The son of Calouste Gulbenkian , he was born in Kadıköy , Ottoman Empire but fled from the country when he was a few weeks old due to the Hamidian massacres of Armenians . Taken by his father to England , he was educated at Harrow School , Trinity College , Cambridge and in Germany . He was admitted as a student to the Middle Temple on 18 October 1917 , but was not Called to the Bar . As a consequence of his educational background Gulbenkian saw himself as British and strove to live up to the model of the English gentleman . As such , during World War II he undertook some amateur sabotage in Vichy France on behalf of the United Kingdom . Despite this he was also attached to the Iranian Embassy in London in an honorary role ( as he held Iranian citizenship ) whilst he regained his Turkish citizenship in 1965 . This however had helped him during the war as his neutral passport allowed him to cross between France and Spain with little trouble and thus gain access to British intelligence in Gibraltar
Hamidian massacres
Hamidian massacres
Nubar Gulbenkian