Early Life
John Vassall (as he was always known) was born in 1924, the son of William Vassall, chaplain at St Bartholomew's Hospital, London, and Mabel Andrea Sellicks, a nurse in the same hospital. He was educated at Monmouth School. In World War II, he worked as a photographer for the Royal Air Force. After the war, in 1948, he became a clerk at the Admiralty.
Although his father was an Anglican priest, his mother converted to Roman Catholicism (a fact which led to some tensions in their marriage), and John himself converted in 1953.
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