|
Bletchley Park was the central site for Britain's codebreakers during World War Two. Run by the Government Code and Cypher School (GC&CS), it regularly penetrated the secret communications of the Axis Powersmost importantly the German Enigma and Lorenz ciphers. The official historian of World War II British Intelligence has written that the "Ultra" intelligence produced at Bletchley shortened the war by two to four years, and that without it the outcome of the war would have been uncertain. Located in Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire, England, Bletchley Park is now a flourishing heritage attraction. Open seven days a week, it is popular with individuals and families as well as school groups and tour parties. == Site == Fifty miles (80 km) northwest of London, the site appears in the Domesday Book as part of the Manor of Eaton. Browne Willis built a mansion there in 1711, but after Thomas Harrison purchased the property in 1793 this was pulled down. It was first known as Bletchley Park after its purchase by Samuel Lipscomb Seckham in 1877. The estate of was bought in 1883 by Sir Herbert Samuel Leon, who expanded the then-existing farmhouse into the present "maudlin and monstrous pile"〔 〕 combining Victorian Gothic, Tudor, and Dutch Baroque styles. In 1938, the mansion and much of the site was bought by a builder planning a housing estate, but in May 1938 Admiral Sir Hugh Sinclair, head of the Secret Intelligence Service (SIS or MI6) bought the mansion and for use by GC&CS and SIS in the event of war. A key advantage seen by Sinclair and his colleagues (inspecting the site under the cover of "Captain Ridley's shooting party") was Bletchley's geographical centrality. It was almost immediately adjacent to Bletchley railway station, where the "Varsity Line" between Oxford and Cambridgewhose universities were expected to supply many of the code-breakersmet the main West Coast railway line connecting London, Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool, Glasgow and Edinburgh. Watling Street, the main road linking London to the north-west (now the A5) was close by, and high-volume communication links were available at the telegraph and telephone repeater station in nearby Fenny Stratford. Bletchley Park was known as "B.P." to those who worked there. "Station X" (X = Roman numeral ten), "London Signals Intelligence Centre", and "Government Communications Headquarters" were all cover names used during the war. (The formal posting of the many "Wrens"members of the Women's Royal Naval Serviceworking there was to HMS Pembroke V.) 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Bletchley Park」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|