Secret & Urgent: The Story of Codes & Ciphers

by Fletcher Pratt

This is a reproduction, without changes, of a classic text in cryptographic literature. Fletcher Pratt has written an outstanding light- reading book concerning classical cryptography and cryptanalysis. The history of codes and ciphers is covered extensively.

Genres: History

Paperback

First published January 1, 1942

About the author

Murray Fletcher Pratt (1897–1956) was a science fiction and fantasy writer; he was also well-known as a writer on naval history and on the American Civil War.

Pratt attended Hobart College for one year. During the 1920s he worked for the Buffalo Courier-Express and on a Staten Island newspaper. In the late 1920s he began selling stories to pulp magazines. When a fire gutted his apartment in the 1930s he used the insurance money to study at the Sorbonne for a year. After that he began writing histories.

Wargamers know Pratt as the inventor of a set of rules for civilian naval wargaming before the Second World War. This was known as the "Naval War Game" and was based on a wargame developed by Fred T. Jane involving dozens of tiny wooden ships, built on a scale of one inch to 50 feet. These were spread over the floor of Pratt's apartment and their maneuvers were calculated via a complex mathematical formula. Noted author and artist Jack Coggins was a frequent participant in Pratt's Navy Game, and L. Sprague de Camp met him through his wargaming group.

Pratt established the literary dining club known as the Trap Door Spiders in 1944. The name is a reference to the exclusive habits of the trapdoor spider, which when it enters its burrow pulls the hatch shut behind it. The club was later fictionalized as the Black Widowers in a series of mystery stories by Isaac Asimov. Pratt himself was fictionalized in one story, "To the Barest", as the Widowers’ founder, Ralph Ottur.

Pratt is best known for his fantasy collaborations with de Camp, the most famous of which is the humorous Harold Shea series, was eventually published in full as The Complete Compleat Enchanter. His solo fantasy novels Well of the Unicorn and The Blue Star are also highly regarded.

Pratt wrote in a markedly identifiable prose style, reminiscent of the style of Bernard DeVoto. One of his books is dedicated "To Benny DeVoto, who taught me to write."

Reviews

[Katherine · Rating 5 out of 5]

Neat overall look at codes and ciphers up until just after WWI. Not in-depth, though I wished I had the time to reread and try to follow some of the ciphers with pencil and paper!

[Daniel · Rating 5 out of 5]

An unexpectedly fun read! A book that looks at history through a lens of cyphers, codes and decryption, starting with achaeological/linguistic problems (like breaking the "code" of heirogly... [see the rest on my book review site.]

[Georgie Sinn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Maybe not the most in-depth code/cipher book, but it's great for beginners and simple to understand that a kid could learn. I also learned from him that it helps if one is a little imaginative as well, just to throw people off that much more. I think I did all the exercises and examples in the book.