Spike Milligan

Terence Alan "Spike" Milligan (16 April 1918 – 27 February 2002) was an Irish comedian, writer, musician, poet, playwright and actor. The son of an English mother and Irish father, he was born in British Colonial India, where he spent his childhood before relocating in 1931 to England, where he lived and worked for the majority of his life. Disliking his first name, he began to call himself "Spike" after hearing the band Spike Jones and his City Slickers on Radio Luxembourg. Milligan was the co-creator, main writer, and a principal cast member of the British radio comedy programme The Goon Show, performing a range of roles including the characters Eccles and Minnie Bannister. He was the earliest-born and last surviving member of the Goons. He took his success with The Goon Show into television with Q5, a surreal sketch show credited as a major influence on the members of Monty Python's Flying Circus. He wrote and edited many books, including Puckoon (1963) and a seven-volume autobiographical account of his time serving during the Second World War, beginning with Adolf Hitler: My Part in His Downfall (1971). He also wrote comical verse, with much of his poetry written for children, including Silly Verse for Kids (1959). Terence Alan Milligan was born in Ahmednagar, India on 16 April 1918 during the British Raj, the son of an Irish father, Leo Alphonso Milligan, MSM, RA (1890–1969), a regimental sergeant-major in the British Indian Army, and English mother, Florence Mary Winifred (née Kettleband; 1893–1990). He spent his childhood in Poona and later in Rangoon, capital of British Burma. He was educated at the Convent of Jesus and Mary, Poona, and later at St Paul's High School, Rangoon. Due to his father remaining in the Indian Army after the end of the First World War, steady promotion meant "the family's lifestyle became almost lavish"; Milligan considered that "My old man lived the life of a gentleman on sergeant's pay". After Army cuts meant his father's position was no longer required, Milligan travelled by sea, from India to England for the first time.