THE SECRET WIRELESS WAR
Grindelwald Productions'  120 minute VHS video is available to buy in both UK and USA formats.
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Broadcast in February 2004 on three PBS television stations in Illinois
(see News and events).

David and Debra have spent almost a year, researching. filming and editing this two-hour video. Armed with information from local author and historian, John Taylor from Bletchley, they visited and interviewed men in their late seventies who were specially enlisted more than 60 years ago for secret wireless operations during World War II. As a result of this extensive and fascinating research, two one-hour documentaries have been made about the secret use of wireless equipment (much of which was of American manufacture) in the Allies’ battle with the Axis powers.

This programme is already of great interest to radio amateurs, both in the UK and US. We visit Bob King G3ASE in his shack where he has re-created his wartime listening post when he was a Radio Security Service Voluntary Interceptor. He shows us his restored Eddystone two-valve receiver. Over 1500 ‘VIs’ like Bob listened throughout the UK for enemy intelligence messages in morse code. These were documented, processed and passed on to the famous Bletchley Park codebreakers for decrypting and analysing.

At Bletchley Park we visit David White G3ZPA who founded and runs the Wireless Museum. He demonstrates a spy suitcase set and tells us about the clandestine radio station hidden in the roof of Bletchley Park mansion (now famous as Station X), still equipped with several American receivers from the period. Not far from ‘B.P.’ is Whaddon Hall, used as an HQ for the Secret Service during WWII. Here special wireless sets were made and installed in vehicles by Geoffrey Pidgeon and his team. He and Debra ride in an authentic 1940 Packard, used as a special wireless vehicle at that time.

After D-Day, British and American military and Intelligence sections at Bletchley Park needed vital wireless communication with their commanders in the field inside Europe. Maurice Richardson, an operator at Whaddon’s Windy Ridge wireless station, tells us how the encrypted messages were received and sent. In France and Germany, attached to General Patton’s 3^rd Army, wireless operator Wilf Neal tells us of conditions for him and his team, working near the front line operating an HRO receiver in the specially fitted out Dodge ambulance.



Part two:
BLACK PROPAGANDA


Not everyone knows that in WWII Britain waged an extremely effective ‘black’ propaganda campaign against the Germans. The Woburn estate in Bedfordshire was the setting for most of the wireless transmissions to Europe, as it was 50 miles from London and out of the bombing zone. We trace the development and content of the broadcasts with Ingram, son of Ralph Murray, who was one of the important Foreign Office officials that shaped the operations.



Phil Luck was a young engineer who operated the RCA 7½ Kilowatt transmitters in the area, beaming the British ‘black’ propaganda broadcasts to Europe. He tells stories of the operations, and with Debra in the back of the Packard, visits the remains of his old transmitter station at Potsgrove. It was here that he and his team replayed the broadcasts from pre-recorded discs much like a modern DJ. More remarkable remains are found at the village of Milton Bryan. Debra visits the ‘black’ propaganda broadcast station there, still almost intact. She finds traces of switchgear and transmission lights from 60 years ago. Teleprinter engineer Roy Tink tells some interesting tales about life and the people at ‘M.B.’ Debra visits Stephen, the station manager Ted Halliday’s son. They uncover new secret papers and cartoons from Ted’s trunk, which give a unique insight into what life was like at ‘M.B.’

The Milton Bryan studios were linked by landline to a gigantic ‘dreadnought of the ether’, an RCA 600 Kilowatt Medium wave transmitter, code-named Aspidistra, obtained from America. Ingram Murray describes some of the dirty tricks (for which Britain had an unexpected talent!) that the transmitter was used for. We hear nostalgic music and extracts from recordings made of the last two days’ propaganda broadcasts in 1945 (courtesy of the Imperial War Museum). The mastermind behind the operations was a journalist called Sefton Delmer, who fought this secret wireless war with the enemy. Although the efforts of his extremely talented team were demonstrably successful, because of the secrecy, his triumphs have largely gone unnoticed.

The two one-hour films uncover just how important wireless communication was in WWII and helped to shorten our conflict with the enemy.

This 120 minute VHS video containing both parts plus a special bonus clip of the Milton Bryan studio commemoration event is available to buy in both UK and USA formats. Click here to buy.



In the past few years, Geoffrey Pidgeon has been writing his own and compiling many other accounts of secret communications during World War 2. His excellent new book has now been published, and is thoroughly recommended.

"The Secret Wireless War" 

The story of MI6 communications 1939-1945, published by UPSO Ltd. ISBN 1-84375-252-2.
For more information, click on www.upso.co.uk/geoffreypidgeon


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