SOMERTON MAN: TWO NEW CODE PAGES FOUND IN SOMERTON MAN FILES

TWO NEW 

CODE PAGES FOUND

Everyone would be familiar with the image above, it is the only Code page associated with the Somerton Man, that was found, developed and made available. That is until now.

Working with Clive we have found that two more pages filled with code exist, furthermore, they have been available for quite some years but no one, ourselves included, bothered to check them out:

The photographs were taken with a Lumix camera with macro and super macro lens.

It only becomes obvious when you actively look at the pages, when we did we found that each of the letters on these two pages contains code. To be fair, I have spent the last 5 or more years learning and developing forensic/photographic techniques designed to lift extremely small writing from images that have background colouration. But this one I totally overlooked.

When you think about it, it makes sense, we have found microcode on the original code page, we found it in the torn Tamam Shud piece and in verse 70. We also found it in the Hay Bank Note signatures so why wouldn't it be within the two pages shown above? The photograph is of the two relevant pages found and handed into Police in June 1948. Note that this image, as opposed to the one published at the time, shows a thumb mid-right of the page as you look at the image.

Below are some of the super macro images that we found in the first pass, there are many more yet to be developed.

The image above is the inverted letter A from the phrase ' Ah, Moon of my Delight...' verse 74 on the left-hand side of the main image.

You can make out :
485 P386 at the inverted apex, 

the cross bar reads:56895 then 39066 in smaller lettering.

top right starts with the number % and then is blurred

Next, we show a much smaller image at this time, it is the letter F from the phrase 'Foot shall pass..': 

Will be doing more work on this as there seems to be a number of instances within it.

Next from the phrase ' Where I made one turn down:

In this image, there are a number of examples including the dash. Note that the base of the letters 'e' occurs 4 times and the base of the letter 'd' occurs relatively clearly:

Reading left to right from the above:

in the 'a': 526524

in the 'd': 0293256

in the 'e': 52356 ( ) 04

Dash:

Reads: J 04465 82462 52828  22C or 6 

Next, from the phrase 'How oft..'

Finally, from the phrase 'oft hereafter..':

Still working on this one but it looks promising...

This is the first pass and we have much more to do, the work is detailed and time-consuming but we will publish more when we have them.

SOMERTON MAN: AN INVITATION TO PETE BOWES

AN INVITATION TO PETE BOWES
(TOMSBYTWO BLOG)

Recently Pete Bowes asked a question regarding strings of code that we had found, in that case, it was found in verse 70. Pete's query was fair, he wanted to know why the images we put up here didn't show the strings of information very clearly.

I said at the time that I would organise some more, clearer images and Voila!

But a twist must accompany this response as Pete would appreciate :)

So, here's the image first, in its uncut version:

The image above is exactly as the string appears in its raw state but cleverly concealed.  The image was taken with a 24 megapixel, Lumix Camera, macro lens/flash/autofocus and approximately 20mm distance from the object.

And now the same image with a little bit of tidying up:

Step 1.

Step 2. 

Now the image has been cleaned up a little, taken a fair bit of the darkness away from it. As a friend of mine once said, 'Curse these spy Johnnies, anyone would think they were deliberately trying to hide these codes!'

So, Pete, I hope you're up for this. All you need to do is to message me with what numbers/letters you can see and if you like, you can take a stab at just where this was found :)

Once you've had a crack at it, I will post a larger image showing you where it came from, might surprise you...

TomsByTwo

SOMERTON MAN: THE WING COMMANDER, INTELLIGENCE MAN OF A DIFFERENT KIND

Acting Wing Commander Norman B Tindale

A fascinating man in anyone's view, his wartime experience is a classic intelligence story of a different kind. But it is his life right after the war that piqued my interest as you will read.

In 1942, Adelaide man Norman Barnett Tindale joined the Royal Australian Airforce. He was a man with an unusual background, Norman was an anthropologist, archaeologist and entomologist.

He went to his war as a junior officer in the RAAF Air Intelligence Technical Unit, no doubt the fact that he was fluent in Japanese stood him in good stead. His role, amongst other things, was to examine parts from Japanese military aircraft that had been shot down. From the information so gathered, he was able to make assessments on the capabilities and capacities of the Japanese aircraft industry.

Before long he was selected to join a joint analysis team in Washington where he worked on the wreckage/debris from Japanese balloon bombing that had taken place on the US West Coast. He was able to determine where the bombs and balloons were made and pass that information on to the US Air Force who took the appropriate action.

This where we get a little closer to just how Tindale may have been linked to the SM case.  He was part of the team that cracked the Japanese aircraft production code system but more importantly from our perspective, he was also involved in deciphering the Japanese master Naval code.

Those who have followed this blog and others will know that a certain Captain Nave RAN, led that team and it is believed that Captain Eric Nave was the Australian Navy code expert that examined the Somerton Man code and he did that in Adelaide or so it is thought.

AFTER THE WAR WAS OVER.

A COINCIDENCE?

After being discharged from the RAAF in 1946 with the rank of Acting Wing Commander, Norman Tindale returned to his pre-war job at the South Australian Museum. That places him in the same location and working for the same employer as Paul Lawson, the man who carried out the work on creating the now famous Somerton Man plaster bust.

There are two questions that we are now left with as a result of this information:

1. Does this mean that the link between Captain Nave, the friend and supporter of Commander Long, head of Naval Intelligence in Australia and very senior man in The Association and Wing Commander Tindale, that the Wing Commander was also a member of The Association?

2. If this is so, just what relationship was there between the Wing Commander, Paul Lawson and the upper echelons of the SA Police service?

You can read more in the book:

''AIRIND in Retrospect', this book looks at the RAAF contribution to Allied Intelligence between 1942 and 1945

Summaries here: https://www.ozatwar.com/sigint/airind.htm

SOMERTON MAN: CLOSING IN... THE SHORT LIST, CODE NAME 'ALIEN'. UPDATED: 27th BATTALION TARTAN

CLOSING IN...

The foreshore at Glenelg, dated 1955, a little bit out in terms of the Somerton Man time frame but I would suggest that it didn't look that different in 1948.

The building you see is the Glenelg Town Hall, normally the seat of local Government and a place for social gatherings.

But between the years of 1946 and at least 1953, this building had another purpose, it played host to a most interesting organisation. But, before we discuss that, here's a map showing the precise location:

(The map is interactive)
JETTY ROAD TAKES PROMINENCE, AGAIN

The address shown is not really of importance, I have used the tools with Google maps to demonstrate just how close this building is to Jetty Road, it was just 1 minute away.

Followers of this blog and others will know the significance of the location, this was where a 'City businessman' said that he had parked his car at the time at which he believed the copy of the Rubaiyat was dropped into it. But who really was the 'City Businessman' and why was he so important that his name was never to be revealed? More on that later.

According to newspaper accounts at the time, this occurred between 1 and 2 weeks prior to the finding of the body of the Somerton Man on the nearby Somerton Beach. In fact, the time was close to the holding of the Parafield Airshow.

The location itself is connected to the Rubaiyat and its 'code' page, by default, it was also connected to the torn piece and then, of course, we have a connection to the now infamous copy of the Rubaiyat said to have been given to Alf Boxall by the nurse Jessica Harkness. It contained a handwritten copy of Verse 70 of the book and it was signed by someone calling themselves 'Jestyn'.

A NATIONAL ORGANISATION

And the organisation to which the Town Hall played host? The RSL. Thanks to Clive, we have dated it's use by the sub-branch to between 15th March 1946 and 3rd July 1953 according to The Advertiser, it may well have had that use before and after those dates. Our concern here is to tie its use specifically to 1948.

THE COMMUNIST THREAT

Let's fast forward now, another 18 months go past and the tensions within Australia were rising as the communist threat loomed large. This thought-provoking short article appeared in the Melbourne Herald on 25th July 1949:

The relevant phrase? 'More than 2000 RSL sub-branches throughout Australia...'
How many men would that be? 100000 or perhaps more? Getting down to brass tacks, in Australia at that time, the RSL was not only an organisation with significant numbers, but it was also the ONLY organisation who could have pulled that many followers together.

THE SHORT LIST, THE BUSINESSMAN

Just who was the 'City Businessman' who handed in the copy of the Rubaiyat to the Adelaide Police?

Whilst other names have been bandied around by others and by me, we are now at a point and in a position to make a much more educated guess. We have 3 names that I now put forward:

1. Sir Kenneth Agnew Wills, Brigadier, Australian Army a member of a well known and well connected local family and owned a large business in Adelaide. Sir Kenneth was a one time leader of the Allied Intelligence Bureau. He was also associated with Commander Long, RAN and was a known member of The Association

2. Colonel Alexander Pope, his details are within this post. His role was that of Manager of the South Australian branch of the RSL the Colonel was a known member of The Association.

3. Brigadier A.S. Blackburn, VC. from another extremely well known Adelaide family, the Brigadier appointed Colonel Pope to the role of manager. It is not known whether the Brigadier was a member of the Association.

THE SUITCASE TARTAN SCARF & THE KILT

A note, Colonel Alexander Pope was the C.O. of the 27th, Scottish Battalion whilst they served in PNG, 1945. The image shows the tartan kilt they wore, not dissimilar to the scarf found in the suitcase perhaps:

The scarf looks to have a more oblong shaped white pattern
but it also appears to be slightly folded?

CODE NAME 'ALIEN'

Another 12 months or so and this was the Government response to the threat:

“On the day immediately following the passing of the [Communist Party] Dissolution Act…Menzies ordered the establishment of a secret organization under military command, identified by the code name “Alien”, which would rally mainly civilian forces to counter the effects of possible industrial actions and demonstrations in protest against the banning legislation.…”

Dr Frank Cain's 'Terrorism and Intelligence' 

THE ASSOCIATION

These words from Sir Charles Court, ex-military officer and Premier of Western Australia talking of the 1940s:

“The Communist Party in Australia was strong, having built up tremendously during the war. A great number of men and women throughout Australia who had held positions in the armed forces and had the training, experience and understanding of what subversive elements meant, were very concerned that the Communist Party was seeking to undermine the elected government.

Sir Charles Court

These words from Sir Charles Court, ex-military officer and Premier of Western Australia talking about the 1940s:
' A group of us came together. Most of us were politically conservative, but we were just as determined to do what we could to protect Ben Chifley as the elected Prime Minister as we would have been had it been Menzies…' There were kindred groups in other States. We had clandestine meetings with people who were prepared to go to extreme lengths to defeat the Communists. We had reason to believe that Chifley knew what was going on and did nothing to stop our covert activities. In fact it was reported to us that he said, ‘You know I can’t condone it, but don’t stop it’… Not all the people concerned about Communism were from the forces. Some were senior in industry and commerce and hadn’t been able to go to the war. There were no paid positions. It was a watchdog type of organization to make it clear that if the Communists moved in any way to upset the elected government, there were plenty of people in Australia who would be prepared to go to the barricades to defend the right of the elected government to govern.”

Colonel Charles Court was also a member of The Association.

It is generally agreed by most historians of the 1940s that both Chifley and Menzies were painfully aware of the threat posed by communism and effectively turned a blind eye to the formation of an organisation known as 'THE ASSOCIATION, in 1947 but it may have been earlier.

In short, The Association was well underway in 1947 and by 1948 they had established themselves as a force to be reckoned with. From my readings, it seems to me that The Association had strong connections to the RSL, what other organisation in Australia could put together 100000 or more people in defence of the country.

Whilst we have previously named Colonel Wills as a known leader of ' The Association' in an ex-military man, trusted and well known in all the right circles in Adelaide, he was believed to have been a confidant of the Police Commissioner.


And the Colonel's Employment? He was appointed as manager of the Adelaide RSL, main branch in July 1946:

THE FINAL PIECES, HARDLY THREADBARE?

The pieces are falling into place, the book, the torn piece, Verse 70, The Association, the communist party, Alf Boxall, Jessica Harkness, and now Colonel Pope. A leading light in The Association, senior military man with huge connections nationally and in SA he was in a position of great influence within the SA RSL, whilst his appointment was for the Adelaide main branch he would have had every reason to visit the Glenelg sub-branch and quite possibly he did just that in November 1948.

All circumstantial? Yes, but with its connections at the highest level of Australian Politics and within the Military and Police services, plus the enormous power that goes hand in hand with such connections, this is truly compelling enough to pursue the line even deeper.

What did Jess say? 'It goes a lot higher than the local Police..'. It doesn't get much higher than what's been posted here.

Many thanks Clive, as usual your input and hard work has contributed greatly to yet another major step forward, or should that be 'Colonel' ?

SOMERTON MAN: THE EXPLOSIVE TRUTH ABOUT VERSE 70, IMAGES

THE MIND BLOWING TRUTH:

The image of verse 70 has been shown multiple times in recent weeks, I have also posted a number of close up images but I can promise you that there has been nothing like the following images shown in public before.

Before we get into the images, I can tell you that the microcode is to be found not only within the words of Verse 70 but also in the fez, the facial features and the clothing. In addition, it is also found around the edges of the book cover and amazingly in the areas that look like they are just stains on the page.

1. PROFILE

Every line on the drawing of the Fez lady is filled with letters and numbers

2. CUFF & SLEEVE

The cuff and sleeve of the Fez lady in close up view:

3.  ABOVE SIGNATURE LINE

  Clear number set in 'the', looks like 'R48' in the full stop, the inverted commas show random numbers:

4. COAT TRIM

Close up view of the edging on the Fez Lady's coat

With every new set of images we get closer and closer to the truth. The process of thinking and rethinking is leading us to a point where we can make an educated assumption back up with solid evidence.

For many years my belief has been that micro writing was the key and now we have it in the torn piece, Verse 70 and the code page. It is essentially the same style of concealment in each item.

Overview 

To date we know:

There is no doubt in my mind that Alf Boxall and Jess both participated in the coding exercise and it appears likely that they must have known who SM was. 

SM was carrying something of great value and the torn piece was a key element in the handover process. The code page of itself, whilst important, was not a key element.

The use of the particular style of micro writing in the evidence trail with its smart concealment techniques including application in shaded areas, hidden in images and super small examples, mirror the technique used by the designers of the Hay Internment Camp banknotes. One major indicator is the use of 'white writing' more on that subject in another post.

The Hay Internment Camp connection leads me to believe that Tibor Kaldor and his demise in Adelaide 2 weeks after the discovery of SMs body at Somerton, is in some way connected to the case.

We suspect that Alf, and Jess were in some way connected with 'The Association', an Australia wide secretive anti-communist group led by very high ranking military officers and Police as well as politicians and public servants.

We have the names of the representatives of The Association in each State.

We also believe that the CIA knew and was involved with the group.

Whatever information it was that SM was carrying, it was significant, it was important enough perhaps to have him killed to prevent that information reaching its intended destination. It was also important enough to keep the whole affair under wraps where it has remained since 1948.

My bones tell me that before too long, there will be an announcement from Adelaide.

SOMERTON MAN: TORN PIECE PART 2.

A CLOSE LOOK AT INDIVIDUAL
LETTERS AND SURROUNDS

Marked up image showing areas to be examined:

And here's the sharpened image:

There will be many more images to come but in the meantime, here's a preview of just one of them, please remember to give your eyes time to focus:

1. If you look at the left end of the top crossbar of the letter T, you should see an 'X' which is surrounded by other numbers
2. The upright of the 'T', there are numbers and letters that run parallel to it and there are two number sets which run diagonally across it.
3. The first upright of the letter 'M', with the letter X quite prominent within the base of that upright.
4. The second upright of the M, looks to have 3 lines of letters/numbers running from bottom to top

SOMERTON MAN: VIDEO, TORN PIECE HIDDEN CODE DISCOVERED

VIDEO SHOWS CODE ON 

TAMAM SHUD TORN PIECE

Over the years, a huge amount has been said about the torn piece and the role that it may have played in the demise of the Somerton man. There would probably been many tens if not hundreds of theories advanced as to its meaning and use.

The operative word is 'said', there has been precious little done apart from the significant input of Gerry Feltus and Adelaide University's Professor Derek Abbott when they jointly worked on the case and took a number of very high-resolution images of the torn piece itself which is still in existence today. 

It is one of those high-resolution images that I have been able to locate and to examine as you will see in the video below. It has revealed the presence of numerous examples of micro written letters and numbers both within the actual printed letters TAMAM SHUD and in many locations on the surface of the piece. This is yet another serious breakthrough coming as it does on the heels of recent posts showing microcode in the Alf Boxall Rubaiyat and especially the handwritten verse and image of the 'Fez' lady as well as recent work showing microcode on the SM code page itself.

We hope you spend just about 8 minutes watching this clip, I think it will surprise many:

This settles any argument about whether this is an espionage case, the clandestine communication techniques used, prove beyond doubt that the torn piece, the code page and the Verse 70 in Alf Boxall's copy of the Rubaiyat all contain examples of the same micro written letters and numbers. 

SOMERTON MAN: MORE EVIDENCE, TORN PIECE CODES UNRAVEL?

CODES?

As usual, a reminder to let your eyes rest for a moment or three on the images, it takes the eyes a few seconds to focus on the object.

 First letter A in TAMAM:

From the letter T upright:

From the second letter a in TAMAM

This micro writing example is written at approximately .4 mm

Letter H in SHUD:

Letter H in SHUD:

Notice how the writer wrote exactly in parallel to the upright of the h. It's very skillfully done and is deliberately made to appear as though the h had been misprinted or was worn:

SOMERTON MAN: THE MISSING LINKS? HAY BANKNOTE SIGNATURE Vs THE VERSE 70 SIGNATURE, THE FEZ LADY'S SECRET. EXPLETIVES NOT DELETED

THE FEZ LADY'S SECRET

The book supposedly given by Jo Harkness to Alf Boxall at the Clifton Gardens Hotel:

My copy of the exact same edition of the Boxall book

I added dimensions to my copy, I know some are keen to get as much detail as possible.

Next! I took some close up images of numerous aspects of the page containing the verse 70 inscription and immediately noted a significant difference between the base images. 

The image on the left above is from my copy, notice the simple avy line effect on the Tassle of the lady's fez, it is obvious that the Verse 70 copy on the right, though similar, is quite different in its structure.

Here's the magnified image for both:

There is clearly code in Verse 70 image:

THE HAY BANKNOTE SIGNATURE V THE JESTYN SIGNATURE:

Below are the close-up images that compare the style of signatures used by 'JESTYN and by STAHL the Manager of the HAY Internment Bank, there is definitely micro writing in and the Jestyn signature has a very clear message :) I had to look 3 or 4 times to get it!

Anyone can get to the original images, they're available, you will be able to see for yourself what has been written.

Just a few more posts with additional proof of micro writing and I will be posting them over the next week or so.

SOMERTON MAN: HAY BANK NOTES CODE, ONE TIME PAD?

HAY BANK NOTE

Hoping back in time to the days prior to Tibor Kaldor, we spent a lot of time looking at Australia's internment camps during WW2. You may recall that our research centred on those men and boys who arrived in Melbourne and Sydney in 1940 following their deportation from the UK.

Long story short, apart from the many and varied activities undertaken by the new arrivals specifically those who were interned in Hay Camp NSW, a man by the name of George A. Teltscher designed and produced bank notes for use within the camp. There were 3 denominations, 2 Shillings, 1 Shilling and Sixpence. In every respect, the design of these notes was stunning even more so given the fact that they had little to no equipment to speak of and relied on a local printer to complete the task.

But it was the detail of the design that interested us most. Hidden within the design of each note were examples of superbly crafted micro-writing.

In some cases that writing was clear and in plain sight as in the verse woven into the barbed wire surround of each note, 'We are here because we are here because...'. If you look carefully at the note above you should spot it. But in other cases, the writing was much less obvious, it had been deliberately concealed.

HAY BANK NOTE CODE

To the right, you can see a section of the right-hand side upright that belongs to the inner rectangular shape on the note. From a distance, it looks like a series of bars but on closer examination, you can clearly see strings of numbers with letters interspersed. Each side of the rectangle also contains additional strings. These numbers sets are different for each of the note denominations.

The question is, were these strings part of a clandestine code? Or were they just designed to prevent someone from copying and making their own notes? The answer came later when Mr Teltscher was released in 1941 and was spirited away from Australia via ship and the Panama canal to arrive in Britain where he promptly dropped out of sight until the end of the war. It is believed that he went to work with SOE.  Was this column code a kind of 'one time' pad?

Microwriting was found in numerous places on these notes and the location and style differed from each individual note with the exception of the more obvious examples, each note had been hand signed, those signatures also contained micro writing much as the JESTYN signature has in Alf Boxalls Verse 70.

The signature close up, the importance of this find is that it adds further to the evidence that micro writing hidden within a signature was practised before the SM case and may even be connected to it:

This appears to me to be pencil markings, this would be consistent with the Code page and Verse 70 micro writing.

Below fine work found in the Denomination wording as shown in the header image, here's the first close up:

GET THE PICTURE?

Every single'shade' line is actually made up of number/letter strings and not just within the letters of the denomination, even those earth red shade lines have numbers and letters.

What does this tell us? It tells us loud and clear that the internees had a ready-made clandestine communication system set up and in no time flat following their arrival in Australia. In fact they had an identical system to that found on the SM code page, Verse 70, and the torn piece.

You may recall that one ex-internee, Tibor Kaldor, was found dead in a Hindley Street Hotel in Adelaide two weeks to the day following the discovery of the Somerton Man, he had also been poisoned. In fact, he shared the same mortuary.

Another better-known ex-internee was later to be Atom Spy Klaus Fuchs, he spent his time in Canada but not before seeing the sights of a Liverpool and Isle of Man camp. He and Tibor Kaldor would have crossed paths and no doubt many others.

SOMERTON MAN: TAMAM SHUD, THE TORN PIECE, CODE REVEALED CLASSIC PICS

THE TORN PIECE

THE JIGSAW ALL BUT COMPLETED

                           High-Resolution Image sourced from Adelaide University.

Over the course of 70 years, literally hundreds of theories have been advanced on what the meaning of the torn piece could have been. From a sad tale of love lost and a spurned lover driven to suicide, to its use as an identification method between two espionage agents and so many more.

In this post, we will show yet another purpose but this time we provide proof.

Over at the Toms By Two blog, Pete Bowes has regularly questioned the purpose and it is something we have discussed. His view is that it is an ID piece, it was meant to match the torn out space in the copy of the ROK that was found. But of course, it didn't match and it could be that SM died because of that mismatch.

I agree with Pete to an extent but what if, instead of the shape of the piece matching the torn out shape, it matched something else that could only be found in the torn piece itself and would be known by only one other person, the person who he had arranged to meet that night.

In the following images, you will see some extraordinary sets of numbers and letters skilfully hidden within the form of each of the letters, some appear random but others appear to be very similar in format. What if the ID process was the marching of these similar formatted number sets?

What we now have is this:
1. Code page with proven micro-code 2. Verse 70 with proven micro-code
3. Torn piece with now proven micro-code

THE CONNECTION

We can now say that these 3 items connect the Somerton Man, Alf Boxall, and Jo Harkness.

PLEASE NOTE:
You will need to let your eyes have time to focus on the highlighted boxes, these codes have been designed to be concealed and in this case, they are faded. Just a matter of seconds will show the examples and you may see more.

Actual size of the torn piece as recovered from SM

Individual letter sizes are 5mm in height for the 'taller' letters and 3mm in height for the smaller letters. The width of the fonts is 1mm. Whilst some of the characters found within these letters measure between .2mm and .5mm, others are finer. These sizes are certainly achievable for a skilled person. 

Here are the first images of the torn piece for you to review:

This post will be updated with more images but as you can see, there are many examples of micro-coded letter and numbers. What could it all mean? Stay tuned! We're working on it.