Mavis Batey
|
Mavis Batey MBE |
|
|---|---|
| Born |
Mavis Lilian Lever 5 May 1921 Dulwich, London, England |
| Died | 12 November 2013 (aged 92) |
| Nationality | English |
| Citizenship | British |
| Alma mater | University College, London |
| Occupation | Garden historian |
| Known for |
|
| Spouse(s) | Keith Batey (m. 1942–2010)(deceased) |
| Children | 3 |
| Awards |
Veitch Memorial Medal 1985 MBE 1987 |
Mavis Lilian Batey, MBE (née Lever; 5 May 1921 – 12 November 2013), was an English code-breaker at Bletchley Park during World War II. Her work was one of the keys to the success of D-Day. She later became a garden historian, who campaigned to save historic parks and gardens, and an author.
Mavis Lilian Lever was born on 5 May 1921 in Dulwich to her seamstress mother and postal worker father. She was brought up in Norbury and went to Coloma Convent Girls' School in Croydon. She was studying German at University College, London at the outbreak of World War II, concentrating on the German romantics in particular.
Initially employed by London Section to check the personal columns of The Times for coded spy messages, in 1940 she was recruited to work as a codebreaker at Bletchley Park. She worked as an assistant to Dilly Knox, and was closely involved in the decryption effort before the Battle of Matapan. According to The Daily Telegraph, she became so familiar with the styles of individual enemy operators that she could determine that two of them had a girlfriend called Rosa and this insight allowed her to develop a successful technique.
In December 1941 she broke a message between Belgrade and Berlin that enabled Dilly Knox's team to work out the wiring of the Abwehr Enigma, an Enigma machine previously thought to be unbreakable. While at Bletchley Park she met Keith Batey, a mathematician and fellow codebreaker whom she married in 1942.
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