George's War: From Harpenden to Berlin with No. 1 Special Wireless Group
George Trumpess, left, at Brandenburg Gate, Berlin, 1945
Recently, a relative of mine had the unenviable task of having to clear the contents of his late parent’s house. Among the countless objects accumulated over a lifetime emerged a large, handcrafted wooden box and several photograph albums. The box contained an assortment of Second World War German medals and coins. The photograph albums revealed a tantalising glimpse into George Trumpess’s wartime service with the Royal Signals. George had been very circumspect about his military career.
George’s collection of Second World War German medals, Nazi currency, assorted photos, and his own campaign medals
Initially, I started my research into George’s unit by contacting the Royal Signals Association on the social media platform Facebook. One member of the Facebook group recommended I contact Bletchley Park. Officially, the Government Code and Cypher School (GC&CS), Bletchley Park was a top-secret centre of Allied codebreaking during the war also known as Station X. Dr Thomas Cheetham, Research Officer at Bletchley was able to provide the following:
George was a member of No. 1 Special Wireless Group (1 SWG), who would become 1 Special Wireless Regiment (1 SWR) in late 1945. 1 Special Wireless Group comprised of army signals units intercepting, decrypting, and analysing low-grade German Army radio traffic and cyphers in the field. It operated in Northwest Europe from D-Day onwards.1
George in the ruins of the Reich Chancellery, Berlin, 1945
Dr Cheetham was not able to provide any information on the Regiment’s post-war activities. However, it appears that 1 SWR was collecting signals intelligence (SIGINT) on the Soviets immediately after the war, although they were still our allies at the time.
Dr Cheetham recommended that I contact the Military Intelligence Museum, which I did. Alan Judge, Corps Historian, Military Intelligence Museum responded with the following:
Not a lot is known about this unit. It started as 1 Wireless Intelligence Company (WIC) of No. 1 Special Wireless Group, which formed up in November 1945 with a strength of 18 officers and 90 other ranks. Both these units were in Gneisenau Kaserne in Minden. 1 WIC's role was signals intelligence, they listened, initially, for clandestine radio transmissions from the remnants of the Nazi resistance units until it became obvious that Nazi resistance was no longer a threat.
However, the threat from the Soviet Union was then becoming more apparent and the unit started to pay more attention to the USSR and the countries under its domination. By 1949, 1 Wireless Group had been re-designated 1 Wireless Regiment and moved to Nelson Barracks in Münster. Detachments were in Berlin at RAF Gatow, Efeld, Cuxhaven, Iserlohn, and Plön in Schleswig-Holstein. In 1970 it was renamed 13 Signal Regiment, which moved into Mercury Barracks near Birgelen on the Dutch/German border in 1955. The unit had a strong Intelligence Corps representation as well as around 80 Women’s Royal Army Corps (WRAC) personnel. There followed a series of moves until 1994 when 13 Signal Regiment closed for good.2
© IWM A 21474, SPECIAL WIRELESS MOBILE UNITS. 30 JANUARY 1944, NEVE, POOL.
Formation of 1 SWG
No. 2 Company, GHQ Signals went to France with the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) in 1940.3 In July, following the evacuation of the BEF from Dunkirk, the unit was renamed No. 1 Special Wireless Group. The unit was based at Rothamsted Manor, Harpenden under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel A.E. Barton.4 1 SWG remained at Harpenden until 22 June 1944, when they closed down Rothamsted Manor and moved in three shifts (A, B and C) of eight detachments to Normandy.5
During the Second World War, 40 Special Wireless Sections were engaged in enemy radio traffic intercepts for the Army (Y Service). Each Section was a composite of Royal Signals operators, Military Intelligence, often with linguistics skills, and Royal Army Service Corps (RASC) providing drivers and logistical support. The parent organisation was the Wireless Group, which trained Signals operators, held stores of equipment and spares, and ran training courses for Intelligence officers and NCOs on Signals sections.6
Recruitment & Training of Special Operators
The recruitment of Y Service operators required the candidates to pass an IQ test, demonstrate an ability to work under pressure, and have the patience to wait for hours until an enemy radio station started broadcasting. Candidates had to show that they were mature enough not to gossip about their work. They also had to be mentally and physically resilient, often working long hours with little sleep and irregular meals. Forces operators’ training lasted 19 weeks, which included both basic military and technical training.7
Basic training for wireless operators consisted of 6-hours of military training and 2-hours of technical training per day. After an aptitude test, those selected for further training were sent to the Special Operations Training Battalion (SOTB), situated in Douglas, Isle of Man, from 1942.8
In his memoir, Major G.K. Rothwell, 1 Special Wireless Group, described his extensive training:
The initial training was standardised for all arms and comprised six weeks of rigorous and exhausting infantry training. The training day ran from 07.30 to 18.00 including Saturdays. It was only after four weeks, when we were fitted with Battle Dress, that we were allowed out on a Sunday afternoon to go to the Club at Camp Centre.
After leave I was instructed to proceed to the Isle of Man where the Special Operator Training Battalion was located. A long row of Boarding House along the promenade had been requisitioned and the promenade divided in half by a wire mesh fence. Special Operators were trained to receive and send Morse to British Army standards and additionally learnt the styles, codes, and procedures of German and Italian services.
After three months or so there was a test which eliminated the less proficient. The remainder continued the course until they qualified as Operator Special Class II after six months or so. Training continued with operational training, meaning one practised monitoring actual German networks. Additionally, Japanese procedures were taught as the Japanese Morse alphabet had 72 characters this was not at all simple.
So, the training lasted over a year (extraordinary for the wartime), and it was not until April 1944 that I was to join No. 1 Special Wireless Group, then located in a large country house at Rothampsted in Harpenden.9
© IWM CM 2448 The interior of the wireless telegraphy receiving van of an RAF Wireless Observer Unit post in the Western Desert, showing the W/T operators at work.
1 SWG & Campaign for Northwest Europe
The long-awaited Second Front finally opened with the D-Day landings on 6 June 1944. On the morning of D-Day, the mobile section (MobSec) of 1 SWG identified 21st Panzer Division moving from Falaise toward Ouistreham (Sword Beach). As a result, the Division was subjected to an Allied air attack. Next, having found the road bridge over the Caen Canal (Pegasus Bridge) in the hands of British 6th Airborne, 21st Panzer had to detour via Caen, which delayed their planned counterattack until 16.30hrs. When they finally attacked, 21st Panzer lost approximately 50 tanks from a strength of 127. Nevertheless, they did frustrate General Montgomery’s planned objective of taking the city of Caen on D-Day.10
From the 14 June, MobSec, 1 SWG started to waterproof their vehicles in anticipation of crossing to Normandy. However, they were then ordered to de-waterproof them at the end of July. Finally, on 8 August the unit received its movement orders, and arrived in Normandy on 10 August 1944.11
Operation OVERLORD, the Battle for Normandy, raged on for three months. The Germans finally withdrew across the river Seine at the end of August 1944. After weeks of inching forward in the notoriously closed country of the Normandy bocage, the Allies suddenly made spectacular advances into France and Belgium.
In August 1944, Major Rothwell, 110 SWS, was monitoring German radio traffic in the Falaise Pocket:
The Germans were using a three letter Book Code. A Book Code provides little or no protection if the enemy has a copy of it. Now we did have a copy of the code book! So, when I began picking up a long message in this code, the Intelligence chap was sitting on the back steps of the radio van decoding it as I handed him each sheet as it was completed. And it turned out to be the complete plan for the counterattack the Germans planned at Mortain.12
© IWM BU 531 The crew of a Cromwell Mk IV tank of 2nd Welsh Guards on the drive into Brussels, 3 September 1944.
On 1 September 1944, one detachment of the 110 Special Wireless Section (110 SWS) was attached to the Guards Armoured Division. The remainder of 110 SWS was attached to XXX Corps HQ, following in the wake of the Guards as they advanced across Belgium. On 3 September, Guards Armoured liberated the Belgium capital of Brussels. Corporal Harold Everett, 110 SWS, recalled the liberation and subsequent celebrations:
The noise, the ecstasy of the crowd, the knowledge that we, the British, were the cause of this great outburst of joy and gratitude gave us feelings of pride and pleasure that it is impossible to put into words. I felt emotionally super charged. On that September day I lived a moment in history that I can never live again.13
Between 5 and 9 September 1944, Shift B of 1 SWG moved six officers, 174 other ranks and 43 vehicles to a transit camp in Wickham, Hampshire. Next, they embarked on Landing Ship, Tank (LST) 158 sailing from Gosport and landed at Arromanches, Normandy. Similarly, Shift C landed in France on 15 September 1944. 1 SWG then moved from Amiens to Brussels, Belgium.14
On 14 September, 1 SWG and 1 Special Intelligence Company (1 SI Coy) moved to Brussels to set up an important intercept station.15 According to Hugh Skillen, Ultra and Y Section intelligence indicated a rapid build-up of German forces in the Arnhem-Nijmegen area at least one week before the start of the ill-fated Operation MARKET-GARDEN.16
Detachments of 1 SWG were operating in Eindhoven, Holland during Operation MARKET-GARDEN (17 to 25 September 1944) but the unit’s war diary makes no mention of it.17 At the end of September MobSec, 1 SWG was attached to the American 12th Army Group.18
During November, No. 7 SW Section (Type A: Army HQ), 109 and 110 SW Sections (Type B: Corps HQ) arrived in the Brussels area. According to the war diary, the winter passed without Christmas, the New Year or Operation VERITABLE. The same phrase is repeatedly used in the war diary: Nothing of importance to record. Presumably, the lack of information recorded in the war diary at a group level is a security precaution in case the documents were ever captured.19
On 13 December 1944, the war diary for MobSec, 1 SWG mentions a force of 20 Germans 3-miles from their positions, and the men having to stand to until the morning. On the 16 December, the war diary records a breakthrough of German forces North of their position at Chattancourt close to the Meuse River. This attack was the Ardennes Counteroffensive, the last major German offensive of the war, also referred to as the Battle of the Bulge. During the night and early morning of the 23/24 December, the war diary records enemy air activity and some bombing nearby but no casualties.20
In February 1945, following leave in the UK, Major Rothwell returned to Holland and Operation VERITABLE (the clearing of German forces from the West bank of the Rhine):
I returned to the section at Issum in Holland, where the Reichwald Forest was slowly being cleared in some very bitter fighting and preparations were being made for the crossing the Rhine. Shift working was back, with a continuous system without free days. The shifts were worked so: 08.00 –13.00, 22.00 – 03.00, 13.00 – 17.00, 03.00 – and then 17.00 – 22.00 before starting round again.
And when one was not on a radio set, sleeping, meals washing (self & cloths) weapon cleaning, sentry duty and various other chores had all to be fitted in. And whenever we moved the old latrine pit had to be filled in and new slit trenches dug at the new site!21
During the winter months of 1945, 110 SWS repeatedly moved locations, setting up new stations, transmitters, and continually changed cypher books. At the same time, leave was organised in the UK and Paris. On 8 May 1945, the war diary for 110 SWS simply states that hostilities officially declared closed.22 The war in Europe was over for 1 SWG.
Visit George’s War in our Gallery section to see 46 photographs of George and his comrades in Berlin between 1945 and 1946. Click Here.
Victory in Europe & Russian Intercepts
By mid-April 1945, 1 SWG was located at Kempen, Germany, northwest of Dusseldorf. By June, the unit had moved to Minden, between Munster and Hanover. The War Diaries are silent about German capitulation in May 1945. Throughout the summer, 1 SWG remained busy and had numerous visitors from Signals Research and Development Establishment (SRDE) and Southeast Asia Command (SEAC). Of course, Japan would not be defeated until August 1945, and it was certain that some elements of Y Service would have been redeployed to the Pacific if the war had continued. In mid-July, the unit found time to exhibit captured German cypher equipment, visited by Chief Signals Officer, 21st Army Group. At the same time, some sections were being returned to the UK and demobilised.23
It seems that 1 SWG was intercepting Russian wireless and possibly landline traffic after May 1945. On 14 September 1945, GC&CS and Foreign Office prepared a draft policy paper on what radio traffic should be monitored in the immediate post-war period. Russia was a prime target for intelligence gathering. The paper stated:
The Russians are realists, and they will intercept our traffic and expect us to intercept theirs.
The paper continued:
Interception of Russian traffic is normally difficult for us, but owing to their present advance westwards, the opportunity to do so is good and an intense study could be made while there is a chance and resources available.24
As the Cold War got underway, GC&CS moved from Bletchley Park to Cheltenham in 1952, having changed its name to Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) in 1946.
References:
Dr Thomas Cheetham, Research Officer, Bletchley Park, museum & heritage attraction, https://bletchleypark.org.uk/, 2020.
Alan Judge, Corps Historian, Military Intelligence Museum, https://www.militaryintelligencemuseum.org/, 2020.
Hugh Skillen, Spies of the Airwaves: A History of Y Sections during the Second World War (London: H.M. Stationery Office, 1989), p. 56.
Skillen, Spies of the Airwaves, p. 110.
Skillen, Spies of the Airwaves, p. 397.
Skillen, Spies of the Airwaves, pp. 50-51.
Sinclair McKay, The Secret Listeners: The Men and Women Posted across the World to Intercept the German Codes for Bletchley Park (London: Aurum Press Ltd, 2013), pp. 6-7.
Skillen, Spies of the Airwaves, pp. 50-51.
The Y Service 1939-1945, Major G.K. Rothwell (Ret'd), extract from his biography, from March 1943 to June 1945, https://www.goldbeach.org.uk/yservice/Rothwell.htm, downloadable PDF, 2021.
Skillen, Spies of the Airwaves, pp. 397-398.
The National Archives (TNA), WO 171/2042, Mob Sect, No. 1 Special Wireless Group, June to August 1944.
Rothwell, The Y Service 1939-1945.
Skillen, Spies of the Airwaves, pp. 432-433.
TNA, WO 171/2041, War Diary, No. 1 S.W. Group, R. Signals, 5 to 9 September 1944.
Skillen, Spies of the Airwaves, p. 431.
Skillen, Spies of the Airwaves, pp. 441.
TNA, WO 171/2041, War Diary, No. 1 S.W. Group, September 1944.
TNA, WO 171/2042, War Diary, Mob Sect, September 1944.
TNA, WO 171/2041, War Diary, No. 1 S.W. Group, September 1944 to November 1945.
TNA, WO 171/2042, War Diary, Mob Sect, December 1944.
Rothwell, The Y Service 1939-1945.
TNA, WO 171/6051, War Diary, 110 S.W. Section, 1 January to 30 June 1945.
TNA, WO 171/2041, War Diary, No. 1 S.W. Group, April to September 1945.
Kenneth Macksey, The Searchers: Radio Intercept in Two World Wars (London: Cassell Military Paperbacks, 2003, (reprinted 2018), p. 274.
Additional resources:
Birgelen Veterans Association
BOAR Locations, Mercury Barracks: https://www.baor-locations.org/MercuryBks.aspx.html
Royal Signals, Corps History: https://www.royalsignalsmuseum.co.uk/
