Queen dedicates memorial to WW2 code breakers 15.07.11
321The Queen has dedicated a memorial to Second World War code breakers at Bletchley Park in Buckinghamshire. It is where the Enigma code was broken -- a pivotal moment that experts say shortened the war by up to two years. Also known as the birth place of the modern computer, the site was home to the Government's Code and Cypher School. It obtained signals intelligence by breaking high-level encrypted enemy radio and teleprinter communications. The Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh visited the Colossus hut, where a restoration project is underway, before touring the park and meeting staff. Colossus machines were the first programmable electronic computers, designed by engineer Tommy Flowers to help codebreakers read German messages. The royal couple saw an Enigma display during their visit and were shown how the machine was used for the encryption and decryption of secret messages. They also viewed the Turing Bombe Machine, an electromechanical device used by British cryptologists to help decipher Enigma-encrypted signals which was created by English mathematician, logician, cryptanalyst and computer scientist Alan Turing. Bletchley Park veterans met the Royal couple who, back in the darkest days of the war, knew nothing of their existence or the vital work they were doing.