SCIF Life: A.G. Denniston and Room 40

The secret lives of secret workers

Alexander Guthrie Denniston was an expert in German literature teaching at the British Navy’s Osborne prep school when the First World War broke out. Offering his services to the Admiralty, he was swiftly enrolled in a new, secret program directed by the First Lord himself, Winston Churchill. Housed in Room 40 of the Old Building at Whitehall, the proje…