Let’s say it’s 1942, and Pierre (who lives in Paris) wants to send a birthday greeting card to his brother Jean who happens to be in London (having wisely gotten out of France when the Panzers rolled across the border back in '39).
Would this have been possible using “Normal” channels (ie, not smuggling the letter out with members of the Resistance/using Carrier Pigeons/anything else that might belong in the pages of a Biggles book), or were “open” communications between the UK and occupied Europe completely severed?
I can imagine that mail might still be able to get through via Spain or Switzerland or North Africa, perhaps with the assistance of the Red Cross- but what about phone calls? Could someone in London phone someone in Amsterdam if they wanted to?
I assume the Governments of the respective countries had ways of communicating with each other (besides gunfire!), so I’m really thinking about “Average People” here… Anyone got any ideas?
German panzers didn’t actually roll across the border until May '40. [/pedantry] I was going to mention BOAC’s flights to Portugal, but that damn Pushkin beat me to it. So I’m left with just the nitpick.
I didn’t say whose border the Panzers were rolling across. Jean may have seen the situation in Poland, figured (rightly) that France wouldn’t be far behind, and promptly headed to Calais and boarded the next Cross-Channel Ferry.
I knew you could fly between Portugal and the UK during WWII- they often used the route to bring back escaped POWs and spies whod been operating in France, IIRC.
Re-mailers are an interesting idea, but of course if you got caught you could probably expect a visit from either Scotland Yard or The Gestapo, so one would probably want to ensure whatever they were sending was extraordinarily worthwhile…
As an example of the sort of communication that was still fairly routinely possible, take Lise Meitner’s role as a wartime contact in the nuclear physics community.
She remained in Sweden throughout most of the war and managed to remain in contact with her old colleagues and relatives on both sides by post. So while she was rarely forwarding specific messages, she was certainly passing on personal news. Thus Max von Laue could routinely write to her from Berlin telling her how he and his family were getting on. Both were aware that these letters were being opened by German censors and the contents had to remain fairly mundane. While forwarding the actual letters would probably lead to confiscation of them by the US censors, her own letters to Theo von Laue - his exiled son - in Princeton could relate how his family were doing in Germany. And so on. Father and son couldn’t write to each other directly, but she could act as a neutral conduit for news between them.
In this fashion, Meitner had quite a correspondance network going all through the war, with contacts in Germany, various occupied countries, Britain, the US and other neutrals.
Since military censors are an inherently suspicious bunch, you really had to keep your letters mundane and accord to various restrictions (no foreign languages, etc.), but vague personal reassurances and greetings - “I hear your father and mother are okay. They send their love.” - could be passed on in this way through mutual neutral acquaintences.
Did the UK manage to tap a cable to intercept German communications during either WWI or WWII? I seem to remember that from somewhere, I’m just not sure where exactly.
The incident you recall was probably Zimmermann Telegram, which was intercepted not by taping, but by good, old tradecraft - by mexican agent. But there was also cable cutting involved. And thus USA joined WWI. Great story, BTW.
