The Secrets of Station X by Michael Smith

Author:Michael Smith [Michael Smith]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781849542623
Publisher: Biteback Publishing
Published: 2011-05-26T16:00:00+00:00

By the end of 1941, the increase in the numbers of people had brought a dramatic improvement in the social life. Phoebe Senyard spent her first Christmas of the war at home. ‘I returned on Boxing Day to find everyone gradually returning to normal after having spent a riotous time, everyone going out of their way to make everyone else enjoy themselves.’

The Christmas of 1941 was the last to be held in the old dining hall in the mansion with a traditional dinner and a fancy dress dance in the school hall. The highlight of the festive period was the revue, run by Bill Marchant, a former German master at Harrow who became deputy head of Hut 3. ‘The revues took place once a year about Christmas or New Year,’ said Barbara Abernethy. ‘They were produced by Bill and his wife and they really were excellent because they had good people who wrote the stuff like Patrick Wilkinson and a man called Patrick Barraclough, who was Hinsley’s tutor at St John’s.’

The revues were not just popular with the staff, recalled Travis’s daughter Valerie. Her father would invite senior service officers to Bletchley as a means of improving relations between the codebreakers and Whitehall. ‘My father always used to have a tremendous party, inviting all the top brass down from London for the revue and they loved it. The little man who was the caterer for Bletchley Park had a wonderful line in the black market and he used to produce the most sumptuous feasts.’

The quality of the revues was not just the result of the standard of writing, but also the number of professional actors and musicians at Bletchley. Pamela Gibson was a professional actress before Birch recruited her for his Naval Section.

I spoke German quite well and I had a letter from a rather interfering godmother who said she was sure I was doing splendid work entertaining the troops but she knew a girl who had just gone to a very secret place and was doing fascinating work and they needed people with languages. That made me feel I was fiddling while Rome burnt. So I wrote off to the address they sent me and thought no more about it. I had just been offered a part in a play when I got a telegram from Frank Birch asking me to meet him at the Admiralty. He gave me several tests and said: ‘Well, I suppose we could offer you a job’ and I said: ‘Well, you know about the stage, what would you do if you were me?’ He said: ‘The stage can wait, the war can’t.’ So I went to Bletchley.

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