Novel research: Secret computing and the fate of computer pioneer Alan Turing

At Bletchley Park, the Enigma code was famously broken by Alan Turing and others. Those who worked there were required to signed the Official Secrets Act, which proved for many to be a long-term undertaking. After the war ended, veterans who worked in intelligence could never meet up with old colleagues for a drink and talk about old times. Indeed, they could not even reveal the nature of their war service to their parents, spouses or children.

In 1974, Frederick Winterbottom, a high-ranking official at Bletchley Park, broke the silence by publishing The Ultra Secret. Later, some Bletchley Park veterans got together and came up with the idea of making their old work place a museum. After much planning, this was accomplished in the early nineties.

When I decided to research Bletchley Park as a novel setting, it was not well-known. The film The Imitation Game came out while I was working on Habit of Secrecy. Interest grew and a new series of films, The Bletchley Circle, portrayed imaginative post-war adventures for the women veterans of Station X, also called Bletchley Park.

The film The Imitation Game also rekindled interest in computer pioneer Alan Turing. The first person to envision the concept of artificial intelligence, Turing built the first computer at Bletchley Park, His codebreaking work made him an incredible asset to his country during the war. Afterwards, while working at Manchester University, he openly admitted to having had a homosexual affair. Charged with “indecency,” then a crime, he was stripped of his high security rating. He agreed to accept libido-reducing hormone injections to avoid a jail term. Not long after, he died at age 41 of an apparent suicide.

In 2013, Queen Elizabeth posthumously granted him a royal pardon.