Contents

Abbreviations

Prologue: Names in the dirt

1939

1. The fires of a distant war

2. Tropical sickness

1940

3. Code Club

4. Sailor Jack

1941

5. A wireless unit in Greece

6. A purple jacket on Crete

7. Mrs Mac and her girls in green

8. Fabian’s tunnel

9. Stone frigates

10. The Special Intelligence Bureau

11. East wind, rain

12. West wind, clear

1942

13. Escape from Manila Bay

14. Beirut bookshops

15. The secrets of the Coral Sea

16. Cranleigh

17. Morse and Kana code

18. Traffic

19. Leaks

20. Nyrambla

21. Wet boots

1943

22. Sausages and sandshoes

23. Planes in daylight

24. Computing machines

25. Killing Yamamoto

26. Noon positions

27. Kaindi

28. Joe Sherr’s final flight

29. Cartwheels

1944

30. The Sio box

31. Pappy Clark goes to Washington

32. Hollandia

33. The Yoshimo Maru

34. Biak

35. A view of Humboldt Bay

36. The Battle of Morotai

37. Akin’s secret unit

1945

38. Spies

39. Lingayan Gulf

40. The expanding web

41. The paper war over women

42. Tarlac

43. The Garage: a cryptological love story

44. All eyes on Kyushu

45. The mushroom cloud

46. A message for the emperor

47. Peace in the Pacific

48. Radio silence

1946 and beyond

49. Secret medals

50. Return to Nyrambla

Bibliography

Notes

Acknowledgements