Kathleen Margaret Godfrey (married names Kinmonth and Warren; 30 October 1922 – 19 October 2015) was a British Women's Auxiliary Air Force officer who served in two highly secretive roles during the Second World War. She worked firstly as a radio operator for radar at Ventnor on the Isle of Wight, and secondly at Hut 3 of Bletchley Park working to extract intelligence from cracked Enigma ciphers.
Family
Her father was John Henry Godfrey, a Royal Navy officer on whom Ian Fleming is said to have based James Bond's boss "M". Godfrey kept her war work secret from her father, even though he was the Director of Naval Intelligence. Her mother was Bertha Margaret Godfrey (née Hope), one of the first women to go to Cambridge University and Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain's niece.
References
- ^ Beesly, Patrick (11 August 2022). "Kathleen Margaret Godfrey [married names Kinmonth, Warren] (1922–2015)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
- Fry, Helen (2023-01-01). Women in Intelligence: The Hidden History of Two World Wars. Yale University Press. p. 110. ISBN 978-0-300-26077-9.
- Macintyre, Ben (5 April 2008). "Was Ian Fleming the real 007?". The Times. Archived from the original on 31 May 2010. Retrieved 3 October 2024.
- Miller, Sarah-Louise (2023-03-09). The Women Behind the Few: The Women's Auxiliary Air Force and British Intelligence during the Second World War. Biteback Publishing. p. 27. ISBN 978-1-78590-798-2.
- "Kathleen Kinmonth Warren". The Times. 7 November 2015. Retrieved 1 October 2023.
- "WW2 People's War - Breaking the Code: A WAAF at Bletchley". www.bbc.co.uk. BBC. 16 March 2004. Retrieved 1 October 2023.