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Introduction
Pictured above is part of D Block (July 2007). The Park is a vast site with many different designs of buildings ranging from the very basic wooden huts, the sprawling fabricated brick and concrete types, to the multi-storey constructions and the large mansion house.
Once a government site, the use of buildings within the Park changed over the years as departments reorganised and relocated, so it's not easy to track all of the changes. The headings below (A to H) give a brief description of the war use and later civilian occupation. Further details with more photos can be found on the individual 'Block' pages.
Since the Park first opened as a museum in 1994, the use of accommodation has continued to change, as more buildings have been refurbished, additional business partners have been gained and more functions and events have been scheduled. Subtle changes in the designation and use of buildings are beyond the scope of this website...
Information has been gathered from site visits, books and other websites, so it is subject to final checking (by you) for its accuracy!
Summary of Code Breaking
Major Ralph Tester set up the extension of the work being done in B Block. This formed the basis of F Block which was the breaking of Hitler's most personal high command messages. Thus the work was carried out in the Testery. Colossus was used to find the wheel settings for the more complex ciphers which were created by the German Lorenz which was a semi automatic multi-rotor machine. The Tunny machines used the correct wheel settings to decipher the message to give plain German Text.
Fish
German codes were given the names of fishes, hence; Jellyfish, Tunny, etc...
Colossus machines
There were 10 Colossus machines on site. Two were housed in the Annex of F Block and five in the main building. Three were housed in H Block.
Bombes
The Bombe machines were used to find the wheel settings for the German Enigma machines.
TypeX Machines
With the correct wheel settings, a message fed into a TypeX machine would produce German Plaintext.
A Block
A Block was home to Naval Intelligence.
B Block
B Block was the Italian Air & Naval and Japanese code breaking, but since 2007 has been the home of the Turing Bombe Rebuild.
C Block
C Block was the Punched Card Index section, but since 2014 has been the main visitor reception.
D Block
D Block carried the Enigma work.
E Block
E Block handled Incoming & Outgoing Radio Transmissions.
F Block
F Block housed Colossus & Tunny Machines. After the war it was known as Gifford House.
G Block
G Block was Traffic Analysis & deception operations. After the war it was the centre of Post Office training in the Park.
H Block
H Block was home to Lorenz & Colossus code breaking, but today houses The National Museum of Computing (TNMoC).
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