A Guernsey couple who found coded WWII messages under their floorboards are trying to crack them with the help of their neighbour, a Bletchley Park codebreaker.
John and Val Campbell found a cache of items in their house in Guernsey by a Nazi soldier, thought to have been billeted there in the 1940s.
Among the items were a mouse-bitten paper covered in code. To decipher it they turned to their neighbour, Marj Dodsworth, 95, a former codebreaker.
Dodsworth, who kept her role secret for 70 years, examined the code — the first she had seen since the war. “
Mrs Dodsworth joined the Women’s Royal Naval Service – familiarly known as Wrens – in 1943, aged 18. ‘I was told I’d be doing something very secret, and I signed the Official Secrets Act. There was a gun on the table, and you don’t say no to that.’
She was informed she would work in Eastcote, at a Bletchley Park outpost.
‘Bletchley was so full they couldn’t take more people in,’ she said.
‘There were 800 of us where I was, but three or four more outstations.’ Marj now lives in a residential home near to Mr Campbell and his wife.
Good luck cracking the code, Marj and thank you for your service.
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Source: Veterans Foundation
Association of Wrens and the
Women of the Royal Naval Services
Lanyard House, Scott Road
HM Naval Base
Portsmouth, PO1 3LU
Registered Charity No. 257040
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