Kelty‘s War Memorial stands beside Station Road.

A greatcoated soldier with slung rifle on a square plinth.

Dedication, “To the glorious memory of the men of Kelty who gave their lives in the Great Wars 1914-1918 and 1939-1945,” plus Second World War names:-

East aspect. Great War names:-

West aspect. Great War names:-

Lassodie is a village that no longer exists. When the pits which were its main employment – and reason for being – closed, the land was cleared of housing. A condition of the original granting of mineral rights, apparently.

Nevertheless it has a War Memorial, which lies beside the B912 between the villages of Kingseat and Kelty in Fife, near Loch Fitty.

Dedication. “Erected in grateful remembrance of the men of this village who fell in the Great War 1914-1918,” with below the “grow not old” lines from Laurence Binyon’s For the Fallen.

The Second World War dedication is inscribed on the southern side of the memorial. “To the glory of god and in memory of the men of Lassodie who fell in the 1939-1945 War.”

Situation. In fenced off square by B912 between Kingseat and Kelty:-

We quite often go into Dunfermline.

Late last October the town (Sorry, it’s a city now) was festooned with poppies in the run-up to Remembrance Day.

Carnegie Library, Abbot Street:-

Lower High Street:-

Carnegie Drive:-

On main roundabout

Appin Crescent:-

None of the last tfour photographs was taken by the driver!

On the way back up from Peterborough we stopped off at the village of Aldborough in Yorkshire.

There are Roman remains there but the English Heritage site was shut due to Covid restrictions so we couldn’t access them. Maybe another time.

Aldborough is one of those English villages centred round a village green. It’s slightly unusual in that the green still has a maypole.

The other part of the green has a lovely oak tree on it:-

There was the obligatory church (St Andrew’s):-

Another historical hangover is the presence of stocks:-

The memorial you can see beyond the stocks in the photo above was erected on the 50th anniversary of an air crash where due to the skill of the pilot the aeroplane narrowly avoided Aldborough. All seven crew were killed.

This stone is just along from the memorial. It records where MPs for Aldborough and Boroughbridge were elected in the days before the Great Reform Act of 1832. Was Aldborough a rotten borough?

In St Sprite’s Chapel are these memorials (left) to members of the King’s School Peterborough (Scola Regia Petraburgensis) who lost their lives in World War 2 and (right) to members of St Peter’s Training College who died in the Great War:-

Rolls of honour:-

There is also a memorial to Edith Cavell, the British nurse executed by the Germans in 1915 for helping Allied soldiers to escape:-

The codebreakers at Bletchley Park were indebted to the Polish secret service for helping break the Enigma code and for smuggling an Enigma machine to them just as war broke out.

At the entrance to the courtyard of houses seen in yesterday’s post lies a memorial to three of these Polish contributors. In Polish and English it commemorates, “the work of Marian Rejewski, Jerzy Różycki and Henryk Zygalski, mathematicians of the Polish intelligence service, in first breaking the Enigma code. Their work greatly assisted the Bletchley Park code breakers and contributed to the Allied victory in World War II.”

Nearer the main museum building is this memorial to those who worked at Bletchley Park. The letters read, “WE ALSO SERVED.”

Reverse of memorial:-

World War 2 wasn’t all technology driven.

One of the exhibits at Bletchley Park featured the contribution pigeons made to message carrying.

The pigeons were parachuted into occupied Europe using contraptions like this:-

Information board:-

Memorial to a pigeon winner of a gallantry medal. They also served:-

There were few facilities at Bletchley Park other than the working spaces. They did have a tennis court and there was the possibility of picnics etc on the lawns.

To simulate this outdoor loudspeakers at the modern museum play voices as if there’s a tennis match or picnic going on.

Some of the workers lived (just slept probably) off-site but there was some accomodation for others.

These buildings enclosing a courtyard were beyond the tennis court:-

Side of building to left above:-

There was a lovely stained glass window in the side wall here:-

Other side of courtyard:-

In courtyard to right of arch in photo above:-

Arch into courtyard:-

Most of the work at Bletchley Park was carried out in huts.

Hut corridor:-

Room with security reminder poster:-

The famous “Careless Talk Costs Lives” slogan and First Aid box:-

Another room in one of the huts:-

Alan Turing’s office:-

Statue of Alan Turing, made in slate. (This is situated in the main building, where most of the Enigma machines are displayed.)

It wasn’t merely European languages that were decoded during WW2. Japanese codes were also broken. One of the decoders taught himself Japanese in weeks to help do so.

These two exhibits refer to the efforts in Japanese.

Index Cards for Japanese words:-

Captured Japanese flag:-

This irreverent cartoon referring to BP (Bumph Palace; aka Bletchley Park) is about all the paperwork etc involved in the war effort:-