Paddy Ashdown
Jeremy John Durham Ashdown, Baron Ashdown of NortonsubHamdon, GCMG, CH, KBE, PC , usually known as Paddy Ashdown, is a British politician and former diplomat who served as Leader of the Liberal Democrats from 1988 until August 1999.
Lord Ashdown is the eldest of seven children he has four brothers and two sisters. He was born in New Delhi, India, onFebruary 1941 to a family of soldiers and colonial administrators who spent their lives in India. His father was a lapsed Catholic, and his mother a Protestant. His mother was a nurse in the Queen Alexandras Royal Army Nursing Corps. Ashdowns father, John William Richard Durham Ashdown , was an Indian Army officer in the 14th Punjab Regiment and the Royal Indian Army Service Corps, and in 1944 attained the rank of temporary lieutenant colonel. During the retreat to Dunkirk in May 1940, John Ashdown ignored an order to abandon the men of the 32nd Animal Transport Company under his command, instead leading them to the port and on to one of the last ships to leave, without losing a single man. Although courtmartialled for disobeying orders, he was exonerated, and by the end of the war had risen to the rank of colonel.
Source: Wikipedia