Mair Russell-Jones

ENIGMA CODEBREAKER AT BLETCHLEY PARK

Born Mair Eluned Thomas in 1917 in Pontycymer near Bridgend, Russell-Jones was headhunted while studying Music and German at Cardiff University, and worked as a civilian codebreaker for the government at Bletchley Park during the Second World War. She decrypted messages in Enigma machine code, and did not talk about this work until 1998, having signed the Official Secrets Act. With the assistance of her son, Gethin Russell-Jones, she wrote a memoir, My Secret Life in Hut Six, which was published posthumously.