Y service
The "Y" service was a network of British
Role
The "Y" name derived from Wireless Interception (WI).
In the Second World War a large house called "Arkley View" on the outskirts of Barnet (now part of the London Borough of Barnet) acted as a data collection centre, where traffic was collated and passed to Bletchley Park; it also housed a Y station.[5] Much of the traffic intercepted by the Y stations was recorded by hand and sent to Bletchley by motorcycle couriers, and later by teleprinter over Post Office landlines.[6] Many amateur radio operators supported the work of the Y stations, being enrolled as "Voluntary Interceptors".[7]
The term was also used for similar stations attached to the India outpost of the Intelligence Corps, the Wireless Experimental Centre (WEC) outside Delhi.[8]
Direction-finding Y stations
Specially constructed Y stations undertook
The design of land-based D/F stations preferred by the
Y station sites in Britain
- Beachy Head, Sussex
- Beaumanor Hall, near Loughborough, Leicestershire (operated by the Army)[2]
- Beeston Hill, Beeston Regis, Norfolk
- Bishop's Waltham, Hampshire (operated by the Army)[11]
- Brora, Sutherland[12]
- RAF Canterbury, Kent
- RAF Cheadle, Cheadle, Staffordshire
- RAF Chicksands, Bedfordshire (operated by the RAF)
- RAF Clophill, Bedfordshire
- Cromer, Norfolk
- Forest Moor, near Harrogate (operated by the Army)
- G.P.O. Transatlantic Radiophone Station Kemback, near Cupar, Fife
- Denmark Hill, Camberwell (operated by the Metropolitan Police and General Post Office (GPO) for the Foreign Office )
- Met Office Dunstable, Bedfordshire
- Felixstowe, Suffolk
- Gilnahirk, Belfast[13]
- Gorleston, Norfolk
- Hall Place, Kent
- Harpenden, Hertfordshire (Army, No. 1 Special Wireless Group)
- Hawklaw, Fife[14]
- HMS Flowerdown, Winchester, Hampshire
- HMS Forest Moor, Harrogate, Yorkshire[15]
- Kedleston Hall, Derbyshire
- RAF Kingsdown, Hollywood Manor, West Kingsdown, Kent
- RAF Monks Risborough, Monks Risborough, Buckinghamshire
- Knockholt, Kent (run by the Foreign Office for non-Morse radiotelegraphy signals)
- Markyate, Hertfordshire (operated by the Army)
- Newbold Revel, RAF 'Y' Service Secret Intelligence and German Telephony Communications Base, Warwickshire.[16]
- North Walsham, Norfolk
- Sandridge, Hertfordshire (operated by the Foreign Office)
- Saxmundham, Suffolk
- Scarborough, Yorkshire (operated by the Royal Navy)
- Shenley Brook End Milton Keynes (operated by the Army)
- South Walsham, Norfolk
- Southwold, Suffolk
- Stockland Bristol, near Bridgwater, Somerset
- Stockton-on-Tees, Cleveland
- HMS Ventnor, Rew Down, Isle of Wight
- RAF Waddington, Lincolnshire
- Whitchurch, Shropshire in The Old Rectory, Claypit Street (operated by the Foreign Office)[17]
- Wick (operated by the RAF)
- Wincombe, Donhead St Mary, Wiltshire (operated by the GPO for the Foreign Office)[18][19]
- Withernsea, East Yorkshire from a pub, the St. Leonards, now known as Captain Williams[20]
- Woodcock Hill, Sandridge, St Albans[21]
References
- ^ "Radio Intelligence Developments". antiqueradios.com.
- ^ a b Kenyon 2019, p. 24.
- ISBN 978-1-78131-079-3.
- ^ "Teleprinter Building, Bletchley Park". Pastscape. Retrieved 13 October 2018.
- OCLC 56715513.
- ^ Nicholls, J., (2000) England Needs You: The Story of Beaumanor Y Station World War II Cheam, published by Joan Nicholls
- ISSN 0733-3315.)
{{cite journal}}
: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link - ^ Aldrich, Richard James (2000), Intelligence and the War Against Japan: Britain, America and the Politics of Secret Service, Cambridge University Press
- ^ "Listening to the enemy" (PDF). Ventnor and District Local History Society. Retrieved 12 February 2024.
- ^ The operators huts can still be seen in the centre of the circles.
- ^ "The National Archives – Piece details HW 50/82". Retrieved 10 May 2008.
- ^ "Brora Intercept Y Station Operations Building". Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland. Retrieved 13 December 2014.
- ^ "Gilnahirk Y Station". Retrieved 22 July 2015.
- ^ "Hawklaw Intercept Y Listening Station". Buildings at Risk Register for Scotland. Retrieved 13 December 2014.
- ^ "HMS Forest Moor is Decommissioned". Navy News. 17 November 2003. Archived from the original on 11 June 2011. Retrieved 12 May 2014.
- ISBN 978-0-7509-4700-8. Retrieved 22 July 2015.
- ^ "The Old Rectory, Claypit Street, Whitchurch". Exploring Shropshire's History. Retrieved 24 September 2018.
- ^ Government Wireless Station, Higher Wincombe Farm, Donhead St. Mary (Report). 1950. F14/428/25 – via The National Archives. Held at Wiltshire and Swindon History Centre
- ^ Friedman, William F. (11–20 August 1943). Report on E operations at BP (Report). Government Code and Cypher School: Directorate: Second World War Policy Papers. HW 14/85 – via The National Archives.
- ^ "Pat Davies, née Owtram" (PDF). Bletchley Park Trust. p. 3. Retrieved 19 July 2023.
- ^ "Tribute to D-Day veteran Len Davidge who died in Winchester". Hampshire Chronicle. 28 January 2021. Retrieved 15 January 2023.
Bibliography
- ISBN 978-0-300-24357-4
Further reading
- Macksey, Kenneth (2003). The Searchers: Radio Intercept in Two World Wars. London: Cassell. ISBN 0-304-36545-9.
External links
- 'Y' Services (Garats Hay) branch of the Royal British Legion
- Beaumanor Park, Leicestershire
- Chicksands in WW2, BBC 3CR
- Bomber Command 'Y' Service – 2003 conference, Australian War Memorial