Tommy Flowers unsung hero in brief

Tommy Flowers shortened the Second World War by at least two years according to historians.
During his first trip to Bletchley Park he helped Alan Turing develop a new Bombe machine. Though this new Bombe was abandoned in its early stages Turing was so impressed with Flowers that he introduced him to Max Newman, who was working on the Lorenz enciphering system which was even more secure than Enigma (and had been broken by Bill Tutte.)



Newman asked Flowers to help fix the Heath Robinson (which was an attempt at a machine to mechanise the breaking of Lorenz). Flowers insisted he could improve Heath Robinson. The Bletchley management believed that Flowers was wrong because Flowers wished to use valves in the new machine. So Flowers was forced to work with his small team of engineers at the Dollis Hill research facility.

In December 1943 Flowers had finished, Colossus was born and the digital age had begun.
Colossus was a giant machine which used a tape reader and 1800 valves. The valves wouldn't break unless the machine was turned on and off regularly.
                                 

The Bletchley management immediately changed their tune and ordered Flowers to build more. They were used to read messages sent within the German High Command in the days leading up to D-Day. Colossus has since been defined as the greatest invention of the 20th Century. It was the worlds FIRST programmable computer.

Flowers was given £1000 for his war work, a pathetic sum considering what he had done. He then split this money equally with his colleges despite the fact that he had invested so much of his own money in the project.

Flowers applied to the Bank of England for a loan in order to build another Colossus like machine. They turned him down believing that such a machine was impossible. He was unable to inform them that he had already built one due to Cold War paranoia and the Official Secrets Act. In 1949 he was heartbroken to see that the Americans were claiming to have invented the worlds "first" computer.
Flowers died on October the 28th 1998.

Flowers really is an unsung hero. Tutte and Turing have also been treated very badly by history. However Turing has been the subject of god knows how many movies now, and has his own statue in the Foreign Office. Whenever Bletchley is mentioned in new reports and newspaper articles, his name is always quite rightly mentioned. Tutte has his own memorial in Newmarket which was unveiled last month. And what does Flowers have? Well, a small bronze bust kept away from the public at BT, and a road that used to be named after him.




Many people have argued that the Colossus replica built by Tony Sale is enough of a memorial for him. After all he was an engineer and perhaps one of his greatest achievements is now the centre piece for one of this countries greatest museums. However, the rebuild is in the National Museum of Computing so will on be seen by those visiting TNMOC or the Bletchely Park Trusts museum on the same site. He really needs to be given a public memorial like the one that Tutte was given, so that they will both be remembered and perhaps become household names like Turing.