A German message would be intercepted at one of the many Y stations that were located all over the country. Once a message had been intercepted it would be sent to Bletchley Park. At Bletchely Park the message would be sent to Hut 3 where it would be de-cyphered. Once it had been de-cyphered it would be sent by a small passage way, pushed by broom, to hut 6 where it would be changed from gibberish to German then to English. It would then go into the index of messages in hut 6.The fact that the people at Bletchley Park were so organised helped them to break the codes. In hut three, one of the code breaking huts, they had every message ever sent to them in a cross-referenced index. The huts were manned twenty four hours a day seven days a week. The people worked eight-hour shifts. Hut three had someone who handed out new messages as soon as the new shift walked into the room.
Bletchley Park was so important in fighting against the Germans that Winston Churchill didn’t want any one to know about it. So the people that worked at Bletchley Park were made to sign a declaration of secrecy. People were not even allowed to tell their families where they were, or even discuss with someone in a different hut what their job was.
2. Why was Bletchely Park able to break the German codes?
The Enigma machine was an extremely technologically advanced machine. It worked much like an ordinary, household typewriter, only with a few alterations. There was a circuit board on the front panel, three rotating cogs on the top of the machine, and also twenty-six lights.
There were several reasons why the people at Station X were able to break the German codes. There was the ever so important help from the Polish, new technology, the long hours of work, the many mistakes made by the German operators and also the genius ideas of the individuals that worked at Bletchley Park.
The Poles had a spy in the German army, who supplied many documents on how the machine worked and how to use it. Two replica machines were constructed. One was given the French and the other to Britain. This gave the people at Bletchley Park a much-wanted head start at breaking the German codes. I think that if Britain had not received an Enigma machine then breaking the codes would have been very difficult, maybe even impossible. It would have certainly have taken a lot longer than it did, and who knows, the war might have been lost by then.
We all know of the masterminds that worked at Station X, but we seem to forget about a key role in the breaking of German codes. Women did one of the most important jobs at Station X. this was of course filing. Every message ever decoded was kept in a cross-reference index, with the thought in mind that it might be needed again someday. There were huge archives of just pieces of paper, on their own meaningless, but conjoined, perfect English. As well as this you had the great minds working a Station X. Every single person at Bletchley Park was working as hard as they could with the main incentive, to break the codes. With out the hard work that was put in, Enigma would not have been broken at all.
As with many things in life, it’s all about luck. Bletchley Park was no exception. An example of this is when the people at Station X received the same message twice, and at the same time. Lucky someone noticed it was the same message. Luck didn’t break the codes it just saved a little time, but without the luck the codes would be a long way from broken.
A vitally important resource in the code breaking was technology, especially as the codes were getting more and more difficult to break every single day. Even after the Enigma was cracked it could take several days to decode a message, by hand that is, and by then it was probably to late. Alan Turin, one of the people at Station x, came up with the idea for a programmable computer. It was named the “Bombe”. You would pass a message into the machine and the bombe would go through all the possible settings until it found the one that would translate the message into clear German. The bombe could do this in a matter of minutes. This meant that messages were decoded very quickly and were used to the advantage of the British. There were many other minds that created new technology, when bigger challenges were to be faced.
All of the points mentioned had a very big effect on the code breakers being able to break the codes. I think the main reason as why they were able to break the codes was the hard work. The Poles may have given us a push in the right direction but that is all it was. During the war the people at Station x worked incredibly hard and in the end they were rewarded with the knowledge that they had broken the supposedly unbreakable.
3. In what ways did the work of Bletchley Park influence the out come of the Second World War?
The work that was being done at Bletchley Park had, in my view, had quite a large influence on many major battles in the Second World War. Some of these major battles were - the war in the Mediterranean, D-Day, North Africa and also the battle of the Atlantic.
During the Second World War, America sent vital supplies across the Atlantic to England. In fact if it weren’t for these supplies the war probably would have ended a lot sooner. These supplies were sent by boat and the ships travelled in large convoys. They were protected by naval destroyers. These convoys of ships were an easy target for the German U-boats, as they knew that this was a vital supply line to Britain. As this route across the Atlantic was so important to Britain we had to some how figure out when the U-boats were going to attack. That’s where Station X came into the action. The RAF would drop mines in the Atlantic and then U-boat commanders would send messages to their naval basses saying where mines were laid. Station X would intercept these messages and decode them, and they would then have the settings for that day. They would then tell the escorts of the convoys where to attack. I think that Station X’s role in the battle of the Atlantic was very important as this allowed supplies to get to Britain which without Britain would have fallen to the Nazi.
Station X also had a major role in the D-Day extravaganza. The people at Station X had to decode the messages hoping that they contained the information that they wanted to hear, which was that the Germans had been fooled and that they thought the attack was to commence at the beaches of Calais.
In the battle of Matapan the Italians were horribly upset when three heavy cruisers were sunk and also two destroyers, and this was with no British losses. This was all with the help of Station X. Station X decode message which contained text such as “ today’s the day minus three”. The Italians also sent a very long message, which contained information like how many ships the Italians had, they had basically sent the battle orders right to the enemy commander. This was very important as it meant the British could anticipate the attack. I think Bletchley Parks role in this battle was very important, as it not only embarrassed the Italians but it also gave the British a boost in morale. It also raised the commanders of the army’s thoughts about Station x.
I think that Bletchley Park played a very important role in the Second World War. It decode many messages that meant German ambushes failed and also that the escorts of the convoys were able to destroy the U-boats before the convoys were destroyed them selves. But Bletchley Park wasn’t the only influence on the outcome Second World War, the men in the armed forces worked very hard. I also think that with out the work of the Red Army in Russia the war would have been very different.
What if there was no Station X would the war have been won by the Nazi’s? Would millions and millions of men died? Would Hitler’s scientists have developed the nuclear bomb? Would Hitler have killed us all with the nuclear bomb he was sure to have in his armoury? Or would we even be speaking German now in stead of our good old English?
History Coursework
Bletchley Park
Daniel Booth
Mr Taubman