Many of us would describe ourselves as a minor cog in a major wheel, but no one more so than Betty Webb, who adopts this as the title of her talk.

Now a parish councillor at Wythall, she served with the ATS at Bletchley Park, the government code and cipher school, during the war. Betty was one of about 10,000 workers, hand-picked from universities, the forces and government. Its work drastically shortened the war, saving thousands of lives.

Betty explained its history, from the purchase of the Buckinghamshire mansion, to Churchill's destruction of all records in 1945, the reconstruction of its archive once secrecy relaxed in 1975, its status today as a museum and her own work.

Betty is bilingual and transcribed messages from the Germans, Italian and Japanese, mainly the latter. She was bound by the Official Secrets Acts, her whereabouts and activities not known even to her family. Her talk was full of detail and anecdotes supported by a display of memorabilia collected over the last 20 years.

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