MEMORIES kentmessenger@thekmgroup.co.uk

Secret recruits trained to listen to the enemy

In 1942, Bertram Ashman was bored of his job as clerk at Springfield Library, Maidstone, and craved something different. He had spent the past year working at the library with his friend, Aubrey Stevens, who had attended Maidstone Grammar School.
Mr Stevens's father was a telegraphist and taught Morse Code as part of the war effort. As both boys were fed up with their jobs, they decided to take a secretive job offer from Mr Steven's father and were sent, with little instruction as to what the job entailed, to Fort Bridgewood in Chatham.
There they stayed for three months learning the rudiments of wireless training. It was only then that Mr Ashman, now 76, reallsed he was listening to German messages.

Along with more than 40 other secretly recruited school leavers from the area, 16.year.old Mr Ashman was then sent to Beaumanor Park, in Leicestershire, where wireless training followed.

The pupils became Experimental Wireless Operators, listening to enemy messages and trying to pinpoint their location. These messages were then passed on to Bletchiey Park, the decoding centre in Buckinghamshire.

Pupils recruited from Kent were posted at wireless stations around the country and by sheer luck, Mr Ashman was sent to a small hut in Sutton Valence, near to his home at the time in Lenham.

There were 10 wireless hut stations across the country - two In the Maiddstone area. One was in Sutton Valence and the other was in Chart Sutton. In these huts, Mr Ashman carried out his wireless work in solitary eight-hour shifts until the end of the war in 1945.

He was not allowed to mention his work. . Even his own family did not know what he did until 30 years after the war."We just got on with things," Mr Ashman said. "People just began to realise that we couldn't talk about what we did. I'd like to stir up a few of the old fellows still in the area. I'd love to know what happened to them all.. I know some are no longer with us. With it being so secretive then, I'd like to get it out in and the open now."

Mr Ashman, a retired policeman who now lives in Woodland Way, Beach Estate, Dymchurch, was thrilled to discover that a book, 'England Needs You', has been written about the work done at Beaumanor Park by ex-servicewoman Joan Nicholl.

He is keen to trace any wartime wireless operators who were recruited from schools in Maidstone and Medway, and has compiled his own list of ex-schoolboy wireless operators from the area.

Some of the names Mr Ashman has collected are as follows:
Michael Albon (Tortoise), Paul Antrum (Weasel), Cyril Baker (Squibs), Ernie Bayley, Dennis Bingham, Tommy Brennan, Dennis Brett, Bob Burr, Phil Cooper, Maurice De La Bertauche, Jimmy Duly, John Elcombe, Derek Basnett, Chris Barnes, Don Barber, Ron Blease, Alec Watt, Spencer MiIway, Derek Gibling, Roy Fullagar, Geoff Hewson, Cyril Jones, Sandy Le Gassick, Jock McPherson, Eric Page, Harry Pope, Phil Roberts, Ron Simmonds, Bill Smith, Ray Snell, Albert Taylor, Roy Ward, Reg Weaver, Mike Withers, Ted Sandy, Bernard Hedley, Owen Lew, Norman Hendley.

If you have any information please contact
reporter Emily Hall on 01622 695866, or by e-mail to ehall@thekmgroup.co.uk or by writing to her at Kent Messenger, 6 & 7 Middle Row, Maidstone, Kent ME14 2AJ.

Alternatively contact his son Chris at christopher.ashman@btinternet.com

See the Meridian TV feature click Here Realplayer required