Bletchley Park

May 2017

Highs and lows of the codebreaking operation at Bletchley Park are the subject of this month’s episode. There were a lot of lows, but it’s not all doom and gloom. We know how the war ended but, back then, the threat of invasion still hung in the air and Hitler’s forces were making great gains, not only in Europe. This was also around the time when the German Navy decided to tighten the security of its radio traffic in the Atlantic, where Allied shipping convoys were being found and sunk with horrifying success. We explore this - and the expansion and change of leadership at the Government Code and Cypher School - with Bletchley Park’s Research Historian, Dr David Kenyon and the late Captain Jerry Roberts.

Also this month, Helen Leadbetter was a wireless telegrapher in Canada during World War Two, providing the codebreakers at Bletchley Park with the raw material they deciphered and turned into vital intelligence. She told her story to the broadcaster CBC, who we have to thank for letting us share it with you.

And we bring you details of some of the coming summer’s exciting events at Bletchley Park, featuring live vintage music, fashion, food and Bletchley Park’s own beer, as well as plenty to challenge and entertain young would-be codebreakers.

Image: ©Bletchley Park Trust 2017

#BPark, #Bletchleypark, #Enigma, #WW2,#Veteran, #History

April 2017

Bletchley Park’s brand new exhibition, Off Duty, High Spirits in Low Times, is now open. It explores what happened outside of the gruelling shifts the thousands of workers did, day and night. Wartime work at the Government Code and Cypher School was stressful and tiring - but the authorities understood it was important to keep staff happy - and healthy. We’ll hear from Veterans who gave an intimate Q&A session, which launched the exhibition.

Also this month, we hear memories from one of the hundreds of Veterans who’ve taken part in Bletchley Park’s Oral History project, about how she spent her precious free time. Barbara Allan, nee Grigg, remembers being in Trafalgar Square, watching Doodlebugs falling, and being told off by a passing officer for not taking cover. This was during one of many trips to London on her days off operating Bombe machines at Eastcote, where she and her friends used to enjoy cheap theatre tickets and dinners for a shilling in the crypt at St Martins in the Field.

Museums at Night makes a welcome return next month, this time exploring the Night Shift. As darkness falls, visitors will get a chance to experience the hush of the huts, just as wartime workers would have done. The last Museums at Night event fell close to Halloween, and podcast producer Mark Cotton went along to see just how spooky the park could be.

Image: ©Bletchley Park Trust 2017

#BPark, #Bletchleypark, #Enigma, #WW2,#Veteran, #History

March 2017

This month’s It Happened Here story is a truly global one. It’s about what happened when the war was no longer just in Europe.

In December 1941, Japan entered World War Two. This meant intelligence gathering and processing became a far bigger and more complex task, which brought about the need for a significant expansion of the top secret operation at Bletchley Park.

We'll hear from two of the women who worked on Japanese codes at Bletchley Park, Betty Webb and Mary Every, who had never met until they were interviewed together for a Japanese newspaper. We look back at this seismic change with Bletchley Park's Research Historian, Dr David Kenyon. As well as all that, Podcast Producer, Mark Cotton, was allowed privileged access to the Bletchley Park Archive to look at flash cards used to help hapless Codebreakers learn Japanese in double quick time.

Also this month, we bring you a sneak preview of an exciting new exhibition opening soon at Bletchley Park, Off Duty. Although few official records remain of what people did in their spare time, this exhibition will use stories pieced together from letters, diaries and surviving wartime documents from Bletchley Park. Off Duty will feature a number of Veterans’ memories gathered by the Oral History Project, which help us understand what it was like, in their own words.

Image: ©Bletchley Park Trust 2017

#BPark, #Bletchleypark, #Enigma, #WW2, #Veteran, #History

February 2017

This month we celebrate the unique and precious memories being gathered in Bletchley Park’s Oral History Project.

Jean Kotchie was a Royal Navy Wren who worked on the noisy, smelly Bombe machines which helped speed up the daily race against time to find the Enigma settings on hundreds of networks, so that messages could be deciphered in enough time to make the intelligence operationally pin-sharp. Hers is a story of oil stains, monotony and exhaustion in the rural outreaches of the home counties; hardly what she had in mind when joining the Navy to do her bit for the war effort. It wasn’t all fun for Jean, and she looks back on a dark chapter in her young life to help future generations understand what happened.

Also in this episode, the baton of celebration is passing down the generations as more and more families of Codebreakers visit Bletchley Park to absorb the atmosphere and learn more about what their ancestors achieved.

One such proud family is the Hinsleys, whose parents met there during World War Two. On 7 June 1940, Harry Hinsley warned the Admiralty that German battle cruisers were about to emerge from the Baltic. His advice was ignored, and the next day the Scharnhorst sank the carrier HMS Glorious. This was but one moment in a highly distinguished career at Bletchley Park and beyond, including becoming the author of the official history of British Intelligence during World War Two.

Image: ©mcfontaine

#BPark, #Bletchleypark, #Enigma, #WW2,#Veteran, #History

January 2017

The Zimmermann Telegram tells the story of how the US became embroiled in World War One. The threat from Germany came home to the United States 100 years ago this month, courtesy of an intercepted telegram sent by the German Foreign Secretary, Arthur Zimmermann. The tricky thing was, British intelligence didn’t want the US finding out they were reading what was coming over those cables. That made it rather difficult to warn the US, without giving the game away and thereby doing enormous diplomatic damage.

We hear from the grandsons of two key figures in this story; Nigel de Grey played his part in decrypting this all-important message in Room 40, and went on to be crucial to codebreaking during World War Two. The other, Thomas Hohler, was our man in Mexico at the time. Last summer their grandsons met up at Bletchley Park, reflecting on the significance of the telegram and their ancestors’ involvement in bringing it to light.

Also in this episode, you really never do know who you might meet at Bletchley Park. Eagle-eyed listeners may have spotted the TV historian, Dan Snow, waxing lyrical on social media recently, about the wonders of the Home of the Codebreakers. He came to visit and - like most people when they first see how brilliantly the story is now told - was moved and amazed. He stopped for a chat with Bletchley Park’s very own broadcast-friendly historian, Dr David Kenyon.

Throughout this year, we’ll bring you more never-heard-before interviews with veterans of Bletchley Park and its outstations, celebrating the ongoing Oral History project, as well as freshly researched stories about what the Codebreakers achieved and the difference it made to the outcome of the war, in the Bletchley Park Podcast’s exclusive It Happened Here series.

Image: ©Bletchley Park Trust 2017

#BPark, #Bletchleypark, #Enigma, #WW1, #History, #DanSnow