Sir Michael Jenkins served Britain's pressing need to comprehend her near neighbours in the second half of the war-damaged 20th century, serving as a diplomat in all the major western embassies. The boy who would become his country's ambassador to the Netherlands, and help construct her role in the emerging European Union, saw even at the age of 14 how different were the wounds left by the two world wars on the European mainland, from those done to Britain. He made himself into a conciliator, having been pitched in as a schoolboy among passions not felt in his own background, while on an extended trip to France.
