Deryk Barker wrote concerning Beethoven's 5th:

>...  I think the reason it was once known as the "Victory Symphony" (I
>cannot recall anyone calling it that during my musical lifetime) is more
>to do with the fact that the BBC broadcasts to occupied Europe during WWII
>began with the opening 4 notes played IIRC on timpani; the rhythmic pattern
>also happens to coincide with the Morse code for the letter V.

My wife a licensed radio operator, informs me that musical rhythmic
analogies to Morse code, are inaccurate.  She found this out, when, while
trying in vain to teach me code to get me licensed, my code was unreadable,
because I kept sending rhythmic musical quotations instead of properly
spaced in time code.  One of the final attempts involved me trying to send
"OK", (dah-dah-dah, dah-dah-di-dah) which kept coming out as the rhythm
for that old pop tune "Barbara Ann", (Ba-ba-ba-,ba-ba-ra-Ann).  8^) A short
study of the instruction book convinced me that music "helpers" was not the
way to go.

Bruce Hunter