Château de Pignerolle

The Chateau de Pignerolle is located to the east of Angers in the commune of Saint-Barthélemy-d'Anjou in the department of Maine-et-Loire in France.

[2] Shortly after the outbreak of war, the Polish cryptologists, including Marian Rejewski were evacuated to France, where they continued breaking Enigma-enciphered messages working with the French and British code breakers.

The staff from Pignerolle were amongst the 24,352 Polish personnel evacuated as part of Operation Aerial to Great Britain before the Chateau was captured on 19 June and was requisitioned by the Wehrmacht on 8 July.

[2] The Polish cryptologists and their support staff resumed work undercover a few months later in Vichy France until the end of 1942.

[5] With ten other concrete constructions and thirty wooden barracks being completed by 600 Organisation Todt workers starting in April 1942 and finishing in May 1943.

[2]: 12 The part buried main command bunker had teletype communications as well as 16 aerial masts on its roof to transmit and receive enigma coded messages with submarines in the Atlantic.

He was responsible for the eight flotillas of boats committed to the Battle of the Atlantic, and thus a great majority of the entire U-boat fleet until autumn 1944.

[4] The barracks were used firstly by US troops then as a repatriation center until in January 1946 it housed 1,000 displaced people whose homes had been destroyed during the war, they continued in use until 1964.