[1][2][3] Porter was brought up in the Lake District and educated at Barrow-in-Furness Grammar School and Leeds University where he studied English.
On 1 March 1941, Porter was recruited by SOE,[4] and was one of a covert three-man mission that was parachuted into Romania in December 1943 to instigate resistance against the Nazis at "any cost" (Operation Autonomous).
The SOE agents were captured and held as prisoners-of-war until, on 23 August 1944, King Michael of Romania carried out his anti-German coup d'état.
He joined the Foreign Office in May 1946 and served in London, Washington, D.C., the U.K. delegation to NATO, Cyprus, as U.K. representative to the Council of Europe, and India.
He was ambassador in Senegal (with concurrent accreditation in Guinea, Mali, and Mauritania) and to the Arms Control Committee in Geneva.