The Churchill Series - Jun. 12, 2006

(One of a series of weekday posts on the life of Winston S. Churchill.)

Sunday, September 6, 1941

The Prime Minister journeys to Buckinghamshire. He enters a gated, fenced and guarded area in the center of which is a Victorian mansion surrounded by a number of small, recently constructed buildings.

Before the war the mansion and its grounds were known as Bletchley Park, but now the government owns them and the place is called Station X.

The place holds secrets. Even John Martin, one of Churchill's principal aides who accompanies him on the visit, doesn't know it is here at Station X that a most unusual group including mathematicians, chess players, crossword specialists, linguists fluent in languages ancient and modern, debutantes, and an actress has broken German codes. Their success has enabled Churchill and a select few to read in almost real time many of the enemy's communications.

Years after the war the world learned about Station X, the heart of the Enigma Project.

On that Sunday as Churchill tours Station X he meets many people we would call "unusual.” Some stare silently as you approach and introduce yourself. They're mentally calculating extraordinarily complex math problems and can't allow an interruption. Another was once so engrossed in explaining a theory to a colleague that he reached without looking for tobacco to fill his pipe. Instead, he picked up and packed in his pipe some of his lunch: tuna salad.

Some ways through the tour, Churchill turns and says to the officer who'd recruited many of the staff: "I know I told you to leave no stone unturned to get staff, but I didn't expect you to take me literally."

Later in the day Churchill addresses the staffers and expresses his appreciation for their work.

He's very sincere in that. As the principal consumer of their intelligence, Churchill knows better than anyone the enormously important contribution the codebreakers are making to the war America will enter three months and one day following his visit to Station X.
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Michael Smith's Station X: Decoding Nazi Secrets (pgs. 106-107) contains all of the material found in this post except that concerning John Martin. That reference is found in Martin Gilbert, Finest Hour: 1939-1941. (pg. 1189)