Puzzle?

This is coolbert:

Thanks here to the crossword maven Vic Fleming and the Daily Record.

Many readers of the blog and students of military history will already be acquainted with this story, at least to some degree.

"Mystery of the D-day crosswords, Part 1"

"D-Day Crosswords, Part 2

" "some puzzling events of 65 years ago. In early 1944, over a period of several weeks before D-Day, the United Kingdom’s “Daily Telegraph” crossword contained Juno, Gold, Sword, Utah, Omaha, Overlord, Mulberry, NEPTUNE — - all code words for things or places associated with the planned D-Day invasion . . . the words in point were conspicuous by military intelligence standards."

The solutions of the daily crossword as carried by the Telegraph containing code names applicable to the Normandy landings of 1944. The most closely guarded secret of the war from the standpoint of the western allies made a mockery of, information of a war-winning nature made available to the German by a crossword puzzle?

So must have been the thought.

And made available by the means of espionage or traitors from amongst the midst of the British themselves - - none of this being clear.

Or was it merely coincidence of an astounding nature?

Those code names to include:

Overlord - - the landing operation in entirety.

Utah - - American landing beach Normandy.

Omaha - - American landing beach Normandy.

Juno - - Canadian landing beach Normandy.

Sword - - British landing beach Normandy.

Gold - - British landing beach Normandy.

Mulberry - - Artificial harbor Normandy.

Neptune - - Naval force and activity Normandy.

And there was precedence for this? One one former occasion the crossword of the Daily Telegraph had seemingly given away TOP SECRET info to the enemy, by design or inadvertently it could not be determined one way or the other?

"MI5 [British internal security, counter-intelligence] was no stranger to The Telegraph’s puzzles and suspicions aroused thereby. About two years earlier—on August 17, 1942, to be exact, DIEPPE (a seaside resort on the English Channel) was in the puzzle. Thus, that place’s name appeared in the solution, which was printed the next day. A day later, on August 19, a disastrous military raid took place on Dieppe."

Apparently, none of this being a coincidence.

It has been revealed from over forty years later, that several schoolboys in a quite deliberate manner were responsible for a near gaffe of incredible proportions:

"headmaster Leonard Dawe [puzzle editor] had students fill in the blank crossword patterns as a mental discipline. Dawe then would complete the grids and write the clues."

These schoolboys having indeed overheard soldiers at military camps [American, British, and Canadian apparently all of them] talking about D-Day and HAD INCORPORATED INTO THE BLANK PATTERN THE EXACT CODE NAMES THAT WERE REVEALED IN THE PUZZLES!

NOW you have the rest of the story, as good as it gets.

Incidentally, thanks to the good work of British MI5 during WW2, THERE WERE NO GERMAN SPIES IN ENGLAND ESCAPING UNSCATHED AND REPORTING FACTUAL INFO TO BERLIN, ALL HAVING BEEN ROUNDED UP BY THE ENGLISH!! This was the Double-Cross XX operation.

coolbert.