- Born
- Died
- Birth nameMavis Lillian Lever
- Mavis Batey was born on May 5, 1921 in Dulwich, London, England, UK. Mavis was married to Keith Batey. Mavis died on November 12, 2013 in Petworth, West Sussex, England, UK.
- SpouseKeith Batey(1942 - 2010) (his death, 3 children)
- Garden historian.
- One of the leading female code-breakers at Bletchley Park during World War II.
- Awarded an MBE for her work on preservation and conservation of gardens.
- She was in college studying German literature, when she was recruited for the code-breaking project. Her work helped the Allies cripple the Italian navy in 1941 and assisted the 1944 Normandy invasion.
- She met her future husband, a mathematician, at Bletchley Park. Their children knew nothing of their parents' wartime work until many years later.
- To test the day's settings, the Germans sometimes used their girlfriends' names and dirty words; it was a great shame when they were stopped, as we enjoyed the dirty words. [in an interview with the Telegraph]
- I think what clinched it for me [being hired for code-breaking] was that during my assessment, they told me they had been puzzling over what the letters STGOCH stood for. While they wondered if there might possibly be a saint called Goch, I had the idea that the answer might be Santiago, Chile, which it was. [in an interview with the London Daily Mail]
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