Terence Alan "Spike" Milligan KBE (16 April 1918 – 27 February 2002) was a comedian, writer and actor. The son of an Irish father and an English mother, his early life was spent in
India where he was born. The majority of his working life was spent in the United Kingdom. He disliked his first name and began to call himself "Spike" after hearing a band on
Radio Luxembourg called
Spike Jones and his City Slickers.