Army Days And The Post-War Years (7 December 1973)
One day, during my first week in my new town of Bletchley, I went to a telephone box in the present Queensway. I found it was occupied. Very shortly, however, the door was pushed open from inside and I found myself face to face with a young man I remembered having been born when both of us lived over 100 miles from North Bucks.
Our meeting was one of those strange coincidences caused by the upheaval of the second world war. The young man was a cousin of the bosom pal of my boyhood and his birth had been memorable for the fact that he was born along with a twin sister.
They lived in the village on the hillside opposite our own but I saw them in their pram a few days later when their mother brought them over for inspection.
Subsequently, the boy joined the radio servicing department of which my brother was foreman. And now here he was in Bletchley, of all places.
Yet I ought not to have all that surprised, as you will see.
The BBC started when I was 14 and like most other boys I was fascinated by what could be done with crystals and wire – of which there was lots, although it was called wireless.
My interest ended with the cost of thermionic valves, but some other lads carried on with what eventually became their full-time trade. There were also some, who, while going into other trades, continued with wireless as a hobby and became what have since been dubbed as “hams.”
They learned the morse code and soon there were many complaints about reception being interfered with by their tapping to each other over the local ether. Some of these lads became quite fast operators and when war came they soon got into that kind of work in the forces. So did I, though more by way of wanting to follow old pals than of merit. I had it all to learn.
After demob I told one of them – then back in the rope and twine trade – that I was going to a place called Bletchley. He said he knew it well because he had served most of his time at a place nearby which was called Whaddon Hall. He added that I might not like North Bucks because it was all so flat round there. And so it seemed to me.
I remember being puzzled as to the location of Meager’s Hill and then being highly amused on finding that I was walking up it two or three times a day (Would that I could laugh at it now).
Arriving in Bletchley, I lodged for the first two or three weeks with Mr. and Mrs. George Jones – who lived near the bottom of Beechcroft Avenue – with an unsuccessful view to taking over the sub-tenancy. Mr. Jones worked at Bletchley Park with what is now called the DWS, and so did several other men living nearby.
Before the war some of them had been ship’s wireless operators and that kind of thing. During the war they were regimented in khaki and afterwards they simply changed back into civvies and carried on with the same kind of work, but now with the Foreign Office.
When, therefore, the young man referred to at the beginning of this article told me he was working at “the park” I already knew a little of what he was referring to, including the fact that, like so many of his colleagues, he would be spending much of his working life at British embassies overseas.
At that time, many of what were called the “park people” – wives and families of men who had served there – were leaving the town, but the park itself was still very much a hush-hush place and still had a large Foreign Office population.
I doubt whether there will ever be a full account of what happened there during the war, but bits keep coming out, one of the most interesting and recent being that this was the place where the enemy’s cyphers were cracked. If you add up significant bits like that, it is clear that not a little war winning was done at Bletchley Park.
Shortly after the war, the DWS moved to Hanslope Park, but a considerable number of personnel continued to live here and still do, and I am on happy terms with many.
Here I might mention that the first place in this district I knew of was Aspley Guise because my brother was billeted there for a time while working as a wireless boffin for the overseas propaganda establishment at Woburn Abbey.
I might also mention that early in my sojourn here I sometimes toyed with the idea of trying to join the DWS myself. Then I remembered how irked I had been in the army with all that five-letter-code stuff to say nothing of the regimentation and decided that I would probably be happier as a free man.
The army experience, however, has had some bearing on my post-war journalistic life in this particular place. Journalism and hush-hushism are poles apart over most sphere of life. But since my army service I have been among the hushers on anything that might even vaguely affect national security.
D-Notice or no D-notice I have always erred on the side of safety. I just haven’t wanted to know. Better miss a hundred stories of that kind than turn up with a wrong-‘un. On the other side, it has been pleasing to note how people can play a good and useful part in local life without a word from them about what they do for a living.
Occasionally, however, a certain amount of digging is justifiable and necessary. This has happened when embassy men have been embroiled in overseas troubles and especially when their wives have been with them. One instance was the Nasser take-over in Egypt, when local people had a rough time on their way out of the country. Another was the fairly recent Jordanian revolt when trigger-happy rebels were abroad in the streets of Amman and it was best that women should come back home.
No Comments
Add a comment about this page