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rjabe
Aug-03-2015, 12:31
Just came across this 1940's diary,it seems a bit too detailed to be from a schoolboy
but makes interesting reading about life in my home city during the early war air raids
http://brianwilliams.org.uk/diary/1940.html
Rob

ATAG_Lewis
Aug-03-2015, 13:30
Thanks for the headsup.....~S~

Combat Wombat
Aug-03-2015, 19:32
I found this rather odd considering it was not public information till after the war well after !!


"Churchill has been told today that Enigma decrypts from Bletchley Park indicate that a major German bombing attack is in the offing ", codenamed Moonlight Sonata, “of very considerable dimensions.” Information gleaned from a German pilot shot down on Saturday the 9th indicates that Coventry and Birmingham are to be attacked in a colossal raid planned to take place between the night of the 15th — when it will be full moon — and the 19th. Counter-measures, codenamed Cold Water, are immediately implemented.

burnsharold
May-19-2016, 10:48
Thanks for the share. An interesting read, but the thing is that many nations/countries sometimes "find" new diaries mostly of children or teenagers, just to slowly form a new public opinion about the past. Always be critical of what you read!


Just came across this 1940's diary,it seems a bit too detailed to be from a schoolboy
but makes interesting reading about life in my home city during the early war air raids
http://brianwilliams.org.uk/diary/1940.html
Rob

RAF74_Buzzsaw
May-19-2016, 15:51
Thanks for the share. An interesting read, but the thing is that many nations/countries sometimes "find" new diaries mostly of children or teenagers, just to slowly form a new public opinion about the past. Always be critical of what you read!

If you are implying the diary is fictional, and created in recent times as some form of propaganda, you are incorrect.

The Diary is authentic and was written in 1940.

It has been verified by comparison with the historical records of Brian Williams and his family as well as the records of the City of Birmingham.

ATAG_Ezzie
May-20-2016, 01:31
But as Wombat says the Enigma description almost certainly could not have been known by this family on 11 Nov so there almost certainly must have been some editing post war as general knowledge of Enigma etc didn't become public knowledge until 1974. Here's what Wikipedia says

Ultra remained strictly secret even after the war. Then in 1974, Winterbotham's book, The Ultra Secret, was published. This was the first book in English about Ultra, and it explained what Ultra was, and revealed Winterbotham's role, particularly with regard to the dissemination and use of Ultra.

There had been mentions of Enigma decryption in earlier books by Władysław Kozaczuk, Ladislas Farago, and Gustave Bertrand. However, Winterbotham's book was the first extensive account of the uses to which the massive volumes of Enigma-derived intelligence were put by the Allies, on the western and eastern European fronts, in the Mediterranean, North Africa, and perhaps most crucially, in the Battle of the Atlantic.

Re-reading it again it seems the pink section provides some sort of historical overlay so maybe the non pink stuff is original and the pink sections - especially the bolded sections - are to provide historical context? Again I dont think a family could have known about X-Gerat etc at the time or that 'Milch is ensconced in a railway carriage in a siding at La Boissiere-le-Deluge near Beauvais'.

So perhaps its a mix of an accurate diary interspersed with some post war historical context?

Ezzie

Edit - this is in the first part of his diaries and explains it.

I have recently expanded some of these childhood diary entries, especially those of wartime events, with newspaper reports from the time (thanks to staff at Birmingham reference library for their help) and other reflections. These “retrospective” passages are marked with a coloured bar like this.