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Just a bit of code breaking with the neighbours....

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    Just a bit of code breaking with the neighbours....

    Couple finds Nazi documents and just happen to try code breaking with their neighbour who worked at
    Bletchley Park
    https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-new...-nazi-24050051


    A couple found secret WW2 German messages under their floorboards and are trying to crack the puzzle with help of a 95-year-old Bletchley Park code breaker.

    John and Val Campbell discovered a cache of wartime items hidden by a Nazi soldier in the 1940s.




    It included cigarette packets, matches, a shampoo sachet, a fuse wire pack, throat pastilles - and even brothel passes.

    But there was also an envelope addressed to Ernst Buchtela and pieces of mice-bitten paper - covered in German code.

    The couple realised they were left by a German soldier who was billeted in the home in occupied Guernsey during the war.
    And now they have enlisted the help of neighbour Marj Dodsworth, 95 to decipher it.




    Marj worked extensively on Alan Turing’s electro-mechanical bombe machine built to crack the Enigma code.

    The WW2 code breaker is now speaking for the first time about her role after having to keep it secret for 70 years.




    Marj was able to examine the Campbell's code - the first time since the war she has seen it since the war.

    Sadly she says she'd need an Enigma machine to be able to crack it.

    Marj said: "When I first saw it I thought there’s no way without a machine. There’s not a cat’s chance I’d be able to do it.

    "The machines were big, noisy, oily, dirty and so large I could barely touch the top."

    Mrs Dodsworth joined the Women’s Royal Naval Service – familiarly known as Wrens – in 1943, aged 18.

    She said: "At that age you had to register either for work or the services. Unless you weren’t fit you were conscripted.

    "My father was in the Navy, although the Wrens were voluntary. With him in the Navy I got in without any problems.

    "Otherwise it was war work, like munitions, which I didn’t want to do."
    For six weeks she did introductory training, which involved lots of potato peeling.

    "There were 800 of us where I was, but three or four more outstations.

    ''What we did was passed on to Bletchley by teleprinter. We did exactly the same work and used the same machines."
    "When I went home my parents were worried and wondered why my hands were nicked, but I couldn’t tell them where I was.
    "When we signed the act, it was for life, but after 50 years we were notified that the Official Secrets Act was no longer enforced.

    "My parents died never knowing what I did during the war."

    Last edited by SueEllen; 7 May 2021, 09:49.
    "You’re just a bad memory who doesn’t know when to go away" JR

    #2
    Originally posted by SueEllen View Post
    Couple finds Nazi documents and just happen to try code breaking with their neighbour who worked at
    Bletchley Park
    https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-new...-nazi-24050051


    Lovely lets hope Bletchley Park get involved and spin up a Bombe or a simulator to decode this!

    Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much.

    Comment


      #3
      If ever there was a time for an emulator, this is it. Something that should appeal to those at GCHQ.

      Comment


        #4
        It included cigarette packets, matches, a shampoo sachet, a fuse wire pack, throat pastilles - and even brothel passes.
        Brothel passes eh? I'll have one of those. Mind you the workers may be 100+ years old by now.
        bloggoth

        If everything isn't black and white, I say, 'Why the hell not?'
        John Wayne (My guru, not to be confused with my beloved prophet Jeremy Clarkson)

        Comment


          #5
          Originally posted by NigelJK View Post
          If ever there was a time for an emulator, this is it. Something that should appeal to those at GCHQ.
          already exist

          https://www.theregister.com/2019/03/...igma_emulator/
          Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much.

          Comment


            #6
            Originally posted by xoggoth View Post

            Brothel passes eh? I'll have one of those. Mind you the workers may be 100+ years old by now.
            Near your demographic you will have to share with Wayne Rooney!
            Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much.

            Comment


              #7
              Thanks for the link. Bit spooky as I thought that GCHQ ,might be interested.

              Comment

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