Bletchley Park codebreaker at the age of 20 who was on duty when the German unconditional surrender came through in 1945
OK, she was 20 in 1945.
It was summer 1943 and although her Foreign Office contact could not divulge what the job was, or its location, he was able to tell the 20-year-old that it was important war work.
Oh, she was 20 in 1943.
Tsk. I mean, Tsk.
Ailsa Maxwell, Bletchley Park codebreaker, was born on December 16, 1922. She died on February 10, 2020, aged 97
By which count?
By which count?
Ahem, by ignoring the dates other than those of her birth and her death?
The first sentence does not imply she was 20in 1945. Becoming a code breaker & the end of WW2 are clearly separate events.
You’re getting confused because two measures of time are being used. try using a different descriptor of her and the confusion disappears.
“Bletchley Park codebreaker with big tits who was on duty when the German unconditional surrender came through in 1945” doesn’t imply she grew them for the VE day celebrations.
I agree with Bloke in Spain, no confusion.
The first sentence states she became a code breaker at age 20 and was on duty when the war ended two years later.
If she was born on Dec 16th 1922 then she was aged 20 until 16th Dec 1943 – and when she joined Bletchley Park that year.
Tsk
That was clearly written in code to fool the Nazis.
Once you have the ‘key’ to translate, it reports that two German destroyers have been spotted in the Lysefjord. Or that Bletchley Park is running short of loo paper. One or the other.
It’s poorly written. They could have had a comma after 20, not that that’s very good English, but it would at least have helped with the meaning.
Quite so. In my direct conversation with one of the Times subs that I happen to know he’s agreed it was an error.
No subscription, so I couldn’t read article.
Was she in fact a ‘codebreaker’ at 20 +/-, or did she just work on a team of codebreakers – bringing them tea?
Journalists miss such distinctions (especially if it will mess up their story).
However, it’d be unusual to use punctuation marks in sub-headings. Note, they’ve also left out the full stop the sentence should end with.
A purest, of course, would say sub-headings should be written in such a way as to not need punctuation. Not contain qualifying clauses.
My journalist mate would say, what’s timportant there? Any of the Bletchly Park codebreakers could have been on duty when the German unconditional surrender came through in 1945. So the story is that she was only twenty when she became one. But he’s a proper journalist.
@Gamecock
According to the article, she was an operator of the Bombe machines – she wasn’t a codebreaker. But still a non-trivial contribution to the war effort:
Fair enough, CM. I withdraw my objection.
@bis
Only if “at” replaced with “from” in current sentence structure