He was educated at Jesus College Oxford and has an M.A. and Ph.D. from the London School of Economics. He is an author and a diplomatic historian. He has published a well-received biography on Sir George Russell Clerk, the British ambassador to France on the eve of the World War II. He has also published on the Kennedy administration and the Vietnam War. He gained an SPS award for Teaching Excellence in 2006. He is the head of the History department at The Browning School and was awarded the Stephen M. Clement, III Chair of the Humanities in 2013.