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18 October 2006

Alan Turnbull sends:

Live Local Bird's Eye: HMS Mercury - the Royal Navy's Special Communications Unit (SCU)

Picture this. The quintessential English countryside. The country estate with a stately home set in acres of parkland. The surrounding affluent stockbroker belt. The gentle walking route, called the South Downs Way, which runs through the whole area. An idyll. Surely no signs of a Secret Base here!

Whoa!!

Take a fresh look with Windows Live Local's Bird's Eye. Out from the lush verdant pastures emerges a once top secret Royal Navy shore establishment involved in covert signals interception.

It was known as HMS Mercury but also referred to as the Special Communications Unit (SCU). Stark 1940s buildings laid out in a curious crescent shape, incongruently nestle next to ancient architectural splendour.

It ran from 1941 and throughout the Cold War until its final decommission in 2001. It is mentioned on the most recent "Sensitive Sites Register", finally scrapped only in 2006 due to the defeat of Government secrecy by Internet-based technology - remember the news story in Summer?

So where is it? Where did its activities get transferred to? Who are those strange new incumbents at the abandoned Royal Navy inland base?

Only the newly updated Secret Bases Part 4 (with Live Local, of course) will show you the way!

http://homepage.ntlworld.com/alan-turnbull/secret4.htm#mercury