The Deb of Bletchley Park : 'There was always a crisis, a lot of stress...

10 Jan 2015

The Deb of Bletchley Park : 'There was always a crisis, a lot of stress 
and a lot of excitement'

A new book reveals the important role women held at Bletchley Park - not 
least Jane Fawcett, an upper-class debutante

By Julia Llewellyn Smith

For 50 years, no one had the slightest idea what Jane Fawcett, and 
thousands like her, had done during the Second World War. “My colleagues 
and I were just completely out in the cold. All these wonderful heroes 
came back from the war and we were just sitting on the sidewalk, unable to 
say a word, because we’d signed the Official Secrets Act, which was for 
life,” recalls Fawcett, now a formidable 93.

But gradually over the past couple of decades, information began to 
trickle out about what Fawcett and 12,000 other very young people – of 
whom 8,000 were women – had achieved in the five years they spent at 
Bletchley Park, the code-breaking centre in Buckinghamshire whose work is 
thought to have shortened the war by two to four years.

“My husband had been in the navy and done all these heroic things in every 
quarter, so of course we all talked about him and those brilliant young 
adventurers who saved Britain – well, saved the world,” says Fawcett, 
sitting in the living room of her West-Kensington home...../snip/


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/11337465/The-Deb-of-Bletchley-Park-There-was-always-a-crisis-a-lot-of-stress-and-a-lot-of-excitement.html

http://i.telegraph.co.uk/multimedia/archive/03160/bletchley_3160657b.jpg

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/books/article-2902429/I-spy-REAL-stars-Bletchley-women.html