ref 1
Wilson, Gen Maitland ref 1
Winterbotham, Capt Frederick ref 1, ref 2, ref 3
wireless technology ref 1, ref 2
Woldongham ref 1
Women’s Auxiliary Air Force (WAAFs) ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6, ref 7, ref 8, ref 9, ref 10, ref 11, ref 12, ref 13, ref 14, ref 15
Women’s Royal Naval Service (Wrens) ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6, ref 7, ref 8, ref 9, ref 10, ref 11, ref 12, ref 13, ref 14, ref 15, ref 16, ref 17, ref 18, ref 19, ref 20, ref 21, ref 22, ref 23, ref 24, ref 25, ref 26, ref 27, ref 28, ref 29, ref 30, ref 31, ref 32, ref 33, ref 34, ref 35, ref 36
Woodhouse Eaves ref 1, ref 2
Wormwood Scrubs ref 1, ref 2
Worrall, Maj Phillip ref 1
WOYG (War Office Y Group) ref 1
see also Beaumanor Hall
Wylie, Captain F. ref 1
Y Committee ref 1, ref 2
Y Service
commemorative medals ref 1
name ref 1
older recruits ref 1, ref 2
operator qualities and skills ref 1, ref 2
pay ref 1, ref 2, ref 3
pressures on operators ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6
recruitment and training ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5, ref 6, ref 7, ref 8, ref 9, ref 10, ref 11, ref 12, ref 13, ref 14, ref 15
social mix ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5
veteran reunions ref 1
Voluntary Interceptors ref 1, ref 2, ref 3, ref 4, ref 5
Yugoslavia ref 1
Zon ref 1
Extracts from
The Secret Life of Bletchley Park
and
The Lost World of Bletchley Park
The Second World War was the first global conflict to be heavily influenced by events behind the front lines - i.e., spying and sophisticated intelligence gathering. Sinclair McKay has celebrated the unheralded work that the brilliant minds of Bletchley Park undertook to thwart the Nazi war machine on land, sea and in the air; in every theatre of war Allied forces found themselves. His first bestseller The Secret Life of Bletchley Park gave a voice to those ordinary people who worked there; whilst his follow-up The Lost World of Bletchley Park brings their world to brilliant life in a beautifully illustrated book. Both titles are now available as ebooks.
Iain Macgregor
Aurum Press
Secret Life of Bletchley Park
ISBN: 978-1-84513-633-8
1 Reporting for Duty
Sarah Baring – and her good friend Osla Henniker-Major – received the summons by means of a terse telegram. She remembers that it read: ‘You are to report to Station X at Bletchley Park, Buckinghamshire, in four days time. Your postal address is Box 111, c/o The Foreign Office. That is all you need to know.’
These two aristocratic young women arrived one evening in the spring of 1941, having travelled by rail from Euston. Their journey had been rendered a little fraught by a male fellow passenger sitting opposite in their compartment, apparently manipulating himself obscenely through his trouser pockets. After some whispered conference, the two outraged young women decided that Osla should deal with the grubby man by reaching up to the luggage rack and then ‘accidentally dropping their case of gramophone records’ on his lap. The man got the message and ‘fled up the corridor’.
Just over an hour later, they were there. ‘We decanted ourselves from the train at Bletchley station,’ recalls the Honourable Sarah Baring, ‘and then, weighed down by our luggage, we staggered up a rutted narrow path. On the side of the tracks, there was an eight foot high chained fence. It was topped by a roll of barbed wire.’
The boundary of the Bletchley Park estate is adjacent to the railway station. The two women struggled with their suitcases through the twilight along this long, quiet path, up a gentle slope running along the fenced side of the wooded grounds, until they reached the short driveway and the concrete RAF sentry post that stood on the road towards the house. The sentry on duty swiftly established that these incongruously elegant ladies were expected.
Then they caught their first view of the big house itself, with the lake before it, the thick branches of a Wellingtonia tree obscuring some of the windows. One or other of them raised an eyebrow at the prospect. For these two young women – both of whom would have been familiar with grander properties – initial impressions were not remotely favourable. ‘It was a bit of a shock,’ says Sarah Baring lightly now. ‘We thought the house was perfectly monstrous.’
Scattered around outside the mansion, on its lawns, were spartan-looking single-storey wooden huts, with little chimneys coughing out thick, inky smoke, and windows covered for the blackout. Round to the side of the house were what had been the old stables, and a sturdy red-brick outbuilding referred to as ‘the Cottage’. The paving around the house, and on the concrete driveway, was in a state of disrepair, with potholes.
It was difficult to see beyond this, but the grounds went on further, much further; there were meadows filled with more huts, and concrete blocks. ‘And there were,’ Sarah Baring says, ‘men and women emerging from all these huts, giving the impression of a labyrinth from which there was no exit.’ She also immediately noted a disconcerting ‘absence of people in uniform’.
The front of the house, looking across the pretty ornamental lake and beyond into the gloaming, down the hill, faced towards the town; but any glimpse of Bletchley was obscured by trees. The only reminder of the outside world was the distant shrieks of train whistles echoing in the spring air.
Once through the door of the big house – which bustled with more intense-looking young men and women in civilian clothes – the two young women were pointed up the stairs, and presented themselves on the first floor to the man who had sent them the telegram: Commander Travis, Deputy Director of Bletchley Park.
Travis immediately asked the two bemused young women to sign the Official Secrets Act. He then told them of a temporary billet in town – a hotel – in which they would be staying, and added that their duties would begin the following morning. ‘He said to me, “I hear you’ve got the German,”’ says Sarah Baring, ‘which at that moment I thought was rather funny because I thought he meant a man.’ At that point, Commander Travis told the two women very little of what their duties would entail; only that the need for secrecy was absolutely paramount.
And after this faintly dreamlike introduction, Sarah and Osla’s years at Bletchley Park began.
Other recruits to the Park often arrived late at night. During the blackout, there would have been no lights visible from the dowdy Buckinghamshire town; these people would not have been able to make out through the murk a single detail of the small red-brick houses, or the long terraced streets, or the pubs. ‘In the early hours of the morning, I alighted on the station platform, and was met by an army captain,’ said one veteran. ‘I might as well have found myself in Outer Mongolia.’
‘I got to Bletchley around midnight,’ recalled another veteran. ‘Everything was in darkness. There were some iron steps going over the bridge. There wasn’t a soul about.’
There is, perhaps, a touch of the Graham Greene thriller about this image: the steam train drawing away, its
red rear lights disappearing into the black distance; then a thick silence, broken only by the click of solitary footsteps pacing in the deep shadows of an unlit platform, waiting for the mysterious contact to arrive. ‘A system of passwords has been instituted to enable authorised persons to circulate in the grounds after dark,’ stated an early Bletchley Park memo in October 1939. ‘[It will] enable them to identify themselves to the military police when challenged.’
Many of those who reported for duty at Bletchley Park recall that suspense; the anticipation and excitement of not knowing what kind of work they were about to step into. For those who arrived on a winter evening, or even in the small hours, the total darkness around the station acquired a chillingly metaphorical depth.
And even for the others who reported for duty in more conventional, brighter daylight, the introduction to Bletchley Park was no less disorientating. The experience of another veteran, Sheila Lawn (née MacKenzie), just nineteen years old at the time, was not untypical.
Sheila was a young nineteen, too; she had never previously left her native Scotland. She had received the summons in some bewilderment, uncertain how anyone would have known about her, or who might have recommended her. She embarked upon a deeply uncomfortable eleven-hour train journey from Inverness to Bletchley (trains during the war were often jammed, and people would often have to sit on their suitcases in the corridors, and try to do without the lavatories, which were gothically horrible); eleven hours with the tension – and the thrill – of having no idea what was coming next.
She now recalls: ‘When I arrived at Bletchley station, I had been instructed to find a phone, which I did. The voice at the other end said: “Ah, yes, Miss MacKenzie, we are expecting you.” And a car came down to take me up there. How could I really speculate about what I was getting into? This was a very secretive business, you see.’
The most secretive business there could be. Years before the outbreak of the Second World War, one branch of the Foreign Office was acutely aware of the immense challenge it was facing; a challenge that would require not merely diamond-sharp minds, but also young people with the energy and the character to face exhausting trials of patience. Recruits with the strength to focus every single day upon tasks of stunning complexity, without letting the pressure undermine their mental well-being.
Upon arrival, most of the young recruits to this establishment immediately gathered that they were to be engaged upon intelligence work of the most crucial nature. There were sharp, serious warnings about total secrecy; glimpses of former university tutors, in civilian clothing; then the swift, giddying realisation that they were now close to the nerve centre of the British war effort.
The Secret Listeners Page 36