Alan Turing was a man way ahead of his time. That term is often misused, but without a doubt, it applies to him. Turing was largely responsible for the code breaking that defeated the Axis Powers in World War II, credited with creating the first practical computer and his work with artificial intelligence and code mapping is still considered the standard by which all others are measured. He was a genius, an eccentric and Alan Turing was gay.
Turing made no secret of his sexuality, despite the fact that being gay could easily lead to criminal prosecution in post-war Britain. In 1952, Turing was convicted of “gross indecency” over his relationship with another man. He was stripped of his security clearance, subjected to monitoring by British authorities, and forced to take estrogen to neutralize his sex drive — a process akin to chemical castration. He agreed to these “treatments” in lieu of going to prison.
In January 1952, Turing started a relationship with a 19-year-old unemployed man named Arnold Murray. Turing met Murray just before Christmas outside the Regal Cinema. The two men bumped into each other while walking down Manchester’s Oxford Road. Turing struck up a friendly conversation with the handsome young man and invited him to lunch. This lunch led to a rather short, but torrid, love affair between the unlikely duo. On January 23 Turing’s house was robbed. Murray admitted that the burglar was an acquaintance of his, and Turing reported the minor crime to the police.
During routine questioning about the break-in, Turing inexplicably told police that Murray was not a roommate, but a sexual partner. Homosexual acts had been officially outlawed in the United Kingdom since the Victorian Era, and police immediately arrested both men, charging them with gross indecency under Section 11 of the Criminal Law Amendment Act of 1885.
Trial proceedings began on February 27, where Turing’s solicitor “reserved his defense.” Later, although he felt no personal remorse or guilt for having committed acts of homosexuality, on the advice of his brother, Turing entered a plea of “guilty”. The case, Regina v. Turing and Murray, came to trial on March 31, 1952. Turing was convicted and given a choice between imprisonment or probation. However, the probation was conditional on his agreement to undergo hormonal treatment designed to reduce libido. He accepted the option of one year’s treatment through injections of stilboestrol, a synthetic estrogen. The treatment rendered Turing impotent, caused weight gain, loss of body hair and gynaecomastia (an enlargement of the breasts), fulfilling Turing’s prediction that “no doubt I shall emerge from it all a different man, but quite who I’ve not found out.” Oddly, co-defendant Murray was given a conditional discharge.
Turing’s conviction led to the removal of his security clearance and barred him from continuing with his cryptographic consultancy for the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ). Although his passport was never revoked, he was denied entry into the United States due to his conviction. Although he was viewed by some as a security risk, Turing was free to visit other European countries. At that time, during the height of the Cold War, there was acute public anxiety about homosexual entrapment of spies by Soviet agents for use as KGB double agents. Turing was never accused of espionage but the prejudice against homosexuals somehow accentuated the possibility with Alan.
No doubt, the bombardment of one of Britain’s greatest minds with invading hormones caused Turing unceasing discomfort, depression and confusion towards a perceived “problem” he was powerless to prevent. Depressed and angry, Turing obsessed over an incident from his school days. While a young student, Alan had formed an important friendship with fellow pupil Christopher Morcom. However, that friendship was cut short by Morcom’s premature death in February 1930 from complications of bovine tuberculosis contracted after drinking infected cow’s milk years earlier. That event shattered Turing’s religious faith. He became an atheist and adopted the conviction that all phenomena, including the workings of the human brain, must be materialistic and he believed in life after death.
On June 8, 1954, Turing’s cleaning lady found him dead. When his body was discovered, a half-eaten apple lay nearby his bed. The condition of the body indicated that he had died the previous day. The autopsy established the cause of death as cyanide poisoning. Although the apple itself was never tested for cyanide, it was speculated that this was the delivery system for that fatal dose of poison.
Along with finding a bottle of cyanide crystals in Turing’s home, authorities also discovered a glass jar filled with liquid cyanide solution. The autopsy report shows that Turing’s stomach “contained four ounces of fluid which smelled very strongly of bitter almonds, as does a solution of cyanide.” This detail is significant because it points strongly to a scenario where Turing consumed the cyanide orally. It is speculated that the half-eaten apple, rather than being the remains of the delivery vehicle, was eaten to mask the flavor of the cyanide. Turing’s body was found lying prone in bed, a position that suggests he had made a choice to end his own life.
It was widely known among Turing’s circle of close friends and colleagues that he had been haunted by the story of the poisoned apple in the fairy tale of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. He was obsessed with the Walt Disney produced movie, especially the scene where the Wicked Queen immerses the apple in her poisonous brew, watching it over and over since it’s initial release in 1937. To many, it seemed perfectly reasonable that Alan would resort to the same desperate measure to end the persecution he was suffering as a result of his homosexuality. But in recent years, researchers have determined that it was just as likely that Turing’s death may well have been an accident.
After all, it was Turing’s ordinary habit to eat an apple before bedtime, and moreover, not to finish it. Therefore, the half-eaten remains of that untested apple should not be viewed as the strict indication of a deliberate act. The inquest determined that he had committed suicide, and he was cremated at Woking Crematorium on June 12, 1954 and his ashes scattered there. These days, a coroner would demand evidence of premeditation before announcing a verdict of suicide, yet nothing in the accounts of Turing’s last days suggest he was in anything but a cheerful mood. Close friends challenged the coroner’s conclusion by claiming Turing was handling his legal setbacks and hormone treatment “with good humour,” showing no sign of despondency prior to his death.
Turing died on a Tuesday, but that previous Friday as was his habit, Alan had left a “to-do” note on his office desk to remind himself of things to be done after the bank holiday (the day after his death). Modern day researchers offer the alternative explanation of “accidental inhalation of cyanide fumes from an apparatus for gold electroplating spoons with potassium cyanide to dissolve the gold,” which Turing had set up in an adjoining un-ventilated closet sized spare room he referred to as the “nightmare room.“ Although brilliant, Turing was careless, literally an absent minded professor. Astonishingly, his electrolysis experiment was wired into the ceiling light socket which had resulted in more than a few severe electric shocks.
And Turing was known for tasting chemicals to identify them. It has been suggested, perhaps, that he accidentally put his apple into a puddle of cyanide. It is far more likely to suppose that Alan accidentally inhaled cyanide vapors from the bubbling liquid. Advocates of this theory believe the autopsy findings were more consistent with “inhalation rather than ingestion” of the poison based on the distribution of cyanide in Turing’s organs. Yet, despite protestations from caring, concerned friends and relatives, the coroner recorded a verdict of suicide “while the balance of his mind was disturbed.” Regardless, we are left to simply shrug our shoulders in wonderment and focus on Turing’s life and extraordinary work.
Now, 60 years after the war hero’s death, the pendulum has finally swung in Turing’s direction. Queen Elizabeth II granted him a pardon, his likeness has appeared on postage stamps, memorial plaques adorn his former residences and statues of the tragic genius can be found all over the U.K. There are bridges and highways named after him in his native Manchester. In a prepared statement, the British Monarch declared “Turing was an exceptional man with a brilliant mind who deserves to be remembered and recognized for his fantastic contribution to the war effort and his legacy to science.”
In short, when viewed through six decades of hazy hindsight, Alan Turing has become a cultural icon. His most enduring contribution, at least in pop culture terms, is just as mysterious as his death. For years, computer aficianados point to the logo used by Apple computers as an homage to Alan Turing and his untimely death. Since 1976, the image of the apple with a bite taken out of it has been identified with cutting edge innovations in the field of computer science. The apple has long been a symbol of forbidden knowledge, the object that banished Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden, inspired Isaac Newton’s theory of gravitation, the usurpation of good by the power of evil by Disney’s wicked queen and finally as the assumed means of Alan Turing’s death.
In 1999, Time Magazine named Turing as one of the 100 Most Important People of the 20th century and stated: “The fact remains that everyone who taps at a keyboard, opening a spreadsheet or a word-processing program, is working on an incarnation of a Turing machine.” The London 2012 Olympic Torch flame was passed on in front of Turing’s statue in Manchester on his 100th birthday. So if I have now sparked an interest within you for the godfather of all modern computers, fear not, for a movie about his life called “The Imitation Game” is set for a November 2014 release. Then perhaps you can make up your own mind about the life and death of Alan Turing.
Al Hunter is the author of the “Haunted Indianapolis” and co-author of the “Haunted Irvington” and “Indiana National Road” book series. Contact Al directly at Huntvault@aol.com or become a friend on Facebook.
