Charlotte “Betty” Webb MBE, a celebrated World War Two code breaker and one of the final surviving veterans of Bletchley Park, has passed away at the age of 101.
Her death on Monday night was confirmed by the Women’s Royal Army Corps Association, who hailed her as a figure who had “inspired women in the Army for decades”.
Originally from Wythall, Worcestershire, Mrs Webb joined the war effort at just 18 years old, working at Bletchley Park in Buckinghamshire, the epicentre of Britain’s wartime code-breaking operations.
Her linguistic skills, including fluency in German taught by her mother, were vital to her role. She later continued her work across the Atlantic, helping to decipher Japanese codes at the Pentagon in the United States.
In recognition of her extraordinary service, Mrs Webb was awarded the prestigious Légion d’Honneur in 2021, France’s highest decoration.
Tributes have poured in across social media platforms. Among them was historian and author Dr Tessa Dunlop, who shared that she was with Mrs Webb during her final hours.
Describing her as “the very best”, Dr Dunlop wrote on X: “She is one of the most remarkable woman I have ever known.”
In a 2020 interview with the BBC, Mrs Webb reflected on the secrecy of her work, recalling that she had “never heard of Bletchley” before being posted there as part of the Auxiliary Territorial Service (ATS).
She recounted being taken into the mansion at Bletchley and asked to read the Official Secrets Act: “I realised that from then on there was no way that I was going to be able to tell even my parents where I was and what I was doing until 1975 [when restrictions were lifted],” she said.
To maintain the veil of secrecy, she would tell the family she lodged with that she was working as a secretary.
After four years at Bletchley, and following the end of the war in Europe in May 1945, Mrs Webb was assigned to the Pentagon.
There, she was involved in paraphrasing and transcribing pre-decoded Japanese messages. She believed she was the only ATS member to have been posted to Washington, calling it a “tremendous honour”.
In 2020, she shared her thoughts on learning about the atomic bomb, saying she had no prior knowledge of the Americans’ intentions to end the war with nuclear weapons, describing their destructive force as “utterly awful”.
Returning to the UK after the war’s conclusion proved challenging, taking several months to arrange. Once home, she worked as a secretary at a school in Shropshire. The head teacher, who had also served at Bletchley, recognised her competence.
However, many prospective employers struggled to understand her unexplained background due to the continued confidentiality of her wartime role.
Decades later, in 2021, she was among 6,000 British recipients of the Légion d’Honneur – a recognition initiated by former French President François Hollande in 2014 to honour British veterans who contributed to the liberation of France during the war.
In 2023, Mrs Webb and her niece were invited to attend King Charles III’s coronation at Westminster Abbey, joining 2,200 guests from 203 countries.
That same year, she marked her 100th birthday at Bletchley Park with a celebration that included a Lancaster bomber fly-past. She expressed her amazement at the gesture, saying: “It was for me – it’s unbelievable isn’t it? Little me.”
