Turing documents found in carrier bag on way to shredder.
A collection of scientific papers by wartime codebreaker Alan Turing, have sold for a ‘record-breaking’ £465,000 at auction.
The cache of important documents written by Turing – the mathematician who was based in Bletchley Park during WW2 – were saved just in time, thanks to the curiosity of a family and the sharp eye of an auctioneer.
The papers were discovered in a plastic carrier bag and nearly shredded, but Charles Hanson, manager of Hansons Auctioneers, was astonished when the documents surfaced during a valuation event in Nottinghamshire.
“Knowing Turing’s legacy – his life, his brilliance, and his contribution to modern computing – I was completely taken aback,” said Charles. “How does one even begin to place a value on such a legacy?”
The collection, which had been stashed away in a loft for decades, was consigned for sale by the family of Norman Routledge – a mathematician and long-time friend of Turing.
The documents had been gifted to Routledge by Turing’s mother, Ethel, and included some of the most significant and rare academic offprints of the 20th century. Centrepieces included Turing’s PhD dissertation ‘Systems of Logic Based on Ordinals’ (1938–39), and On Computable Numbers (1936–37) – both hailed as foundational works in the field of theoretical computer science.
Each carried an auction estimate of £40,000–£60,000, but competitive bidding online, in the room and on five open phonelines pushed prices well beyond estimates.
“The vendor was absolutely over the moon,” he added. “To think these precious papers could’ve been lost to the shredder – and now they will go on to educate and inspire generations. Turing was a man ahead of his time, and through these pages, he lives on.”
