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  1. #1
    Geoff1959
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    Default Berlin Mystery 1956

    Can any of my Brit Gen friends help uncover my Berlin mystery?
    My elder brother recounts that our mother told him that they had an apartment in Berlin and that one day they got on a wrong train and went into the Russian sector.
    I have mum's photo album and there are photos that are dated June 1956.
    Dad was in the RAF and in April 1956 was assigned to AMU (Gen) Ruislip (Sup)
    I think AMU is Air Ministry Unit but i have no idea what they did. Then later that month he was assigned to HQ 5 Signals Wing where he remained until returning to the AMU in November 1956.
    Dad was very good with languages and could speak and write in Hebrew and Arabic and also took a course in Russian.
    What did 5 signals wing do? were they connected in any way to signals monitoring at RAF Gatow?
    Bearing in mind he learnt Russian is there any way he could have been assigned to a temporary assignment without it showing on his service record?

    As always your thoughts most welcomed.

  2. #2

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    My Dad was also in Signals, and spent much of 1953 switching between 5Sigs and 755 SU while the family were in married quarters in Germany (at 3 different camps as far as I remember). One was Celle, don’t remember the other 2 but one of them may have been Frankfurt or Hamburg. In 1956, we came back to Stanbridge.

    Dad never spoke about his work, except to say that it was covered by the Official Secrets Act, and was “communications”. One of his Sgts ended up in jail for spying in the ‘60s.

    Do you know what your father’s service number was? Did it start with 55?

  3. #3
    Geoff1959
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    Hi Lesley,
    Thank you for your reply.
    My father's service number started 40*****
    He served in the RAF between 1946 and 1968 and his trade was listed as Air Defence Op.
    One of his postings was to 365SU. Peter Jackson in his book "Covert Radar and signals Interception - The secret life of Eric Ackermann" reports that this unit was "secretive" and that very little documentary evidence exists within the national archive. Most RAF units have an operations log book but none seem to exist for 365SU. Maybe dad's job was routine or possibly a little James Bondesque ?
    I suppose the question is how true a record of what he did is his service record?
    Is it possible that he went abroad without it showing on his service record?

  4. #4

    Default

    You can order his service record from MOD. There’s a message about how/where at the top of this forum. It’ll. cost £30 and a copy of his death certificate. I have my Dad’s. It shows dates and locations, exams passed, behavior and family status. It does not say what he actually did, but there’s not a lot of room on the form for that sort of detail, so it’s probably normal. I think that the records are/were true as far as they went, but they are certainly minimal. He seems to have been mostly Ground Op.

    Remember that a lot of Signals work was done in highly secure rooms, often in Morse code. If your Dad spoke Russian and other languages, he was possibly listening... Or keeping Communications and lines secure. Don’t forget that this was the start of the Cold War. He could have been running service or government commas, but I doubt if we’ll ever know.

    I suspect that their work laid the foundations of GCHQ, but of course I have no evidence of that!

  5. #5
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    Default

    I know 2 Russian speakers who worked at Gatow in the 1950s. Their task mainly was to listen to Russian air traffic control messages and transcribe them. There was a Russian airfield somewhere nearby and most of the time the messages were to and from young Russian pilots doing circuits of the airfield as they learned to fly. My colleagues didn’t really know why they were listening to these fairly mundane messages all day long. Need to know. With hindsight it appears that what they were probably doing is observing the norm, so that if the Russians decided to build up their forces to invade the consequential increase in air traffic control activity would immediately be apparent, and give Allied Forces some time to prepare. This article describes a bit about it.

    https://www.standard.co.uk/showbiz/i...y-7230996.html
    ELWYN

  6. #6

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    Thanks Elwyn.
    I spent a bit of time with Dad’s records last evening, and that would fit with some of what he was doing. I’m certain that the family only lived at 3 locations in Germany, but Dad was moving around quite a bit, sometimes for only a few days. One of our residences (we normally refer to it as Celle because it’s easier to spell) was Uetterson (sp?) and I saw with the help of Google last evening that this links to 365SU.

    I’m beginning to suspect that our Dad’s paths might actually have crossed!

  7. #7
    Geoff1959
    Guest

    Default

    Thank you Lesley and Elwyn,
    I have dad's service record I got it a number of years ago. With Covid-19 I have a new energy and time to delve into the past. Sadly my father died when i was 16. There are now so many questions that i wish i could have asked him.I guess that is the same for anyone who has lost a parent a long time ago.
    It is possible that our father's met. My father had what I consider an interesting life, if you are interested you can have a look at my site https://www.serlefamilyhistory {dot} geoff-searle.co.uk/art_serle/alanserlemag.php The link will take you to dad's page. We do know that even today signals are monitored and though we may not understand the content the increase in "chatter" is indicative that something is going on. Though a bit technical Peter's book tells of the early days of radar interception.
    Clearly they are not going to say "covert listening" on his service record but I would have expected to see Gatow or similar. Particularly as it does say 365SU and Luneburg in 1950.
    I'll have a look at Elwyn's link. Thanks for you input.
    Last edited by Lesley Robertson; 26-04-2020 at 1:37 PM. Reason: URL broken as per our TOC, replace {dot} with .

  8. #8
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    May 2008
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    Co. Antrim, Northern Ireland
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    The 2 people I knew who worked at Gatow did this as part of their National Service, around 1956 I think. The playwright Alan Bennett who is/was a Russian speaker was also there at that time. As the newspaper article explains they were all trained in Crail in the East Neuk of Fife, and some of them used to meet up for “East Neuk reunion” meals for years afterwards.

    My colleagues loved it because, though soldiers or airmen, they didn’t have to do any square bashing or marching, could wear civilian clothes most of the time and were mostly indoors in the warm all day. Plus they got to learn an interesting language or two.
    ELWYN

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