“We thought probably that was the last we were ever going to see of them,” said Dominic Luckett, headmaster at Sherborne School, in BBC coverage of the repatriation ceremony. “So it was a rather pleasant surprise when we got wind that the American authorities knew they were in America and they were doing their best to track them down and get them back.”

But that’s not the end of the story: How those artifacts got to Colorado, and whether they were stolen or secretly given away — are mysteries that have not been solved.

[Well, not *officially*, but clearly the US government reached some conclusions. The materials were found in the possession of a “Julia Turing,” who apparently changed her name to that after visiting Turing’s school under her original name, claiming to be researching the famed father of modern computing. According to the report, “Julia Turing” cut some sort of deal with the Department of Homeland Security to avoid prosecution. The bottom line is that the materials, missing for 30 or more years, are back at the school Alan Turing attended and to which his mother had donated his effects. — Ed]