Sir Arthur Wilfred "Bill" Bonsall (25 June 1917 – 26 November 2014) was director of the British signals intelligence agency,

GCHQ Government Communications Headquarters, commonly known as GCHQ, is an intelligence and security organisation responsible for providing signals intelligence (SIGINT) and information assurance (IA) to the government and armed forces of the Uni ...

—a post he held from 1973 to 1978.

Early life

Bonsall was born in

Middlesbrough Middlesbrough ( ) is a town on the southern bank of the River Tees in North Yorkshire, England. It is near the North York Moors national park. It is the namesake and main town of its local borough council area. Until the early 1800s, the a ...

on 25 June 1917, the eldest son of Wilfred C Bonsall and Sarah Frank.

Career

Educated at

Bishop's Stortford College Bishop's Stortford College is a independent day and boarding school in the English public school tradition for more than 1,200 pupils aged 4–18, situated in a campus on the edge of the market town of Bishop's Stortford, Hertfordshire, Englan ...

, Bonsall went on to study modern languages at St Catharine's College, Cambridge before joining the

Government Code and Cypher School Government Communications Headquarters, commonly known as GCHQ, is an intelligence and security organisation responsible for providing signals intelligence (SIGINT) and information assurance (IA) to the government and armed forces of the Uni ...

Bletchley Park Bletchley Park is an English country house and estate in Bletchley, Milton Keynes ( Buckinghamshire) that became the principal centre of Allied code-breaking during the Second World War. The mansion was constructed during the years followin ...

.James Bamford, ''The Puzzle Palace: A Report on America's Most Secret Agency'', Penguin, 1983 From 1940, Bonsall served in the German Air Section under Josh Cooper, studying the

Luftwaffe The ''Luftwaffe'' () was the aerial-warfare branch of the German ''Wehrmacht'' before and during World War II. Germany's military air arms during World War I, the ''Luftstreitkräfte'' of the Imperial Army and the '' Marine-Fliegerabtei ...

. In 1942 he helped to create a series of daily reports known as the BMP (from the initials of its three co-creators, Bonsall, Moyes and Prior). They were based primarily on Luftwaffe radio-telephony and low-grade codes and were issued at Secret Pearl level. Later reports included information from Luftwaffe

Enigma Enigma may refer to: *Riddle, someone or something that is mysterious or puzzling Biology *ENIGMA, a class of gene in the LIM domain Computing and technology * Enigma (company), a New York-based data-technology startup * Enigma machine, a family ...

traffic and were issued at Top Secret Ultra level. They dealt with the operations of the Luftwaffe defensive organisation and assisted the Allied Air Commands to design their tactics. Bonsall stayed on with the organisation, which became

after the war, and served as its director from December 1973 to 1978. He was knighted in 1977. After retirement he served for a period as a tax commissioner. In later retirement he was concerned to preserve a more accurate record of the non-Enigma side of Bletchley Park, especially the work of the German Air Section. The first outcome was a talk given to a Cheltenham Probus club, later developed into a privately printed family memoir entitled 'Another Bit of Bletchley'. In 2007 he presented a paper to a research group in Oxford on ''

and the RAF Y Service, some recollections.'' A more formal version of 'Another Bit of Bletchley' was published as no. 17 in the Bletchley Park Trust Report series. This was followed in 2011 by another report, no. 21 in the same series, entitled 'An Uphill Struggle', dealing with the internal battle to overcome Air Ministry failure to understand the value to RAF Commands of tactically derived signals intelligence. He collaborated closely with Wg Cdr John Stubbington in the latter's 2012 account of BMP reports by the German Air Section.BP Trust Report No 29, March 2012, In September 2013, he gave an interview about his career to the BBC.

Personal life

At Bletchley Park he met (and on 17 November 1941 married) Joan Wingfield, who was working in the Italian Naval Section. They had seven children. He died on 26 November 2014, in Cheltenham. His younger brother was Frank Bonsall.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bonsall, Bill 1917 births 2014 deaths Alumni of St Catharine's College, Cambridge Commanders of the Order of the British Empire Directors of the Government Communications Headquarters Knights Commander of the Order of St Michael and St George Bletchley Park people People educated at Bishop's Stortford College People from Cheltenham People from Middlesbrough