The Lincolnshire Poacher

A numbers station later designated E03 begins broadcasting a synthesised English female voice reading five-figure groups, introduced by bars of the folk song 'The Lincolnshire Poacher'. Direction-finding traces it to RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus; it is widely attributed to the British Secret Intelligence Service.

A sister station, E03a 'Cherry Ripe', reads the same kind of English number groups behind the tune 'Cherry Ripe', transmitting first from Guam to cover the Asia-Pacific theatre. It is the twin of the Lincolnshire Poacher, run by the same suspected operator.

British monitor Simon Mason publishes 'Secret Signals: The Euronumbers Mystery', an early catalogue of European numbers stations by their tunes and voices, the Lincolnshire Poacher, Swedish Rhapsody, Papa November, and to insist, patiently, that they were real.

Patient direction-finding by amateurs pins the Lincolnshire Poacher to RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus, one of the few numbers stations whose transmitter site is confidently located. The mystery, for once, yields to triangulation.

After some four decades, the Lincolnshire Poacher makes its last recorded transmission. Its Pacific sibling Cherry Ripe carries on a little longer before ceasing in December 2009; the classic Western numbers stations are winding down as the Cold War recedes.