Intelligence Insight No. 001
March 2020    Bletchley Park Museum is currently closed as a precautionary measure to help contain the spread of coronavirus (COVID-19). Our staff and volunteers like so many around the world are in lockdown, self-isolation or working remotely from home.   Bletchley Parks CEO Iain Standen said “This isn’t the first time that Bletchley Park has operated at unprecedented times of national crisis ...
1hr 5m Mar 27, 2020
1hr 5m
E105 - Plunder on the Rhine
March 2020 As 1945 began, the Germans’ last roll of the dice in the Ardennes has failed. They were left to face the overwhelming force of men and materiel of the Allied armies approaching the Fatherland from all directions. For the Allies in the west, the natural barrier of the Rhine River was all that lay between them and the open plains of Germany, and the last phase of the war in the west....
1hr 15m Mar 13, 2020
1hr 15m
E104 - Challenge HQ
February 2020    In contrast to its roots as a top secret organisation, the name of Bletchley Park is now recognised around the world. Sharing Bletchley Park’s stories with our audiences through education is at the heart what we now do here. Since first opening the site as a museum in 1992, educational programming has been a crucial part of the work of Bletchley Park Trust.    Our Learning team...
48m Feb 18, 2020
48m
E103 - Enigma Unlocked
January 2020 80 years ago, in January 1940, British and French troops were freezing in their dugouts awaiting a German attack which would not come for several months yet; the so-called ‘Phony war’. Bletchley Park, by contrast was a hive of activity as efforts were made to break into German codes and ciphers, including the Enigma system, before the land war began in earnest. In this ‘It Happe...
1hr 26m Jan 22, 2020
1hr 26m
E102 - Collegiate Connections
December 2019    During World War Two, 34 alumnae of St Hugh’s College Oxford ended up working at Bletchley Park and its Outstations and In March 2020 the college will be holding a symposium to celebrate them.    In this, the last of three episodes this month, our Oral History Officer Jonathan Byrne tells us how this has opened up a potential new source for us to discover more of our Veterans a...
58m Dec 28, 2019
58m
E101 - Battle of the Bulge
December 2019    After nearly 6 months of fighting from the beaches of Normandy, by early December 1944 the Allies’ front line stretched for 600 miles from the North Sea coast to the borders of Switzerland. The Scheldt estuary had finally been cleared, allowing the port of Antwerp to be opened and to start to ease their supply problems.    With one of the coldest winters on record taking hold a...
1hr 4m Dec 17, 2019
1hr 4m
E100 – Légion d’honneur
December 2019    At the end of each year we like to focus on the important work that our Oral History Officer Jonathan Byrne and his team of staff and volunteers carry out. The interviews they record not only help to build a better picture of the vital work carried out here during World War Two but also help us develop new ways to share those stories with our visitors, such as exhibitions, fami...
1hr 11m Dec 12, 2019
1hr 11m
E99 - 100 Years of Codebreaking
November 2019    In this month’s 2nd episode celebrating the anniversary of the creation of GCHQ, where better to learn more about those 100 years than in the heart of its current Headquarters.   We were given special permission to record within the walls of the famous ‘Doughnut’ building in Cheltenham. Our guide to those top secret corridors is GCHQ’s new official Historian David Abrutat.   Wi...
59m Nov 21, 2019
59m
E98 - GCHQ at 100
November 2019    During WW1 the United Kingdom had two separate cryptographic organisations, the Navy’s Room 40 & the Army’s MI1(b). Both had major codebreaking success during the conflict but it was decided that after the war that they should merge.    On the 1st of November 1919 the Government Code & Cypher School or GC&CS was created. Best known for its work during WW2 at Bletchley Park, aft...
43m Nov 11, 2019
43m
E97 - Early Days
October 2019    “Gas masks are to be taken” so ends what seems a rather mundane government memo dated the 2nd of August 1939. It importance becomes apparent when you discover this was the Move Order sent to the staff of the Government Code and Cypher School.    As Hitler threatened Poland it seemed another war in Europe was inevitable, so it was decided the staff of GC&CS should move to their W...
1hr 13m Oct 10, 2019
1hr 13m
E96 - Market Garden
September 2019    By early September 1944, with the Normandy Campaign behind them, 6 Allied Armies were racing across Northern France and into the Low Countries. Ahead of them the remnants of the German Army were retreating to the borders of the Fatherland. To many on the Allied side it seemed that a bold action was all that was needed to finish the war by Christmas.   The plan called for a car...
1hr 2m Sep 17, 2019
1hr 2m
E95 - Veterans’ Reunion 2019
September 2019    Each year, to mark the arrival of the first Codebreakers at Station X in 1939 we hold our Veterans Reunion. This year it was made more poignant as the date fell on the 80th anniversary of the invasion of Poland.    The Reunion is always a very special day for us at Bletchley Park as it gives us the chance to thank our Veterans for their service. For the Veterans it is a chance...
52m Sep 10, 2019
52m
E94 - 90 Days
August 2019    In earlier episodes this year we have concentrated on the preparations for, and the events of D-Day itself, the 6th of June. However D-Day was only the beginning of the Normandy Campaign.   The Allies had to face an enemy determined to throw them back in to the sea and it led to some of the bitterest fighting that Western Europe saw in WW2. It would eventually, after three months...
1hr 5m Aug 10, 2019
1hr 5m
E93 - The GPO and GC&CS
July 2019    Most people now know of the work carried out by Tommy Flowers and his team that ultimately led to the design and construction of ‘Colossus’, the world’s first large-scale electronic digital computer. Flowers worked for the General Post Office at their Research Station at Dollis Hill but that work was just one part of the connection between the GPO and the Codebreakers at Bletchley ...
1hr 1m Jul 23, 2019
1hr 1m
E92 - The D-Day Dodgers
July 2019    In this It Happened Here episode we leave the invasion of Western Europe and return to the hard fought battles of the Italian Campaign.   Since first invading in September 1943, Italy had been anything but the “soft underbelly” that Churchill had called it. Finally in the spring and summer of 1944, after months of being held back by German forces defending Italy, things started to ...
1hr 2m Jul 09, 2019
1hr 2m
E91 – David Kenyon presents: Bletchley Park and D-Day
June 2019    On June the 6th 2019, Bletchley Park ran a number of events to mark the 75th anniversary of D-Day.   Never before seen handwritten decrypts were release to the public and we took over Twitter for the day to Tweet those very messages in real time, as if it was 1944. You can now find these messages on our website at http://www.bletchleypark.org.uk/news/bletchley-park-and-d-day    In ...
48m Jun 20, 2019
48m
E90 – Overlord
June 2019    75 years ago today, more than 150,000 allied troops were boarding planes, gliders and landing craft as they prepared to invade Fortress Europe in Operation Overlord, the Normandy Invasion. Meanwhile, 200 miles away in the Buckinghamshire countryside the Codebreakers of GC&CS were also ready and waiting.    A special section, known as NSV(X), spent the day decrypting German messages...
54m Jun 05, 2019
54m
E89 - Bletchley Park and D-Day
May 2019     With the opening of D-Day: Interception, Intelligence, Invasion, the key role that Bletchley Park played in the success of the Normandy campaign is finally being told. Now, a new book written by our very own research historian, Dr David Kenyon adds even more depth to that story.   Using previously classified documents, David casts the work of Bletchley Park in a new light, as not j...
24m May 23, 2019
24m
E88 - The Tide of Victory
May 2019  It Happened Here this month takes us to a Britain who’s south coast in May 1944 resembled one huge army camp as over 2 million men waited for D-Day. In the Buckinghamshire countryside the staff at GC&CS carried on feeding detailed and crucial intelligence to the Allied forces that would play an integral part in the success of the upcoming Operation Overlord.  The Western Front Committ...
58m May 09, 2019
58m
E87 - D-Day: Interception, Intelligence, Invasion
April 2019  In this month’s episode we take you to the preview opening of a major new exhibition, D-Day: Interception, Intelligence, Invasion.  For 18 months prior to the launch of Overlord the staff at GC&CS produced intelligence that was integral to the invasion plans. The detailed picture that the codebreakers created of German forces in France made sure that as the troops hit the beaches on...
56m Apr 15, 2019
56m
E86 - From Cassino to Kohima
March 2019 In this It Happened Here episode we go back to the spring of 1944 when much of Europe, and indeed the world held its breath awaiting the ‘Second Front’ in Europe. This would be realised in June when Operation OVERLORD; the D-Day landings, began in France. During that spring, however British and Allied troops were involved in some of the fiercest fighting of the war, in Italy and in...
58m Mar 10, 2019
58m
E85 - Drama at Bletchley Park
February 2019 This month we leave the code breaking behind and focus on what became an important part of the Off-Duty time for many of the staff at GC&CS during World War 2. Working long shifts and being far from the bright lights of London and other major towns, the staff of Bletchley Park organised much of their own entertainment. As early as 1940 the management recognised that the staff ne...
53m Feb 10, 2019
53m
E84 - Second Front Now
January 2019  1943 had been a year of Turning Points in World War 2, but 75 years ago few people could have known for certain the monumental events that would unfold in 1944.  In this It Happened Here episode we take stock and look at the year ahead. The Big Three, Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin met together for the first time and took decisions that would ultimately lead to the 6th of June, D...
53m Jan 10, 2019
53m
E83 - Bletchley Park & Beyond Part 2
December 2018 In this second of our two episodes this month we bring you two more interviews from our Oral History Archive. Our Oral History Officer Jonathan Byrne and his team have collected over 450 interviews in the last 7 years with our Veterans’. Now with the support of Milton Keynes Council the project is being extended to include local people with connections to the wartime Bletchley P...
59m Dec 19, 2018
59m
E82 - Bletchley Park & Beyond Part 1
December 2018 In the first of two episodes this month we bring you three interviews of Veterans and local people from our Oral History Archive. Our Oral History Officer Jonathan Byrne and his team have collected over 450 interviews in the last 7 years. He tells us about a new project, being run with the support of Milton Keynes Council, to extend our archive to include local people with conne...
1hr Dec 10, 2018
1hr
E81 - Inside GCHQ
November 2018 In this exclusive additional episode, podcast producer Mark Cotton was given special permission to record inside the normally top secret walls of GCHQ in Cheltenham. There he met GCHQ’s Departmental Historian Tony Comer to talk about the life of a modern GCHQ insider, how it has changed over the last 3 decades and was given a guided tour of their own secret museum. Tony also gi...
31m Nov 23, 2018
31m
E80 – Eastcote From GC&CS to GCHQ
November 2018 In this month’s ‘It Happened Here’ we are marking 75 years since the establishment of the Eastcote Outstation, the site at which Bombe machines were operated from the autumn of 1943. By 1945 over 100 machines were at Eastcote along with over 800 Wrens and RAF technicians, and a small group of American GIs. How did it start and what was life there really like? Bletchley Park’s re...
53m Nov 10, 2018
53m
E79 - Over Here & Over There
October 2018 In this It Happened Here episode we are going back to the autumn of 1943 and the invasion of Italy. British Prime Minister Winston Churchill saw it as strike at the Germans via the “soft underbelly of Europe”, while our American allies saw it as a “tough old gut”. At a strategic level the allies may have had differing opinions but in the Intelligence War the cooperation grew clos...
55m Oct 09, 2018
55m
E78 - Veterans’ Reunion 2018 Part 2
September 2018 During World War Two more than 10,000 people worked for GC&CS either at Bletchley Park, it’s Outstations or connected branches both Civilian and Military. This gives us a wealth of different stories to be able to tell and in this second visit to this year’s Reunion we will bring you 3 more exclusive interviews with our Veterans. Sergeant Stanley Clegg served from 1943 till 1945...
52m Sep 23, 2018
52m
E77 - Veterans’ Reunion 2018 Part 1
September 2018 Every year, close to the anniversary of GC&CS staff first arriving at Bletchley Park in 1939 we invite our Veterans and their families back to celebrate their vital war work. It’s our favourite day of the year at the Museum and it allows us to share their amazing stories with our listeners. This year also coincides with the 80th anniversary of the formation of the Auxiliary Ter...
48m Sep 09, 2018
48m
E76 - Captain Ridley’s Shooting Party
August 2018 This is the second of two episodes this month. In this It Happened Here episode we’ll be taking you further back than our normal 75 years, this time to September 1938. Twenty years after The Great War, the clouds of conflict were once again looming across Europe. Hitler threatened Czechoslovakia and British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain flew to Germany to try to avert war. ...
50m Aug 26, 2018
50m
E75 - Countdown to D-Day
August 2018 This is the first of two episodes this month. In August 1943 at the Quebec Conference the Allies began the initial discussions for what would ultimate become Operation Overlord, the invasion of France in 1944. So it seems fitting that 75 years later Bletchley Park have released the plans for what will be an exciting new exhibition opening in spring 2019. D-DAY: Interception, Inte...
25m Aug 09, 2018
25m
E74 - Sound and Vision
July 2018 This month we swing a shoe, meet the artist exploring the layers and fragmentation of the Bletchley Park story and hear from a Foreign Office clerk who thought she was going to be a spy. Hear what happened when Bletchley Park played host to a Guinness World Record attempt at the largest swing dance lesson. The swing dance club, JiveSwing, led the couples, many of whom who’d turned o...
58m Jul 09, 2018
58m
E73 - Bond at Bletchley Park
June 2018 This month it’s all about 007. Bletchley Park has opened a new exhibition in historic Hut 12, featuring memos, letters and personal photographs of Ian Fleming, a fantastic collection of Bond novels through the decades and original, specially commissioned works by talented and innovative artists, inspired by scenes, themes and characters from Bond novels. The Bond creator and author,...
55m Jun 09, 2018
55m
E72 - Fishing Season
May 2018 The Bletchley Park story is about more than Enigma. A different kind of traffic was also coming over the airwaves, being intercepted and mined for crucial intelligence. But it was generated by an even more fiendishly complex system than Enigma, which was itself believed to be unbreakable. Lorenz was the machine being used by Hitler and his high command to send top level, strategic mes...
57m May 09, 2018
57m
E71 - The Bombe Breakthrough
April 2018 A brand new exhibition telling the story of the Bombe machines has opened in Hut 11a, where they were housed during World War Two. Hundreds of Bombe machines were made and operated at both Bletchley Park and its outstations. This exhibition tells the story of how this incredible technological breakthrough came to be, and the stories of the people whose ingenuity and hard work made ...
59m Apr 09, 2018
59m
E70 - Secrets Revealed
March 2018 From the attempt to assassinate Hitler in July 1944, to orders to shoot dead any German soldier seen fleeing Riga as a cowardly traitor, the Hut 3 Headlines tell a story of World War Two in tiny snippet form. They were succinct summaries of Enigma messages sent by the German army and air force, intercepted and deciphered by Bletchley Park. These messages were then boiled down to the...
53m Mar 10, 2018
53m
E69 - From Cooks to Codebreakers
February 2018 Is Bletchley Park about codes, machines or people? Of those, the most fascinating stories come from the people who did this incredible job, and then kept it absolutely secret, for at least another 30 years. Their memories are precious and it’s crucial that we capture as many as we can, so that future generations can read and listen to their first-hand accounts of not only their ...
58m Feb 12, 2018
58m
E68 - Turning Points
January 2018 January is a good time to take stock and look at the year ahead. 75 years ago, it was January 1943 and, after a dark and difficult year, things were starting to look up. By this time, Hut 8 had broken back into the naval Enigma codenamed Shark, after a devastating ten-month blackout. The daring raid on a sinking submarine which cost the lives of two brave sailors became a huge tu...
49m Jan 10, 2018
49m
E67 - In Their Words Part 2
December 2017 Bletchley Park’s Oral History project has been running for six years, interviewing more than 400 veterans so far. These personal testimonies capture the unique and precious memories of people who worked at Bletchley Park and its outstations. Not only are these interviews a great source of historical facts, adding to what we know about the work carried out by the Government Code ...
53m Dec 29, 2017
53m
E66 - In Their Words Part 1
December 2017 Bletchley Park’s Oral History project has been running for six years, interviewing more than 400 veterans so far. These personal testimonies capture the unique and precious memories of people who worked at Bletchley Park and its outstations. Not only are these interviews a great source of historical facts, adding to what we know about the work carried out by the Government Code ...
55m Dec 13, 2017
55m
E65 - Women at War
November 2017 This month, it’s all about women. A century ago, the Women’s Royal Naval Service - aka Wrens - were founded. They went on to play a crucial part in the codebreaking effort during World War Two. By November 1917, Britain was three years into a bloody, devastating war. In this episode, we explore what kind of work women did during both wars and what they - and the men - thought of...
59m Nov 16, 2017
59m
E64 - The End of the Beginning
October 2017 75 years ago, one of the most decisive battles of World War Two marked the end of the beginning. El Alamein was of huge strategic importance to both the Allied and Axis forces in North Africa. Rommel and Montgomery’s forces clashed twice. The second battle would become famous, making a household name of this obscure outpost. The intelligence was a crucial weapon. Rommel’s attack...
53m Oct 22, 2017
53m
E63 - Veterans' Reunion 2017 Part 2
September 2017 There were so many memories shared at this year’s Veterans’ Reunion, that we’ve split this month’s episode into two parts. This time, we’ll hear some of the longer conversations, as people who spent part of their youth carrying out vital war work, tucked away in the Buckinghamshire countryside or at one of Bletchley Park’s equally secretive outstations. They went on to keep thei...
44m Sep 26, 2017
44m
E62 - Veterans' Reunion 2017 Part 1
September 2017 More than 110 Veterans returned to Bletchley Park for this year’s reunion - the highest number in recent years. They came back to the headquarters of the Government Code and Cipher School, where they, among thousands of men and women, carried out vital war work which made a huge difference, not only to the outcome of World War Two, but to the digital age in which we live today. ...
52m Sep 12, 2017
52m
E61 - Our 5th Anniversary
August 2017 Hear some of the best bits from five packed years of this podcast, primarily from the Veterans themselves, but also a smattering of prestigious visitors down the years, from movie stars to heads of foreign security agencies. The highlight of the calendar at Bletchley Park is without doubt the annual Veterans’ Reunion, when people who worked at the Government Code and Cypher School...
59m Aug 09, 2017
59m
E60 - PQ17 Disaster in the Arctic
July 2017 What happened when the Admiralty didn’t believe the intelligence coming from Bletchley Park? The answer; huge losses at sea. But this is not to suggest blame - hindsight can be cruel. The Tirpitz was a much-feared German battleship - it was the biggest they had built. Bletchley Park provided intelligence under the banner of Ultra - the highest level of secrecy - that it had not yet ...
43m Jul 09, 2017
43m
E59 - Bill Tutte
June 2017 Bill Tutte played a crucial role in deciphering messages between Hitler and his high command. Yet he remains one of Bletchley Park’s unsung heroes. This little-known genius went straight from studying mathematics at Cambridge to the Government Code and Cypher School, where he used his analytical brilliance to help break what was believed to be an unbreakable code. His work also paved...
1hr Jun 11, 2017
1hr
E58 - Highs and Lows
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 th...
54m May 09, 2017
54m
E57 - Off Duty
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 ...
1hr Apr 09, 2017
1hr