The couple had three daughters,[3] the eldest, Kathleen Margaret Godfrey (1922–2015) (married names Kinmonth, then Warren), became a Women’s Auxiliary Air Force officer and a Bletchley Park code breaker.

[4] Mrs Margaret Godfrey Hope was very active and supportive of her husband's career, assisting the establishment of the Bletchley Park at the end of 1939, compiling maps and data for the Admiralty from 1940, and was head of the Indian Women's Voluntary Service during the time they were stationed there.

[4] During the First World War, Godfrey served on HMS Euryalus in the Dardanelles Campaign in 1915, and was present at the re-occupation of Sollum, during the bombardment of Smyrna, and in the Red Sea operations in support of the Arab forces.

He commanded the battle-cruiser HMS Repulse from 1936 to 1939, then served as Director of Naval Intelligence from 1939 to 1942.

These contain many unpublished sources and are based in part on an official history of the Naval Intelligence Division which he had written at the end of the war.