The Man Who Broke Napoleon's Codes

B
etween 1807 and 1814 the Iberian Peninsula (comprising Spain and Portugal) was the scene of a titanic and merciless struggle. It took place on many different planes: between Napoleon's French army and the angry inhabitants; between the British, ever keen to exacerbate the emperor's difficulties, and the marshals sent from Paris to try to keep them in check; between new forces of science and meritocracy and old ones of conservatism and birth. It was also, and this is unknown even to many people well read about the period, a battle between those who made codes and those who broke them.

I first discovered the Napoleonic cryptographic battle a few years ago when I was reading Sir Charles Oman's epic
History of the Peninsular War.
In volume V he had attached an appendix, “The Scovell Ciphers.” It listed many documents in code that had been captured from the French army of Spain, and whose secrets had been revealed by the work of one George Scovell, an officer in British headquarters.
Oman rated Scovell's significance highly, but at the same time, the general nature of his
History
meant that he could not analyze carefully what this obscure officer may or may not have contributed to that great struggle between nations or indeed tell us anything much about the man himself. I was keen to read more, but was surprised to find that Oman's appendix, published in 1914, was the only considered thing that had been written about this secret war.

I became convinced that this story was every bit as exciting and significant as that of Enigma and the breaking of German codes in the Second World War. The question was, could it be told?

Studying Scovell's papers at the Public Record Office (in Kew, west London) I found that he had left an extensive journal and copious notes about his work in the peninsula. What was more, many original French dispatches had been preserved in this collection. I realized at once that this was priceless. There may have been many spies and intelligence officers during the Napoleonic Wars, but it is usually extremely difficult to find the material they actually provided or worked on. Furthermore, Scovell's story involved much more than just intelligence work. His status in Lord Wellington's headquarters and the recognition given to him for his work were all bound up with the class politics of the army at the time. His tale of self-improvement and hard work would make a fascinating biography in its own right, but represents something more than that. Just as the code breaking has its wider relevance in the struggle for Spain, so his attempts to make his way up the promotion ladder speak volumes about British society.

The story of Wellington himself also gripped me. Half a century ago his campaigns were considered a central part of the British historical mythology and spoon-fed to schoolboys. More recently this has not been the case, which is a great shame. A generation has grown up without learning about his battles or indeed his mesmerizing and complex historical character. I therefore felt quite unashamed about giving him a central part in this narrative. One cannot think of a person less in tune with the emotional openness and social inclusiveness of our own time, but his results were spectacular: a paradox that fascinates me. He was certainly one of Britain's greatest military leaders, but without doubt one of the most difficult men one could ever have had to work for.

I have written Scovell's saga as a
story,
but the reader should rest
assured that nothing significant has been invented to make it a better read. When Scovell is described, for example, as he walks to the top of a lighthouse in Corunna in January 1809 at the very beginning of this book, it's not an invention, but comes from a detailed description in his journal. The notes at the end of the book will hopefully provide the curious with a better idea of where much of the material came from. Journals and letters are the main sources for this text, and I have deliberately adopted a writing style that fits in with those sources, avoiding references to phenomena or people unknown in 1809.

Although this may be narrative history, it is still meant to be history and there were many occasions when I resisted the temptation to put thoughts into his head or those of the others in Wellington's staff. Much of Scovell's emotional life remains a closed book to me. His partnership with his wife was a strong one, but, alas, I have not been able to find letters between them or other documents that would really fill out this aspect of the story. Scovell's journal barely mentioned her since it concentrates solely on his professional concerns. Similarly, he did not leave us an account of his childhood. It was not poor, we know that, but it was not rich either, and it seems that Scovell regarded his life as a struggle to escape his origins and become a financially independent gentleman.

Did he change the face of history? It's up to the reader to decide. What was important to me was that Scovell did extraordinary work but has languished in obscurity for too long.

One word about style. I have used modern spellings in my own text, but often kept period ones in the quotes, notably when transcribing manuscript sources. Thus, most obviously, the modern word
cipher
is frequently rendered
cypher.
While mentioning this frequently used term, it is worth pointing out that the secrets Scovell uncovered were not protected by “codes” in the strictly defined modern sense of the word. The tables used to convert letters or words into digits are properly called ciphers. I hope cryptographers will permit me the liberty of using the two words
codes
and
ciphers
fairly interchangeably in this work: I am doing no more than accepting modern usage. I agreed with the publishers that a book entitled
The Man Who Broke Napoleon's Ciphers
might be misconstrued to be about the humbling of a series of nobodies.