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What TV show have you just watched

Since I retired ... many years ago ... I developed a late in life interest in Cryptology started off by being given a copy of " The Code Book " by Simon Singh which contains a chapter devoted to Enigma .... the seed was sown . Over the years I read more and more about all the work at Bletchley and was one of a small group of ARRSE members** who took part in a Manchester University Alan Turing Cryptology Competition . The final test which could only be reached after solving an increasingly complex series of messages encrypted using a variety of techniques was to decrypt an incomplete / damaged message sent from a Kriegsmarine Enigma Machine ... we even had to work out what type of Enigma Machine had been used ... anyway we cracked it .
I was aware of the work done by Tommy Flowers and the poor treatment post war for his truly ground breaking work to develop Colossus to break Tunny . That programme , which I had never seen before , was excellent in treating the viewers as adults and not attempting to dumb down some very complex work ... one of the better efforts of the BBC .

Thanks again for the heads up .

ETA ... ** including @Tedsson @supermatelot

In case you haven't read it, can I recommend a really good book about cryptography during the war. "Between the Silk and Cyanide, a Code Maker's War" by Leo Marks. Leo was rejected by Bletchley so went to work for SOE. I found it absolutely fascinating.
 
In case you haven't read it, can I recommend a really good book about cryptography during the war. "Between the Silk and Cyanide, a Code Maker's War" by Leo Marks. Leo was rejected by Bletchley so went to work for SOE. I found it absolutely fascinating.

Quickly checked and looks interesting ... copy ordered .
 
I see Portillo has become a hard lefty - I watched the first episode of his Empire series on India and it seemed as though they'd looked for anyone with a grudge against Britain (not hard in India, grant you) to slang us off and tell us what a disaster it was having the British there for 150 years. I haven't watched the following two episodes (West Indies and Southern Africa) but from the trailers it looks like much more of the same. Not what I'd generally expect from Channel 5, more the sort of fare that the BBC or Channel 4 revel in.
 
I see Portillo has become a hard lefty - I watched the first episode of his Empire series on India and it seemed as though they'd looked for anyone with a grudge against Britain (not hard in India, grant you) to slang us off and tell us what a disaster it was having the British there for 150 years. I haven't watched the following two episodes (West Indies and Southern Africa) but from the trailers it looks like much more of the same. Not what I'd generally expect from Channel 5, more the sort of fare that the BBC or Channel 4 revel in.
My very thoughts after being tricked to tune in to another Portillo series.
I managed ten minutes before flicking over.
Very disapointed.
 
My very thoughts after being tricked to tune in to another Portillo series.
I managed ten minutes before flicking over.
Very disapointed.
I have taped them do I haven't seen them yet. I was afraid of this because during his last railway series around south-east Asia, he didn't miss an opportunity to slag off the nasty colonists. I did, however, find it interesting so will give this a go. I wonder if he writes his own scripts?
 
I have taped them do I haven't seen them yet. I was afraid of this because during his last railway series around south-east Asia, he didn't miss an opportunity to slag off the nasty colonists. I did, however, find it interesting so will give this a go. I wonder if he writes his own scripts?

Portillo's natural set (along with many other 'Tories') is the turn of the 19th/early 20th Century Liberals: an old-style Whig with a light dusting of Peelite, if you will.
 
I watched it last night, scene in the film ghandi touches on his SA time. Reading up on the wholesale indian indentured population, made me think Boers deserved what the sowed.
The SA chap claiming Britain for his countries history ignored the whole 1834 abolition act that led to the great trek. The Boers treated the natives as slaves, the british were outnumbered by the Boers throughout the 19th century. The Boers consistently shaped South Africa throughout the 20th century, even the more humane SA knew that what was practiced was morally wrong.

In essence Boers are dobbers
 
In case you haven't read it, can I recommend a really good book about cryptography during the war. "Between the Silk and Cyanide, a Code Maker's War" by Leo Marks. Leo was rejected by Bletchley so went to work for SOE. I found it absolutely fascinating.
An absolutely superb book that I picked up from a second hand stall at Tankfest for £1 a couple of years ago. Reading up on the author, although he had a career as a screenwriter after the war you feel that his life effectively ended in 1945. Nothing could compare with the work he did in his 20s. He was smitten by Violette Szabo to whom he gave that famous poem (which he had written for someone else). And he was not impressed with the decision to hand SOEs files over to C at SIS after the war ended, stating:

"But that's like burying Hitler in Westminster Abbey. "

Note, edited because Arse seems to have deleted everything that I posted after Violette Szabo's poem.
 
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An episode of "Traffic Cops", with Jamie Theakston narrating what seemed to be a special dealing with the carnage left behind by motorcyclists on both sides of the law when either they screw up or in a case that led to a fatality, when the road planners, designers and builders are the ones that do so.

The show was not shy in letting people know that in the real world, traffic cops don't always get an arrest or even capture the divs they are after.
 
A House Through Time (BBC2 Tuesday 9pm).

David Olusoga traces the history and occupants of a single house in Bristol from 1720 (when it was built) to the present. Given the first census was not until 1831 it is amazing what you can dig up in the records before this.

Episode 1 focused on the 18th Century and was mostly pirates, escaped slaves, Wesleyan abolition, political dissidents, foundlings in a basket on the doorstep and general skullduggery.

Excellent programme. Always been well worth watching.
 
A House Through Time (BBC2 Tuesday 9pm).

David Olusoga traces the history and occupants of a single house in Bristol from 1720 (when it was built) to the present. Given the first census was not until 1831 it is amazing what you can dig up in the records before this.

Episode 1 focused on the 18th Century and was mostly pirates, escaped slaves, Wesleyan abolition, political dissidents, foundlings in a basket on the doorstep and general skullduggery.

Excellent programme. Always been well worth watching.

I was totally absolutely gobsmacked that the house they chose just happened to have slavery in its story!
 
I was totally absolutely gobsmacked that the house they chose just happened to have slavery in its story!

It came as a shock to me as well.

Slavery bringing wealth to Bristol in the 18th Century. Who would have guessed it. Unpossible.

Next week they will probably making wild and lurid claims about tobacco and fags.

I doubt if there is a single standing property in Bristol from that time that does not have a connection to slavery. Or fags. Or authorised piracy (in fact the piracy section of the programme was probably the most interesting bit).
 
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