He was born in England in 1934 and the following year went to India India with his parents.  When his father went to Egypt in 1940, Nicholas and his mother returned to England, a dangerous journey described above.  In July 1941, they sailed for Australia Australia an equally eventful journey, starting with the bombing of their Liverpool hotel, and bomb damage to the ship they were originally to join.  Transferring to a fast and armed ship which did not need the protection of a convoy, a ten-week voyage to Sydney Sydney was via Iceland Iceland, the east coast of America, and South Africa South Africa.  In Sydney they lived briefly with Boultbee:William Michael Michael and Boultbee:John Jeremy Jeremy, the sons of Gardner Boultbee:Jack Gardner Boultbee of Canada who were visiting Australia with their mother.  Nicholas attended Cranbrook School as a boarder -- his mother returned to India in 1942 -- and he returned to England in 1947, where he was educated at Stowe School, Buckingham Stowe School, Buckingham.
  He did his twoyear National Service in the Royal Marines Royal Marines.  After basic training he went to Officer Cadet School where he again met Michael Boultbee. On receiving his Commission Nicholas joined the aircraft carrier Ships:Triumph H.M.S. Triumph.  Besides the West Indies and Scandinavia, the ship was also stationed in the Mediterranean where it took part in an incident in Greece Greece.  Nicholas, at the unusually young age of 19 second-in-command of the ship's detachment of Royal Marines, was in command of a small force of seamen and Marines landed to assist the population of a small and isolated coastal village.  This episode was so dramatic that to do it proper justice, we quote here Nicholas' own description of it.
  The place had been levelled by an earthquake, the men had caught fish but had not shared the food with the women and children.  Not having eaten for seven days they were starving and frantically trying to get at the food brought ashore.
  While the Royal Navy cooks were setting up stoves and sorting out the food, the Marines formed a perimeter to keep the women and children from getting at the flour and tinned food.  The Royal Navy doctor was alarmed at what might happen to starving people if they ate uncooked food before being given water, soup and biscuits.
  A mass of women and children were trying to get at the food.  The situation was out of control and developing into a riot fanned to combustion point by local Communists Communists at a safe distance, they thought, from the armed Marines.
  The senior officers of "H.M.S. Ships:Triumph Triumph", lying two miles off shore, were slow to realize the worsening situation which needed something done quickly.  The riot ceased when Nicholas shot and killed the Communist ringleader some 300 metres distant.  As Nicholas had used minimum force to contain the trouble and had done everything by the book he survived the numerous Boards of Enquiry Boards of Enquiry by the Greek authorities and the Royal Navy.
  He went up to Trinity College, Cambridge Trinity College, Cambridge in 1954 and graduated in 1957 in History, Archaeology and Anthropology.  During the summer University vacation of 1956, he went to Canada Canada for a, partly working, holiday, in the High Arctic, and also visited Horace Boultbee:Horace Boultbee of Toronto and cousins on his grandmother's -- Molson family Molson-side in Montreal.  After University, he went to visit his parents in Southern Rhodesia (Zimbabwe) Southern Rhodesia (Zimbabwe) and liked the place so much that he stayed.  He joined a large copper mining company, Rhodesian Selection Trust Rhodesian Selection Trust (RST).  After training in Head Office and at the mines in Northern Rhodesia (Zambia) Northern Rhodesia (Zambia) he was appointed Administrative Assistant to a newly formed mineral exploration company in Bechuanaland (Botswana) Bechuanaland (Botswana).
  In May 1961, he married Geraldine Cooke, Geraldine Cooke, a teacher at a girls' school in Salisbury (Harare, Zimbabwe) Salisbury, Southern Rhodesia (Harare, Zimbabwe).  Their respective greatgrandparents had probably known each other in Bedfordshire Police Force Bedford, England, Nicholas' greatgrandfather being Captain Boultbee:Edward Moore, Captain Edward Moore Boultbee, the Chief Constable.
  The prospect of an uncertain political future in Rhodesia following the Rhodesian Front's victory, 1962 Rhodesian Front's victory in the 1962 general election led Nicholas to decide to emigrate to Canada.  After completing his tour of duty in Bechuanaland (Botswana) he left for Canada by air in September, 1963, Geraldine following him shortly after in one of the last regular transatlantic voyages by passenger liner.  This was the Ships:Empress of England Empress of England, a Canadian Pacific Line ship.

  For the next twelve years Nicholas was an investment analyst specialising in pulp and paper companies.
  In 1975 he joined the Canadian Pulp and Paper Association Canadian Pulp and Paper Association (CPPA) as manager of its Newsprint Section.  CPPA is a trade association representing the Canadian producers of pulp and paper.  His work involved statistics and representing the Canadian newsprint producers in trade matters with domestic and foreign governments.  He wrote an amendment to Canadian law involving the weighing of newsprint as government officials were unable to do this.  He represented the Canadian companies at conferences in North America and Europe.
  In 1985 he was appointed Administrative Manager of the much larger Technical Section but lost his job during the downsizing that accompanied the recession of 1991.  He subsequently joined a small pulp brokerage firm to sell paper.