‘Their keenness to do well and their enthusiasm was the inspiration for all who came later. These ratings were destined to be the future officers and chief wrens of their section.’
14 Food, Booze and Too Much Tea
If an army marches on its stomach, then it would also seem to be the case that the most absent-minded and eccentric of boffins and linguists decrypted on theirs. One of the subjects that seems to cause the sharpest polarisation in views of Bletchley Park is neither the pressure of the work, nor the tension of keeping it secret – but the quality of the food (and indeed of the drink) that was on offer.
And this is perhaps not surprising. In a time of severe rationing, it was only natural that young appetites would be sharpened. And the taste, smell and texture of food is one of those things, like scents, that have the power to bring old memories sharply into focus. Just as Evelyn Waugh’s son Auberon recalled that an intense feature of his post-wartime childhood was the very occasional manifestation of bananas, so Bletchley Park veterans now find themselves amused to think back to the food that they were served up on both day and night shifts. One might think that in such a rarefied, cerebral atmosphere, that food would be low on the list of daily concerns. But it wasn’t.
‘The food was disgusting,’ declares Sarah Baring. She elaborated vividly in her personal memoir of life at the Park:
We thought a lot about food. Night watches were especially vulnerable to rumbling tummies and usually forced us to go down to the canteen at 3 a.m., where the food was indescribably awful. It is a well-known fact that to cater for so many people is difficult, and particularly in wartime … but our canteen outshone any sleazy restaurant in producing sludge and the smell of watery cabbage and stale fat regularly afflicted the nostrils to the point of nausea.
One night I found a cooked cockroach nestling in my meat, if you can dignify it by that name, the meat not the beetle. I was about to return it to the catering manageress when my friend Osla, who had the appetite of a lioness with cubs, snatched the plate and said: ‘What a waste – I’ll eat it!’ How she managed to eat so much – minus the insect – and stay so slim I never knew, because any leftovers on any nearby plate were gobbled up by her in a flash.
Oliver Lawn recalls differently, though his endorsement does not quite add up to faint praise: ‘Andrew Hodges, in his biography of Turing, talks about the “poor food” at Bletchley Park. Which I didn’t agree with. I thought it was all right: wartime food, rationing, all the rest of it. But it wasn’t as bad as he has painted it.’ Another veteran said: ‘A lot of people complained about the meals but I thought they were wonderful.’
When the war began in 1939, meals were taken in the house itself; the then head of SIS, Admiral Hugh Sinclair, arranged stylishly for a professional chef to be brought in from the Ritz, and there was waitress service at the tables, as Mimi Gallilee remembers well, since for a short time her own mother was one such waitress.
Even then, however, there was no such thing as a free luncheon. In October 1939, the first of many nit-picking internal memos concerning catering arrangements and tea breaks was circulated to staff. ‘There is no obligation for anyone to take lunch at the war site,’ the management memo stated. ‘But those who do must understand that the rates charged apply for the whole month.’ Furthermore, ‘all GC and CS personnel are requested to pay their lunch money to Miss Reid, room 38.’
And that unusual and generous bonus of exquisitely prepared food was not sustainable. In the first place, the Ritz chef in question was a troubled soul who tried to commit suicide. He did not last long at Bletchley Park. Second, as numbers at the Park steadily grew, this method of catering was less and less practical; although another Bletchley veteran, Jean Valentine, recalls that the ground floor was used for quite a while for ‘self-service cafeteria’ purposes – quite a novelty to a young Scots girl unacquainted with such modern ways. Later there was to follow a large purpose-built canteen, the wares of which were to divide opinion sharply.
Given the shortages of meat, of butter, of sugar, of practically everything, it would have been a tall order to expect the canteen staff to produce works of culinary genius. But reactions might also have had a little to do with one’s upbringing: for instance, if one hailed from the north of Scotland, where the food tended towards the plain and hearty and filling, then there may have been some comfort to draw from the Bletchley efforts.
For instance, one wartime dish, Woolton Pie – named after its inventor, Lord Woolton, and involving substantial amounts of potatoes, turnips and other bland vegetables – was rather popular with some of the Bletchley Park veterans. It might have been plain and tending towards the tasteless, but it was also gratifyingly filling.
One Scottish lady who was not so impressed was Irene Young, who recorded these views in her memoirs: ‘The food was not particularly appetising – I remember with especial distaste the packeted pastry fruit pies which we called “cardboard tarts” – but then, few expected delectable food in wartime.’
Just because it tasted of nothing didn’t lessen demand, however, as she wrote: ‘Some people, though, were very hungry, and second helpings were not allowed. I recollect one girl putting on dark glasses as a disguise in the hope that she would be luckier than Oliver Twist. She was similarly rebuffed.’1
An admonishing official memo from the Park authorities to all personnel put the issue in sharp relief. ‘Everyone should collect their own helpings from the counter, one course at a time. No second helpings can be given,’ it declared, going on to explain the parameters of what constituted a helping. ‘A Welsh rarebit or cheese dish with vegetables or salad is classed as a main dish.’2
And yet it wasn’t all cheese dishes and cardboard tarts. Bletchley Park did have more access to meat – local, it has been suggested – than many other establishments. The same was true of vegetables – even though, as one memo from Alistair Denniston pointed out plaintively, ‘competition from the railways and the factories has increased our difficulties’ in terms of getting fresh produce. Jean Valentine recalls: ‘The food was great at BP. I am open to correction. But I think there was a vegetable garden just over the stone wall. Whether they still grew vegetables there I don’t know, but that is certainly what happened when the Leons owned the house.’
And Sheila Lawn found herself comparing it favourably with the competition on offer in the town: ‘One day, I went to see a film, and then, I was hungry, so I went into what was called the British Restaurant. And I thought: “This isn’t half as good as our canteen.” I thought it was a terribly dull meal.’ But one might also see that a week of working night shifts would turn tastes, as well as sleep patterns, upside down.
The canteen itself is remembered by many for its egalitarian atmosphere. Diana Plowman observed: ‘There was a huge cafeteria where one could eat breakfast (exhausted) with an Admiral on one side and an American Colonel on the other.’
There was a lounge area within the house in which anyone could take a quick break of tea or coffee. Happily there were fewer complaints about authenticity on this front. One veteran said: ‘We got real coffee – it came in those sealed tins. Lyons, I think.’ Yet the subject of tea, and tea breaks – those perennial marker buoys of all things British – proved a reliable source of controversy at the Park. Quite early on, a peevish memo was sent out to all personnel: ‘It is regretted that owing to losses, it is no longer possible to provide service crockery for morning and afternoon teas … those wanting tea must provide their own gear … all service cups, saucers and spoons are to be returned to the kitchen by Tuesday 13th Feb.’3
Among his many eccentricities, Alan Turing was known to chain his tea mug firmly to a radiator. According to Andrew Hodges, people would then pick the lock and steal the mug to tease him. Hodges claims that Turing’s logic was impeccable; such mugs during the war were in short supply. So why not take good care of your only good one? This memo places Turing’s mug in its proper context. Clearly he was anxious that it would othe
rwise be removed by officialdom.
But crockery friction did not end there. Captain Ridley sent out another memo in which he practically levitated with indignation. ‘The breakage and loss of tea-cups, tumblers, knives and forks is taking place on a fantastic scale. The rate of loss is no less than five times that normally experienced in a man-of-war. Tumblers, cups and plates,’ he added crossly, ‘have been found pushed away into the shrubberies and left about in offices, many of them broken.’ Only the most extreme measures would do. ‘The watchmen have orders to stop anyone carrying government crockery away from the dining room.’4 Despite this, Mimi Gallilee remembered of Josh Cooper: ‘When he had his coffee, he used to amble along, in old grey suits, all loose, his hands going in his hair. He would go round the lake, finish his coffee there – and then throw the cup into the lake.’
The wastage of crockery was not the only problem. Tea breaks also raised a matter so serious that a memo came from Alistair Denniston. ‘A considerable time is wasted every forenoon and afternoon by persons congregating in the dining hall for the purpose of taking tea,’ he wrote. ‘Heads of section should arrange that one junior member of their sections is sent to collect jugs of tea, milk etc.’5
His strictures may have caught attention for a while but a year later, the Park’s senior men were forced to return to the subject. ‘Owing to the time taken in collecting afternoon teas,’ one memo went, ‘arrangements are being made to obtain a limited number of tea urns which will be supplied to heads of larger sections … these urns,’ the memo added, clearly for encouragement, ‘have a capacity of about 70 cups.’
For a teenager like Mimi Gallilee, there were other food priorities, which the war made extremely difficult to satisfy. She recalls: ‘Everything was rationed and you couldn’t walk into a sweet shop unless you had some of your sweet coupons left – and need I tell you, mine would go in the first week! That was the month’s worth.’
A couple of veterans recall that in the later stages of the war, a NAAFI van would periodically turn up at the edge of the Park – its arrival would especially be noted by those within the house – to be greeted with enthusiasm similar to that of six-year-olds crowding round an ice cream van. This one, however, specialised in such delicacies as chocolate and cigarettes, both very rare commodities at the time.
Cigarettes were especially sought after; this was a more innocent age in which most adults smoked. The scarcity of tobacco led some to try other brands, sometimes American; but these were deemed inferior to more familiar products such as Black Cat and Passing Clouds.
Eschewing the allure of the canteen, Gordon Welchman would often duck into the town of Bletchley for some fish and chips, which he recalled as being especially good, although thanks to shortages, one sometimes had to provide one’s own newspaper in which to wrap them. Bletchley caterers offered other lures: one could, apparently, procure ox heart at the Station Inn, though it was ‘very pricey’. The railway station itself boasted a buffet – ‘a gloomy place, almost a replica of the film set for Brief Encounter’, said Irene Young. And the coffee was akin to snake venom.
Back at the Park, there were comforts other than food on offer. Beer was available from Hut 2. Staff on their breaks could come here and indulge in general (never work) chit-chat – or indeed anything else that might break the knot of tension. In the early days, people also went to Hut 2 for afternoon teas and coffees, while a tiny library was also provided. According to one veteran, as staffing levels at the Park crept up, so Hut 2 became almost intolerably popular: ‘There were times when if one wanted to move down the central corridor, one had to shuffle sideways.’ Eventually, the tea operation was moved to the purpose-built canteen, and the library inside the big house.
Occasionally there were transgressions, such as the time when Alan Turing established a barrel of cider in the corner of Hut 4, and was informed in unambiguous terms that it was not to stay there. Others managed to secrete barrels of beer in their billets and spend summer evenings consuming it by the jug. On top of that, the men tended to favour the very many local pubs in the vicinity, though even here there was rationing and shortages. One veteran recalled how whisky became a rarity and thirsts had to be slaked with sherry instead, a most unsatisfactory substitute.
Sarah Baring vividly recalls how she was introduced to alcohol at Bletchley Park:
There was the Recreation Club. My friend Osla and I were too shy at first to apply for membership, but eventually plucked up courage, hoping to be treated to a glass of beer when as applicants we were considered suitable. I am sure everybody was welcome, but we didn’t know it at the time. It was in this Recreational Hut or Beer Hut as it was commonly known that I was first introduced to alcoholic spirits.
It was something called Dutch Gin, a pale yellow oily looking liquid. I practically burst into flames at the first sip, like a volcanic eruption, but as it sank lower into my system, my stomach produced a warm glow and I promptly took another swig …
The night shifts proved to many to be the most wearing, not only in terms of work but of refreshment. Tea was stewed until bright orange – and milk was often of the ‘dried’ variety, which tended to produce big, unappetising lumps. There were also digestion issues after eating cheese and piccalilli or even prunes in the middle of the night. Jean Valentine found that working to such a strict rota had unexpected side-effects: ‘It’s the disturbing of your stomach. When you wake up in the morning, normally you have breakfast. But after a night shift, you wake up and have your evening meal. In other words, you come off at eight, go to bed, and when you get up at five or six, it’s the evening meal that’s laid on, so you are having an evening meal for breakfast. Most people suffered slightly bumpy tummies.’
But she adds: ‘The food was very good – and compared to what I got later on a boat over to Ceylon [codebreaking in the Far East], it was magnificent, laid out in cafeteria fashion which we had never come across until then. If you went out for a meal, you sat down and somebody served you. Here, you went and served yourself, which I had never seen before. It was a whole new world. Everything was different.’
And whatever the complaints, there was a bright side. Since the war, it has been proved time and again that whatever the privations, and no matter how irksome the shortages of butter, sugar and meat were, the wartime diet was possibly the healthiest that the British have ever consumed.
15 1941: The Wrens and their Larks
As the numbers of Wrens at the Park grew from hundreds into thousands, their increasing presence also subtly changed the atmosphere of the place. Photographs of these girls in uniform, taken on what seem to be perpetually sunny days in Buckinghamshire, show not only a freshness, but also a good-humoured, no-nonsense expression in so many of their faces.
Despite the discomforts and privations and the relative lack of freedom – or perhaps because for many working-class girls, this life actually presented more freedom – there seemed a general sense of satisfaction, the knowledge that they were fundamentally doing their bit.
For Jean Valentine, who grew up in the Scottish town of Perth, and who turned eighteen in the later years of the war, joining up was a matter of patriotic duty, although she believes that her own recruitment for work on Turing’s bombes was an administrative mistake; for crucially, at just over five foot, she was, according to Bletchley guidelines, too short (indeed, when Jean’s work on the machines began – once she knew the secret, there was no question of opting out – she had to use a special stool to reach the highest drums). Like so many young women during those years, she was acutely aware of the need to contribute in the most solid and practical way possible. It was not enough to stay at home. She now recalls:
‘I got to be eighteen and I thought, if I don’t hurry up and do something positive apart from a bit of firewatching and working in a soldiers’ canteen … then I might end up in a munitions factory. Or on the land. Neither of which was my cup of tea.
‘So one day, I was going down to Carnoustie, near D
undee, to visit my aunt. I had some time to spare so I wandered off into the city. I saw an office which was a recruiting centre for the navy, so I popped in. They gave me an intelligence test and said, “You’ll be hearing from us.”’
Like linguist Sheila Lawn, Jean Valentine had never before left her native land. Her upbringing was comfortable, middle-class – her father had businesses in Perth, one of which, Valentine’s Motors, is still remembered fondly by the townspeople today. Jean was aware that she was signing up for a life radically different from the one she had known. Thanks to that administrative mix-up, she was heading into a career of helping to crack the Enigma codes. Her rude introduction to that life, however, was a head-spinning culture shock.
‘I got a summons and a railway warrant to go to Tullichewan Castle in Dumbartonshire, which at that time was a training centre for Wrens. And I spent a fortnight there learning to do what you do – marching, saluting, that sort of thing.
‘We were told the castle had just been vacated by workmen. The place was filthy. It was disgusting. There were filthy greasy tables. And the washing facilities, to put it mildly, were primitive. They were huge concrete huts with a concrete floor. The loos did have doors, but there was no lock. And I can’t tell you what the smell was like.
‘There was a bit where people could have a shower – a row of showers on a wall. I was an only child and I wasn’t used to stripping off in front of people and washing myself, but I did it. Some of them kept their swimming costumes on because they were just too embarrassed to strip down to the buff.’
But after these privations – perhaps deliberately spartan – a rather more attractive prospect for some Wrens started to loom. Jean Valentine recalls: ‘On the last day we were all called into a room – forty or fifty of us – and told to sit there, and we would be called one at a time and be told where we were going, what we’d be doing. So when I was called in, I did what I was told, sat down in a chair in front of three or four officers sitting there. “We don’t know what we’re going to be asking you to do. But we have been told to look for people like you. So tomorrow you will go to London.”’
The Secret Life of Bletchley Park Page 15