E188 - Focus On: Emily Anderson

February 2026

Even amongst the distinguished ranks of WW2 codebreakers, Emily Anderson stood out. Recruited into military intelligence during WWI, her stellar career in diplomatic codebreaking lasted into the 1950s. Her greatest achievement came with the breaking of high-level Italian ciphers during the East African Campaign of 1940-41. It was called 'the perfect example of the cryptographers' war' and earned her the OBE in 1943.

Anderson was also a renowned musicologist - her translations of the letters of Mozart and Beethoven are still considered authoritative. Yet until recent years, her life and intelligence work remained under the radar.

This episode helps to set the record straight, and kick off a new occasional series focusing on key personalities in codebreaking and intelligence. Bletchley Park's Research Officer Dr Thomas Cheetham is joined by Jackie Uí Chionna from the University of Galway to discuss the subject of her 2023 biography Queen of Codes: The Secret Life of Emily Anderson, Britain's Greatest Female Codebreaker.

Our thanks go to Sarah Langston for voicing our historical documents.

The Marriage of Figaro - K. 492   CC PDM 1.0   www.classicals.de 

Image: © Dr. Dagmar von Bushe-Weise

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