LINCOLN, Nebraska – For years, Jean Watters kept her crucial role in the defeat of Hitler in World War II secret.
Watters, who was born in Suffolk, England, was afraid she might make a mistake and inadvertently reveal something she had sworn to keep secret – she even had nightmares about it.
But for more than three decades, long after the war, she kept her past a secret from her husband, the American pilot John Watters, while they built a new life with six children in the Omaha suburb of Bellevue.
After the British government finally revealed the existence of the “Ultra Program” to decrypt codes used by the German army, Jean was able to reveal her work during the war.
Now her heroic story could reach a much larger audience.
A documentary about her work as one of Britain’s “codebreakers” was recently released on a YouTube channel run by a partnership that highlights the heroism of war veterans.
Comprehensive war effort
The 20-minute film, Decoding Jean: Secrets of WWII, focuses on the sacrifice of a then 18-year-old girl during the war as part of Britain’s all-out effort to defeat Hitler, and Watters’ devotion to her duty to keep her work as a codebreaker secret.
If the video gets enough views and finds funding, the amazing story of a young English woman who cracks the codes of the German army could become a feature-length film.
“She and her husband were interesting people who told the story of World War II in ever more exciting ways,” said filmmaker Daniel Bernardi, president and director of El Dorado Films, which produced the documentary.
“We’re considering making it into a feature-length film and telling more about her husband’s story,” he said. “But we need to raise additional funds to do that.”
El Dorado Films, together with San Francisco State University, is a partner of the “Veteran Documentary Corps,” which publishes its work on a YouTube channel.
Two of Jean Watters’ children, Pete of Lincoln, Nebraska, and Robin of Jamestown, Rhode Island, said making their parents’ story into a feature-length film would be a fitting tribute to their service and sacrifice during the war.
Top advisor to General LeMay
John Watters, who died in 2018 at the age of 101, flew more than 25 missions as a navigator and bombardier aboard a B-17 bomber from his base in Bury St. Edmunds in Suffolk, Jean’s hometown. He insisted on flying more than the required 25 missions – most did not even survive 10 – so that he could get better information about the bombing runs because of his role as planner of the next missions.
Before his retirement, he served as senior advisor to General Curtis LeMay at Offutt Air Force Base.
His wife was one of the 10,000 people involved in the Enigma code-breaking program, feeding intercepted German messages into an electromechanical machine known as the “Bombe.”
The machine, described as an early version of a computer, decoded Nazi military orders and warned the Allies of troop movements and impending submarine attacks, shortening the war and preventing countless deaths, officials said.
“We read their military mail and knew where their people were going,” said Robin Watters. “Knowing that was really beneficial.”
Jean Watters, a talented artist, turned down a deferment to attend art school to instead enlist in the Women’s Royal Navy Service, known as the “Wrens.” At one point she told her family she was training to be a driver, concealing her top-secret service. Robin Watters said his mother avoided coming home at weekends, perhaps to avoid her slipping up and revealing what she was doing.
“It’s hard to convey to people today the mindset of people like my parents,” he said.
“They were not unique. … They were surrounded by people who did this,” he said. “But these were other people with incredible courage.”
Advice sought from Churchill
His father, he said, had promised to marry Jean Briggs when he first saw her at a dance at the base in Bury St. Edmunds.
They dated each other throughout the war, but when they tried to plan a new life in the United States, they encountered obstacles: Jean’s wife was a wartime intelligence officer and was also still a member of the British Navy.
It was only when John Watters wrote to former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, then leader of the British opposition party, that he learned how to marry his sweetheart: “Marry first,” advised one of Churchill’s advisers, “and then ask to move to America.”
Robin Watters, a retired Marine, said his mother was “old school,” meaning that when she signed up to keep her top-secret war work secret, she kept it secret.
He said he was too young to fully understand that she had played a key role in Hitler’s defeat when his mother finally told her family. His father, who was in the military himself, understood why she had kept her wartime exploits a secret from him.
“Having secrets is just part of the job,” said Robin Watters. “To do something so important at such a young age is pretty impressive.”
This story was first published by the Nebraska Examiner, part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network that includes Rhode Island Current and is a 501c(3) nonprofit organization supported by grants and a coalition of donors.
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