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Bletchley Park

Bletchley Park - Photo is by "Matt Crypto" and is copy right free

The Bletchely Park mansion was built by Sir Herbet Samuel Leon, an industrialist and Liberal MP, in the nineteenth century. He mixed and matched his architectural styles to produce a rather eccentric mansion. By 1938 the house was due for demolition to make way for housing, but it was bought by Sir Hugh Sinclair, head of Naval Intelligence and MI6. He then set up the Government Code and Cypher School here. The house was conveniently situated on a railway line between Oxford and Cambridge, the universities which suppiled many of the codebreakers. Visiting Bletchley Park today you'll notice that the site lies directly over the road from Bletchley station. The clever young men and women didn't have to walk far when they got off their trains.

Work started on breaking German codes in 1939, coded messages being received at "Y" listening stations at Chicksands in Bedfordshire and Beaumanor Hall in Leicestershire, and being sent to a wireless room, known as Station X, in the water tower at Bletchley Park. The coded messages would then be studied by the codebreakers, many of whom were recruited through a crossword competition held by The Daily Telegraph. Once the code breakers had cracked the codes, their information, known as ULTRA, was passed on to the military authorities. ULTRA was important in the struggle against German U boats in the Atlantic, in the Battle of Matapan in the Mediterranean, and in the Battle of the North Cape in 1943, when the German battlecruiser Scharnhorst was sunk.

1943 also saw the building at Bletchley Park of Colossus, considered to be the world's first electronic digital computer. The machine was put together by a team from the Post Office Research Station. Colossus was used to break the Fish codes used by the German high command.

George Eliot once said that making sense of things was like holding a candle over a polished metal surface. The light would seemingly pick out a perfect circular pattern in the tiny scratches on the metal's surface. In reality of course the scratches were random, and it was merely the way the light struck the scratches that gave the illusion of order. Code breaking at Bletchley Park demanded more.The pattern found in the virtually impenetrable chaos of letters coming from the German Enigma machines had to be the right one. If the interpretation wasn't correct ships would sink.

Opening Times: Bletchley Park is open all the year round. From 1st April to 31st October weekday opening is 9.30am - 5pm and 10:30am - 5pm at weekends and on bank holidays. From 1st November to 31st March opening hours are 10:30am to 4pm every day . Bletchley Park is closed over Christmas, and on New Year's Day.

On some weekdays and Saturdays the mansion is used for weddings and conferences and therefore might not be fully open. If you want to be sure of seeing all of the mansion ring ahead to check, or go on a Sunday when other events are rarely taking place.

Dogs are allowed in the grounds on leads.

Directions: Bletchely Park is just off the A5 at Bletchley. Back in the war years most personnel would arrive by train, Bletchley station standing just across from the entrance. The same is true today. Click here for an interactive road and satellite map centred on Bletchely Park.

Access: there is full disabled access.To book a wheelchair ring ahead.

Contact:

phone: 01908 640404

web site: http://www.bletchleypark.org.uk/