Thursday, May 16, 2024
Julia Garrett, of Houston, didn’t know her mother was a spy. When she found out, she became highly interested in the roll women played doing intelligence work during World War Two. Now, she gives talks all over the country about the women who deciphered codes and helped win the war. After Pearl Harbor, the military knew it needed to break codes.
“There were ten thousand women in the Navy and ten thousand women in the Army breaking codes,” says Julia. “They worked around the clock in three shifts, twenty-four seven for years and they shortened the war because they could break the codes. They had a natural affinity for it because they were recruited from Ivy League universities while studying math, music, science, anyone who could understand the flow of numbers, space, and time.”
Her mother was one of them but never talked about it. She did tell Julia she worked in the code room, and the girl sitting next to her broke a Japanese code.
“I didn’t ask her this question: If you were sitting next to her and she broke a code, what were you doing? I feel it is my job to tell her story as well as other women who broke codes and were never recognized.”
Julia put two and two together when she read a book, “Code Girls” by Liza Mundy about the female code breakers.
“Why didn’t my sweet mother tell us? During the war, the women were told they would be shot if they told about what they were doing. Even though the code of silence was lifted in 1990, and my mother died in 1998, she could have told us. She was a Girl Scout leader and could have told those girls about her experiences. Even Liza Mundy, doing research for her book, had a hard time getting some of the women to talk to her.”
When Julia found out what her mother did during the war, she started looking through a drawer in a piece of furniture that had gone through several moves.
“And there they were: her commendation letter, her little notebook about how to break codes and the little tests she took, her uniform, and all sorts of items I use in my talks. Her uniform had the letter Q on its sleeve, indicating intelligence service. If they were asked about it, they were told to say, “I empty trash and sit on the Admiral’s lap.”
The first time Julia gave her program was for neighbors and friends, people who had known her mother.
“They were in tears. They, too, asked why couldn’t she or my dad have told us. They never imagined my mother being in the Navy and breaking Japanese codes. We could have gloried in her, hugged her, and thanked her for her service.”
After the war some of those women went to the CIA or the National Security Agency.
