大象传媒

This story was submitted to the People's War site by Audrey Peach. She fully understands the site's terms and conditions.

This particular day was very hot and, at ten years old, I had to look after my younger brother. We went walking over the fields from Blackbird Road to the City Farms towards Beaumont Leys. My small brother was complaining that he was all hot and wanted a drink of water.

No way was there anywhere that I thought we could get a drink from, so we kept walking along until we came to this very large house with a long driveway, all surrounded by a low barbed wire fence.

By this time he was crying, 鈥淚 want a drink of water鈥�. I walked up the drive towards the house and knocked on this big door and all hell was let loose: bells rang, lights flashed - you name it, it happened.

The big black door opened and a gentleman stood there in his suit and tie looking very harassed, asking what we were doing. Several other similarly dressed men had appeared by this time and I just looked at them and said, 鈥淐an we have a drink of water please, mister鈥�. He replied, 鈥淵ou do know where you are, don鈥檛 you?鈥� and I said, 鈥淣o鈥�.

We were, in fact, at Beaumanor Hall, the secret headquarters for the Midlands involved in the deciphering of coding using the Enigma machine, which should have been totally inaccessible 鈥� but two young Leicester children proved it otherwise.

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